DLNA, and SMB Shares

[Guest surgex]

There are a couple of other threads about these things, but none of them really have the answers I'm looking for, so I thought I would start a new thread.

For the first topic, I'll start with SMB.

I connect to my WiFi network successfully and then open the standard WM 6.5 File Explorer program.

I select Menu, Then Go To, and then Open Path, and then New Path.

I type in "\\192.168.1.4" (IP Address of one of my SMB Boxes on my WiFi LAN) and then I get "Connecting to server..." and then "Error - The network path was not found." and then "Network resource cannot be found or you do not have permission to access the network." so then I try another box, 192.168.1.2...same thing.  A lot of people say to use Resco File Explorer (which I haven't tried yet), but my real question is, why can't the standard file explorer do this?  I tried using their NetBIOS names as well (ie. \\Laptop or \\Desktop) and none of those work either.  Is there some way for me to join the workgroup?  Both machines have no firewalls and I do have NetBIOS over TCP\IP enabled.  Every other computer on my network is able to access the shares, even mac and linux machines.

Why does the built in file explorer not work?  Any technical explanation?

I will just try resco explorer for now, but I would really like to know the answer regardless.

Second topic is Samsung's DLNA application, their "Connected Home" program.

I open the application, his "Select Contents" and then there is a grey phone icon with a blue circle around it (god what a stupid UI) with my phone's name (Omnia2) and that's it.  I hit "Refresh" and nothing happens.  

I go to "Details" and then tap the grey \ blue circle "Omnia2" icon and it says "server name: IP address: model: Model No.: Company:" and all the fields are blank!  I go to menu then "Settings" set my device name to "Omnia2" press the green light on "My Media Sharing" then go to "Sharing Folders" and I just have "\Storage card\" as choice one.  2 and 3 are blank.

I've tried ORB, XBMC, and Windows Media Connect in both Vista and Windows 7 -- nothing.

Again, all of the other computers on my LAN can access either one of those program's DLNA servers, and stream content...

The manual that came with the phone has no mention of connecting to SMB shares, and the section about the "Connected Home" application is about half a page, and really doesn't explain anything.

If someone could help I would really appreciate it.

And if anyone from Samsung ever comes across this -- I would just like you to know that this application's UI (along with the WiFi and Bluetooth App UI) is simply retarded...the WORST design I have ever seen, in my life.  Completely bogus and unintuitive, and your product manuals are terrible as well.

[Guest surgex]

OK, so as for SMB issue -- I downloaded Resco Explorer 2010 beta 2 and I am able to connect to my SMB shares on my XP Machine.

My Windows 7 box still won't allow it to connect...Not sure what's up with that...tried the NetBIOS name and the IP address.

What is interesting is that I can use Remote Desktop from my i920 and remote into my Win7 machine fine, so it's not any kind of firewall issue.

I can ping my phone fine from the Win7 box as well..it would seem to be either an issue with Win7's SMB server (security settings perhaps) or possibly something else...not sure ;)

I want to take care of this issue before I muddle around again with DLNA...so if any of you have windows 7 can you please try to share a folder and access it from your omnia2? TY :)

EDIT:

Got it to work...Had to manually type in the share name in Resco (so \\MyWin7Box\RAID Storage) then tap Share, then select "Connect using different username and password" -- now it works!  But I guess there was no point in this anyways...most of my movies cannot play with the samsung player from the network share...they stutter (even smaller resolution videos).  So then I just did a manual copy from the share to my internal storage -- 362 Kilobtes \ sec....(wow..)....Seriously?  Maybe because of PowerSaving WiFi mode is on...I'll try turning that off.  PowerSaving mode off jumped up to 450 kilobytes per second...which IMHO is a joke for a device of this caliber.  And no, it's not my network or server.  I guess SMB (while I did get it to work) is a dead end for wireless media streaming.  I really hope I have more luck with DLNA.

EDIT2:

DLNA not working at all with this application.  I'm not sure what I did but it won't find XBMC or any other DLNA player on my network.  I've tried them all.

If no one else has any advice I think I'm going to just make a backup and then hard reset...if it still doesn't work then I'll just restore backup..oh well.

Edited December 27, 2009 by surgex

[Guest surgex]

I performed a hard reset, and now the "Connected Home" application actually sees the other DLNA devices on my network...ok, step in the right direction.

However, after doing some testing, this is not good...

1.) Windows 7 x64 Ultimate box running latest XBMC (dlna renderer and player) -- will not play any media.

I get "A problem has occurred with NexPlayerDLNA.exe" and the program crashes.  Will not even play music.

2.) I've tried the built in Media Sharing server that comes with Windows 7...Windows Media Connect or whatever it's called...it's in the "Advanced Sharing Options" -- same exact thing..."A problem has occurred with NexPlayerDLNA.exe" and the program crashes.  Will not even play music.

So then I set up media sharing from my xp laptop using windows media player 11 on XP.

The "Connected Home" program has no problems playing back media from this host...there are a few quirks, for example if I play a song, it will go really fast for the first 10 seconds (sounds like the chipmunks)...I just figure all of this is just BS from Samsung.

Are there any better DLNA programs for Windows Mobile?  This is one of the reasons I bought this device, and if it won't work with windows 7, that really sucks.

Since I've already solved the issue by hard resetting (not sure what caused it but it's gone now) of the Connected Home app not seeing my servers, I am going to continue discussion of the "NexPlayerDLNA.exe" crash in this thread where it was already reported:

http://www.modaco.com/content/i8000-verizo...sues-windows-7/

Edited December 27, 2009 by surgex

[Guest XeOS]

I performed a hard reset, and now the "Connected Home" application actually sees the other DLNA devices on my network...ok, step in the right direction.

However, after doing some testing, this is not good...

1.) Windows 7 x64 Ultimate box running latest XBMC (dlna renderer and player) -- will not play any media.

I get "A problem has occurred with NexPlayerDLNA.exe" and the program crashes. Will not even play music.

2.) I've tried the built in Media Sharing server that comes with Windows 7...Windows Media Connect or whatever it's called...it's in the "Advanced Sharing Options" -- same exact thing..."A problem has occurred with NexPlayerDLNA.exe" and the program crashes. Will not even play music.

So then I set up media sharing from my xp laptop using windows media player 11 on XP.

The "Connected Home" program has no problems playing back media from this host...there are a few quirks, for example if I play a song, it will go really fast for the first 10 seconds (sounds like the chipmunks)...I just figure all of this is just BS from Samsung.

Are there any better DLNA programs for Windows Mobile? This is one of the reasons I bought this device, and if it won't work with windows 7, that really sucks.

Since I've already solved the issue by hard resetting (not sure what caused it but it's gone now) of the Connected Home app not seeing my servers, I am going to continue discussion of the "NexPlayerDLNA.exe" crash in this thread where it was already reported:

http://www.modaco.com/content/i8000-verizo...sues-windows-7/

Tested this on stock IL5 rom with:

1) Win 7 X64 Ultimate with Media Sharing -- will sometimes play small music files, but no vid, nor pictures

2) Win 7 X64 Ultimate with XBMC -- will not play any media

3) Popcorn Hour A110 latest version -- will not play any media

4) XBOX-1 with XBMC -- will not play any media

5) Win 7 x64 Enterprise with Media Sharing -- will sometimes play music, but no vid, nor pictures

6) Win 7 x64 Enterprise with Winamp Remote -- will sometimes play small music files, but no vid, nor pictures

On one of the first 6.1 roms it did work sometimes on Win 7 x64 (don't remember which one, sorry)

Maybe it has to do with buffering as it will sometimes play small music files?

[Guest Snow02]

Got it to work...Had to manually type in the share name in Resco (so \\MyWin7Box\RAID Storage) then tap Share, then select "Connect using different username and password" -- now it works!  But I guess there was no point in this anyways...most of my movies cannot play with the samsung player from the network share...they stutter (even smaller resolution videos).  So then I just did a manual copy from the share to my internal storage -- 362 Kilobtes \ sec....(wow..)....Seriously?  Maybe because of PowerSaving WiFi mode is on...I'll try turning that off.  PowerSaving mode off jumped up to 450 kilobytes per second...which IMHO is a joke for a device of this caliber.

My Storage write speed is < 500 k/sec. Read speed is ~2000 k/sec. That's the bottleneck, not the wifi speed. Try writing a remote file to device memory and you'll see what I mean. Device write speed ~4000 k/sec and read speed is over twice that. Unfortunately it's not big enough to actually do anything with. How much can it cost, really, to include a gig+... Just FYI.

[Guest surenz]

My Storage write speed is < 500 k/sec. Read speed is ~2000 k/sec. That's the bottleneck, not the wifi speed. Try writing a remote file to device memory and you'll see what I mean. Device write speed ~4000 k/sec and read speed is over twice that. Unfortunately it's not big enough to actually do anything with. How much can it cost, really, to include a gig+... Just FYI.

yes but when I download files from the network they are going to my storage card and according to SKtools benchmark the write speed is ~600kB/s there.

So it seems the Wifi adapter is the bottleneck. My speed is around 200-450 kB/s most of the time on the lower limit. It is written it the specs that the phone has a b/g wifi card but it is not able even to fulfill the 802.11b specs.

The DLNA on windows7 x64 Media server share are just seen by the phone but any chance to be played. They are in infinite status: connecting.

I didn't try yet with some other DLNA servers or file types.

And finally I wonder how a WinMo doesn't have samba server nor any application that do that. Even for Symbian there is Samba share server app.

Isn't it natural to coexist a Windows OS and Samba ?!

Edited January 22, 2010 by surenz

[Guest surgex]

I don't have time to do a benchmark (right now), but when I put my phone in "Mass Storage" mode then hook it up to my laptop (via usb 2.0) -- it's wicked fast.

Way faster than any numbers you guys are quoting...I have it pointing to the SD card now.

I highly doubt the storage throughput is the bottleneck.

I'll post back when I get a chance to bench it.

EDIT:

Yeah, those numbers are WAY off.

Using a transfer size of 128k I get 7.5 MB\sec writes and 8MB\sec reads with SD Card (In Mass storage mode, and yes thats MegaBytes per sec not Megabits)

And I get 6 MB\sec writes and 7 MB\sec reads with My Storage (In Mass storage mode)

There is no way the storage is the bottleneck

Also, WinMo does have a SMB client, it's just garbage..heh!

Resco works OK though.

Also just FYI the only reason they have wireless G on here (or on any mobile really) is because some routers have the option to only accept G clients, so it's for compatibility only, not speed.

I guess I could set up an FTP server and bench that via WiFi to see if the wifi really is the bottleneck.

Edited January 23, 2010 by surgex

[Guest qtilt]

maybe you guys should try to use ps3 Media Server.

I use it all the time to stream media to my i8000 through Connected Home.

http://code.google.com/p/ps3mediaserver/downloads/list

[Guest rperezlo]

My experience with Connected Home is with a Synology DS107e. The Omnia 2 recognizes the Synology as a DLNA server and plays supported media. I occasionally have to refresh the DLNA file list when it appears empty, but that's all.

This is with IJ9 and JA1.

[Guest WidowmakerNZ]

bump

any solutions out there for this problem guys.

i also have a win 7 pc and hate having to manually xfer files to my phone to play them. connected home seems useless and i havent found anything better.

[Guest XeOS]

bump

any solutions out there for this problem guys.

i also have a win 7 pc and hate having to manually xfer files to my phone to play them. connected home seems useless and i havent found anything better.

You can kinda make it work. I can stream most of my music, but you really have to make sure that settings on your Win 7 machine are correct as you no longer decide in WMP what to share. A good deal of information on this can be found here

A rumour which I can't confirm is that people can play more formats with the 32 bit version than the 64 bit version of Windows. Sorry I can't help you further on this, I'm still waiting for the solution myself.