View Full Version : HDI-DUNE prime firmware
bramschats
10-12-09, 07:37
Hello,
bought my prime yesterday and it works like a charm.... There is only one thing i am not so happy about. The dune does the trick but all interfaces set up settings, skins, etc etc, it is all very basic.
Now i can understand that this is because the prime is recently launced but i hope this will change with new firmware updates wich also is not availeble yet from the HDI-DUNE site.
Can someone give me any feedback on this issue and tell me when the official firmware is launced?
thanks in advance.
For skins/artwork see this subforum:
http://www.mpcclub.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=85
It works also for the 3.0 players.
I use mymovies and it's very stable.
The interfaces are ment to be basic for convenience. HDI wants that all the family members can handle the Dune. Maybe HDI will change that with more options in the future for the more advanced people.
Still even it's basic, for watching movies it does the job on a professional level.
I also heard that you should have the latest (beta)firmware installed which is not yet available on the hdi site if your prime is from the second batch.
Could you share your firmware version with us?
Can you for example make your external .srt's bigger then small or medium?
edit: Just received my second prime 3.0 and it has the same firmwareversion 091023_1444 as my buy-in prime 3.0 player installed
bramschats
10-12-09, 18:56
I checked the firmware and indeed, i have the same FW 091023_1444, the same as can be downloaded from the official website.
Can you tell me short how to install the artwork on the dune?
thnx.
bramschats
11-12-09, 08:03
Mart,
I have taken a closer look at the dune and it's firmware and i must say i'am not very impressed by it's software capabilities!
About playing video i don't have a single complain, it does the trick great but creating a playlist, creating a slide show, the window it plays audio in (black screen and the name of the mp3 in the middle) is in my opinion bad, it can be much more intuitive.
In my opinion the HDI dune is very basic for the standard users who just want to have a media player that always does the trick the low profile way.
In my opinion the popcorn hour and nmp1000 have their own forum, they are much more busy improving their products and make it also good to look at and they are much open source, they want that their customers to program things etc, etc..
I don't know what to do with my hdi, i bought it because i tought it was the best in its way, and yes, i think it is but on a very basic, low profile way.
No single brand is open source, that's a hoax... as it is limited to adding stuff no one needs actually but want to play with anyway :-) Own forums is great, but directly tailored to themselves and compared to C-200, which is more advanced for techy users, the HDI is more stable and better tailored for HD all round... Also the interface is far more convenient than C-200 to be honest...
depends on what you want and seek...
Both products in their own little corner, are the best of the best and both can improve a lot on many subjects...
I use mymovies for artwork see also: http://www.mymovies.dk/how-to/written-documentation.aspx?Page=My%20Movies%20and%20HDI%20 Dune
bramschats
11-12-09, 10:49
Thnx for the reply.
When i want to change the dune for the nmp1000 or popcorn hour i have to do that within 7 days.
I just don't know what to do, i know the firmware has to mature and that all other options like a playlist, etc, etc will come with time but i just don't know if i have made the right decision for the player. Isn't the qnap or the popcorn hour the "more advanced" player?
The shop tells me that i have made the right choice and that this will be the player to beat in the future?
Help....
Hi,
qnap is very new in multimedia player I do not know what to think about. popcornhour has experience but does it help? Look in the thread about the C-200. Itīs longer on the market but also has a lot of problems.
Ralf
Yesterday i also received the Dune Prime 3.0, and i must agree with bramschats that the interface is far behind from today's mediaplayers, even the cheap ones, like WD TV. I do own a WD TV as well, and this little thing is capable of showing folderimages for movies and audiodirectories. Even jpg preview is not suported in the Dune. Watching a photoslideshow with one of your music albums, just forget it, the € 99,= WD TV does!
One thing i do admit, is the amazing picturequality.
I've never seen bluray's that sharp on mij 50" plasma before.
Upscaled DVD's also look amazing, almost HD-like.
I have a PS3, which is also capable of playing bluray's, but was never satisfied with the upscaling quality of DVD's and the limited support for HD audio bitstreaming, so i bought myself a Panasonic stand-alone player. Bluray's and DVD's looked better than the PS3 and even audio cd's sounded much better.
For downloaded movies (mkv's, iso's etc) i wasn't able to stream these containers to my PS3, so i ordered the Dune to do the job. My first test was the bluray from The Police with Dolby True HD audio. My God, the Panasonic is blown away by the Dune. Sharp as a razor, great colours, very detailed and no jagged vertical lines. I thought the Panasonic already was a great player, but the Dune is something else.
Next test is a DVD from Lionel Richie Symphonica in Rosso. This already is a great DVD (picturequality wise), but upscaled by the Dune it is not far from a blurayversion. Very detailed and sharp image.
Streaming a fullhd bluray iso from my Qnap with DTS HD Master audiotrack and a average bitrate of 35mbit/sec is no problem for the dune. My Onkyo receiver display's the HD audio format correctly and the sound is realy amazing, picturequality is stunning.
So far so good, picturequality is the best i've seen so far, but going on-topic again, interface, photoviewing and no-albumart is simply not what you expect from a € 399,= mediaplayer. I do understand that the interface is also "designed" for the rest of the family, but i won't let my 3 year old daughter play with it :wink: .
I'm planning to give the "mymovies" a try, but i'm not sure of this will work from a nas. I do not have a HD inside the Dune, but attached a 320Gb USB-HD to it. This is for photoviewing, since the Twonkyvision on the Qnap is downscaling my 21mp files from my EOS 5D mark II and that lookes awefull.
It must be possible to stream the 21mp files over a shared directory in stead of Twonkyvision, but i still have to figure that out this weekend.
So, is it possible to use "mymovies" on the Dune with the Qnap nas?
The PCH200 was also on my list, but decided for the Dune, just because of IQ and stability. Even though the Dune's interface and possibilities are a bit to simple compared to the PCH200, i will stay with the Dune, because IQ is much more important to me than gadgets. And having a player (like de PCH200) with still having too many bugs, will be raising the same question: "Is the Dune the way to go?".
For now i'm very pleased with the Dune and can only hope for a better interface in the near future. The Dune 1&2 where also great players, but the interface in the 3rd generation is almost a copy of his predesesors, so i don't think they are planning a huge upgrade here. And because the Dune is not intended for hobbyists (playing with open source firmware) i think you have to decide yourself what is more important to you, quality & stability (Dune) or fooling around for the next period of time with unstable and unfinished firmware (PCH200).
My Movies will work with every nas. You map the share from your nas as a network drive in windows or browse to the share on the nas with my movies.
Go first In Collection Management to -> file->import-> folder content and scan your hdd's and/or networkshare on your nas. Afterwards you can go to options to make the meta-data for each share you scanned. You can also use the folder monitoring options to make everything fully automatic if you put new stuff or delete stuff in your shares.
However scanning and making meta-data for your networkshare's will take much longer then local shares.
Arnold_W I also hope that HDI will come with a product to meet more advanced users, but I don't think that you really can compare a €99,- player with the Dune if you want a bd loader, playing full bd-rips as bdmv folder and bd .iso. You can throw almost any important codec on the Dune and it plays them flawless, also with all the HD audio.
The Dune has 7.1 analoge out and other audio output options so you can decode really all the audio.
Users with 'older' receivers can keep their precious and sometimes very expensive receivers. PQ and AQ is much better then the WD's and many other 'cheaper' mediaplayers.
Ok thanks, but lucky me, my nas and windows pc do share a 1Gb network, so this must be doable.
I believe IDune is also one of those tools like mymovies, which one do you prefer?
Btw: you don't have to convince me about the differences between the WD en the Dune, I also noticed the IQ. But the WD just has a better interface, that's all i am trying to say.
The WD also play's almost everything you throw at it, even TV recordings from your MCE.
I recorded some concerts a couple of years ago on a Windows Media Center with a satellite card but the record format is not supported by the Dune. It shows a square image with no sound. The WD shows the 16:9 format with sound. IQ may be far behind the Dune, but supported codecs is very well equiped by the WD. (ok, it does not play iso DVD/BD menu's, but it will play the iso itself).
I also have a 1gb network but since I switched to Windows 7 scanning and processing the meta-data is slower then it was with xp.
I prefer my movies, because I also wanted to keep track of all my movies that I have in one database with a nice interface. It's also fully automated and that works quite well.
I have 4 pc's in my house. With one pC I do all the scanning and I have both client and server installed on it. On the others I installed only the client. When we pick a movie from my my movies on a pc we can exactly see on which hdd it sits. If the hdd is not online we know which hdd to get.
I didn't want to convince you, sorry I made that impression. I also find that you right about the interface.
Only wanted to fill the gap why maybe the Dune hasn't also a good interface.
OK, just to be sure, one more question.
Mymovies is for Windows based platforms, right?
You build a catalog on your Windwos PC wether the footage is on your local drive or on a nas.
But..... do you have to turn on your pc to use mymovies on the Dune?
Mymovies is streaming the movies over the network from a PC, just like Twonkyvision does, right?
In that case you can ask yourself the advantage of a nas, because i bought one just to turn OFF the computer during moviewatching.
MyMovies doesn't stream anything.
It is only an indexing and layout program.
So if your media is on you PC it indexes the PC and creates layouts in the dirs.
And yes your PC does need to be on to stream :):):)
If your media is on your nas, MyMovies indexes your NAS and creates the layouts on your NAS. Then your PC doesn't have to be on to stream.
MyMovies doesn't stream, PC or NAS does that. My Movies only creates templates wich the dune interprets as nice dir layouts.
Yes, only Windows
Yes, local, networkshares on other pc's or nas, it doesn't matter.
Your meta-data will be placed static on your shares (each movies has to be in a seperate folder) and you can shut off your pc and or nas.
So you put your meta-data on the nas with the pc and you can turn of the pc afterwards to stream with the Dune of the nas, you will see the movie icons and movie descriptions.
Same as with usb hdd's hooked up at your pc, scan the shares and make the meta-data, disconnect it, hook it up to your Dune and you will see the movie icons and movie descriptions from that hdd.
My Movies in combination with the Dune is only for making meta-data and is not needed to stream.
edit: 1 minute too late, lol.
OK, that looks much more convenient than i thought it would be.
I was afraid that the database is on the PC and just to read the movie-info, the pc has to be turned on, but as you describe it the meta data will be placed on the nas (or any other drive) and you can turn off the pc after that.
That's great !
This is how it works.
The link describes how HDI Dune menu system works regarding layout.
MyMovies creates files on the HDs that the Dune use to create the nice menus.
http://dune-hd.com/firmware/misc/dune_folder_howto.txt
/S
HDI_fw_dev
11-12-09, 19:55
creating a playlist, creating a slide show, the window it plays audio in (black screen and the name of the mp3 in the middle) is in my opinion bad, it can be much more intuitive.
Posting here the info about Dune abilities in respect to playlists (crossposting from Dune-vs-C200 thread):
- Play M3U, PLS playlist files.
- Browse content of M3U or PLS files directly in file browser by pressing "0". Then e.g. mark several items and start playback of a playlist built from these selected items.
- Support for M3U/PLS playlist files referencing other playlist files (referenced playlist files are resolved automatically).
- Build playlist from the current folder content by pressing PLAY on a file in the folder.
- Build playlist by marking multiple files and pressing PLAY.
- Build playlist by recursive scanning a folder by pressing PLAY on it.
- Build playlist by recursive scanning multiple folders by marking folders and pressing PLAY.
- Automatically sort folder content when building playlist according to M3U file inside the folder (if any).
- Press MENU during playback to show the playlist browser instead of default black screen (screensaver).
- REPEAT playback.
- SHUFFLE playback (still missing on C200 AFAIK).
All of the above can be used both for music files, and for photo files.
Maybe this should have it's own thread, but since there already are quite a few posts in this one ...
I now have two Base 3.0 units on order, I'm thinking about the best way to get my music collection properly organized on them.
HDI_fw_dev,
Do I understand correctly that it is possible to have a folder structure that contains only playlists?
Like;
A
ArtistName
AlbumName.m3u
AND a second file strucure for looking at all albums
Root
AlbumName.m3u
AND/Or ... some other structure, depending on how you want to view them in the DUNE menus.
And each AlbumName.m3u contains UNC paths to all the *.flac songs.
Not sure if *.m3u/*.pls can contain cover art references (have to look that up) .. but will Dune display that image?
If this works, it should not take long to write a tool generating all the necesary structures.
I use ALOT of juctions on my server..
MainDrive\Disks\DiskA
MainDrive\Disks\DiskB
These junctions are dynamically mounted whenever I plug-in a sata drive in the computer.
How will the DUNE react to selecting a *.m3u containg a file that is on a disk currently not mounted on the server?
Will it just display an error message?
Could it be made to respond to a specific tag in the *.m3u file (like "Please insert disk 12") ..
Again .. I have to read up on *.m3u format if it allows custom attributes.
(This question also applys to the MyMovies approach, where the *.txt files could reference a file on a "missing" disk)
Would it be possible to have the *.m3u file structure on the internal storage of the DUNE (not the swappable drives!).
I guess not much you can do with .. was it 2 GB internal memory?
But maybe you can plug a bigger 2.5" disk in there :)
OR... if it is possible to have the folder structure on the server and UNC path referes to the swappable drive on the DUNE..
\\duneplayer\drive2\....
And custom "missing" attribute "Please insert Disk12 in dune player".
/S
Hi guys,
can any one tell me how to install a new firmware on hdi dune 3.0? thank you
Kelana
DivXPlayer_NL
17-12-09, 00:10
Hi guys,
can any one tell me how to install a new firmware on hdi dune 3.0? thank you
Kelana
Put it on a USB drive, and just launch it.
Put it on a USB drive, and just launch it.
i downloaded it..put it in a usb drive.. but cant lanch it.. can anybody help me plz?
Check if you have a system storage first prior to upgrading the firmware as you need it.
Check Home>Setup>Information that system storage is enabled: you should see 'Attached (use 36.6MB of 2.0GB)'
vBulletin® v3.8.4, Copyright ©2000-2013, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.