How are you guys handling movies on a fat client?

[cmhardwick]

I know the thin client with internal player will not work. I'm the one that brought that to his attention. I'll try to look this weekend and play around with it and see if I can get it to work. Again, to make sure, you are talking about using the internal player, not external such as Zoom Player (yes, if you configure it, you can still do this).

[Jay]

I'd take either right now. It's just that I didn't want to bother them about a player that isn't theirs.
And OK on your notifying them about the thin client. I had assumed it worked - until I tried it.

[Jay]

In fact, I'd prefer the VLC external. Reason - I had DL'd some vid apps recommended on this board. Shortly afterwards, My Vista MS DVD Maker blew up every time I tried to take a home movie and burn it to a DVD. I didn't make any association with that and my internal player playback problems after ripping commercial DVDs to my HD at that time, playing on the interal at the time.
I just ran an app called codec sniper which supposedly checks the integrety of your codecs and directshow modules.
It told me many DirectShow, a Windows DVD Maker dll and codecs were messed. I don't know where to go to fix/replace those the files yet, but as you know, VLC contains it's own codecs so it works.
Just need to find the correct command syntax to get it to open in the second monitor automatically. WAF

[cmhardwick]

Tested, even setting the event on the "server" as a server event (click on the event group such as play movie under MOVIES then look at the upper right of the setup screen, next to MultiThreaded) won't make it play on the "server", only locally when using a fat client. My thinking for this is, in Steven's way of thinking, if you have the fat client you are wanting to host audio and video from that machine so I don't think there is a provision to have it trigger a movie at the server. You can control audio because of the multiple zones (each fat client being one or more zones). Thin clients work fine launching and controlling external players.
Is there a reason you want the full client on that machine as well? Just curious. Eventually I would like to have multiple fat clients, basically one per TV in the house so my wife could watch one movie or TV episode on one TV while I did the same on another. If I just want audio and lighting control, etc, I'll use thin clients and zones.

[Jay]

Ha! I never noticed 'server event' and ''multithreaded' options in the upper right.

Why a fat client? All content is on the server. I only want movie control from the client.
My scenario is having the theater monitor attached to the server (obviously) and 1 or 2 screens is irrelavent at this point.
The fat client would be next to my viewing chair. This device will be free to control lighting, use the XL Web browser, etc. I thought it would be a nice touch to also use it to control the movies' functions - adjust volume, scene select - the usual stuff - without interfering with the current view on the screen.

But more to the point.
My server is in my barn about 200ft from the house. I modulate audio and video to Channel 79. Using any client, I can play music in the house, of course. So, if I'm in the house, I can launch a movie with the thin client, but after that, I have no access to the player controls. If I launch with the fat client, the movie plays on it - even with 'server event' checked on both server and fat client - as you know.

[Jay]

Anyway, got the thin client to control the internal player. Thanks CMH

Not VLC, of course.

I guess my next big decision is whether to restore the system because I have so many broken codecs that I can't play many of my movies on the internal player

[cmhardwick]

Ok, how did you get the thin client to control/trigger the internal movie player? I cannot get this to work on my systems. Music, no problem, movies on internal won't play from the internal player.

[Jay]

Well, I can't duplicate it It worked that one time, then zip. And that, it turns out was a thin client from 2004.
I installed the latest from pre-rel 7. No good. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I was told there's a known bug and it's not a high priority, as I interpreted their email.

Sorry to get your hopes up then dash them. Best I can do is start the movie on the server, then pause, play and adjust volume on the thin client. If I start a movie from the thin client, I just get audio.

A Web client does nothing.

I imagine you're seeing the same.

Until this is sorted by Calrad, it appears that I'll need to keep 2 monitors on the htpc and launch an external player on 1 while keeping XL free to do other stuff on the other screen. And that is a real pain because I'll need to wire a touch screen from the CPU thru the floor and up to my chair - unless there's such a thing as a wireless thouch screen.