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PS2 Gets A Working Divx Player 150

Posted by Hemos from the no-sorenson-yet dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Over the weekend, the PS2reality team released the first working Divx player for the Playstation 2. Site is in spanish, so try using babel for translation. Works with Divx 3 and up. You can also swap your avi cd-roms if you have a modchip or you can use the other various swap techniques out there for the PS2. Divx player does require some way of booting the homebrew program, either no-swap modchip or modchip+bootdisc( e.g swap magic, gameshark, etc.) would work."
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PS2 Gets A Working Divx Player More

PS2 Gets A Working Divx Player

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  • Or.... (Score:5, Informative)

    by GeorgeH ( 5469 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @09:48AM (#4792792) Homepage Journal
    If you don't want to deal with modchips and swapping you can get a Qcast [broadq.com] for $50 (thinkgeek sells 'em too) and play MP3, OGG, MPEG and DivX files streamed from a Windows, Mac OS X or Linux system over the network.

    • Re:Or.... (Score:3, Informative)

      by Mysticalfruit ( 533341 )
      I went out and bought a copy of Qcast a couple of months ago and I like it. It works as adverstised. The only issue I've had is that you have to be very particular in how you encode the divx stuff, otherwise it scarf at the files.
    • Arghh...that page is cool...but geez! It's dooo much damn info on one page!

      Some people need to learn that they should ORGANIZE stuff better.
    • It requires you install software on your host computer.

      Why can't qcast mount a remote samba partition or win32 partition? Simplify the life of your customers, please....
    • I have Qcast also, just set it up last week. It works great, and requires no mod chips to work, unlike the other methods out there... Yes, you have to stream from your own PC, and yes, you could hook a video card right up to your TV. I had a PS2 there already, so why not use it? The server component is Java, and supports Win32/MacOSX/Linux without any issues.
    • Qcast is where it's at! Until the official hard drive adapter is released, the qcast is the only elegant way to handle video.

  • XBox (Score:5, Informative)

    by NetJunkie ( 56134 ) <jason.nashNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Monday December 02, 2002 @09:51AM (#4792806)
    The XBox media player does most media including DIVX, SVCD, VCD, mp3, etc. The next version due any time has a great interface and even better media support. It would be a great system to make an XBox a good media server.

    • Re:XBox (Score:2, Insightful)

      by gilesjuk ( 604902 )
      That's hardly suprising, it's a familiar API. You have to commend the PS2 dev scene, they've created their own libraries for the PS2 hardware and built their own development suite.

  • Steps to Success (Score:5, Funny)

    by ekrout ( 139379 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @09:54AM (#4792823) Journal
    1) Spend several years researching Sony's Playstation 2 entertainment console
    2) Enlist a few smart friends to help you build a mod chip that allows Divx movies to be decoded
    3) Get some recognition for your hack by posting a story to the most popular geek news site in the world
    4) Get phone call from Sony's lawyers
    5) Get phone call from Web host's sysadmin
    6) Learn that you're the defendant in a billion dollar lawsuit
    7) Learn that your Web server's disk died, bringing all of your research from the past couple of years down with it
    8) Shoot self.
    • 9) ...
      10) Profit!!
    • 9) ...
      10) Profit!

  • Hmmm (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jbmoll ( 629525 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @09:54AM (#4792826)
    Well if we all have computers why go buy a ps2 and try and modifiy it when you can watch it on the computer. Seems like a risky way to blow up your ps2.

    • Re:Hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Lebannen ( 626462 )
      On the other hand, location matters as well.

      Personally, I live in a bedsit-type thing, so my living-room is also my computer room; easy to watch computery stuff from my sofa.

      However, in your average house [hahaha], the computer tends to be in a different room from the sofa, sound system, and/or TV. Whereas the PS2 will be in the right spot. I know several people who have an old PC hidden in their living room for DVDs and divxs... but if there's a playstation 2 there, seems a lot less hassle to just install something nice like this.
      • Not to mention the portability aspect of PS2's. Personally, I'd rather lug my ~15 lb. PS2 to different rooms of my house, and different houses, rather than my ~60 lb. computer.

    • Re:Hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)

      by droopus ( 33472 )
      Because, other than geeks....people do not consume media in an unfamiliar paradigm. They want tunes in their car, their portable device or their stereo.

      They want movies on their TV. Qcast allows both of these. I have a Cinema Display and I won't even watch a movie on that. Rather than lying on my couch looking at a 61" Toshiba? No contest.

      As for "blowing up your PS2" using Qcast puts far less strain on the graphics chips in the PS2 than GTA: it merely becomes an interface device. IMO, Qcast (and Roomlink, eventually) are the PS2's killer apps.

  • Get this (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Apreche ( 239272 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @09:57AM (#4792843) Homepage Journal
    If you want to watch DivX's on your TV, get a video card with S-Video out. It's a lot easier to plug that into the video in on your television and put another cable from your sound card to your reciever than it is to mod a PS2.
    And video cards are cheap. Just stick it in a PCI slot and set it as a second display. It's the cheapest solution.

    I'll be impressed when somebody has a portable DivX players so I can watch TV episodes on the go.

    • Re:Get this (Score:4, Insightful)

      by 91degrees ( 207121 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @10:03AM (#4792885) Journal
      I am not lugging my PC downstairs just to watch a movie thanks.

      That said, it would probably be less hassle all round to buy a DVD player with VCD capability and reencode the DivXs to VCD.
      • You don't have TV in your dorm room?

        Since college students (including me at the time) refuse to see things from the perspective of the real world, we must adapt and interpret their comments as if from the cozy confines of a dorm.

        Joe
        • I read this. I paused. I didn't get it. I thunk about the alien lifestyle.

          I looked immediately around me... at the TV, the laptop on my lap, the sofa I was sitting on, which I often fall asleep on, in this position, after too much tech writing or coding. Hmmm. I live in a 2BR apartment, and given the hectic pace of the last few weeks of my life as a freelancer, I might as well be living in a dorm room, because when deadlines get tight, I find a place that has almost everything I need and just stay put there -- because moving around unnecessarily takes time.

          Much of the time, I'm in this mode, and wouldn't need a separate DivX player, but on those occasions where my electronic bits and pieces are spread out among several rooms, it might be handy and might be worth chipping my as-yet-unmodded PS2 for.

          FYI: I got reacquainted with the rest of my apartment this past weekend, post-major-deadline... and then another deadline crunch hit. To be continued....
          --
          * Helen *

    • Re:Get this (Score:3, Interesting)

      by mrob2002 ( 564229 )
      The Sharp Zaurus plus tkcVideo lets me watch DivX on the go. A 25 minute TV show compresses down to about 50 Mbytes, so I can fit two episodes onto a 128M Compact Flash card. Pretty watchable too on long boring train journeys.
      • May I ask, is MAME available for the Zaurus? And if so, would you consider it to be a decent platform for MAME (i.e. are there diagonals on the d-pad, does it handle multiple button-presses, etc.)?

        Thanks in advance!
        • MAME is available for the Zaurus. Whether or not it's a decent platform for it - that's debatable. The controls are all there (it has diagonals on the D-pad and multiple button presses are supported). The issue right now is speed of emulation - last time I tried the Z version of MAME I was unable to play alot of games at full speed. I'm not sure if this is a processor-speed limitation, or if the code just needs more optimization.

          On the other hand, the NES emu works perfectly. I've had quite a few excellent games of Bubble Bobble on the subway lately (while listening to MP3's via XMMS)

    • Enter the Sharp Zaurus, using either the mplayer [killefiz.de] port, OpieMediaplayer2 [killefiz.de], or the commercial tkcVideo [thekompany.com]. Not exactly the screen size you're probably looking for, but hey, it works. Plus, the 640x480 zaurus is available in japan.
      • May I ask, is MAME available for the Zaurus? And if so, would you consider it to be a decent platform for MAME (i.e. are there diagonals on the d-pad, does it handle multiple button-presses, etc.)?

        Thanks!
    • Actually, a PS2 mod is fairly easy these days. Usually it revolves around removing the case (which you'd have to do to put a PCI card into the PC) and a single wiring solder (usually 2 points). Oh, and plugging in a USB device.

      Yes, I realize that opening a PS2 is different from opening a PC, but the fact remains that it's not remotely difficult. And considering how much wiring the average person has to do to get a signal from their PC to their TV, this is a very useful product.

      I however haven't checked the website yet on the one item that killed the Dreamcasts Divx player: reencoding. I know for formatting purposes, Divx needed to be reencoded to play it on the dreamcast. Usually that was time consuming and a general pain. Anyone know if this one needs that too?
    • mmm, ain't these things called laptops? Seriously I had a dell something or other for sometime and a long commute time. So I watched anime fansubs in the train. Worked perfectly except I kept burning my penis :p

      Oh and for those posters who want to watch in their living room and ain't allowed to put their computer there, laptops come with tv-outs nowadays. Granted picture quality may suck.

      Isn't including DivX support in hardware a bit tricky? Not only do they keep changing but isn't the legal state a bit to unclear for a hardware company to mess around with? Sure they have to pay a royalty for DVD but that is simple. Sign the check and you are in the clear.

      • Licensing Divx.com's technology for inclusion in hardware is legally a pretty safe bet. Using a less proprietary, more versatile decoder (one based off ffmpeg/libavcodec, for instance) one would have to work out mpeg4 licensing with MPEG-LA, but $.25 per decoder shouldn't be much of a barrier for a hardware manufacturer.
    • The makers of those lil portable USB hard drives that also play mp3s have a new product with an LCD that plays divx files.

      It's called the Archos Multimedia Jukebox, and costs about $100 more than the mp3 players.

      Thinkgeek:
      http://www.thinkgeek.com/electronics /mp3/5b44/

      Tom's Review:
      http://www17.tomshardware.com/mobile/02q3 /020809/i ndex.html

      Sweet, yes?
  • I can get a walkman sized cd player which can play divX. I've seen one that can play VCD's.

    I'd want divX, DVD, SVCD, MP3, VCD playback, etc. that can fit in my jacket pocket so I can take it around to another house/office and watch movies without having to lug a laptop.

    Plus to complete the functionality, how about CD-R, CD-RW or DVD-R support. Make it connect up via a Firewire cable for high-speed data, recharging, cross platform support and interfacing with DV cameras.

    Until then, playing around with consoles will have to do... evening though I only have a Dreamcast.. which can play divx, but only at lously bitrates.

  • Linux kit (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mtthws ( 572660 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @10:07AM (#4792905) Homepage
    I know the linux kit for the ps2 has been out for a while, so I was wondering if anyone knows of any divx players for linux that have been ported to the ps2 yet? It seems like it would be a lot nicer to just boot it linux then watch your movie from mplayer instead of having to mod you ps2 and keep changing cds just to watch a divx movie.
    • The mod talked about here is much less intrusive and difficult than the linux kit.

    • Re:Linux kit (Score:2, Insightful)

      by yerricde ( 125198 )

      I was wondering if anyone knows of any divx players for linux that have been ported to the ps2 yet

      PS2 Linux can't read CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, or DVD+RW media. Its only storage devices are the 8 MB memory card and the network connector (and possibly the IEEE 1394 connector).

      • ...and the hard disk supplied with the Linux kit and possibly USB storage devices if anyone wants to hack up the kernel to support them.

      • Re:Linux kit (Score:2, Interesting)

        by XMunkki ( 533952 )
        As I don't have a PS2 with a modchip, I can't verify this, but I have heard from many instances that if your PS2 can read CD-R:s, so does the Linux. Of course this means that you already must have a PS2 with the necessary mods and thus could use the homebrewn divx player. Advantages with the Linux version are clear. Some people (like me) keep all their divx movies in a separate network server. Plus it's easier to develop for Linux (own patches, frontends, GUIs, filters etc.)

        Also I'm sure on the status of the USB CD-ROM support, but I guess it may be possible to plug in an external CD drive which you can use freely.
    • Don't take this too seriously since it's just something I heard someone mention on a DivX message board. But, for what it's worth someone there mentioned he'd gotten mplayer compiled on the ps2 linux, and was getting something along the lines of 8 fps.
      • I have managed to get the openDivx decoder and mplayer compiled on the PS2 Linux kit. Unfortunately, just like the person you mention, I am only able to get 5-10fps :-(

  • I wonder how well will it perform. Although I'm aware these are two entirely different platforms, I'm kinda disappointed at how bad DivX plays in my P2/400.

  • Not the intended use... (Score:5, Funny)

    by PjotrP ( 593817 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @10:24AM (#4793008)
    So clearly this should not even be on slashdot. Surely this way of using something that is designed to play ps2 games and dvd's to do something else is illegal! Sony might wanna bring a hardware divx player on the market in a later stage. By violating the PS2 in such a way you are effectively stealing money from them which you might have paid for their divx player when it will be released. I hope slashdot will quickly remove this newsitem and stops supporting theft!
    • I'd mod you up as funny if I had any points left.

      Slashdot, the voice of corporate america! ;)
    • Not all DIVX is illegal, I could take a family video and divx it and plop it on a CD, Send it to my uncle in toronto or somthin and he could watch it on his PS2. Plus, who fucking cares if the software developers don't make it ... I don't, I found a nice home in linux. So if windows and those shitty game companys die ... fuck them
    • If Sony wants to release a DIVX player, perhaps they should have done it before the thought came by of modding a PS2 to do such a function? (Gasp! Common sense wins again!)

  • Some English (Score:5, Funny)

    by ReadParse ( 38517 ) <john@IIIfunnycow.com minus threevowels> on Monday December 02, 2002 @10:26AM (#4793016) Homepage
    Funny that it's all in spanish except "Make a Donation" :)
  • The website may be in spanish, but fortunately the zipped archive comes with a nice little english readme file. Very useful actualy. Now I can take my piracy one step further by watching them on my tv, the way dvd rips were never ment to be viewed! For the longest time i've been confined by this pussy 1600 x 1200 15" laptop monitor but now i can move into a 800 x 600 27 inch screen! muwahaha!
  • Yah this sounds like a neat idea, but lets rethink this for a second... DVD > Computer (some loss of quality) > DivX (definite loss of quality to save space) > TV (loss of picture resolution now). Doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me... I mean I guess its ok if you are all about ripping off movies and old tv shows, but seems like a very expensive round about way to do that.
    • Please, explain to me how transferring the data from a DVD to the computer results in some loss of quality (considering that the divx encoding stage is yet to happen.) It exists as digital information on the DVD, it exists as the same digital information on my HD but somehow there was a magical degredation of the quality during the transfer?!
    • You are very ignorant. DVD --> Computer = no loss of quality. You simple extract vobs off of the DVD to the HD. I can make divx rips of my movies that are indistinguishable from DVDs when played on a television. The quality all depends on the bitrate used. I even keep the dolby digital tracks intact. (and use the directors commentary as a second audio track too).

  • Come on... (Score:4, Funny)

    by pctainto ( 325762 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @11:28AM (#4793475) Homepage
    I mean, PS2 has all the hardware to be able to play divx files, so, it seems that making the mod chip would be hard, but not exceptionally hard. People should instead focus on getting divx players to run on PSX or Nintendo 64 (buy cartridge divxs, heh). Come on, make it harder and less usable, like the people that modify C64s...

  • From the webpage (Score:3, Funny)

    by Espectr0 ( 577637 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @11:45AM (#4793585) Journal
    Debido a la gran cantidad de visitantes que ha recibido la web sobre las 18:00 horas, el servidor se ha venido abajo sin permitirnos tan siquiera, dar un enlace de descarga del reproductor. Hasta hace escasos minutos no hemos podido volver a acceder a la web, lo que nos ha obligado a empezar a distribuir el reproductor por otros canales.

    Translation: thanks to those sob's from slashdot, now we cannot release our player due to severe slashdotting. Those goats! ;)
    • Debido a la gran cantidad de visitantes que ha recibido la web sobre las 18:00 horas, el servidor se ha venido abajo sin permitirnos tan siquiera, dar un enlace de descarga del reproductor. Hasta hace escasos minutos no hemos podido volver a acceder a la web, lo que nos ha obligado a empezar a distribuir el reproductor por otros canales

      Oy! Raya-punteado!!

      (P.S. No habla espanol ;)

  • Bridging Cultures... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Slackrat ( 128095 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @11:47AM (#4793596)

    Debido a la gran cantidad de visitantes que ha recibido la web sobre las 18:00 horas, el servidor se ha venido abajo sin permitirnos tan siquiera, dar un enlace de descarga del reproductor.

    Universal in any language: we've been Slashdotted.

  • why do all of that work when you can just get a dreamcast that already has a Divx player out there and the player adn most of the games are self bootable?
  • Giga congratulations to the PS2Reality team for this outstanding work of patience. The player works very nicely, picture looks good and audio is fine.

    The PS2 hardware is quite complicated to develop for, it takes many times to understand how to properly use all the coprocessors, DMA and GPU. That's why this media player is such an achievement.

    So once again, ignore the mockery, keep it going!
  • Finally a divx player yet still no VCD player oh well that will just have to do. Only MAJOR draw back of BroadQ is the point that you still have to have a PC. DiVX can be burnt anywhere and then used on the PS2 with the new util anywhere even in my car. THe whole point of coming out for mods for consoles is so there is no need for a PC except for burning games downloading and such and to use a home theater or for portability. Atleast thats my whole look at things. I don't want to carry my games in my car and afford them to be scratched or thrown on the floor for soemone to step on. They are safe at home, i need a modchop so i can have it in my car with my burnt games. w00t yet Sony nor any console company believe in such an idea.

  • Mirrors for downloading the player (Score:4, Informative)

    by Tensor ( 102132 ) on Monday December 02, 2002 @07:46PM (#4797524)
    These are the places to download the player:

    PS2Newz.net [ps2newz.net]
    PS2Ownz.com [rr.com]
    elotrolado.net [hosteol.com]
    crackmanworld.com [afiliadosw...imites.com]
    indicedivx.com [indicedivx.com]
    bandaancha.st [bandaancha.st]
  • VCD, SVCD, DVD; ok, Mpeg2 compresion... Mp3; ok, Mpeg layer 3 compresion... but DivX, How many version of DivX are now? Too fast changes for hardware descompresion...

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