Fusion Research...please help!

[wappinghigh]

Guys. I'd like some advice on which Fusion Research media player set up is as close to a Dune 3.0 Base with Internal HDD.

What I like about the Dune is the ability to self install (swap and go) the quiet and reliable WD 2.0 TB HDD....and store all the movies on this.

What I don't like about the Dune is:

1/No 2way driver...and company coy about the future of this

2/ the user is reliant on his own rips (not all decrypting software is reliable EVERY time...

3/ The available scrappers aren't very reliable..

What I like about the Fusion is Boxee and complete C4 integration

So which Fusion player would suit my needs, and can I simply copy over my movie library?

Thanks.

[srhamy]

I have a Fusion studio media server. I can't seem to find a specific question in your post, but it seems as though it meets MOST of your desires. I can say I am happy with it. I would rather have a Kaledescape, but choke at the price every time I see it.

It rips DVDs reliably. Some of my older discs would not import because of scratch damage. No problem, ripped them with ANY-DVD and imported them via computer. I paid for the BlueRay upgrade also. Pretty expensive, but does allow me to import via Blue ray drive attached to a windows computer (with AnyDVD-HD also). As for accessing via Boxee, I haven't seen anything about that. 2 way driver works well, the videos and coverart show up without fail. The complaint I have about the unit is that it is nothing more than a specialized computer and it puts out a S**T-Ton of heat. My well ventilated, previously cool, electronics closet is now a bit toasty. It has a single hard-drive, and is not going to be easily swappable because it is also running the proprietary software. I supports external drives which would allow to "pull and go". I can import mp4/mkv/mpg/avi/wmv/hdmov/bfmv filetypes. It has coverart and spec scraping that works pretty well. The interface is very good.

If you do whole-house distribution it is important to know that audio out can either be digital optical or analog composite (not both). Also HDMI out does not include audio by default, although this can be modified by Fusion (killing other audio outs). This was a problem for me with a HDMI video matrix and C4 8 zone amp. If you wish to see how I got around this:

http://www.c4diy.com/wiki/index.php?title=Studio_Movie_Server

JCL automation gives a good discount.

[wappinghigh]

Thanks for the extremely helpful reply!

So being a computer..and running hot, it has a fan..right? Is it noisy...that is could you have it sitting out in the TV shelf?

I assume it runs Linux. Right?

What is the size of the internal HDD?

Can you import your own .iso and .vob files?

Audio out is no problem. I only want for movies. With the monoprice HDMI audio/video to one HDMI gizmo, have you had any handshake problems. I would want to run this HDMI into an Integra receiver.

Finally, I have pasted this feature: Licensed CSS decoder - no decryption software needed.

Does this mean you get bit perfect DVD and Blu Ray backups?

[srhamy]

I didn't pay too much attention to fan noise because its in a closet with a exhaust fan of its own. I will check it out soon.

It runs Windows XP, but isn't accessible as such.

I think the Internal HD is 2TB, It hold about 250 DVDs, less if putting in Blue Rays, more if you import smaller encoded material. If have 131 loaded, and estimated 131 to import.

No importing of ISO or VOB directly, but if you mount them and they will import just fine.

It has a nice delete in 1 week feature as well as custom start position (ie miss trailers)

I have had no handshake problems at all.

Yes I get perfect DVD copies via a licensed CSS Decoder.

I get perfect Blue-Ray copies via an unlicensed Any-DVD-HD.