The Iomega ScreenPlay Pro HD is a Windows-only stand-alone, single 1TB hard drive and NAS that you can attach to your TV and play media.
Iomega ScreenPlay Pro HD Multimedia Drive
Pros
Nice on-screen interface
Cons
Remote is difficult to use
Bottom Line
tk
Iomega ScreenPlay Pro HD
ScreenPlay Pro HD Multimedia Drive Review, by Jon L. Jacobi and Melissa J. Perenson, PC World March 24, 2009
However, as much as we liked the ScreenPlay Pro HD's on-screen interface, we found its remote difficult to use. Instead of opting for a few simple multifunction buttons, this unit has a slew of tiny, similarly-styled buttons whose functions aren't consistently applied in the interface. For instance, in some cases you back out of a page with the ‘left' button; at other times you must press ‘return'.
We would have foregone the remote altogether and used the controls on the face of the drive itself except that the box was one function shy of a full deck--none of the controls seemed to let you back out of menus. The ScreenPlay Pro HD will output full 1080 video it via HDMI, component, and composite jacks; audio output options include both analog and digital jacks. And you get composite video and analog audio inputs for recording video directly from a video source (using the one-touch record).
Other than the clunky remote interface, the unit worked very well with the media types it supported, including MP3, JPEG, and DivX. However, it wouldn't play high-definition WMV files or H.264 files, as supported by the DMA. The only playback glitch I noticed was that a 1280-by-544 X-Men DivX trailer I used for testing displayed full-screen with the edges off screen, instead of displaying as letterboxed.
Network copying performance from a PC to the device appeared adequate, except that the drive was frustratingly slothful at times in showing up on the network. Nor can it be configured via a browser. This is the only direct-connected drive in our roundup that has a 10/100 ethernet connection, not a gigabit connection; it's also the only one to include a USB Wi-Fi dongle, though streaming performance over Wi-Fi may be mixed.
--Jon L. Jacobi and Melissa J. Perenson
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Review Now! Already own it? Tell us What You Think
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Reviewed by: bbrown2008
Strengths: Great capacity, hooked up great, sounds/looks fantastic
Weaknesses: Slow network speed and VERY basic, boardline POOR interface see comments for further explanation.
Overall: This product works completely as indicated, however, with a little bit more effort on the interface this could have been MUCH better. The interface works from basic file structures, no alpha searches for ANYTHING . . . with 1TB of data it SHOULD have a way to search/sort or SOMETHING. We've resorted to playlists for the music which don't make up for the lack of search capabilities or even "jump to" based on an alpha list. Each time you?re done paying a music in a given folder, you return to the main screen you have to start at the top of your folder list ALL the time, it won't even "hold your place" where you were in the folders as a starting point. For the amount of space afforded even minimalist search capabilities should be there. We?ve put over 500 albums with over 350 artists thus far and it?s quite frustrating!
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