Playing Divx files from external drive on Samsung Samsung BD-P3600

[nyteowl]

I recently purchased this player and I am having difficulty getting it to play divx files from a USB external hard drive. Movies play fine from a burned CD but when I connect USB drive (250GB-external) it recognizes that a drive is attached but does not read the file structure.

Has anyone had this problem or know if there is a workaround? I have not tried a thumb drive because I do not have one large enough to hold a divx movie (700MB).

[MrBoylan]

I recently purchased this player and I am having difficulty getting it to play divx files from a USB external hard drive. Movies play fine from a burned CD but when I connect USB drive (250GB-external) it recognizes that a drive is attached but does not read the file structure.

Has anyone had this problem or know if there is a workaround? I have not tried a thumb drive because I do not have one large enough to hold a divx movie (700MB).

Well, to find movies you do need to go into the "Movies" tab (not music or photos), but I assume you're doing that. The manual does go into some detail about what kind of drive and file structure is supported, e.g., if you attempt to connect an external drive that requires more than 500 mA of power, then you need to provide that power directly to the drive via a power adapter. In other words, the USB port on the Samsung player cannot provide more than 500 mA of power to an external drive. Also, "only those USB devices formatted in the FAT file system (DOS 8.3 volume label) are supported, and it is recommended to use USB devices that support USB 2.0 protocol, 4 MB/sec or faster read/write speed." So if you're not FAT, then you're out of luck.

I tested the player with USB flash drives (2 GB and 8 GB), as most of the notes in the manual refer to using the unit with a "USB memory flash stick." Apparently if you want to update the firmware from USB, you can only use a flash drive for that (not a non-flash external drive).

I suspect your issue is either power consumption or file system formatting.

BTW, the BD-P3600 owner's manual (user manual) is available here:

http://downloadcenter.samsung.com/co...EW-0427-BM.pdf

[nyteowl]

Thanks for the info, looks like it was the formatting. I created a FAT32 partition on the external drive and copied some files to it and the player had no problem recognizing them.

Of course, as luck would have it, I'm noticing a new issue. With both Blu-rays discs and the divx files from the external drive, I am getting a very slight audio sync problem. The audio is not terribly out of sync but it is bad enough that you can notice it. I've done a little reading online and others appear to have had similar sync issues with this player. Some report that there is no fix, others say it has something to do with the power supply to the player.

Anyone have any insight?

[jackBauer]

will it be possible with Just a firmware update if it's possible to play MKV files? on the P3600? if so can people please send samsung emails askin for MKV file support.

[MrBoylan]

will it be possible with Just a firmware update if it's possible to play MKV files? on the P3600? if so can people please send samsung emails askin for MKV file support.

I'm not 100% sure whether a new codec could be delivered via firmware, but considering the fact that Samsung added DTS-HD decoding to the BD-P2500 months after it was released (via a firmware upgrade), I'd say it's pretty likely they could add MKV support if there is a significant market opportunity there.

-CB

[jackBauer]

...if there is a significant market opportunity there.

-CB

are you kidding??? most if not all HD videos i seen on the net are in MKV. plus just search for MKV and blu ray player to see the demand for it. to be honest i'm suprised there is only the LG and i think oppo that support MKV. If the LG390 was available in the UK, i'd have gotten it!

[MrBoylan]

are you kidding??? most if not all HD videos i seen on the net are in MKV. plus just search for MKV and blu ray player to see the demand for it. to be honest i'm suprised there is only the LG and i think oppo that support MKV. If the LG390 was available in the UK, i'd have gotten it!

I am not making any value judgements here. And I even mentioned the lack of MKV support when I reviewed the Panasonic BD80. I'm just saying that if the hardware manufacturers see MKV support as an opportunity for a competitive advantage, they will add it. Clearly, Samsung, Sony, Panasonic and Pioneer don't see this as a competitive advantage so they haven't added it. At least not yet. JVC has already announced a Blu-ray player that supports MKV, plus the LG and OPPO players as you mentioned. I've also heard that some Samsung LCD TVs do (or will) support MKV playback as well so if anyone is likely to add it to Blu-ray players, Samsung is a likely candidate.

I think the general perception in the industry is that MKV files are used primarily to bootleg Blu-ray discs and other content in high def so it's easy to see why electronics companies that have close ties to Hollywood (Panasonic, Sony) would be hesitant to add support for it. But this was also the reputation that Divx had early on and now it's a lot easier to find Divx support in DVD and Blu-ray players so maybe the same thing will happen with MKV?

But by all means send Samsung an e-mail and ask them to add it.

Regards,

-Chris

[jackBauer]

just got off the phone to a guy at samsung he mentioned the newer sony blu-ray players will have mkv support, whethere that's true or not i dont know.

[bichons9]

I bought 5 samsung DIVX players and LOVE them because i can burn 5 movies to one DVD and play with excellent quality. I also like to put the movies on a 2 GB flash drive as not to burn to DVD. Howevwer, lately and especially today..All three movies that I downloaded and put on a flash drive start playing..then after the paramount beginning they all stop!!! I don't think it has to do with size but am strting to wonder. Each movie is 1.25 GB..And so i decided to burn them with nero Express per data file (since it's quick) and they failed as well. i don't know much about file structure except they are AVI files and were provided by the same person. i have used mediainfo but since i don't know how to interpret them very well..I haven't investigated with this today. i don't doubt that I can burn them in nero Vision but I really didn't want to keep the movies..Any suggestions would be appreciated..Example of medi info:
Format : AVI
Format/Info : Audio Video Interleave
Format profile : OpenDML
File size : 1.26 GiB
Duration : 1h 52mn
Overall bit rate : 1 603 Kbps
Writing application : AVI-Mux GUI 1.17.8, Aug 30 2008 12:36:58

Video
ID : 0
Format : MPEG-4 Visual
Format profile : Advanced Simple@L5
Format settings, BVOP : Yes
Format settings, QPel : No
Format settings, GMC : No warppoints
Format settings, Matrix : Custom
Codec ID : XVID
Codec ID/Hint : XviD
Duration : 1h 52mn
Bit rate : 1 213 Kbps
Width : 720 pixels
Height : 400 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16/9
Frame rate : 23.976 fps
Resolution : 24 bits
Colorimetry : 4:2:0
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.176
Stream size : 975 MiB (76%)
Writing library : XviD 1.2.1 (UTC 2008-12-04)

Audio
ID : 1
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Codec ID : 2000
Duration : 1h 52mn
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 384 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Surround: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Stream size : 309 MiB (24%)
Alignment : Aligned on interleaves
Interleave, duration : 64 ms (1.53 video frames)
Interleave, preload duration : 192 ms