I have a panasonic smart tele. I have a PS3. I have a PC with internet access and a USB stick. In days gone by mostly I was able to get hold of (cough) some content and upload the avi file to the usb stick. Stick it in my PS3 and hey presto it played without fault. Nowadays the file format of choice is MKV (Matroska) which the PS3 doesn't play.
How to get the MKv file to play on my tele without a time consuming coversion process? mich obliged for any help you can give. ta.
shouldn't you be posting this in the game of thrones thread? 😉
Hdmi lead into the computer? When you work out a better answer let me know!
has your tv got a usb slot?
Got a phone/tablet? Stream to tele via wi-fi?
Try simply renaming the .mkv to .mp4
Stupid hack but this works on the Sony Bravia tv media player - before I get flamed about codec formats etc 🙂
@bob yes my tv does have a usb slot. I will investigate whether it can play media files. I would think not, as it would require it decode the format first and wouldn't that require greater tech than is available on a tele?
@bungle - yes I have both of course. We have a hudl in the house and an ipad. How does one go about streaming content from them to a Tele?
thanks.
re usb slot - i have one on my sony smart tv and it plays most formats except some avis ok. Much cheaper to insert usb stick than burn dvd. no problem with mkvs. Will even play subtitles if they are in a seperate srt file as long as name of srt file and fim match. Modern tvs more in common with computers than anything else.
If you run PS3 Media server on your PC you can stream to the PS3 machine to play your mkv files.
Our Samsung TV is many years old, has very basic smart TV functionality but can still play some mkv files.
AIUI *mkv is just the container and doesn't tell you what video or audio codecs are being used.
Run Plex server on your PC. Use anything that can view upnp shares to watch the movies. For a nicer experience, also run Plex app on your PS3, tablet, phone and possibly Tele too.
Streaming, a nice library and auto conversion of your films, music, photos, and home movies.
We use a humax satellite receiver for watching movies using the upnp interface (can't run apps on it, and a dumb Tele), the PS3 has Plex as it is better for playing music* and long at photos. The smart TV has the Plex app and we use that for everything too.
* We have a large music library, the PS3 struggles with it sometimes.
I've used one of these in the past, straight into the tele hdmi port...
[url= http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/cyclone-micro-hdmi-media-player-adapter-a90jr ]Maplins[/url]
My brother then used it on his lder Sony TV too, without any problems.
My Panasonic smart tele plays MKV files natively, straight off the USB stick
Convert the file to a format your tv will play. On the Mac you have Handbrake, their must be a PC equivalent programme. Then put that on usb stick.
Just use your PC to convert the file into mp4 format
Lots of free software will do this - I've used VLC media player before.
Edit: as above, Handbrake will do the job also.
Cheers all. I having a go at that plex. I like the idea of being able to stream all my music, films and pics to devices.
If you set it up properly (I haven't bothered), it can also stream to you when you are away from home.
I'm sure your TV will be able to play MKV files directly from the USB stick. I have a 4 year old Sony TV and it can play most MKV files without issues. Just plug the stick in and it starts the media player.
As for MKV's, they are just the file type, but there are lots of different codecs that can be used with them. Best description I've ever heard of them is think of them like a wrapper on a Quality Street, they all look similar but have very different contents.