Gizmodo: windows media player 11

Windows Media Player 11 Is Useful: It Cuts WoW Load Times By Up to 50 Percent

matt buchanan — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 01:20:24 EST

Windows Media Player 11 discovers a purpose in life—how awesome is that? (Seriously, who actually uses it for anything?) Apparently, European forums started reporting last month that running WMP 11 in the background noticeably cuts World of Warcraft load times, especially in stickier areas, though American slackjaws have just recently caught on. Game|Life confirms WoW Insider's post on the bizarre performance steroid with a test on their own machine. But will it help your rig run Crysis—or any other game for that matter? [WoW Insider via Game|Life]

PlayStation 3 XviD Playback Update: It Works, Kinda

Jason Chen — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 12:42:22 EST

Huzzah! I've discovered why XviD files didn't work in the PlayStation DivX Playback test. Apparently, streaming over Windows Media Player 11 does not work for any XviD files and most DivX files, but it does work fine if you load the files onto an external USB drive or burn it to a DVD. But there's a workaround, kind of.

The best alternative to get "streaming" to work with Windows Media Player 11 is to first locate the file you want to watch over the network, then press the triangle button and copy it to your PS3. The same file that couldn't play back a minute ago will happily render itself when viewed off the PlayStation 3's hard drive.

It seems to us that the fault may either lie with the way that WMP11 streams files or the way that the PS3 plays back streamed files over the network—we're not sure. If the PS3 supported SMB networking, this problem might be eliminated. We'll have to check back in the future if and when they do add this feature.

Sorry for the confusion everybody! When I got DivX, and not XviD, to stream correctly, I assumed that XviD does not work. I should have tested it on an external drive as well. But hurray, XviD works fine on PS3. Thanks for checking up on us.

Update: I just did another test, and EyeConnect on Macs seem to stream DivX and XviD just fine for me. So it looks like a WMP11 problem. Has anyone else gotten it to support streaming w/ WMP11? TVersity seems to stream alright on PCs too, according to some users.

Update 2: Just re-confirmed that TVersity works for me, but the same files that work in TVersity don't work streaming over WMP11. Very strange.

Venzero LINQ mini Has Wi-Fi Streaming From Windows Media Player 11

Jason Chen — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 19:20:15 EDT

Never mind that the LINQ mini has only 1GB of flash memory—the thing can stream music directly from Windows Media Player 11, giving it essentially unlimited (or at least PC-levels of) storage if you're hooked up to Wi-Fi...on the LAN. Why is this cool, again?

Other than this, there's a monochrome LCD (wha?), MP3/WMA support, 20 hours battery life in MP3 mode, 5 hours battery life in Wi-Fi mode and the ability to record music being played back from the car's radio, Starbucks speakers or the GAP and identify it the next time you sync your player. All this for $99 means that if you don't mind the black and white screen, the odd combination of features makes it a tempting buy. [Venzero via Generation Mp3 via Dapreview]

Venzero Linq Combines Wi-Fi Internet Radio With Video Playback

Jason Chen — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 15:00:12 EDT

Venzero's black-sheened players have always looked good, which is why the Venzero Linq looks so promising. Besides having the standard MP3, WMA, WAV, AAC, OGG, JPEG and MPEG4 playback, it also supports Wi-Fi streaming from internet radio stations and your Windows Media Player 11 on a PC. That means you don't need to jam-pack its 4GB of memory with songs if you're at home—you can just stream your entire library over wireless. But if you do want portable storage, there's an extra 2GB microSD slot for a total of 6GB of memory. Available at the end of September. [Venzero via GizmLounge]