hdvision RT1186 Media Player review

[ranjeetrain]

There seems to a be a lot of interest here about media players these days. So for the benefit of members looking for information about them I am going to write my impressions of this media player.

Introduction: hdvision RT1186 comes from a company (yes your guess is right, called hdvision). If you checked out the company website and concluded that it's a Chinese company, you are right again. hdvision is one of the upmarket Chinese manufacturers and has a good following in the Chinese retail market. The build quality of their products is good and there don't appear to be many unhappy customers around. The best part is that the company is quick to release new products based on advances made in other contemporary technologies. In other words, they like to stay on the top and relevant.

I bought the media player under review, the hdvision RT1186, soon after it was launched and have used it regularly since then. Barring some gotchas, this player, I am happy to say, has satisfied me. Unlike many other Chinese products I tried, this one didn't have any surprises.

Headline features:

1. Based on Realtek RT1186 chip (yes your guess was right again)
2. 3D capable (I couldn't verify it as I don't have a 3D TV, but it supports)
3. Plays all popular audio and video formats
4. Can house an HDD inside and play from there
5. Can play from network (Recognizes Samba shares, couldn't verify for other platforms)
6. Wired and Wireless connectivity
7. Can share it's contents over network (configurable)
8. Torrent client (couldn't get it to work, details to follow)
9. Internet streaming
10. Coaxial, TOSLink and HDMI outs
11. Full function remote

Pictures and detailed review to follow.

 

[ranjeetrain]

hdvision RT1186 Media Player Pictures

Some pictures from the product site. Pictures taken by me to follow. I am quite disorganized these days. Can't seem to file my files in correct folder and later keep looking where did they go.

 

[ranjeetrain]

hdvision RT1186 Media Player features review

I chose this player because of the following reasons:

1. It was built around the latest and greatest SOC at the time
2. It was cheapest among the reputed manufacturers
3. It was spoken well of

Packaging in which this player came was good. Usually required cables were provided in the box. The remote was not fancy but good to do its job. All in all, first impressions were not great, but it didn't disappoint me either. My biggest fear was about the build quality that most Chinese manufacturers are guilty of, but the quality was good enough.

The first thing I did when I received this player was insert an HDD that I had in spare. The manufacturer states this player can take HDDs up to 2 TB and that claim was verified. It immediately recognized the HDD and referred to the C drive (formatted as FAT32) as "C".

Now the sailing was smooth. I hooked it up to my TV with the supplied HDMI cable (about 1 meter in length) and switched on. I was about to be very happy. The player went on to do a few things that were needed for a first time setup and from there on it was a smooth sailing. It was able to recognize all the media and catalogue them itself.

Then I began playing some of the media I had on the HDD, most of them sports videos downloaded from YouTube, most of them SD stuff, but some HD and even FHD.

First test was what all formats the player could play. IIRC, it couldn't play Flash media (.swf) but it played rest of them all.

Second test was audio test. The player was able to play the ubiquitous MP3s and FLACs with ease but didn't play AACs. I only have media only in four formats including these three. So I was not too disappointed there either.

As a digital transport. I haven't done critical test, but the player was able to play high resolution media up to 24/96 locally as well as from my NAS without any problem whatsoever. The audio output can be Analogue over RCA or Digital over Coaxial or TOSLink, in addition to composite AV output on HDMI.

Next test was of picture quality. Picture quality wise this player didn't disappoint me at all. In fact I was prepared to be somewhat disappointed given the price I paid for it, but it didn't. Picture quality was surprisingly good, thanks to the Realtek RT1186 chip. It decoded and played all media I threw at it, low bit rate, high bit rate, low resolution high resolution, all compressions, all containers.

One important purchase decisions in these media players is whether or not can they play ISO images or MKV containers. These two formats are critical to any serious movie buff, as they significantly reduce the clutter and help minimize the time one needs to spend on maintaining his media library.

As far as the cataloging of the media was concerned, it was a mixed bag. It finds and catalogues the media itself, good. But at the same time it counts each and every file as one media unit, not intelligent. Though on a positive note, it has folder playing capability. Means, even if you just copy paste the data from your disk into a folder, the player will be able to treat it as a disk and play the present media as if it was a disk.

Another very useful feature I found is, when I play a media I have played earlier, it prompts me whether I want to play from beginning or resume playing from where I left. Very handy, no more bookmark messing.

Review of advanced features to follow........

 

[sann]

Re: hdvision RT1186 Media Player Pictures

Hi ranjeetrain, how much does it cost? their site says it is for 499 yuan that is around 4K INR.
Does it play the large BRR mkv, around 13GB, specially WVC-1 encoded, which I am not able to convert to VOB.
-Sann'

 

[ranjeetrain]

Re: hdvision RT1186 Media Player Pictures

Hi ranjeetrain, how much does it cost? their site says it is for 499 yuan that is around 4K INR.
Does it play the large BRR mkv, around 13GB, specially WVC-1 encoded, which I am not able to convert to VOB.
-Sann'

I have no idea about the India prices. I paid 750 yuan when I bought But as with all electronics, prices come down with time, so no regrets.

Yes, it will play MKVs even if its 25 GB. I have Lords of the Ring Triology extended edition which is around 110 GB IIRC. It plays them perfectly.

Not sure about WVC-1. I don't know if I even have any media using that codec. Most of mine is x264.

 

[ranjeetrain]

hdvision RT1186 Media Player: Advanced features

Continuing from the basics... ... ... to the advanced features:

Torrent client: One of the best features of the media player is that it has a torrent client built in. I wanted to test the feature, but I wasn't able to get it to work. My experience with torrent clients found on such devices has been that they are not powerful enough. Torrent applications need quite a bit of resources to be successful at their job, specially if you have more than just a few of torrents in your library. So, I just tried to configure it and it didn't work so left it alone.

File sharing: Here is the best part. What would you like it to do apart from playing your 10GB files? Share them! That's right! The biggest problem with these media players is that you would generally stream your contents from a NAS as they won't have much storage capability. This media player with the ability to house a 2 TB SATA drive internally removes that barrier. You can store 80 uncompressed Bluray rips or 500 compressed ones on that local drive that it will read as fast as 60 MBps. And not only that, it will further allow you to mark your drive as shared and share it's contents over the network. It has a SAMBA client built-in and it works like a charm.

Network connectivity: The player provides both wired and wireless connectivity. I tested both and both worked flawlessly. Wireless configuration was easy. It could be used as a DHCP client essentially making it a zero configuration item. Wireless performance was stable, however, my conditions were optimal. In my case, my AP and the player were kept centimeters apart. Depending on your case YMMV.

Operating System: The operating system in these devices is of academic interest, but FWIW, it works on Android operating system with a custom UI. But it doesn't stop there. It has the ability to install Apps, which makes it incredibly flexible and powerful.

Internet Surfing: Personally I don't need or use this feature, but a lot of families will find this feature really cool. It has a full scale web browser built-in which allows you to surf internet. Don't expect it to be a full replacement for your computer, but for occasional stuff such as checking emails or watching online videos it can be quite useful. Better than to surf internet on the tiny screen of a mobile phone IMO. This feature is extremely useful for people who don't have a Smart TV.

Review of some super fun features to follow........

 

[spirovious]

Thanks for detailed review.Media player buyers have new option available now.

 

[sann]

Hi ranjeetrain, Thanks for the detailed review, it is really helpful. Did you buy directly form realhd.com? -Sann

 

[pnreddy]

Hi ranjeetrain, Thanks for the detailed review. You convinced me. Their web site is all in Chinese/Mandarin. Can you please tell how to order it.
Thanks

 

[ranjeetrain]

Hi ranjeetrain, how much does it cost? their site says it is for 499 yuan that is around 4K INR.-Sann'

Hi, I guess you misunderstood something. 499 is the price for the TV100. That's a low end model

Hi ranjeetrain, Thanks for the detailed review, it is really helpful. Did you buy directly form realhd.com? -Sann

I don't think RealHD sells directly. I bought it from a brick n mortar store.

Hi ranjeetrain, Thanks for the detailed review. You convinced me. Their web site is all in Chinese/Mandarin. Can you please tell how to order it.
Thanks

Hi, as of now I can't find any online site selling this one. I will update the thread once I find it on any site available online. Please stay tuned in.

Thanks for detailed review.Media player buyers have new option available now.

Yes, that's the very idea. Without a credible review these Chinese products don't inspire confidence.

 

[ranjeetrain]

hdvision RT1186 Media Player: User pictures

Finally I managed to fish out the pictures I had taken when I received this. Here they are!

Retail pack

Contains: The player, the remote, PSU, an HDMI cable, utilitarian composite AV cable, power cord, batteries for the remote, user manual (in Chinese)

Rear panel: HDMI, Coaxial, TOSLink, Composite, and Component outputs, Ethernet and USB inputs.

​

Excuse the poor quality, these are cellphone pics that too taken at a reduced resolution.

 

[Prabhu.ME]

Hi Ranjeet,
Thanks for the review. Can you compare this with Kaiboer K6 & Kaiboer K660i. Also let me know the total price you paid for this player. Kaiboer K6 is priced Rs. 6K & K660i at Rs. 9K (ebay). I am looking for a player at 6K price range, kindly recommend a player at this range.

Regards
Prabhu

 

[ranjeetrain]

Hi Ranjeet,
Thanks for the review. Can you compare this with Kaiboer K6 & Kaiboer K660i. Also let me know the total price you paid for this player. Kaiboer K6 is priced Rs. 6K & K660i at Rs. 9K (ebay). I am looking for a player at 6K price range, kindly recommend a player at this range.

Regards
Prabhu

Hi Prabhu, I can't compare it with any other media player on actual performance basis. Specification wise and manufacturer claim wise there are dozens of Chinese manufacturers making media players based on Realtek chip. On paper they may look very identical. The difference lies in unpublished specs and actual performance.

There are Chinese manufacturers with good quality control, and there are Chinese manufacturers with bad quality control. hdvision is very popular with people in China and that's why I chose it.

I had paid 750 Chinese yuan. That was a discount of 50 yuan on the MRP of 799 Yuan.

hdvision has many media players at different price points. Their most basic media player cost as little as 299 Chinese Yuan (about 4k equivalent). More expensive ones were 1699, 1999 Chinese Yuan. They have been discontinued now. My observation is that, there is a difference of about 30% in China retail price and India retail price. This is quite understandable, as the importer would definitely have a profit margin.

At 6k, you should look at a 2D media player. 3D capable ones are slightly expensive as of now. You can look at any media player based on RT1185 chip. They are pretty similar to this one, except they can't play 3D content.

Hope that helps!

 

[masoud]

does this player support arabic srt subtitle for movies?