Akai LC-24G77A DVD usb video file playback formats?

[Johny B Good]

About a year or so back, the missus was after a TV set for the
bedroom to replace an ancient 14 inch Philips protable.

We weren't after anything exotic (just as long as it wasn't quite so
dire as the LG M197W flatron piece of shit we'd bought a couple of
years eariler for the kitchen dining room - no support whatsoever for
_any_ form of video playback from a USB drive).

After shopping around we decided on the Akai set, after I'd made
quite sure that it had, at the very least, some ability to playback
movie files from externally connected USB media.

I've been able to get it to play mpg files ok but I haven't been able
to find any information on what video file standards it supports. No
mention in the otherwise comprehensive 67 x A4 pages of english only
user guide nor anywhere on the interweb.

Since it is a full HD display (1920 by 1080), I was hoping it would
provide support for full HD playback of HD video files from the USB
port.

The total lack of information regarding video format compatability
suggests this was a rather forlorn hope on my part and a level of
optimism way beyond that which is due to "White Goods" manufacturers.

Most TV set manufacturers seem to belong in this class rather than
in the more technical class of HiFi and multimedia they pretend to be
part of, IMHO.

I'm guessing the only support for full HD is restricted to sources
connected via the HDMI port. Since that's only a guess, I'm wondering
whether any of the experts here can confirm this limitation or, better
yet, provide more detail on the range (if there is one) of video
formats that this set can playback from USB connected media.

One thing I can say is that it fails to recognise MP4 as a valid
format (I've got a 1920 by 1080 HD mp4 file I'd like to be able to
watch on this TV without having to downscale to DVD MPG standard).

I've just tried the trick of renaming it as a MOV file type and the
Akai does attempt to load it before popping up the message
"unsupported Format" instead of rejecting it straight away.

There are so many many permutations of video standards and container
file types, that blind testing like this just isn't on for more than a
few likely guesses (see the very fine video tutotrial - A Digital
Media Primer for Geeks at <http://xiph.org/video/vid1.shtml> in
particular, the section entitled "Video Vegetables (they're good for
you!)" at the 16 minute mark of this 30 minute video to catch a
glimpse of the truth of this).
--
Regards, J B Good

[Max Demian]

"Johny B Good" <johnny...@invalid.ntlworld.com> wrote in message
news:00sun99nhq9b9rrrr...@4ax.com...

> About a year or so back, the missus was after a TV set for the
> bedroom to replace an ancient 14 inch Philips protable.
>
> We weren't after anything exotic (just as long as it wasn't quite so
> dire as the LG M197W flatron piece of shit we'd bought a couple of
> years eariler for the kitchen dining room - no support whatsoever for
> _any_ form of video playback from a USB drive).
>
> After shopping around we decided on the Akai set, after I'd made
> quite sure that it had, at the very least, some ability to playback
> movie files from externally connected USB media.
>
> I've been able to get it to play mpg files ok but I haven't been able
> to find any information on what video file standards it supports. No
> mention in the otherwise comprehensive 67 x A4 pages of english only
> user guide nor anywhere on the interweb.
>
> Since it is a full HD display (1920 by 1080), I was hoping it would
> provide support for full HD playback of HD video files from the USB
> port.

Why don't you buy a TV to watch TV?

> The total lack of information regarding video format compatability
> suggests this was a rather forlorn hope on my part and a level of
> optimism way beyond that which is due to "White Goods" manufacturers.

You mean washing machines and fridges?

--
Max Demian

[Johny B Good]

On Fri, 23 May 2014 22:58:33 +0100, "Max Demian"
<max_d...@bigfoot.com> wrote:

>"Johny B Good" <johnny...@invalid.ntlworld.com> wrote in message
>news:00sun99nhq9b9rrrr...@4ax.com...
>> About a year or so back, the missus was after a TV set for the
>> bedroom to replace an ancient 14 inch Philips protable.
>>
>> We weren't after anything exotic (just as long as it wasn't quite so
>> dire as the LG M197W flatron piece of shit we'd bought a couple of
>> years eariler for the kitchen dining room - no support whatsoever for
>> _any_ form of video playback from a USB drive).
>>
>> After shopping around we decided on the Akai set, after I'd made
>> quite sure that it had, at the very least, some ability to playback
>> movie files from externally connected USB media.
>>
>> I've been able to get it to play mpg files ok but I haven't been able
>> to find any information on what video file standards it supports. No
>> mention in the otherwise comprehensive 67 x A4 pages of english only
>> user guide nor anywhere on the interweb.
>>
>> Since it is a full HD display (1920 by 1080), I was hoping it would
>> provide support for full HD playback of HD video files from the USB
>> port.
>
>Why don't you buy a TV to watch TV?

With the state of UK broadcasting being what it is, that's rather a
'quaint notion' today. :-)

>
>> The total lack of information regarding video format compatability
>> suggests this was a rather forlorn hope on my part and a level of
>> optimism way beyond that which is due to "White Goods" manufacturers.
>
>You mean washing machines and fridges?

Yep! That about sums up how TV sets are being sold today in High
Street shops like Currys et al. Unfortunately, this is nothing new. I
had to smile at the Sony 'Seperates' setup where the 'monitor' was
still basically an overscanned TV set sans tuner back in the early 80s
rather than a 'Real Monitor'.

However, that does nothing to help answer my question but thanks for
your interest anyway.

[Brian Gaff]

Do Akai still exist or they badge engineers like many others now. When VHS
was in, they made some very good budget range vcrs I seem to recall, with
features like teletext program settings etc.
Most of the other companies simply dressed up a crappy vcr mechanism with
their own livery and set it loose.
Brian

--
From the Bed of Brian Gaff.
The email is valid as bri...@blueyonder.co.uk
Blind user.

"Johny B Good" <johnny...@invalid.ntlworld.com> wrote in message

news:kjlvn9liufcb6bo6r...@4ax.com...

[Johny B Good]

On Sat, 24 May 2014 00:49:24 +0100, "Brian Gaff"
<bri...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

>Do Akai still exist or they badge engineers like many others now. When VHS
>was in, they made some very good budget range vcrs I seem to recall, with
>features like teletext program settings etc.
> Most of the other companies simply dressed up a crappy vcr mechanism with
>their own livery and set it loose.
> Brian

As far as TV sets are concerned, that seems to be very much the case
(the Akai brand for TV sets and the like seems to now be based in,
iirc, Singapore).

Checking out the TV set product support page showed a distinct lack
of support for the UK (and Spain) in the European region. Indeed, I
couldn't find an English speaking country in any of their worldwide
regions.

I tried Italy but that was just contact details for their Italian
agents. I thought Spain was a curious omission. It might have been
useful since I took Spanish in grammar school and got a 1st class CSE
pass (accepted as an O level GCE pass grade - I reckon Mr Bradbury had
sussed it just right that we'd stand a better chance of a 1st class
CSE than an O level GCE pass).

If there'd been a Spanish support site, I'd have stood a fighting
chance at being able to interpret its content. As it was, I was
stymied on either count.

I didn't bother with the Professional Audio department of Akai which
does still offer UK support since they only dealt with audio kit
anyway. TV sets, afaicr, were never part of Akai's core business. That
just seems to be a "Badge Engineering" exercise to earn a little more
revenue out of their brand name. It's curious that they seem to have
abandoned the English speaking markets. Maybe they don't want to sully
their reputation in the HiFi and professional audio field.

Anyway, that 67 page manual seems to be the most comprehensive source
of technical data I'm ever going to see. It's just unfortunate that
they couldn't be arsed to list the playable video file formats it
would accept for playback over the USB port so I'd know exactly where
I stood vis a vis video file formats I could use.

[Brian Gaff]

Hmm, I thought as much, I guess the video they produced was a toe in the
water job, and they have now retracted back to their core business and
licensed the name much like others seem to have done. Shame really.
Brian

--
From the Sofa of Brian Gaff Reply address is active

"Johny B Good" <johnny...@invalid.ntlworld.com> wrote in message

news:i2vvn9pp8183o28qf...@4ax.com...

[Jeff Layman]

On 24/05/2014 03:28, Johny B Good wrote:

> Anyway, that 67 page manual seems to be the most comprehensive source
> of technical data I'm ever going to see. It's just unfortunate that
> they couldn't be arsed to list the playable video file formats it
> would accept for playback over the USB port so I'd know exactly where
> I stood vis a vis video file formats I could use.

Wouldn't it be a lot simpler to just get a few seconds of a video
recording and use a converter to save it in various formats? Then you
could try viewing them all on the Akai, to see which ones it supports.
Might save a lot of time trying to find info on the internet which may
not exist.

--

Jeff

[Johny B Good]

It rather looks as though it's limited to DVD formats (SD Freeview
tuner and built in DVD player). I got hold of a DVD rip of the movie
file with file extension .avi which played ok except for squeezing it
into 4:3 AR on the 1080 HD screen. Forgetting to manually change the
AR mode, I tried renaming it as a .mov file which it still played just
fine at a 4:3 AR until I changed the AR mode.

The Full HD version was rejected straight away when presented as an
mp4 file but took a little longer to reject it when I renamed it as a
.mov file. It seems happy enough to play .mpg, .avi and .mov files as
long as they're encoded to a DVD standard. It might possibly accept
other file extensions under the same proviso but ICBA to explore this
any further at the moment.

However, about a year ago, converting to another video format
_without_ changing video settings did make a file playable (I think it
was the audio bit rate I had to modify in this case) so this is
something worth bearing in mind.

The obvious way to playback my true 1080 HD movie files on this TV
set is to use a decent streaming player connected via the HDMI port.
The last time I tried a 'reasonably priced' streaming player, it was
one I'd bought in Aldi for 50 quid which, quite frankly, proved harder
to use than I would have expected of such a "White Goods" gadget.

I found myself, effectively having to 'browse the server's file
system via the rather clunky TV interface pretty much as if I'd
connected a PC to it to act as a streaming player[1]. At least, in
this case, I'd have had much better control from a real PC or even a
laptop.

I returned it to Aldi as "Unfit for purpose" a week or so later and
got a refund. I've been rather reluctant to repeat the experience
since such boxes still seem to be over priced to the point where a
Rasberry Pi and XBMC or whatever looks a cheaper option. Whether it
would be a better option than a more expensive properly designed media
streaming box is another question I couldn't answer so I've passed on
this one for now.

[1] I'd set up the DNLA service on the NAS box especially to gain the
benefit of media streaming but I might just as well not have bothered
since the media streaming player treated the whole deal as if it were
exploring the file system and leaving you to manually pick the folders
and files exactly as if you'd been accessing them from a PC that just
happened to be using the TV set as a display monitor.

[Dave Saville]

On Sat, 24 May 2014 14:12:50 UTC, Johny B Good
<johnny...@invalid.ntlworld.com> wrote:

> I returned it to Aldi as "Unfit for purpose" a week or so later and
> got a refund. I've been rather reluctant to repeat the experience
> since such boxes still seem to be over priced to the point where a
> Rasberry Pi and XBMC or whatever looks a cheaper option. Whether it
> would be a better option than a more expensive properly designed media
> streaming box is another question I couldn't answer so I've passed on
> this one for now.
>

I have just finished setting up raspbmc together with an IR sensor to
control from a spare remote. About 30 quid in total - but then I had a
PSU. If you go down that path be sure to get the raspbmc image from
the raspbmc site and not the one on the normal pi download site. I had
endless grief before someone pointed that one out. I only wanted the
catch up services. Note that a plug-in called tvcatchup has absolutely
*nothing* to do with catch up tv ! iPlayer & ITV work. 4oD works
sometimes and 5 not at all. The last two not working has someting to
do with DRM.

Not used it much, but it does seem to portray wide as 14:9. My old TV
does not have HDMI so I am using composite video which *may* explain
it.

HTH
--
Regards
Dave Saville

[Johny B Good]

Thanks for that information, Dave. I rather like the idea of making a
DIY media streaming box from an RPi and was entertaining the use of
XBMC with a PC but the bulk and power consumption of that solution is
a bit of a downer which makes the RPi a rather neater looking solution
if it has enough cpu/gpu 'grunt' for the job with 1920 by 1080 HD
material via the HDMI port.

The GPU is reckoned to be well up to the job but I think there was an
issue with proprietry drivers. I'll have to check out the raspbmc site
for the latest info on that situation. I'm guessing if anyone has got
it sorted out, it'll be that lot.

I've got a bit of a collection of 5v wallwarts kept as spares for
just such projects as this, as well as a few spare SD cards. Setting
up a RasPi should be simple enough. I've built a ZX80 from kit and
designed and built a 3KiB sram pack for it (before that lazy pig got
off his arse to supply those infamous wobbly 16KiB DRAM packs), as
well as building an S100 Bus computer from kit after ditching the ZX80
(and designing and building a 64K DRAM board for that one as well).

The RasPi looks like an opportunity to outdo the mass produced kit on
both performance and cost. It's not very often that that situation
arises these days. 30 years or more back, you could build better than
commercial offerings and often cheaper to boot. It's a neat trick to
be able to do so today (other than building your own NAS box where you
can still blow the commercial product into the weeds on both cost and
performance).

[Dave Saville]

On Sun, 25 May 2014 03:09:53 UTC, Johny B Good
<johnny...@invalid.ntlworld.com> wrote:

<snip>

> Thanks for that information, Dave. I rather like the idea of making a
> DIY media streaming box from an RPi and was entertaining the use of
> XBMC with a PC but the bulk and power consumption of that solution is
> a bit of a downer which makes the RPi a rather neater looking solution
> if it has enough cpu/gpu 'grunt' for the job with 1920 by 1080 HD
> material via the HDMI port.
>
> The GPU is reckoned to be well up to the job but I think there was an
> issue with proprietry drivers. I'll have to check out the raspbmc site
> for the latest info on that situation. I'm guessing if anyone has got
> it sorted out, it'll be that lot.
>

raspbmc is "tweaked" compared with raspbian to get the best out of the
gpu.

> I've got a bit of a collection of 5v wallwarts kept as spares for
> just such projects as this, as well as a few spare SD cards. Setting
> up a RasPi should be simple enough. I've built a ZX80 from kit and
> designed and built a 3KiB sram pack for it (before that lazy pig got
> off his arse to supply those infamous wobbly 16KiB DRAM packs), as
> well as building an S100 Bus computer from kit after ditching the ZX80
> (and designing and building a 64K DRAM board for that one as well).
>

As long as it can supply one amp and has the right connector you
should be OK. Although the "official" one is only a few quid. I never
throw away wall warts either. :-)

If you mean to store and play from the SD card then get a 10 speed.
The pi sites have a list of known to work cards. Some don't play ball
it seems. Even if you have to buy everything it should come in at
under fifty quid.

PM me if you get stuck. dave at deezee dot org
--
Regards
Dave Saville

[Johny B Good]

I wasn't thinking of storing media files on the SD card for playout.
After posting my reply, it occurred to me that my real concern was
over its use of a USB to ethernet adapter chip.

The GPU will handle the job ok, it's the cpu that's going to land up
banging its brains out against the brick wall of USB inefficiency
which is my main concern. You've only got to look at the result of
trying to get a Humax PVR to transfer files via the USB port.

The Toppy does a lot better at about twice the speed of the Humax
(and reliably) but that's still only about 10% of the speed you'd
expect out of a PC made within the last decade. The Raspberry Pi needs
to be at least twice as fast again to reliably stream HD content
through a USB port.

I'm going to have to take a look at USB/Ethernet performance
benchmark figures before I decide on trying the RasPi/XBMC route to
media streaming happiness.

>PM me if you get stuck. dave at deezee dot org

Thanks, will do if I get _really_ stuck.