TESTING METHODOLOGY - RESULTS

     After thinking it over i have decided on performing the same exact tests for all the Media Players i review. This occurred right after some of you emailed me while on my previous position asking for a more reliable methodology when testing such players/recorders. To be honest this may complicate things but it should also save me quite a bit of time. So from now and on testing will be performed with the help of 4 specific MKV media files and several BDISO, MOV, RMVB and AVI ones, with bitrates of up to 35Mbps, something which as many of you know is not easy to come by. Of course the 4 specific MKV files are ones i ripped myself from 4 Blu-Ray titles i currently own in order to not only manage to hit the desired bitrate of up to 35Mbps but also use specific, high detailed scenes. My good old SONY 55A2000 (already 3+ years old but still my favorite) along with my latest Panasonic TX-P42S20 are the two screens i will be using for testing. In due time and when i finally see a 3D Screen that really makes me want to buy it i will also start using 3D material for testing but currently that is simply not possible and so i can't comment on 3D results. As for sound the audio/video amplifiers used with the two screens are the Yamaha RX-650 and the Yamaha RX-V463 coupled with 5.1 systems by TANNOY and Crystal Audio.

        As many of you know I’ve been a Sigma Designs supporter for the past years but Realtek has really started taking things seriously and so the RTD1186 is amongst the best HD chipsets i have ever seen not only because of its specifications but also because of the end result which is almost on par with the best Sigma chipsets currently available. Colors are vibrant, audio output is very good and crystal but i did say almost and so i did experience some freezing’s and some smoothness issues when playing BDISO files. Egreat has a beta firmware available which resolves most of those issues so if you do come across something like that feel free to contact us to give you the latest download link, however don't expect official support for a beta release so use it only if you have to (if it ain't broken don't try to fix it). Also as mentioned earlier audio playback was very good but as always i really think that media players have a long way to go before they actually playback audio at the same level as professional players. I did encounter a few connection/speed issues with the new Gigabit LAN which were also somewhat resolved with the latest beta firmware (speed is not the best), still i don't think people buy such devices to surf the web. On the bright side the external Wi-Fi Antennas proved to be quite useful since i was able to connect my system with the R300 at a range of no less than 18 meters with 3 concrete walls in between.

     Bellow you will find 4 different screenshots from the 4 specific MKV media files i mentioned above featuring a bit rate between 20 and 35Mbps. The resolution has remained unchanged (however the files are compressed to JPEG to save space on the server) at 1920x1080.