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[G_A_V]

ok I was just using the Online Spotlight part of media center I cant work out if these pages are launched locally or remotely, how ever Clips played fine using the Online Spotlight so possible we could use a hack similar to the psp hack that mimmiks the online spotlight site locally and design our own online spotlight

[G_A_V]

Ok exciting stuff I have been using a packet sniffer and found that Online spot light is using a Webpage viewer viewing urls like http://207.46.225.60...aspx?view=en-au

[HiRoll3r]

The author's email address is at the bottom of the readme. Also, is it the 360 that is requesting this URL directly or is it MCE that is requesting it and then sending the data to the 360? Not having MCE, I have no way of checking myself.

[G_A_V]

Thanks I contacted the author, The Requests are comming from my mce pc, so it must be just displaying it remotely, like the More Applications part of MCe, but it is also transfering sound, and is at a higher fps

[Underworld]

QUOTE(G_A_V @ Jan 5 2006, 11:13 AM)

The Jerky Video problem does not happen on the local machine, so my guess is MS has limited the bandwidth allowed to be used through the media center more programs addon. Which leads me to think that any hack using the More Programs Part of Media centre would not work even if it launched any application.

2nd Problem is that Sound is not working. I think they have also restriced Sound

Maybe..  you need a codec for that part...
With a normal Computer you can't play DivXvid files, you have exacly the same problem "no sound" / "crappy video" so you download simply a bunch of codecs to help this...
So i think its just a simple codec(s) you missed on the 360 MCE, nothing more.

QUOTE

If we can get past these two hurdles I was thinking we could make a home brew app that lists files from a directory lets you open them in the player.

Yes i think so too

But i don't think that M$ has restricted sound/bandwith.
That's to much work for an console like this  

Just a simple thought

[HiRoll3r]

The "jerky video" is actually because when using the more programs option the 360 is just acting as a dumb terminal. The video is being shown on the MCE PC and the 360 is just displaying the same thing. Hence the jerky video and no sound. I'm not 100% sure what the "Online Spotlight" does, but am I correct in assuming that it actually plays online video content from the Internet, or is it similar to "More Programs."

[G_A_V]

Its not so much limited bandwidth but more limited frames pr second.
I have tested it with Flash or any webpage with sound and no sound works at all under the more programs part of mce.
The Online spotlight is the same as the more programs tab, except this run at a faster fps and also uses sound, I have run videos from the content under online spotlight. so If I can fake the online spotlight then divx playback is possible

[fubarkid]

The answer to why "no sound works at all under the more programs part of mce" is answered already by HiRoll3r.  

QUOTE(HiRoll3r @ Jan 6 2006, 10:09 PM)

The "jerky video" is actually because when using the more programs option the 360 is just acting as a dumb terminal. The video is being shown on the MCE PC and the 360 is just displaying the same thing. Hence the jerky video and no sound."

Think of your Media Center PC as the server and the Xbox 360 as a client.  When you start a 'More Programs' application through a client/Xbox 360, the client connects to the server and tells it to run the application.  The Xbox 360 doesn't run anything and simply acts like a dual display of the server.  This isn't very efficient, hence the choppy framerates.  No sound because since the app is running on server, then sound is also outputted on the server.

So why does Online Spotlight have such smooth playback with sound?  That's because it serves Windows Media Content (i.e. wmv, wma files).  These files can be played natively on the Xbox 360.  So instead of acting as a dual display, the Xbox 360 streams/downloads those files and decodes them on the fly.  Now we get sound and smoother video playback.

This is why the current workaround divx playback is to use Windows Media Encoder.  It serves the content in the same manner as Online Spotlight.

[G_A_V]

Thats incorrect, if it were playing streams nativly then the requests would come from the xbox, not my pc
The content is streaming to the pc and then beeing dual displayed on the xbox 360
Having to select a file on your pc to convcert, then running that stream on the xbox 360 is a huge anoying work around.
I am sure once I get this code from the psp hack I can modify it to display divx videos on the xbox 360 smooth with sound.
Have you ever used any remote desktop client in windows ? the sound is transfered and played on the client.
If it were the network and software in efficenencies explain to me why it works ok on another windows workstation in IE or even through a more bloated remote viewing protocol like rdp ?
I am sure MS has put a limit on the fps transfered through my programs but not the online spotlight.t

[paul_phil]

I think the stream is directed striaght to the 360 using the online spotlight. I think the 360 actually has divx support though (if it didn't you wouldn't be able to see preview thumbnails of the video files in the browser), it's just disabled for playback of local files.

This idea sounds like a good work around though. Keep us posted

[tommiwan]

The media center operating system comes with a program that will convert videos from dixv or other formats to WMV.  Has anyone tried this?  I will be trying it tonight with a DVD that I ripped to Divx.

[eurodeseo]

QUOTE(tommiwan @ Jan 12 2006, 11:03 AM)

The media center operating system comes with a program that will convert videos from dixv or other formats to WMV.  Has anyone tried this?  I will be trying it tonight with a DVD that I ripped to Divx.

So how did it go?  Did you lose anything in the conversion like surround sound?

[JakeStriker2]

QUOTE(eurodeseo @ Jan 13 2006, 03:35 PM)

So how did it go?  Did you lose anything in the conversion like surround sound?