Patriot PBO Alpine review!

[Tonytoronto]

New player? No thank you.
Patriot gave up on the "old" player long time ago, they stopped firmware updates. Funny thing is, with Mede8er firmware the little box quite good. With its firmware disgrace. Instead of supporting and fixing bugs you guys decide to bring another half ass experiment to market.. well, like i said--- No thanks.. You can keep them all.
For less money there are tons of better choices. If i sound bitter, well after getting 5 units for me and friends, i think i earned that right!

[ledan]

Hi. Just got the new alpine and I am disapointed.
Remote is garbage.
Just swapped my WDTV live to the alpine but cannot connect to network share.
There is no video in media server which took 15 minutes to be seen.
Switched back to WDTV and no problem...

The software isn't ready yet and the remote will always be garbage.

[Patriot_Ben]

I don't mean to intrude on a review, but since it's off topic....

I have a few questions:

1. will it stream from a network drive like my trusty PBO original (how I love that little machine). I have the drive connected to a router that both the PBO, my laptop and even my Blackberry Playbook can access along with a printer.

2. Where can I purchase one of these new units locally (North of Toronto Ontario, CANADA)?

3. Are there any recommended apps the you would say are a must have for this unit?

I don't want to replace my original PBO- btw they're getting harder to get a hold of day by day here from www.CanadaComputers.com I would however like to purchase one to test since the media player that I purchased HERE to test but it does NOT function properly unless you save the entire file to a card in order to play it Hence question #1 I have tried numerous times to get it to stream from the network drive like the PBO, but is seems like its "playing" in fast forward- audio and all. It is about 1/3 the size of the PBO but is totally USELESS.


TIA,
Mod

Hello Mod,

To answer your questions:

1) Yes, the unit does have network streaming capabilities.

2) In Canada, they are currently available at NCIX.

3) As far as apps… we haven’t tested too many yet. As posted by snappy46,
http://www.patriotmemory.com/forums/...our-PBO-Alpine

…the current mass production firmware is slightly modified.

Here are a few that we have played around with: Attachment 690

We have another firmware team building our “Matrix” firmware that will be built on the native Android 2.2 that will be much more app-friendly with traditional Android Devices, and will be compatible with traditional App sources such as Google Play.

[Patriot_Ben]

New player? No thank you.
Patriot gave up on the "old" player long time ago, they stopped firmware updates. Funny thing is, with Mede8er firmware the little box quite good. With its firmware disgrace. Instead of supporting and fixing bugs you guys decide to bring another half ass experiment to market.. well, like i said--- No thanks.. You can keep them all.
For less money there are tons of better choices. If i sound bitter, well after getting 5 units for me and friends, i think i earned that right!

Hi Tonytoronto,

It was never our intention to halt support for the PBO Core, nor have stopped supporting our PBO Core and customers. Our PBO Core is now EOL, but we are still working with providing some bugs fixes and firmware for it. With that being said, the PBO Core was our first Media Player and entry device to this market. Our firmware for PBO Core is built and supported by a third party firmware team from Taiwan. Because of this, things can tend to take a bit longer to program and test for.

With the PBO Alpine, everything is completely designed in the US. Furthermore, we have more options and support for the product being built on the Android Platform.

[tim711]

Hi Patriot_Ben,

My apline unit will NOT rewind video playback using the remote and it will only fast-forward 2x not the 64x lp_Stealth had mentioned. Reasons why?

I am also frustrated with this miniature remote, too small, hard to use, hard to feel the button feedback, impossible to use in the dark, and begins to hurt your fingers. I find it very difficult to use this remote, if possible could you please provide me with the original bigger PBO remote?

Thanks,
Tim

[Patriot_Ben]

Hi Patriot_Ben,

My apline unit will NOT rewind video playback using the remote and it will only fast-forward 2x not the 64x lp_Stealth had mentioned. Reasons why?

I am also frustrated with this miniature remote, too small, hard to use, hard to feel the button feedback, impossible to use in the dark, and begins to hurt your fingers. I find it very difficult to use this remote, if possible could you please provide me with the original bigger PBO remote?

Thanks,
Tim

Tim711,

What kind of media files are you playing? What are the files being played from? Does this happen with every file you play?

As far as the remote, we'll be glad to get you a larger remote. Please forward your mailing address and proof of purchase to RMA@Patriotmem.com and our RMA department will be glad to ship out the larger remote for your unit.

[tim711]

Ben,

The files were as follows:

1080p mkv
video ....... x264 @ 8080 kbps
resol ....... 1920 x 816
audio ....... DTS 1509 kbits

720p mkv
video ....... x264
audio ....... 5.1


The files are in my shared folder on my Windows 7 Pro SP1 desktop.
I will try with more files tonight... I just received the media player last night so those were the only ones tested at the time.

Thanks,
Tim

[tim711]

Ben,

So, I tested a HD .wmv sample video that comes with windows 7, same issue.

What I did discover is that any one of these files placed on a flash drive and inserted into the media player will rewind and fast-forward 64x. Is it possible to look into fixing this rewind / fast-forward issue with network drives? win7 issue?

Thanks,
Tim

[Patriot_Ben]

We definitely will... so the issue appears to be rewinding while playing on a network share?

Another question, are you connected via lan or wireless?

If wireless, what kind of router and wifi adapter are you using?

We'll try to replicate it here first so that we can resolve the issue.

[tim711]

Both PC & media player on Lan (wired to router)

Network Drive: No rewind at all, only 2x fast-forward
Flash Drive: Rewind works, 64x fast-forward (FINE)


Also, for some reason I can only see my shared (default window shares) folders that windows has setup. My folders / files I select and make shared (no password) will not show up on my Apline... only the windows default ones... even after rebooting both PC & Apline. I didn't have much time last night to fiddle with this much more.