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Popcorn Hour A-200
The natural successor to the hugely successful A-100/110 now upgraded with the same faster Sigma 8643 chip as the C-200. The main difference between this and the C-200 is the lack of Blu-Ray menu support. The casing is plastic rather than metal and has a (relatively quiet) cooling fan. The A-200 is formidable and represents great value. It has a much larger array of applications than any of the Realteks, is more powerful, has full HD-Audio support, and is getting close to mid-range Realtek price levels.
Update 23-Nov-2010: This player has now been superceed by the A-210. The specs are very similar with the main difference being no fan in the A-210.
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Links
• Official Website • Official Forum • Firmware Updates • A200 Compatibility List • AVSForum /A-200 • New Interface Video |
Reviews
• MPC Club • MediaSmartServer [Feb-2010] |
Places to Buy
• Amazon  
• Popcorn Hour Direct • Google Shopping     |
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Product Discussion There are 17 comments
November 17, 2010 - 01:36
Sep. firmware broke the TrueHD downmix - the interleaved 5.1DD track isn't handled any more. November 11, 2010 - 13:13
I am very disappointed. The fan on this device is so loud that it interferes with listening. So many stutters when playing movies or music that it is not usable. Really bad gaps between FLAC tracks when playing an album. Horrible to hear the noises generated. October 01, 2010 - 14:09
The A-200 since the 23rd September firmware does HD audio passthrough from single files (MKV, TS & m2ts) now - same as the C-200. @whammo: Look at MJB (MusicJukeBox) for a coverart jukebox for the 200 series audio side. The built in jukebox is hopefully being released this month for both the c & a 200 As to a non-fan version, no idea, mail Syabas and ask - but I doubt it (maybe an A-210?) September 22, 2010 - 07:52
does this unit have a GUI that supports album art (jpg) when playing music? also, does syabas have any plans to make a model with a heat sink instead of a fan? June 17, 2010 - 10:54
I am very satisfied as the owner of this A-200 player. Everything is up to my expectations without any issue so far. +1 for Syabas' good work on firmware updates! April 29, 2010 - 20:08
This review of the A-200 states that full DVD ISO menu support is present. Maybe this was added with a new FW? In any case, kindly update the specs to reflect this. April 09, 2010 - 11:02
True that they do not play HD audio from single file sources (MKV or TS files). Untrue on m2ts as long as they are in BD folder structures rather than files on their own. It is purely a bug in the single file player in the firmware. When the Disc player is used full HD audio is attained. My concern is that you state in your summaries that the C200 does not do DTS HD audio at all - which is untrue. You state that the WDTV live does HD audio passthrough (it does not according to WDs own site). The A-200 has the same features as the C-200 (except full BD support) but does not show HD mixdown. April 09, 2010 - 11:31
I've updated both Popcorn Hour pages and specs today and am confident both are now correct. DTS-HD MA for both is now listed as 'partial' in the specs and is discussed in more detail in the summaries. The WDTV live supports TrueHD passthrough but not DTS-HD MA. There is confirmation of this all over the various forums. April 11, 2010 - 12:01
They all need the HD audio options checking on their pages. If you check TrueHD or DTS HD passthrough in the search specs, the only PCH that appears in the results is the A-110. April 11, 2010 - 12:13
Both the 200 models appear for TrueHD passthrough, but neither do for DTS-HD MA because they don't fully support it. Our specs are correct! April 11, 2010 - 17:00
Sorry, but I get DTS-HD MA from my videos on my C-200. Your specs are NOT correct. April 11, 2010 - 17:15
Your own post above confirms that DTS-HD MA support is not full on the PH-A200! QUOTE: 'True that they do not play HD audio from single file sources (MKV or TS files)' Support for DTS-HD MA is partial. This is how we present it on our site and is entirely correct. Anything else would be misrepresentation. April 11, 2010 - 19:14
Then you should remove TrueHD as it does not do this from single files and you should also remove TrueHD and DTS MA from the A100 and A110 as they do not do HD audio from blu-ray structures. You should be consistent across the board if you are going to claim you are accurate. If you are going to remove a feature from an appliance because it cannot play it in a specific container then this rule should apply to ALL NMTs. You seem to be selective in your judgements. April 08, 2010 - 21:51
I would like to know what "does not yet support full HD-Audio" means as I have a C-200 and you report the same for that but I get full TrueHD and DTS-MA/HD from my machine bitstreamed or downmixed. Another thing is that your spec sheets are wrong in a lot of the listed player/features which will mislead people. April 08, 2010 - 22:25
It is widely reported that neither of the Popcorn Hour 864x players will pass DTS-HD MA audio from .mkv or .m2ts files, they will only pass the DTS core. The Popcorn Hour summaries could do with updating / clarifying though. It is a minor problem that will presumably be surmountable by future firmware update. If you find anything that you think is incorrect in our specs then please email us or leave a comment on the relevant page. We're not claiming 100% accuracy. We try our best. April 08, 2010 - 22:27
Actually, I see mistakes right here in the A-200 specs. January 15, 2010 - 09:30
If it won't stack I won't buy it. Leave a Comment
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Detailed Specification
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US$215
Point taken. There will be an effort to review things tomorrow.