Mvisto DivX and ISO Pocket Media Player Review

published: 04/19/05 last updated: 04/19/05

Taiwan based MacPower & Tytech Technology Co., Ltd. (site) sent us their new Mvisto Pocket DivX and ISO Player for review. The small Linux powered player supports HDTV quality Video and Dolby Digital or DTS quality Audio. When those media players without displays first appeared on the market last year, I was not sure why I would need one. Comparing them in my mind to PVPs with display. Now that I tried to find a robust solution to play high resolution DivX videos on my TV in the living room, I learned to love those players. Read about the "why" below.

MacPower is selling the Mvisto through distributors. Contact MacPower to find out the nearest distributor for you. There seem to be more distributors in Europe as of yet.
The MSRP is 250 Euros (~$325) with a 40GB hard-drive.

mvisto dvix pocket player review av hdd video jukebox
Mvisto Pocket DivX Player Gallery

Overview
The Mvisto DivX Player works like an external USB drive, but has additional components to runs embedded Linux to view media on a TV. The Mvisto Player is not much bigger than a Notebook hard-drive enclosure. It measures 132x80x17mm. The test unit I received has a 40GB 2.5" HDD built-in. Enclosed in a brushed aluminum case the Mvisto makes a solid impression. The back side has the USB, AV and Digital Audio plugs. The front panel hides the Power LED and IR receiver for the remote control.

mvisto dvix pocket player review av hdd video jukebox

The Mvisto DivX player comes with video cable, slim remote, USB cable, digital Audio cable and power adapter.

Back to why I love this device. It solves my problem of playing hi-res DivX encoded TV Shows on my TV in the living room. The DivX videos have a resolution of 512x384 and 30fps. I had a Hauppauge MediaMVP (see review) in place for enabling this, but it does not work reliably and it takes up all CPU power on the streaming computer when watching DivX videos. As mentioned in the review Hauppauge plans to release a DivX onboard encoding solution in the future. It is just easier and more robust solution for me at this point to use a player like the Mvisto to playback videos on my TV than dealing with network issues or CPU power needs.
Now the Mvisto does much more than what I need. One important feature to highlight that many sure find exciting: The Mvisto can play ISO files. This means users can copy a full DVD onto the Mvisto and play it back including all DVD features (menus, subtitles, etc.). MacPower recommends dvddecrypter or dvdshrink software to copy DVDs to the Mvisto drive (of course keep in line with copyright regulations).

Mvisto supports also the DivX VOD (Video on Demand) format. More details on VOD at DivX.com.

mvisto dvix pocket player review av hdd video jukebox

Copy media files onto the external drive. Watch media on TV or Computer monitors.

Usage
The Mvisto connects via USB 2.0 as external storage. USB is also the power supply for the drive. Only when using the drive without a computer it needs the power adapter that plugs into the mini-USB plug. Audio, video and photos are organized in different folders. The folder structure can be freely changed and the folders also appear in the on-screen menu on the TV. The Mvisto player can be connected in many ways to TVs, monitors and audio systems. I connected mine via Composite to my TV. The On-screen menu looks nice with the black and yellow design. No manual needed here. The remote control and the on-screen menu are straight forward. See more TV screen-shots in the gallery.
The playback quality is great and I did not hit any snag there. It supports both PAL and NTSC, which does not make a difference for me as my TV supports both. In the settings screen the output formats can be chosen, including HDTV with 1080i. Playing music or viewing photos is also easy. The Audio player supports OGG, WMA and MP3 (see specifications below). Photos need to be jpeg format (up to 8MB).

mvisto dvix pocket player review av hdd video jukebox

SPDIF Audio plag, AV and USB.

mvisto dvix pocket player review av hdd video jukebox

On Screen Display of main menu. More hi-res photos in the Gallery.

Pvisto Quick Look
MacPower also sent us another product called Pvisto that is a card-reader with TV-Out to view photos on a TV. This device also comes with a small remote control and can view JPEG and Avi files on a TV. It accepts CF, Microdrive, SM, MS, MS-Pro, SD and MMC cards.

mvisto dvix pocket player review av hdd video jukebox

Pvisto Card Reader with TV-Out for Photo Viewing on TVs.


Conclusion
The Mvisto Pocket Media Player is an impressive gadget supporting a wide range of formats and standards. It's high resolution support (HDTV: 480p, 720p and 1080i), Dolby Digital 5.1 and digital audio-out makes it also at home in high-end home theaters. The small size on the other limits the storage-size to what 2.5" hard-drives can support these days (<120GB). Larger media players like the TVIX can offer more storage but are by far not as portable.


How to Buy
MacPower is selling the Mvisto through distributors. Contact MacPower to find out the nearest distributor for you.
The MSRP is 250 Euros (~$325) with a 40GB hard-drive.


More Photos
Hi-Res Photos in the Mvisto Pocket DivX Player Gallery


Specification of Mvisto DivX Pocket Player

Model No. MV-U2UGS
Color Silver (other colors available on request)
Case Material Brushed Aluminum
Application Any 2.5" Parallel ATA Hard Drive (Notebook size HDD up to 9.5mm)
Playback Media Formats
  • Video:
    MPEG-1 (AVI, MPG)
    MPEG-2 (AVI, VOB), ISO *
    MPEG-4 (AVI, DivX, DivX VOD, XviD) ***
  • DivX Subtitle:
    SUB, SRT, Embedded Multiple Subtitle support
  • Audio:
    WAV, MP3, MPEG-4 (AAC) ****, WMA, AC3, OGG Vorbis
  • Photo:
    JPG baseline and progressive up to 8 mega pixel
Supported Filesystem
  • NTFS
  • FAT32
  • HFS+
Operating System Embedded Linux (v2.4 ucLinux)
Bus Interface USB 2.0 High Speed (USB1.1 backwards compatible)
Output Interfaces
  • Video: NTSC/PAL Composite Video, S-Video, Analog YPbPr Video, SCART RGB, VGA, HDTV (480p, 720p, 1080i)
  • Audio: Dual Stereo Analog Audio supporting compressed Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS pass through
System Requirements
  • Windows 98SE, Win2000, WinME, WinXP
  • Mac OS 9.2 or higher
  • Your hardware device must have proper port or PCI card
Power Supply
  • External Power Adapter universal auto-switching (UL, cUL)
    Input: AC 100-240V, 0.4A, 50-60Hz
    Output: DC +5V/2A
  • USB Bus Power
Enclosure Size 13.2cm x 8.0cm x 1.7cm
Packing Contents

Optional Accessories
(click here)

  • Mvisto (no HDD included)
  • USB 2.0 cable, AV cable, SPDIF Coaxial Cable
  • Infrared Remote Control
  • Power Adapter
  • Manual, screw package, driver CD
  • **
Carton/Packing
  • Retail Box Size: 28.5cm x 19.5cm x 7.2cm
  • Carton Size: 60.0cm x 41.0cm x 38.5cm within 20pcs retail box
  • G.W. 19.5kg
Remark * ISO = One image file backup of the complete DVD. 'Mvisto' will play the ISO file exactly the same as if it was running from the original DVD!

** Additional accessories available on request

*** Official DivX Certified™ product. Plays DivX® 5, DivX® 4, DivX® 3 and DivX® VOD video content (in compliance with DivX Cerfitied™ technical requirements)

**** AAC stands for "Adaptive Audio Coding" and does not support AAC files created by iTunes!

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