| D-Link DSM-320 Wireless Media Player, Audio/Photo/Video, 802.11g |
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| Features: |
Transfer Speeds Up to 54 Mbps
Supports all popular media formats
Allows you to access digital media content stored on your PC, browse your music files, watch your videos, and display your photos
Connects Wirelessly Using 802.11g or Via Ethernet
Compatible with Windows 98SE, Me, 2000 or XP |
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| Description: |
| D-Link DSM-320 Wireless Media Player - The Wireless Media Player from D-Link merges your abundant digital entertainment collection on your PC, with the comfort and convenience of your living room. It's slim design fits into entertainment centers easily, and once attached to your TV, you can wirelessly stream your audio, photo, and video files. Navigation of your content is easy with D-Link's intuitive user interface and included remote control! Audio Compatibility - MP3, WMA, WAV,&Radio AOL Video Compatibility - MPEG1, MPEG2, MPEG4, AVI, QuickTime,&XviD Image Compatibility - JPEG, JPEG2000, TIFF, GIF, BMP,&PNG |
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| User Reviews (143 total): |
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 of Total 7 Pages
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Awesome, April 22, 2005
By J. Goldberg (Centennial, CO USA)
The best Multimedia yet. It's great I didn't use the wireless since I have cat-5 by my TV for the xbox. It's great and works great with Window's Media Connect. Been getting better with each release of firmware.
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Get Listening to Online Music Today, April 19, 2005
By Samual H. (Oklahoma)
I also bought this so that I can listen to online radio via my entertainment center. This device works great for that. For all thsoe who are using wireless ... try wired, even if the wire looks bad, just try it, it's much more reliable and has more bandwidth available. It just makes more sense.
I like the user interface even though some things a little confusing. You get over that in about 2 minutes of using it. No biggy. Also make sure to upgrade the firmware if it doesn't automatically. It's a nice feature.
Also make sure all your MP3s have the right ID3 tags. Otherwise you wont know what songs you are about to play.
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Online Media ROCKS!, April 9, 2005
By Geek
I love the Internet and what it can bring to our computers. But this is a cut down version of a computer, so it costs less than a new PC. I can stream live radio over the Internet and out my entertainment system speakers. I can stream my MP3s straight from my desktop PC to my entertainment system speakers. AND my videos straight to my TV and entertainment systems speakers. See the advantage here?
So the setup was rather straight forward and not too complicated. If you read the instructions you will know what you are doing. Getting the files indexed on my PC took a little while because of how many MP3s and media I have stored on my 120GB hard drive. :) And the performance of this media player was rather well considering it's not all high powered and expensive.
Needless to say I greatly enjoy the convenience this provides me and the overall ease of use myself and my family find this product to be. I thank it's makers.
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Online Media Support is Excellent, April 8, 2005
By phil (USA)
I just ordered my second DSM-320.
The first one I bought for the Rhapsody music on demand service and as soon as I hooked it up I was addicted to it. The Rhapsody support (it also supports Radio AOL and Napster) make this thing one of the most 'killer apps' I've seen.
The icing on the cake for me and the reason I decided to buy another unit is that the video support turned out to be so good that I ended up continually moving it from my bedroom (for watching video) and my living room to listen to music.
For video, I have a basic and cheap video capture card in my PC which records in MPEG-1 which the DSM-320 play perfectly and in effect this setup can be used like a subscription-free DVR. Recently I have also been using it to play files orginating from my TiVo which were extracted using the TiVoToGo service.
The Rhapsody service supported by the DSM-320 is something that might not appeal to everyone given the $10 monthly cost of the subscription but to me I find the fact that I can run the Rhapsody service on my laptop in my living room and instantly play just about ANY music I can think of on the DSM-320 something that continually blows me away. This particular use has high 'wife acceptance factor' at least in my house and is one of those services that once you start you quickly begin considering your time before discovering it as the 'dark ages'.
Setting the unit up is no more or less difficult than setting up any other wireless network item although I would recommend a wireless G only network for streaming higher bitrate video.
The user-interface is simple to use, responsive and comprehensive. You can get to your PC based or online media very quickly and intuitively.
One last point: I also have owned a Linksys audio-only wireless media player which burned me badly in terms of media streamers. The DSM-320 is pretty much everything the Linksys unit wasn't, i.e. it delivers on what it promises and at least for me exceeded expectations.
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Upgrade Your Firmware - It's Automatic (Usually), March 31, 2005
By Red Yoshi (Mario Land)
I have to say that the best thing I did to make this work the way I want is to upgrade the firmware. This device is supposed to stay up to date by itself, but the first day I plugged it in there was no notice to upgrade the firmware. It wasn't until I was somewhat dissapointed in the product and tuned it off for the night did I remember that it should have an upgraded firmware. So in the morning when I booted it up, it told me there is a new fimrware available and I clicked OK and it upgraded itself.
THEN .. I was able to get everything working correctly. I could fast forward through videos, I could shuffle songs in folders, etc.
Overall I have to say that this product is a wonder product. I never thought I'd see the day when I got to play my movies from my PC onto my entertainment center so easily. I have so many small videos on my PC that I'd like to see full screen, but are just to pixelated when full screen on my 19 inch monitor. But that same video looks much better on my 27 inch TV. It's because of the resolution. I greatly enjoy the radio streams, and playlist features, plus I can't get enough of watching my pictures in slideshow mode. :)
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A Great Addition to any Home Entertainment Center, March 26, 2005
By Larry the Snake (I once was a man)
With the surround sound capability and s-video connections this thing can really pump out some quality sound and video. I heard new ones will do HD, but I don't even have an HDTV, so whatever.
I'm happy with this device even with its little hang ups. I wont mention them because I really don't come across them often and I think I've read enough about them on the Internet. Everyone is always complaining. Either way this works for what I want it to do. Play music on my *good* speakers, with a remote!
I always liked how my PC could handle all my MP3s and music and playlists and whatnot, but my PC is so far from my entertainment center and TV. Well now I can play my sweet tunes on my surround sound speakers and just crank it up to 11!
Installation was fairly simple, the remote is good enough, a little light for me, but it works. Internet streaming works great, and shuffle works great with the newest firmware. This thing even updates itself. Well almost, you just have to press OK a couple times to confirm that you want to upgrade.
I'd recommend it for those that live alone, otherwise you'd all be fighting for the remote and what streaming station to listen to next. :)
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Not bad for an MP3 streamer, March 25, 2005
By Auto/Technology Elite (California)
I originally wanted a simple MP3 streamer like the Netgear MP101, but received the DSM-320 as a birthday gift. I don't keep many movies or pictures on my PC as I'm not an avid home video maker and my wife prints all relevent pictures for scrap booking. As solely an MP3 streamer this piece of hardware works excellent. I have it setup on an 11g 128bit WEP signal, using a dynamic IP address and only experience a very minor skip or two every so often, not enough to be a burden or to be even noticed sometimes. When I got married, my wife and I had a combined 500 CD collection not including the doubles, so once I ripped and organized all of our music, I organized everything into genre playlists for my different moods or when we're entertaining guests. I do have some gripes.. .
1.) you have to force a refresh of any shared directory in the server software if you want the player to see new files or added files.
2.)directory browsing is agonizingly slow at times, especially through a 128bit encrypted signal. I patched it directly to my network, which improved browsing performance quite a bit. i spent enough time hiding all of my speaker wire and i have no interest in running and trying to hide a 50 foot CAT 5 running from my den to the family room.
3.)a front panel display would have been nice, much like the Netgear MP101, but you cant have it all. Turning on the TV everytime i want to navigate can be annoying at times.
This kind of hardware can be very usefull in many aspects, especially in a Home Entertainment system. I considered a high volume CD changer before the inception of this kind of technology. Now that I own the DSM-320, entertaining guests with some tunes or relaxing on the couch to some smooth beats is easy especially if you have a vast audio library.
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I <3 the Radio@AOL Feature!, March 25, 2005
By Kris R. (Texas)
I don't use this much to view/play my movies or pictures. I stream my MP3s and play the Radio@AOL all the time though.
I can choose from a bunch of channels and it's almost always something new that I haven't heard for weeks. I usually turn this on in the morning while I'm getting ready instead of the news like I used to.
Installation and setup of this device were done pretty quickly if you follow the guide that comes with it. Although it's pretty self explanitory. I wish I didn't have to have another remote to use, but until I can get one big remote for all my junk, err entertainment options, then I wont complain.
The remote is easy to use and you can tune into a Radio@AOL channel with the greatest of ease. Personally I'd recommend this for that reason alone.
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I Recommend it to Friends and Family, March 23, 2005
By Mike Terrible (Oregon)
First I have to say I see where people are coming from when they say not everything works the way it should.
BUT
There is a huge advantage to useing this device than most others. OK the price is right on this, and that's not very argueable since everything else that I saw that can play videos over your home network is priced a lot higher. The big advantage is that it can play video, and does it pretty well. Yes soem videos can't play, but this media player from D-link actually plays more videos than I can on my PC. Yep, this media player has more codecs than my PC. I don't really know where to get codecs or how exactly they work, but I do know this media player can play about 95% of all my videos.
Plus this has surround sound capabilities, easy setup and interface, a nice remote, and the server software isn't THAT bad. The server software is a little laggy sometimes, and I have to restart it on occasion, but it's hardly a burden.
Overall I have to give this device 5 stars because it does work fine for me. I can play streaming radio, all my MP3s, most of my videos, and browse through my pictures with the greatest of ease.
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Good media server, March 21, 2005
By Luke (Tacoma WA)
This is a good little machine to play your digital media on. My wife just did not see the sense in buying a whole new computer for a media server so this was our middle ground. Now that we have it, she loves it. We have every CD in the house burned into MP3s and WMAs and now she can boom them over the home stereo. I do have one piece of advice about this though. Get Windows Media connect and run it instead of the media server that comes with it. The the windows server the browsing is faster and you can use your Window Media Player playlist (otherwise you have to set up play list through the player itself, very painful if you have alot of files). You can also play sercure WMAs using the windows media connect.
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Good audio; video compatability spotty at best, March 14, 2005
By SimonTuck (Boston, MA USA)
I read dozens of reviews before purchasing this player so I expected a few gliches and realized that the player wouldn't support some of my files. As a bit of a tech nerd, I thought I could work around many of these issues; and I could. Here are some problems that I (and others) have come across and how I addressed them: First, the player does not support divx and WMV. This is extremely annoying, but I found two sollutions to play divx files. If the file is small, you can convert it to a mpg at about 2x using the free TMPG video encoder. I have a lot of half-hour length TV shows encoded in Divx and was able to convert them in approximately 8 - 10 minutes each. The second option is to use Nero's Media Home server which encodes files on the fly as you play them over your Dlink. This is great for larger files or if you don't want to take the time to re-encode a large library of files. The only downside with this is that it takes considerable CPU resources so if you don't have a ton of memory and want to use your computer at the same time you could be frustrated. Neither of the afore-mentioned fixes will work with WMV files. Dlink will likely resolve this with a future firmware release, but if download video files from places like MLB.tv you'll still have to hook your computer up to your TV to view them. The ability to stream baseball games to my TV without using a computer was one of the main reasons I got the player so I am especially frustrated with this non-feature. The second issue I have come across is the hit and miss playing of some supported movie files (AVI and MPG). I frequently get the "File not supported" error even while the video still plays in the background. I haven't been able to work around this yet, but know it has nothing to do with the files themselves as I am often able to play files seamlessly one day and the next I get the error every five minutes. It is probably that this has something to do with the wireless network. Currently my Dlink is the only device on my network and the wireless router is only 8 feet away streaming at 54 mbps. I refuse to even try to connect it wirelessly as I see this as defeatist. The whole idea with a device like this is that you want to play files on your computer which is likely in your office or den on your home entertainment center in your living room. Devices like this should be used wirelessly. My only problem with audio is that the device doesn't play my lossless WMA files. This wasn't a big deal for me since less than 10% of my files are encoded at this extremely high bitrate and I was able to easilly re-encode them at a still high, but playable rate.
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Some good, some bad -- I'm enjoying it on balance, March 12, 2005
By Joel Cohen (Amesbury, MA USA)
There's both bad and good to say about this one.
Ok here are the downsides I have experienced:
1. Crummy reception, weak range. I had to move my router much closer to the unit before I could get clear signal with no dropouts, and the video feeds STILL tend to choke.
2. Miserable onscreen display, finding files is inordinately slow and messy.
3. Cranky remote control. The unit sometimes jams for no discernible reason
4. Tech support -- the guys you call haven't got a clue.
On the other hand --
I enjoy AOL radio and Live365 radio (available with the latest firmware update).
MP3 files from my hard disk play OK, once I can locate them.
This unit will do some useful things for you if you are willing to give it some TLC. It's reasonably priced and looks OK in a stack of sound/video components.
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Not perfect but fun, March 11, 2005
By blixacave (Forest Lake, MN USA)
I have had my DLink for over a month now. I have enjoyed it and it has passed the wife test. She can just turn the box on and find a video and she is on her way. We listen to music on both the online media and music from my network. Now you know how fun it can be here is the rest of the story.
1.Do not use the wireless. First of all the 2.4 GHz frequency is so over used it is a wonder that any of the equipment runs at all. I have plugged mine direct into my switch.
2.Upgrade the firmware ASAP. This is easy and painless.
3.Be sure you have a stable back end box. I have a dedicated box as I found that if you push the box to hard the content does not arrive at the DLink very well. Is this the fault of DLink, I do not think so but it really was not a big deal for me to build a box but it may be a pain for those not able to do so
4.The media connection software is not the best as anytime you have a new file dumped in the folders it is watching the folder has to be refreshed. You can schedule it but I have found that if you a lot of content the media server become unavailable to the DLink. I got around this by a script.
5.It does not play AVI which is a pain but it is a quirk I have gotten use to. I just convert all the files to mpeg.
6.I enjoy the online media but you need to subscribe to three of the four offered and live365 is not the best. It would be nice if you could listen to any Window media play or Real played enable radio station.
7.It can and does lock up. It has happened twice as my son turned it on then off then on in a short amount of time and it just froze.
All these things said it has been a blast. My media connect server is also my PVR so I just have all files copied to my NAS server which and the media connect server pulls from it. I did not want to thrash my hard drive. Anyway it does need improvement but I people like me did not buy these boxes and send feedback to the vendor the products will not get to the point that the people below will not have anything to complain about. If you are technically inclined and are use to technology not being perfect then I would recommend you purchase this item.
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This product requires more work from D-Link, February 17, 2005
By ex D-Link (Florida)
An avid D-Link fan I am. Their routers and Wi-Fi equipment are top notch. But the DSM-320 is not as good as I expected. In fact I think it is quite bad. My bet is that you would be dissatisfied with it and return it (as I did). Especially if you have a large amount of music and especially if it is Classical music. After having numerous problems finding a proper location in my house (I experienced a lot of drop-outs) I finally found one but it did not at all agree with where I really wanted it placed. The reception capability is weak and is definitely going to cause you a problem unless your computer is in the same room as the MediaLounge (God forbid!). Now, I have meticulously given my mp3 files proper names, artists, etc. We all know that the tags are often wrong especially on older recordings. But the darn MediaLounge uses the tags to display the music rather than the file name so it becomes a real mess. And, the real killer is - the unit can not display enough characters to allow me to see which movement of a particular piece of music is being played as such information typically is truncated due to the number of character limitation! Enough is enough so I decided to return it despite the expense of paying for re-stocking and return freight. But before I returned it I wrote to D-Link about my experience. They did not bother to answer or offer any encouraging news about updates or anything. Save yourself the agony and wait until something better comes around and be sure to check that whatever new comes out does not have the same limitations and weaknesses I mentioned above.
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DO NOT BUY IF YOU USE WINDOWS 98SE!!!!!!!!, February 10, 2005
By jtherrien (Seattle, WA USA)
This product does not support the ID tags for your WMA files in Win98 SE, so you are not able to sort by album, artist or genre. D-link's tech support has no fix for this, and will tell you to run Windows Media Connect, which is not available for Windows 98. Your only option if you have WMA files is to convert them to MP3's.
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Awesome player, February 9, 2005
By KennyC (Yokota Air Base, Japan)
I am totally impressed with the D-Link media player. I use to hook up my laptop to my TV and stereo system to listen to the internet radio or listen to music files from my wireless network, but now it is a thing of the past. Thanks to my media player. The online radio and watching photos is a blast. Watching videos at first was a little choppy at times and some of my videos I couldn't even watch for whatever reason. Since I have downloaded the latest and greatest firmware along with windows media connect software, I'm able to watch all my movies like watching it from my DVD player. For those reading this, I strongly recommend that you download WINDOWS MEDIA CONNECT from the Microsoft website. It enhances the streaming of your videos, music files, and photos with a wireless connection. This digital media player is off the hook. Get it!! I hope you enjoy it as much as I do and my family enjoys it as well.
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Fantastic potential, poor execution., January 26, 2005
By Mark T. Shillingburg
I just couldn't wait to get my feet wet in the Wireless Media player arena. I chose the DSM-320 for several reasons. It was inexpensive enough to use as a "proof-of-concept" platform. The idea was to use a LinkSys NSLU2 (with USB harddisk) as an always on media server over my wireless network. For the $150 that the DSM-320 cost me it would be okay if it did not work at all.
To my delight, the DSM-320 has been more than satisfactory in playing Music and Photos. The video has left something to be desired, however, I have found a couple of recipes that permit me to watch DVD quality video (MPEG2) without pauses or skips.
With promises of updated firmware, the DSM-320 may actually reach it's advertised potential. Working with the wireless requires a lot of patience and knowledge of your access point and wireless operations. I have used it with three different routers and it has worked best with the D-Link DI-624 and okay with the Netgear WGR614. I also ended up using an external 7dbi antenna on the DSM-320 to maximize the wireless connection.
Would not recommend this to users who are not familiar with MPEG encoding or wish to use it with a wireless network and do not know how to reconfigure your wireless network parameters.
For the bleeing edge techoids, it can be a very fun toy.
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Robust and Good Features to Price Ratio, January 15, 2005
By Master Pwn4ge (Idahoian Pwntatoes)
Although this device does leave a bit to be desired it shines when it comes to playing your media on the big screen.
First of all this was very easy to setup and get working.
Just plug it into your network via Ethernet cable and TV and go through the setup wizard. Then on the PC running the media server software just point to the folders/directories you want to share with the media player.
I was able to hear my songs great with no hiccups. Same with video, although I did get some files that can't play. But from what I've read D-Link will be providing automatic upgrades to add the new codecs in so the player can read all files.
I also love the Internet radio feature. I can read my napster files on my PC, plus stream AOL radio. AOL radio works great and I've only incountered a couple of hiccups, but I later learned it was because my kids were downloading some big files or something.
Overall this is a nice piece of equipment that works well with what it needs to do. Plus it is priced so much better than all other network media players that can play video. Very nice!
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It just does not work, January 12, 2005
By A. Rothbaum
Unless you are some kind of computer software engineer or love to build things like train sets or models this unit is a complete piece of junk. You must be ready to troubleshoot the firmware upgrades, installing Windows Media Connect and still spend the entire weekend setting this thing up. I even found a message board online with a community of owners discussing problems, d-link tech support aggrevations and general complaints. The only positive areas are where people have found ways to work around all the problems this thing has.
After all the bad reviews I read, I was still stupid enough to buy the DSM-320 because I really want to stream media from my computer to my home stereo. What a mistake. It is not a plug and play media device!!! I am a music lover and fairly comfortable working my way around the computer, but this thing is a beta model. Now why would I want to buy a product that has known issues and wait for the company to fix them and release the upgrades? I have microsoft for that! D-link should be ashamed of putting this product out to the public. I am returing it today.
So in short, DON'T BUY THIS PRODUCT!
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totally junk !!!!`, January 11, 2005
By Chiu M. Luk
wireless doesnt work and ethernet still doesn't work
wasted an hour ... I have tried another $99 similar product from huggcences which works great except it's wired no wireless
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