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GigaView HDD AV Media Enclosure.

Gigaviewhddavmediabox

The GigaView HDD AV Media Enclosure. Clever little box. Just shove your spare 3.5 inch hard drive in it and you’ve got an instant media player at a fraction of the cost. No drive? No problem, just use the integral memory card slots. Hook the whole thing up to your TV and beam away. Comes with remote control, and handles the main audio and video media formats. Neat, and at £39.99 nicely priced.

 Just install your hard drive with your videos, pictures and music and play them back through your TV. View your photos on your camera direct from the memory card using the card reader. Easy to use graphical interface. Navigate using the included remote control or front panel push buttons…Can be used as a standard external hard drive enclosure

  • Video formats, VCD, (VOB) DVD, MPEG1/2/4, DIVX3.X, DIVX4.X, DIVX5.X
  • Audio media formats, MP3
  • Image media formats, JPEG
  • Media outputs AV / VGA / S-video / optical
  • NTSC / PAL

14 Comments

  • I have one of these and it’s quite good, copies pictures of memory cards onto its self. It plays MP3s ok (you can just play on folder at a time or all mp3s on a drive) but there is no random play feature which is a bit of a shame. The user interface is pretty terible but I can live with it.
    If you can afford better then don’t bother, but if you can’t then this does everything it says reasonably well.

  • Thanks for the feedback, sounds like it’s pretty good value for money then. :-)

  • Done a bit of research on how to get hold of one of these in Australia….

    here`s the manufacturer and the GigaView:

    http://www.noontec.com/en/ProductShow.asp?ArticleID=109

    but can`t get hold of it in Aus it seems.

    So…. here`s something we can get here, and might even be better…

    http://www.mvixusa.com/product.php?product=mv5000u (buy it off ebay.com.au)

  • I bought one of these, nice looking box, very easy to setup. USB interface lets you upload files without any difficulty. The only problem is with the software on the box. If you have a large number of files it can take 20-30 seconds before you�re presented with a menu while it builds the file list.
    The music jukebox feature is ok, but with any more than 30 files in it searching for the one you want can be tricky. It�s better to put large numbers of music files into folders and use the file and directory listing feature.
    Movie playing is fine, depending on the quality of the movie encoding. Playing movies that have been converted using low quality encoders show every artefact on a big screen.
    Overall I�d recommend the unit to anyone wanting to watch movies or listen to music without the expense of a separate computer running media centre software. And for the price, it�s excellent.

  • I have a bit of a blog going about this neat little box.

    http://videoguy999.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!62E7885A2D55142B!163.entry

  • A bought one of these, thinking I would be able to put all the kids DVDs on it, which I did.

    The only problem is that when playing back DVD VOB files the widescreen get severly cropped, there is no option to letterbox the film. Even on a widescreen TV you end up loosing quite a bit of the frame on the left and right.

  • When was it £39.99 and where from ?

    Just checked at Maplins and its £59.99 and as far as the ( not too bright ) girl knew it had always been that price.

    Anybody help out on this one ?

    Thanks

  • It was definitely at �39.95 when I wrote it up, either they’ve decided to up the price after the Ferret featured it, or it was on short term special offer (although I don’t remember seeing that anywhere). But it was definitely at that price originally.

  • Maplin had this media player enclosure on promotion at �39.99p in their price crash magazine (PRO906) 9th August 2006 to 5th September 2006. It is now back to full price (�59.99p) as advertised in their current Autumn Winter 2006/2007 catalogue.

    However, all Maplin stores haven’t any stocks of the item except Barnsley branch who’s stock level showed one. After some enquiries Barnsley branch said they had sold the item and that stocks were not due in from the manufacturer to any branches until early November 2006.

  • Maplin do this with most of their new products. The Car DVD head unit that was �149 has gone up to �199. It means you have to keep an eye on promo leaflets and the website for good prices.

    Oh and I wouldn’t buy it for 59.99 it was only really worth it when it was cheap.

  • Thanks for all your comments, guys.

    I’ll keep my eyes open for any further promotions now I understand what this product is !

    Cheers
    Steve

  • Hi i am a new user my question is dos all ide 3.5 multi media hdd come supplied with remote controls. if not can some body send me in the wright direction. where i can obtain one. thank you whacker

  • Hi,
    I bought one of these some time back and would like to upgrade to the latest firmware available – but I cannot find a download for it anywhere!!! Can anyone help please?
    Thanks…
    James

  • I've got one of these boxes but I can't play MP4. Is there any firmware available to enable this box to do so?

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