I have a portable DVD reader/writer that connects through USB. It has a separate power supply. When I connect it to the PPM nothing happens. After reading up on the topic of DVD reader/writers and Android, I realise that to make this work, you need two things: 1) An Android device that supports OTG and 2) A driver called MLUSB DVD. I downloaded the driver but it still does not seem to work. Does PPM support OTG? Or is there any other way that I can play my DVD’s on the projector? (I have a whole bunch of DVD’s that are copy-protected in a way that does not let me rip them using DVDFab or Handbrake).
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There’s a way: use a DVD player that has a HDMI output, not a portable DVD reader, which is what you probably have. Those are what a computer would use to read the data from a DVD, the interpretation gets done inside the computer.
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Yes, I understand that. However, my DVD reader is really light and small, whereas my Blueray Player is big and bulky and not something that I would even consider bringing along on a trip. The number of small and light DVD players that I’ve come across can be counted on… one finger.
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I understand, I just wanted to tell you the way that I know would work.
As for your question regarding the use of a DVD data reader, perhaps @Philips_Support_P can answer that one for us.
Hi Hans, the projector does not require OTG cable, it is in USB-Host mode (like a computer) so you can connect your devices without an OTG cable.
But note that Android might not support every kind of peripheral through the USB port. Originally it was only designed for USB drives, later expanded to keyboard/mouse/soundcards. Most products that are class-compliant should work. But if it requires a special driver, unfortunately we can’t support it.
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Hi @Hans-Goran_Puke,
I know the followings lines will not answer directly your question, but still it may give you another idea on how to enjoy your DVDs while keeping the portability of the PPM.
In my case, I’ve used the DVD reader connected to my computer to get an ISO image of my DVDs. Then, copied the ISO files on a small external drive (Samsung T5), plugged the drive into the USB-A port of the PPM, and watched movies from the ISO files using VLC. It takes the time of creating the ISO files first, plus it requires an external drive with some free space on it, but it saves from carrying the DVD reader and the DVDs.
Cheers
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Thanks Arnaud. May I ask which software you used to create the ISO files?
My computer is a MacBook, so I use the provided disk utility tool to make an image of the DVD. This creates a .DMG file by default, or I can choose the .CDR format instead. CDR is very close to ISO, and sometime renaming a .CDR file to .ISO is enough, but both DMG and CDR files can be easily converted to the ISO format with a one line command in the terminal (hdiutil convert myINPUT.cdr -format UDTO -o myOUTPUT.iso).
On Windows, although I haven’t produced ISO files, I’ve used CDBurnerXP regularly in the past (to burn CDs) and always found it convenient and reliable, so I’ll try it first.
Note: KODI works well in reading ISO files, even better than VLC in my opinion.
OK, so I tried your method to store a DVD (Ally McBeal, Season 1, Disc 3) as an ISO file using the Disk Utility on my Mac and then convert it from DMG to ISO format. The file became 7GB in size. I transferred the file to a 32GB micro SD card and put it in the projector. Started up VLC pointed it to the file and then … Nothing. Well, actually VLC turned its cone a couple of time before the screen went black. I let it stand there for a couple of minutes just in case this was a startup problem. But no, nothing ever happened. (Which is strange, as VLC on the Mac could play the file without any problems). Tried the Media Player and the Media Center apps to. No luck. Tried Kodi. Works! However, playback is a bit choppy (I guess it loses frames every now and again) and if I enable subtitles, they flash like hell, so they are not usable at all. So so far, not much luck with playing DVDs without converting them first.
Next I will try a couple of ripping tools. The one I usually use - DVDFab - doesn’t work with this particular set of disks.
Please try this Hans-Goran, and then test with Kodi again:
Thanks IvoG, tried it. No difference, I’m afraid. I might have toggled the Keystone Correction setting before. I also tried to lower the number of buffers used by Kodi from 3 to 2 in the Advanced System Settings, but that made no difference either. I’d say that the playback is sufficiently good unless you turn on the subtitles.
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OK, I found a workflow that works for me.
- Use Apples Disk Utility to store the DVD as an image (with a .cdr extension)
- Start Handbrake and point it to the cdr
- For each episode, change the save file name and click in the subtitles wanted
- Move the resulting .m4v files to a folder on the NAS containing TV-series and let Plex and/or Emby serve them to the PPM
The time to rip and convert each DVD is about 30 minutes. Disk Utility and Handbrake can run simultaneously.
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Thank you for sharing your experience.
I did not mention it, but I first tried to read files from a micro SD card too, with no success at all (for sure a micro SD card is the best option for portability).
I’m glad you determined the workflow that suits best your need!
Cheers
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I bought this DVD writer and my PPX did not recognize it:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07PV958PN/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Anyone know which usb DVD writer works with the PPX for playing DVDs?
I tried the apps, True DVD and DISC LINK Platinum to play the DVD but no success. What’s the work around @Philips_Support_P ?
Nice, thank you for checking out that detail. Do you know if there are DVD reader/writers that work with the PPX?
Checking in again @Philips_Support_T. Do you know of a USB DVD reader/writer that can play DVDs on the the PPX?
Hello guys, we are sorry we cannot really help here. We don’t have such product on our testing lab.