Quick question that one of you guys might be able to help me with: can I play video stored on a USB drive on my XBox 360? I’ve tried copying a video to my iPod and then plugging it into the Xbox but it doesn’t present the iPod as an option when go to Media->Video. As far as I know the file is in the correct format (converted using VideoraXbox360Converter).
I’ve been looking into just that myself lately, and found this link with several
different search parameters:
http://www.llamma.com/xbox360/mods/USB%20Hard%20Drive%20Mod.htm
After adding media, you should see files for anything that it supports. Dunno if
it’s just MP3s, or MP3s and movies.
Okay, this is what I’ve sussed out.
Firstly, the 360 supports, among other formats, MPEG1/2 but only if they are on Video-DVDs or streamed from a PC running Windows Media Center. You can play files from external devices such as thumbdrives if they are encoded in WMV format but the audio stream must be WMA - so MP3 is out of the question.
I converted a file to WMV using Encode360 and burned it to DVD (as a file rather than a VOB). Stuck the disk in the 360 and it played fine. Copied the same file onto my iPod, plugged it in, and the iPod doesn’t appear as an option when I go into Media->Video. The iPod’s music library is available under Media->Music. I wonder if the 360 identifies the iPod as an iPod (rather than a generic USB volume) and just assumes that any videos on the device will be in a non-compatible format?
If there’s one thing that pisses me off it’s video codecs and containers and audio streams. Pick a standard, fuckos.
Correct me if I’m wrong but I remember there was some sort of ipod update you have to d/l from xbox live marketplace before ipods would work on the 360.
There are definitely people using iPods and other players with it, so either a
firmware update or sacrifice to the gods of entropic computing is in order.
The dashboard update adds support for (non-DRM’ed) AAC tracks. That’s not what I’m talking about though.
How did you copy the WMV file to your iPod? If you used iTunes or something, it probably transcoded it. If you can play the video on your iPod, it’s not WMV any longer.
I haven’t tried it, but if your iPod had a standard hard drive volume and you just dragged the file there, it should play in the 360. What might be hanging it up, if that’s what you did, is that when you plug in that one USB device the 360 just identifies it as an iPod and is looking at the standard iPod music volume.
Long story short - yes you can play WMVs off a USB drive. Even hi-def ones. I’ve done it myself. It’s hard to know where your attempts are holding up without knowing exactly what you did and how you did it.
Jason:
I’m drag-and-dropping the file directly to the iPod, not re-transcoding it to MP4. As I said in one of my previous posts, I agree about the 360 identifying the iPod as an iPod and ignoring the non-music contents of its HDD. A little annoying but at least you’ve confirmed that what I want to do will work with a different USB volume.