Popcorn Hour A-200

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The Popcorn Hour A-200 has not gotten a ton of reviews, but given its relatively new life on the market that’s to be expected. Of course, after Cedia a lot of the buzz was around the Popbox from Syabas, so you will want to consider that before making any investments in this or any other media player. I’m a fan of the UI, but disappointing to see some issues at this price point.

 

Media Smart Server

Now for the big one, bitstreaming of HD Audio. It seems more and more this is the first question that is asked when a new player is announced, can it bitstream DTS(MA) and TrueHD. It also became somewhat of a hotly debated topic with the C-200. The A-110 was capable of bitstreaming HD audio from standalone m2ts files, so it was expected that this same feature would apply to the C-200 (adding to the confusion is that the specs do state Audio Pass-Through of DTS-HD and TrueHD). However, it was discovered that the C-200 could in fact not bitstream from standalone m2ts files, only from Blu Ray disc structures (i.e. ISO or BDMV). It appears the lack of this feature is due to the new Sigma chip that is used with the C-200, so there is still hope that this “bug” can be resolved soon enough.

 

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