How to play digital video on Series 5mx!

[PhilG]

I know the 5mx an old machine now, but it has hidden capabilities. Want to play Quicktime movie clips on your Series 5mx? Even 3 or 4 minute, multi-megabyte files, with full sound and no dropped frames? (well, almost!)

Follow this link to find out how!

http://web.onetel.net.uk/~philgooch/psion/video/index.html


Phil Gooch
Author of Asteroids for ER5
http://www.neuon.com

[wanman]

Hi Phil,

I have downloaded the applet and it works on my 7book. Only problem is that I can't find any .avi files that work. Have you converted any that I could try? Could you load them onto your website? I don't have Quicktime pro but am curious what other apps could convert avi's?

Look forward to any additional help you can provide.

Cheers

Si

[PhilG]

Hi there Si

I've uploaded a couple of video files that have been tweaked according to the specs I posted so that they play OK on the 5mx.

Download them from here as before:

http://web.onetel.net.uk/~philgooch/psion/video/index.html

Let me know how you get on. I don't have access to a netBook/S7 to test this out, so fingers crossed.

Phil

[hammera]

Phil,
The small .mov files I've downloaded seem to play well and a damn site better than the java .mpg player. A 5MB, 30 second manga trailer didn't appear to drop a frame.

I'm now off to find some live action clips to play with.

Adam

[PhilG]

That's great to hear. Were you using a netBook or Series 5mx? I'd love to know how the clips play on a colour screen.

On my 5mx I think I'm only getting 4 greys; I've been unable to get the Java window to run in 16 greys. Does anyone know how to do this? I've tried creating a stub OPL application that sets defaultwin to 16 greys and then launching the Java app, but this doesn't seem to work.

Phil

[lazerin]

Wow, this is great!!

Does this work on a Revo?? Please say yes :D

[wanman]

Downloaded the files you put on your website and they both played quite well. In colour, which was nice too !! Sound was as bad as expected so the film trailer voice over will never be clear. Would be nice to see if we can play better resolution clips although I have tried playing normal .mov files and it is a no go (this was only 2.5mb).

Look forward to what else we can get this to work with. God bless Java !!! lol

Si

[PhilG]

To lazerin: it *may* work on a Revo Plus, but I'm not sure the basic Revo with its 8MB RAM will have enough free memory/disk space to hold the Java Runtime Engine, the Java Media Framework classes *and* the video clips. It's worth a try though.

Phil

[lazerin]

Ok, there's still hope :)

Where abouts would I get the Java Runtime Engine?

[PhilG]

It's on the CD that comes with the 5mx. You can probably download it from the symbian web site, or elsewhere. Try a google search.

Phil

[Ed_Ca22]

Has anyone tried the new version of this software? It does not require java 2 and can decode alot more types of media than this one (including most types of avi - but I havent tried it yet).

[lazerin]

Where is the new version?

[Ed_Ca22]

I just did a search for Java Media Framework and found it on Sun's site. They have hit version 2.something (we are on 1.something). I haven't tried it yet though. By the way, has anyone gotten cinepak avis to work? They are meant to. Are we limited to this resolution? I converted an avi to cinepak but got only audio. I think I may have had a bad conversion prog though because it was the same in windows.

Ed.

[Ed_Ca22]

Also, someone should write a program to start this from the extras bar. I'll make a nice little icon if anyone does the job! Or maybe I'll do it...

Ed.

[Beakynet]

I have downloaded Version 2.1.1e, however, the problem is in identifying the Java program to run. If this can be worked out I might be able to write an OPL program to run it. With version 1.1 the program froze when I tried to do anything (such as pause or mute or rewind). When it did run it ran well on my Series 7.

David

[lazerin]

Originally posted by Ed_Ca22
It does not require java 2

Does that mean you don't have to install the Java Runtime Engine?

[Beakynet]

Originally posted by lazerin
Does that mean you don't have to install the Java Runtime Engine?

No, it does not. You will still have to install the runtime engin. The version of Java on the Psion is not version 2, which means any Java program designed to run on Java 2 will not run on the Psion. You still need the runtime though.

:cool:

[andy whitlock]

I have read with interest the comments on running movie clips on series 7. I have down loaded the scream clip onto the psion, via my home PC.

I have also down loaded JMf-Alljava-nomedia.zip, also to psion via my home PC.

The above whne opened shows a mass of listed files / notes do I need to open certains ones or some thing, I have tried to open some and come up with the message can not read file.

Sorry to sound unsure but all the down loads I have tried from the pdastreet forums and others I have managed to open up and run with the zip files installed etc.

My psion is farley new - do I needx to install some other java programes first??

cheers


Andy

[Beakynet]

Originally posted by andy whitlock

My psion is farley new - do I needx to install some other java programes first??

cheers

Andy

If you have not installed the Java run time from the CD that came with your Series 7 then you should do this, it is about 2meg so will be worth putting on a CF card (D:).

[andy whitlock]

I can only assume that I hvae already done this as I have the psion disk loaded on my home PC in which I do back ups and synchronizes with contact emails etc.

Is there a simple way to see if I have Java set up on the psion.

Where on the cd provided with the psion is the java run time, will this install automatically if the cd has been run on my home PC and I have been synchronizing the two already.:confused:

[Beakynet]

If you have the Jave runtime installed, you will have a (d: or c: ) \System\Java directory. I can't remember where on the CD it is, try looking through the extras or Internet section of the menu - keep looking and you will find it.

Regards
David

[edited by MikeMcC to remove 'smiley' from file path]

[andy whitlock]

Thanks David I have now found and installed the Java fromthe cd to my S7.

I have tried to follow the instructions to play the clip from your oringinal down load. So far I have on the D drive the following

D\ System\jmf1.1\samples\player. I have then double clicked on the Simpleplayer.class the psion then says "starting" nothing else happens.

I have, in the same drive as above, the movie clip love-dont-lead.m

I am not sure about the compression as you stated on your down load instructions, the movie clip plays ok on my home pc, but nothing happens on the psion.

Any suggestions would be grateful.

Andy

[Beakynet]

Andy,

There are two files that should me moved to the D:\System\Java\EXT directory: jmf.jar and jmfbean.jar. Without these two files in this directory the player will not work.

Regards
David

[andy whitlock]

Thanks for getting back.

On the d drive, in the JMF 1.1 folder I have another folder called samples, in here are the following files.

JMF.jar
jmfbean.jar
love-dont-leab
simpleplayer.class

There are two others

jmf11ialljava-nomedia.zip
simpleplayer.java

on double tapping simpleplayer.class the psion says "starting", then nothing happens.

On trying to open love-dont etc, again nothing happens.

Any thoughts would be great.

Cheers for now.


Andy

[PhilG]

Things look a bit amiss with that list of files you've given us Andy. In D:\System\Java\ext you should have

jmf.jar
jmfbean.jar

(I also have swingall.jar and javac.jar so I can write and run Swing apps, but that's another story! - you don't need those)

Then, in a separate directory somewhere on D:, you need to unzip the jmf11ialljava-nomedia.zip file, **making sure you keep the directory system intact**

So, you should have a JMF1.1\samples directory containing the following directories

DataSource
Player
PlayerBean
RTP
Util

Don't mess with this structure or move any of the classes out of these folders.

In the Player directory, you should have a bunch of classes. Double-tap on SimplePlayer.class and the app should start. You can store the movie files anywhere.

You can in fact move all the classes whose names begin with 'SimplePlayer' to a separate location, but you must keep them all together. But get the thing running first.

Phil

[cangiante]

it took me long to perform a trial of this on my netbook but it surely was worth:)

I would be glad to try a java player capable of handling small MPEG files, as long as there is one which can suit the netbook as much as this one does.

in case somebody knows, please drop a couple of lines here;)

happy 2004 to all!

[robertsont]

can anyone help me.... i have been trying to use phil's video on the 5mx setup but have lost the original psion cd and can't find the Java Runtime Engine on the psion site anywhere, can anyone send me the necessary files??


many thanks,

tom

robertsont@lineone.net