HD-100 Future improvements / support?

[trini0]

Originally Posted by paulbeers

I bet if you ebayed your HD100, and bought an HD200, the "upgrade" cost would only be about 75 (and possibly less).

I prefer, the form factor of the HD100. I'm not really liking the footprint of the newer model unfortunately.

[OneThomas]

Just to throw my 2 cents in - I am thrilled that SAGE has come out with a new model, But, honestly, my first reaction was -- I hope they don't forget about the 100 this soon... The 100 is too new and too wonderful to be tossed aside this soon (I.E. - no more fixes/enhancements)... But, I am sure they will continue to support if for a reasonable amount of time. Also, I do feel this is a "little" different then the MVP's... Everything is going Digital/HD - which may be why most of us purchased the 100... The MVP's, being SD, (and I have 2 of them), I can see support ENHANCEMENTS being stopped - but I doubt Sage would PULL the existing support out of the software - untul the time SD became incompatible with SAGE functionality...

[paulbeers]

My question for everyone in this thread is this:

Is the HD100 not doing what it is supposed to do? If there are issues, then I see Sage making updates to the firmware, but if there aren't issues then I doubt we will see any firmware changes be made. Since I turned annimations off on my HD100's, they have been rock solid for playback. My guess is that by now, Sage has released all enhancements to the HD100 that they plan to make (most likely due to limitations of the hardware itself).

I look at the HD100 and the HD200 as I do my car. The year I bought my car, the stereo did not have an auxillary audio plug to play my MP3 player thru the factory head unit, the next year's version did. I don't expect Ford to retrofit my head unit because I have the 2006 that doesn't have the audio jack. I bought it knowing what you see is what you get. Now if there are factory recalls due to issues, then those will be taken care of (unless Ford goes bankrupt, but that is an entirely different subject).

Just my .02 worth. I currently have no HD200's and while I would love to have the functionality of the HD200, I am happy with what I have. It does what I need and when I need more, I will pick up an HD200.

[Deacon Crusher]

I think the one big question for the 100s is the playback of full bit-rate blu ray rips.

That's the one issue I have with 100s that I feel like should be dealt with.

Otherwise what the 200 offers is new features that I don't feel Sage owes me a way to accomplish in my 100.

[Rob]

I beileve they need to finish the mkv support. Full bit rate BD. subtitles, chapter support and selection of audio tracks/subtitles.

The hd100 was advertised as 1080P with mkv support. Without the above, it falls short of what was advertised.

[valnar]

Originally Posted by Rob

I beileve they need to finish the mkv support. Full bit rate BD. subtitles, chapter support and selection of audio tracks/subtitles.

The hd100 was advertised as 1080P with mkv support. Without the above, it falls short of what was advertised.

True, but Sage in general (client, server, placeshifter, extender, etc) need this support too. It's highly anticipated.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Rob

I beileve they need to finish the mkv support. Full bit rate BD. subtitles, chapter support and selection of audio tracks/subtitles.

The hd100 was advertised as 1080P with mkv support. Without the above, it falls short of what was advertised.

It does support 1080p H.264, VC-1 and MPEG-2. Whether it can, or cannot support the same profiles and bitrates is undetermined at this time.

SageTV smartly (or not) never promised full BD-profile H.264/VC-1, it also supports the MKV container (but again, never advertiesd chapter, subtitle, or track selection there-in), so you can't say if falls short of what was advertised.

Chapter and track support in MKV would be great, and I'd guess if the HD200 gets it, the HD100 will get those as well. As for H.264 HP@L4.1 and VC-1 AP@L3 support, I truely hope that's something Sage can "fix" but if it's a limitation of the SOC, the HD200's more powerful SOC is the only solution.

[Rob]

To me, saying it supports it means it supports it, not that it supports it with limitations.

Maybe they should have said limited 1080P support and limited mkv support, but they did not say limited support in their specifications, so I do believe in its current form, the HD100 falls short of what was advertised.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Rob

To me, saying it supports it means it supports it, not that it supports it with limitations.

Everything has limitations. Blu-ray players have limitations on what sorts of H.264 they support, the PS3, Xbox360, nVidia video cards, etc.

Does the PS3 fall short of it's advertising because people can encode H.264 that won't play on it? What about the Xbox 360, or BD players?

When the HD100 came out, Blu-ray was essentially unrippable (technically there is still no legit way to get Blu-ray content onto an HD100). HD PVR and Quicktime trailers are about the only 100% legit sources of H.264 for the HD100 and it supports them just fine.

How many players that support MKV support chapters or audio track selection? What about MKV menus? The MKV container supports menus (AFAIK), but to my knowledge, nothing supports them.

[Rob]

I still think that is like saying someone who goes to two weeks of college has a college education.

I suppose it is caveat emptor (let the buyer beware).