I'm a home theatre buff and was dealing with some DLNA daemons at home.
My dedicated home theatre is running a Panasonic 60" ST60. (awesome picture!) and a Pioneer VSX-1028 receiver with matching 7 Polk speakers and 2 12" Polk subs. This setup is PICKY on video formats and codecs.. Active 3D
My living room tv is a Sony 55" 802A with a Sony wireless sound bar. This is my TV slutt... She will play anything you throw at her. Picture is nice for an LED... Just our everyday family room TV. Passive 3D..
The kids have Samsung 32" panels in their rooms
We have a 46" Samsung in our bedroom.
My main drive where all my movies and media is stored is a 4TB WD Live Book Duo. (Using this instead of a PC to save on power)
DLNA was a nightmare... The Panasonic ST60 would only play 5% of the movies on my WD live book. Most were "unsupported format" and having to convert the movies was a PITA... Especially 1080P 3D stuff and 13GB a movie...
The Sony was ok, sometimes it glitched and I had to stop the movie and resume it and all was good.
The kids TV had access to movies we didn't want to kids to watch (horror, violence, etc.. ) the built in DLNA server on the WD live book was not very good at setting accounts and access levels..
Samsung in our bedroom would freeze at times but we rarely use DLNA up there..
I got fed-up of not being able to enjoy my home theatre to watch the movies I wanted to. I was going to just buy a digital player like a Roku and add be done with it... Loosing the built in DLNA from the TV and possibly have issues with 3D...
After doing some searches, I found programs that need a dedicated PC to run as a server. Such as Plex, Myth, Tversity, etc... But then I found TWONKY! Never even heard of them before! I found an SSH script to install it on my WD Live Book Duo. I ran the free trial for a day. Has its own web interface hosted by the WD Live Book for configurations accounts etc..
When TWONKY detects a DLNA capable device it configures itself for proper transcoding to that device! It transcodes on the fly to my Panasonic ST60! now my ST60 plays anything! You can also rate your music and movies like on iTunes and have favorites and play lists! It also controls content to my kids TV ! No more glitching on any TV because the transcoding is giving the TV exactly what it wants!
I'll admit, I rarely pay for software... I will even search for hours for a key or crack for a program worth under $20.. Not with TWONKY! That server program saved me so much time and headaches, I didn't even wait for the trial to expire! I bought it right away (Only $19.95) and worth every single penny!
It also aggregates files from other devices that enter my network! My wife's medial library on her Android phone was automatically copied over to the WD Live Book and files with my other music just by connecting to the network!
I'm now in DLNA heaven!
That is all.
