A.C.Ryan PlayON!HD Mini 2 Full HD Media Streamer None Specified   Page 1

Reviewer: RWL Staff Article Publish Date: 4/3/2011

 

 

 

 

 

 

INTRODUCTION

 

 

 

 

    With far too many media players released during the first 3 months of 2011 it is somewhat obvious that standalone media players have begun to take the place of both DVD and Blu-Ray players and not a moment too soon if i may add. Although i was amongst the first people who rushed to get a DVD player back in the late 90's the same did not happen when Blu-Ray got released. Instead i decided on supporting Toshiba and their HD-DVD players since they offered the same audio/video quality as the SONY Blu-Ray but with both their units and movies costing quite less and that was what mattered to me the most. Of course you all know what happened next, a small war started between Toshiba and Sony with most film studios siding with the second and thus forcing Toshiba to cease all support for their format. Now what i really like with media players is that they care not about formats and so no matter if you own a player from ACRyan or HDI Dune the supported media file list will be identical. So as usual true to our promise of continuous reviews focused on all the latest standalone media players today we are taking a closer look on the latest offering by A.C.Ryan, the PlayON!HD mini 2.

 

 

    AC Ryan has been one of the leading producers of quality cabling & accessories for international companies since 1992. The establishment of the modding product line in 2002 led to the international brand awareness of AC Ryan. Known for innovation and quality, never afraid to break new grounds, AC Ryan instantly became a favorite of promodders and advanced users. Pioneering the revolutionary CableFREE concept, introducing Connectx connector modding system, advancing the FlexSleeving craze, infecting half the modworld with UVactive Fever... there's no doubt AC Ryan leads the way. To this day, modders around the world still use AC Ryan ProModding products to give their award winning casemods the final touch.

   

 

    Over a year ago we took a closer look on the PlayON!HD Mini again by A.C.Ryan and i have to say that its size and features left us with the best possible impressions. Now over a year later A.C.Ryan has released an updated version of their original mini unit featuring the latest Realtek RTD1185DD decoding chip and several additional changes including support for extra media types and of course their latest GUI 2.0 version which we also saw in the Essential unit. The only real question however is whether or not the new mini 2 can impress as its predecessor did since compared to then now there are just countless similar solutions in the market.