PC-To-TV Product Review: Solwise DMP-1120w UPnP/DLNA Network Media Player

A rather critical review of the Solwise DMP-1120w UPnP/DLNA network media player by Reg Hardware shed some light on the functionality of this relatively low-cost PC-to-TV box. The Solwise seemed to be plagued by problems right from the initial setup. While most wireless streamers simply plug into your TV and connect wirelessly to your network's router, not so with the Solwise. It was an ordeal to establish a wireless connection and once that was done, another ordeal began as the testers tried to establish the PC as the "media source". This should be a straight forward process. Furthermore, the Solwise's specs aren't anything great either. There is no HD output, and though you can connect the streamer to a HDTV, you'll still see a standard definition picture on the screen. The box also has no hard drive so your PC has to be turned on pretty much all the time and it can't pull content from your computer without the user being logged in to Windows Media Player or installing a Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) compliant media server app.

Importing your iTunes library from WMP to the Solwise pretty much guarantees a complete reorganization or perhaps disorganization of your files, and the box can't pull content from YouTube or a great many other media content providers found on the web. The only file type that didn't present a playback problem was the DivX codec and though the manual states support for MPEG 4, Windows Media Player won't recognize the file type at all. Doesn't make a whole lot of sense, does it?

In terms of photographic display, the Solwise only supports JPEG files and because it only outputs standard definition, photographs that look good on your laptop, Mac, or PC will probably look horrible when displayed on your HDTV. The reviewers found this to be true.

The Solwise can play media directly off SD, Memory Stick, or CompactFlash card and works well with standard definition television, something that the more expensive Apple TV does not do at all. The user interface is fairly friendly and straight forward, and the price tag is less than half the cost of the 40GB Apple TV (in the UK) at $171 US. Low cost yes, but you definitely get what you pay for.

Via Register Hardware

December 1, 2007

PC-To-TV Product Review: Solwise DMP-1120w UPnP/DLNA Network Media Player