Best Media player(s) in March?

If we had a penny for every phone call asking us what media player is the best one to buy we would have enough for a giant size Kit Kat each day  

The best media player is a tough one, every forum or review will always have someone who has a negative comment, normally Mr Angry venting his lack of understanding at a poor little media player. It’s not often someone takes time out to write something positive. This makes picking a media player hard work, because as soon as you have made your mind up after weeks of research you read about someone’s bad time with the model you are after.

Unfortunately there is no perfect media player, otherwise we would just sell the one option and leave it at that. As it is we constantly review our media player line up, hence we just said good bye to the WDTV live and Asus Oplay regardless of how well they sold. 

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We only stock the media players we think are worth selling to end users and will make our customers happy. The last thing you or us (or even our suppliers) want is a unhappy customer returning a product, everyone loses that way. 

We currently sell around eight media players and hopefully one to suit most needs. Some media player may look much the same but there are subtle difference. For example some players can only have 2.5″ hard drives installed, others no drive at all! others pass-through DTS-MA or Dolby TrueHD audio others cant. It is a complicated world and can seem a little daunting, we spend a lot of time offering impartial and honest advice regardless of us getting a sale or not. 

We are going to take some time to have a quick write up once a month on the media player we feel is the best choice. Feel free to give us a call to discuss any of our players as it can be a complicated subject. It is hard to think of categories to arrange the media players in so it may change over time but for now this is the general advice. 

Best hybrid Blu-ray/Media player – Dune HD Prime 3.0 Wouldn’t look out of place under any TV, one of our more professional looking players but at a price. The reason it costs a lot is because of the license to playback Blu-ray and DVD movies. If you are looking for something a bit more customizable then have a look at the Popcorn Hour C200. 

Best for HD audio – Popcorn Hour A200. While not the prettiest player to look at this little box of tricks can play it all and handle HD audio properly. A new user interface is planned for release soon and the developers are busy releasing enhancements and fixes via firmware updates. In a few months time I can see THIS being the one to own but at a price £££. While the box IMO is not the best to look at, it will no doubt live in the AV rack so you won’t ever have to look at it  

Best “budget” - PlayOn HD Mini Budget does not mean it’s missing features, almost exactly the same as its bigger brother the only difference is the PlayON HD mini does not have room in it for an internal hard drive. As it uses less physical parts it’s cheaper to make, so if an internal hard drive is not important then this is the one to go for. 

Best all rounder Mede8er / Playon HD A close call, currently I would say the Mede8er and PlayonHD are much the same and would be fine for most customers.  Both are perfect for a first time buyer, nice to look at, have a well designed UI, YAMJ support in development and a responsive remote. 

If Full YAMJ support is important then the PlayOn will have this feature first. Saying that my money is currently on the Mede8er, it’s is one of the few media players I have taken home and had up and running within seconds and months later the family still has not had one problem. 

Any questions just give us a call. Next round up in April. 

Regards, DE Support Team support@digitalera.co.uk