INTRODUCTION

   One of the things i really like about the electronics industry is that no matter how many manufacturers there are at this exact moment in time there will always be more around each day that goes by and so although I’ve been testing hardware (standalone) media players for the past 5 years (or so) i have yet to cooperate with all of them something which some of you keep reminding me from time to time (as you should). Xtreamer may not be the most famous hardware media player manufacturer (A.C.Ryan is and unfortunately they are not doing well so that means little nowadays) but they've been around almost from the very beginning (i think they were established in late 2008/ early 2009) and they are known to manufacture cost-effective yet feature-rich solutions. So since their latest media player & streamer is called the Prodigy Black and has been around for over a year we thought it was about time that we took it out for a test drive.

   The Xtreamer was built by several Korean companies backed up fully by the semiconductor chipset manufacturer and launched under the Mvix chain of partners worldwide. It is their purpose to create a device that will compete with DVD and will become a global leader in its online segmented market. The innovative and cutting edge technology in the design and development of the product is expected to bring about dramatic growth since media players have being widely accepted as a real option for playing HD content on TV. The experience and expertise from all manufacturing partners to combine both television and computer technology will make the Xtreamer product highly adaptable to the constantly evolving IT industry. The Xtreamers are distinguished by their aggressive price, innovative features, manufacturing qualities, functionality and design. Our European HQ is located in NL. Our devices are aimed at the online-only market so as to retain a competitive price that will be attractive to the end-user. You will not be able to find them in retail stores anywhere which means you'll pay less. It is our strategy to constantly depend on your input to help make our products great for everyone. It is our way to value your investment of time and money in our devices. By unleashing the creativity from our ever-expanding community of super-users and open source developers, the world's smartest and most passionate consumers, and encouraging our community to work side-by-side with our internal development team, we hope you will get greater value for you money. Welcome to the affordable world of Media Streaming of Xtreamer.

   Xtreamer released two versions of the Prodigy Media Player & Streamer in the market, the silver and the black which is also the unit we have here with us. The only difference between both models is that the black also features an dual DVB-T MPEG4 decoder so unless you need that particular feature you can save a few bucks by going after the silver model (unless you really like black). Specs-wise both the silver and black models feature an Android based OS, the latest Realtek RTD1186DD HD decoding chipset, 512MB SDRAM, 256MB Flash Memory, HDMI 1.4, built-in Wi-Fi, Gigabit LAN, 7.1 pass-through, USB 3.0 host port, card reader and interior space for a 3.5" drive. Now I’m not really much of an Android OS fan when it comes to media players since it's not really "needed" nor was it designed for that specific purpose but leaving that out the Prodigy Black by Xtreamer seems to have pretty much everything one would ever hope to find in a hardware media player. The only thing that remains is to see just how well all these features work together so let's move forward with our testing.

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

The player arrived inside a large white box with a product image at the front, the Xtreamer logo and several icons pointing to the specifications of the unit.

A few words about the Prodigy line are present at the right side.

Two product images are placed at the rear right next to the features and specifications lists.

The player is located between two pieces of Styrofoam and the rest of the bundle is placed inside a long cardboard box.

Inside the box you will find pretty much everything including the Prodigy Black media player & streamer, remote control, DVB-T Antenna, HDMI cable, USB 3.0 host cable, RCA cables, 4 HDD mounting screws, quick start guide, products catalog and the AC power adapter.

THE PRODIGY BLACK

Xtreamer packs a nice and long remote control with the Prodigy black, however the buttons are quite small so if you have large fingers that may be a problem. On the bright side the buttons are light sensitive so they illuminate in the dark (I’d rather Xtreamer had placed light illumination but better than nothing).

At first glance the Prodigy Black looks a lot like some mini DVD & A/V amplifier combos so it's quite good looking (largely thanks to the brushed aluminum cover).

However it is somewhat large compared to other similar solutions like the TViX Xroid A1 (the mini players are mostly for general reference).

Three things stand out from the front fascia, the audio control knob (doubles as a power on/off button), the IR receiver and the SD/MMC card reader.

The 3.5" drive tray is placed at the far right and as you can see it has several logos printed on it.

To install an 3.5" drive you just need to pull the tray out, mount the drive (inverted), secure it with the available screws and push it back in (we didn't and it worked fine).

The top brushed aluminum cover extends to both sides of the player.

The company logo is placed at the top.

As expected all the available connectors are placed at the rear of the unit. So from left to right we see the Wi-Fi Antenna, two USB 2.0 ports, USB 3.0 host port, A/V RCA connectors, component video connectors, HDMI 1.4 port, gigabit LAN, digital audio out (optical & coaxial), DC power in and finally the Antenna in and out connectors.

At the belly of the player we see several perforated sections and what seems to be a section ready to install an exhaust fan. I did remove it but i was unable to find a way to mount something on it, instead i was able to take a closer look at some of its interior components (so no real reason to remove the cover).

Xtreamer has placed a large aluminum heatsink above the RTD1186DD (passive cooling).

Four Nanya DDR3-800/1066/1333/1600 128MB SDRAM memory modules are present on the main PCB.

Hynix is the supplier of the onboard flash memory module (256MB).

USING THE PRODIGY BLACK

Before using the unit i decided to check the official support page (standard procedure) to download the latest available firmware update. Well right now the available firmware update on the official support page is v3.5 RC6 (release candidate) however if you check the community forums you will find the v3.5 RC10 and soon the latest v4 firmware (some have it already).

Xtreamer is using by far the best looking GUI (graphical user interface) i have seen with any hardware media player and it provides you with a plethora of settings (can even use the unit as a NAS and FTP server) to adjust. However that's not all so you can also download and use various android targeted applications, download information about your audio and video library and you can even download subtitles for your video files. The in-play menus are also very nicely done although some of them take too much space when used.

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 in the process. So from now and on testing will be performed with the help of 4 specific MKV media files and several BDISO (when possible), 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 5 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.

     The first hardware media player i ever tested that carried the android OS was the TViX Xroid A1 and back then i was somewhat excited to see such a solution, until of course i started testing and problems started to appear one after the other (most of those were later resolved but still the unit was far from perfect). Today android based hardware media players have improved quite a bit but still are not what they should be and so although they offer amazing menu detail and countless applications for you to choose from in the end no matter how you see it the android OS was never designed for such use. Because of that the Prodigy Black slows down quite a bit when you start using android compatible applications. Perhaps the Realtek RTD1186DD chipset is simply not powerful enough to sustain android OS usage but the why is not as important as the end result. On the other hand however the Prodigy Black excels when playing Full HD media and it can even reproduce the heaviest media files i have (even a 30GB MKV rip of the latest Avengers BD) with very good image and audio quality. Since the Prodigy Black is based on the latest Realtek RTD1186DD solution it can also playback BDISO files successfully and without serious slowdowns in the menus (happened a few times with the Avengers BDISO). We did encounter some slow data transfer rates when using the Gigabit Ethernet connection but that only happened a couple of times when transferring extremely large media files. The dual DVB-T MPEG4 decoder worked ok although we had to scan twice in order to find every available channel (it missed two the first time).

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

CONCLUSION

   Up until roughly 6 months ago i admit that i didn't have best opinion in the world about Xtreamer mainly because i really thought they were just another OEM manufacturer (the limited reviews online also supported that) producing mediocre products at best. Today i feel almost the same way i did when i first received and reviewed a hardware media player by A.C.Ryan quite a few years ago (who knows they just might pull through from their current situation). I am saying this because Xtreamer seems to put a lot of weight on their firmware (just like A.C.Ryan) and so the end result is not only a great looking GUI but also a plethora of available features and settings for you to play with and almost zero bugs. Another similarity with A.C.Ryan is that they also allow users to take an active role in their forums regarding the features found in new units and firmware updates. The only problem i did encounter with the Prodigy Black were some slight factory issues with the quality of the enclosure so i guess their quality control is not perfect (it rarely is with any manufacturer) but that's something you can easily spot and report to them.

   Since Xtreamer is not a very large manufacturer their products are not available in every single store but currently you can find the Prodigy Black for USD234.99 in the USA (Amazon) and at around 200Euros inside the EU a price tag which is not very high considering we are not talking about just a hardware media player but also an dual DVB-T MPEG4 Tuner. It would be nice if Xtreamer was able to lower the price a bit just to make the Prodigy Black more appealing to potential buyers but i see nothing wrong with its price as is right now. Overall the Prodigy Black is a very good hardware media player but what really separates it from most of the competition is not the android OS but rather the built-in dual DVB-T MPEG4 tuner which allows you to watch one channel and record another at the same time. So for all of the mentioned pros the Prodigy Black by Xtreamer receives our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality (Excluding A Small Mark On The Enclosure)
- Design
- Picture/Audio Quality
- USB 3.0 Host Port
- Built In Wi-Fi
- Android OS
- Dual DVB-T MPEG4 Tuner
- 3.5" Drive Tray
- Card Reader 

CONS

- Slow Android Response
- Price (For Some)
- Product Availability