I have received my Cloud Media Popcornhour A-410 on friday and here are my initial impressions of the device.
Hardware Specifications
Chipset: Sigma SMP8911 Dual-Core 800Mhz with 512KB L2
Memory: 1024MB DDR2, 256MB SLC NAND Flash
Audio/Video: HDMI, Component, CVBS, Stereo Audio, S/PDIF, Digital Optical
Other Interface: Power LED and Standby LED, 2x USB 2.0 Host, 1 x USB 3.0 Slave, 1 x eSATA, quick dock mounting for 2.5" or 3.5" SATA HDD, Infra-Red Remote Control, SD card reader, IR-Receiver Port
Network: Ethernet 10/100/1000 Mbps
Casing: Casing designed by Silverstone aluminum Case, fanless Operation
More.....
2 Channel Audio: ESS technology ES9023P Sabre 24/192
112dB DNR
Storage
There are no HDD bundled along with device. A disk bay provided and installation is easier than thought. Just place the SDD on disk-bay, tighten provided screws and lock it after pushing inside. HDD manager application detect the disk and format it. I bought a 1TB disk it took almost 5 minutes to get the disk ready.
User Interface
Good:
I wont say the user interface design is outstanding among the class but it is quite responsive in comparison to other media players I used before. In comparison to WD LIvehub A-410 is almost 10 time faster, may be because of duel core processor and 1 GB RAM.
Albums are listed similar to PS3 X navigation with thumbnails, there are different sort options. Major categories are Movies, music and Photos. If you have a well defined tagging for your music collection searching and playing album or songs takes only few seconds( I got only 8K songs in music category). There are options to sort songs based on genre, album, Year, songs, playlist etc. For my 8k songs library rearraging entire list took less than 5-10 seconds.
Verdict: Quite satisfied with the response time as I have not experienced any abnormal lag during navigation.
Bad:
In NMJ media player those menus are not intutive like apple or xmbc player.
Movie
Good:
I have less than 50 movies ripped to my HDD only few have 4 GB size with Dolby digital. May try ripping few more movies in coming weekends from my DVD collection. No BD rips are in my collection as I do not have a device to to rip my BD collection, so unable to provide a details on BD playing quality.
DVD rips are played exactly as it played from a DVD player. Here too no lag on browsing through the collection or playing. VXP processing is found usefulfor the movies with high contrast raito.
Bad:
NMJ software can get subtitle from net but it is useles for all practical purpose, In addition size of the subtitle is annoyingly big.
Verdict: Time to look beyond those DVD Players and get a popcorn.
Music
As per the specification 2 Channnel Audio:
ESS technology ES9023P Sabre 24/192
112dB DNR
Good:
I have played my regular tracks that I am familier with and found music quality is exceptionally good for the price I paid. It is not as defined as a standalone DAC, I would rate the the built in DAC above squeezebox touch and equal to Cambridge Audio DACMagic. It is more an attacking than more refined Micromega Mydac.
Bad:
There is a slight distortion observed on high frequency instruments, this is not immediately noticeable but if you sit closer to speaker you may notice it. This may be a NMJ software bug as I could observe same on HDMI-out as well.
Still could not make out how albums are organised. Songs from same album listed as more than one album. Cloud media needs to add more features to make it usable for Audiophiles.
Verdict: If you use Popcorn hour A-410 for music playback, then you may only look for a DAC above $350, nothing less will be satisfying.
Remote control Remote control is fully back-lit with white LEDs. So you dont need to switch on the light to operate it. NMJ controller for iPAD and Android are really good but I could not add/remove songs to playlists using it. This software is absolutely free, but not available for iPhone and Android below version 3.
TCO: 21300 (Including $70 shipping charges) + 3800 (duty paid) + 4600 (1TB HDD) = 29700/-
Note: This review is based on almost 3 days listening, opinion may change after extended usage
Hardware Specifications
Chipset: Sigma SMP8911 Dual-Core 800Mhz with 512KB L2
Memory: 1024MB DDR2, 256MB SLC NAND Flash
Audio/Video: HDMI, Component, CVBS, Stereo Audio, S/PDIF, Digital Optical
Other Interface: Power LED and Standby LED, 2x USB 2.0 Host, 1 x USB 3.0 Slave, 1 x eSATA, quick dock mounting for 2.5" or 3.5" SATA HDD, Infra-Red Remote Control, SD card reader, IR-Receiver Port
Network: Ethernet 10/100/1000 Mbps
Casing: Casing designed by Silverstone aluminum Case, fanless Operation
More.....
2 Channel Audio: ESS technology ES9023P Sabre 24/192
112dB DNR
Storage
There are no HDD bundled along with device. A disk bay provided and installation is easier than thought. Just place the SDD on disk-bay, tighten provided screws and lock it after pushing inside. HDD manager application detect the disk and format it. I bought a 1TB disk it took almost 5 minutes to get the disk ready.
User Interface
Good:
I wont say the user interface design is outstanding among the class but it is quite responsive in comparison to other media players I used before. In comparison to WD LIvehub A-410 is almost 10 time faster, may be because of duel core processor and 1 GB RAM.
Albums are listed similar to PS3 X navigation with thumbnails, there are different sort options. Major categories are Movies, music and Photos. If you have a well defined tagging for your music collection searching and playing album or songs takes only few seconds( I got only 8K songs in music category). There are options to sort songs based on genre, album, Year, songs, playlist etc. For my 8k songs library rearraging entire list took less than 5-10 seconds.
Verdict: Quite satisfied with the response time as I have not experienced any abnormal lag during navigation.
Bad:
In NMJ media player those menus are not intutive like apple or xmbc player.
Movie
Good:
I have less than 50 movies ripped to my HDD only few have 4 GB size with Dolby digital. May try ripping few more movies in coming weekends from my DVD collection. No BD rips are in my collection as I do not have a device to to rip my BD collection, so unable to provide a details on BD playing quality.
DVD rips are played exactly as it played from a DVD player. Here too no lag on browsing through the collection or playing. VXP processing is found usefulfor the movies with high contrast raito.
Bad:
NMJ software can get subtitle from net but it is useles for all practical purpose, In addition size of the subtitle is annoyingly big.
Verdict: Time to look beyond those DVD Players and get a popcorn.
Music
As per the specification 2 Channnel Audio:
ESS technology ES9023P Sabre 24/192
112dB DNR
Good:
I have played my regular tracks that I am familier with and found music quality is exceptionally good for the price I paid. It is not as defined as a standalone DAC, I would rate the the built in DAC above squeezebox touch and equal to Cambridge Audio DACMagic. It is more an attacking than more refined Micromega Mydac.
Bad:
There is a slight distortion observed on high frequency instruments, this is not immediately noticeable but if you sit closer to speaker you may notice it. This may be a NMJ software bug as I could observe same on HDMI-out as well.
Still could not make out how albums are organised. Songs from same album listed as more than one album. Cloud media needs to add more features to make it usable for Audiophiles.
Verdict: If you use Popcorn hour A-410 for music playback, then you may only look for a DAC above $350, nothing less will be satisfying.
Remote control Remote control is fully back-lit with white LEDs. So you dont need to switch on the light to operate it. NMJ controller for iPAD and Android are really good but I could not add/remove songs to playlists using it. This software is absolutely free, but not available for iPhone and Android below version 3.
TCO: 21300 (Including $70 shipping charges) + 3800 (duty paid) + 4600 (1TB HDD) = 29700/-
Note: This review is based on almost 3 days listening, opinion may change after extended usage
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