DLNA Server App for WP8?

DNHill

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I've been looking for a DLNA server app for my phone, which would allow the movies (MP4 files) stored on the device to be sent via wifi to a DLNA renderer via wifi. All I can find is MyMediaHub, which allows control of files from an external DLNA server to an external DLNA renderer, and MoliPlayer which will act as a DLNA renderer for an external server (it can play the local files, but cannot cast them via DLNA to an external renderer). But what I cannot find anywhere is an app which will act as the server (with visibility of files stored locally) for casting.

Does anyone know of a suitable app, preferrably with a trial version (if it's not free) to confirm that everything works before committing to purchase?
 

DNHill

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Nokia Play-To/ Search the store with the query: "DLNA"

I'm on an HTC 8X (sorry should have mentioned that originally), so that's not in the store (and I can't really work-around too much, as it's a locked down corporate phone although I can install more or less whatever apps I like directly from the Windows Store). Did the DLNA search of the store and tried more or less all I could find by way of free or trial players, and nothing appears to do what I need. Hence my original question.

Thanks for the input though :)
 

azcruz

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I'm using HTC 8S and MyMediaHub is also what I used. But it didn't have an update in ages, it was a Windows Phone 7 app.
 

DNHill

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Can you try Smart Player and cPlayer?

Thanks - I did look at both of those, and couldn't find the functionality in either of them. I couldn't see any kind of video playback option in Smart Player aside from saved video - I have my movie files currently stored in Camera Roll so that Moliplayer can see them, but SmartPlayer cannot see them at all, even though they're MP4. cPlayer again has a "saved offline" page, but it can't see anything that's stored locally as described above (or if saved in the videos folder - just checked). About the only one I didn't try was YxPlayer as that doesn't have a trial version and I don't want to pay upfront just to find out if it can do it.

It's obviously something that is possible as MyMediaHub can do the DLNA sending (but not the local file opening) and of course opening and playing local files is bread-and-butter to most of the other players. I was just amazed that there doesn't seem to be anything which can do the local-to-DLNA.
 
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dergutehirte

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Usually no WP App has access to your video library, thats why apps like moliplayer pro are using a bug these days to got access to the photos. and you have to store the movies there to got them playable in moliplayer. and i dont think that there is an app out today that will use these "feature" and support dlna at the same time.
the only way will be if you put your videos in the photos folder on your phone. then you could get access and maybe you could play them to your dlna device. Thats how it seems to work with my nokia. But you should be sure your dlna player is supporting this files. The SmartPlayer for example has an option to ignore the Player Functions and just to stream everything you want to regardless if the player is able to play it or not.
 

DNHill

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Usually no WP App has access to your video library, thats why apps like moliplayer pro are using a bug these days to got access to the photos. and you have to store the movies there to got them playable in moliplayer. and i dont think that there is an app out today that will use these "feature" and support dlna at the same time.
the only way will be if you put your videos in the photos folder on your phone. then you could get access and maybe you could play them to your dlna device. Thats how it seems to work with my nokia. But you should be sure your dlna player is supporting this files. The SmartPlayer for example has an option to ignore the Player Functions and just to stream everything you want to regardless if the player is able to play it or not.

The files are MP4, so should play in almost anything (if they're in the video folder the built-in player happily plays them, as does Moliplayer if I put them under the Camera Roll folder). But SmartPlayer doesn't see them, no matter where I put them even if I select the "Display non-media files" option under settings. All SP seems to be able to see on my phone is the various pictures (.jpg files) that are also in the folder.

So it looks like basically I need something like "Nokia Play-to", except for an HTC device - ie I'm outtaluck :(
 

DNHill

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You could take a look in here: Running Nokia and Samsung WP8 apps on the HTC 8x | Adam's Code Blog
Maybe you are able to get Nokia Play to on your phone this way and maybe its working for you too :)

I actually came across that site myself earlier, after I posted my previous reply above (but thanks for the heads-up).

Gave it a go, and my mileage is unfortunately the same as he achieved. I've got Fiddler2 up and running on my personal laptop, and successfully used it to install Nokia Play To onto my 8X. It ran, but like was noted on the page you linked to it failed to find the DLNA renderer (in my case it's an iPush Dongle - Play To couldn't see it even when directly connected to its own hotspot, although MyMediaHub could).

It does look like a very useful tool/site for spoofing Nokia / Samsung apps onto my HTC, but unfortunately in this case it didn't work. Ah well, it was certainly worth a try, but I think I'm on a loser here overall...
 

Silverdogz

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Well is your tv able to connect to the internet because then it might play through that instead.

Sent from my Lumia 928 using Tapatalk
 

DNHill

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Well is your tv able to connect to the internet because then it might play through that instead.

Sent from my Lumia 928 using Tapatalk

I had thought of that, but it is for use in a hotel when travelling. The dongle can be hooked up to the hotel wifi, but the wifi speed would make upload a joke for a movie filesize, and would certainly not be fast enough or reliable enough to stream back down from a pre-stored cloud movie.

Basically I've given up with trying to do this via my Windows Phone, although it's trivial to do via my Android tablet so I just had a clear-out and stuck the movies onto there and use that instead. Means I have to tie that up rather than having it free for parallel web browsing whilst I'm watching, but if that has to be then so be it. It was just amazing that with at least a few DLNA/player apps around for WP8, that there was nothing at all that would work to do this.

Nokia Play-To looks exactly what I want, but not much use for an HTC device even with side-loading, and no-one else has made something equally as functional but more generically available.
 

link68759

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Usually no WP App has access to your video library, thats why apps like moliplayer pro are using a bug these days to got access to the photos. and you have to store the movies there to got them playable in moliplayer. and i dont think that there is an app out today that will use these "feature" and support dlna at the same time.
the only way will be if you put your videos in the photos folder on your phone. then you could get access and maybe you could play them to your dlna device. Thats how it seems to work with my nokia. But you should be sure your dlna player is supporting this files. The SmartPlayer for example has an option to ignore the Player Functions and just to stream everything you want to regardless if the player is able to play it or not.


You.... Have no idea what you're talking about. Everything about this post is just wrong.


OP, you don't want a dlna server, you want a dlna controller with the ability to pick local files. A real server would be viewable by any control point. Just nitpicking terminology. Here you go.


http://www.windowsphone.com/s?appid=ed2de477-b31a-46dc-b297-11d9a8873cdf
 

DNHill

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Thanks - you are correct although in the usage case I have in mind there would only be the phone and the DLNA renderer dongle on the network (a wifi hotspot generated by the dongle) so it would end up being the same anyway.

I've tried the trial version of the app you recommended, and whilst it looks like it should do what I want, unfortunately it can't seem to see .mp4 video files. I put a test folder under Camera Roll with one in and pointed the app at it but just got "no entries found" even though both Moliplayer and Pocket File Manager can see the file in there.

The app itself can see and send .jpg files from the parent Camera Roll folder, so the link itself works. It's just unfortunate that .mp4 files seem to be invisible. That's even with the settings option set to ignore player file restrictions, and the files are fully playable by both Moliplayer locally and the DLNA renderer (a Pi running Kodi/XBMC).

I've emailed the app creator and am awaiting feedback to see if it's a fundamental issue or something weird somewhere in the set-up, as I'd expect .mp4 to be supported if it was going to play video at all.
 

link68759

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Thanks - you are correct although in the usage case I have in mind there would only be the phone and the DLNA renderer dongle on the network (a wifi hotspot generated by the dongle) so it would end up being the same anyway.

I've tried the trial version of the app you recommended, and whilst it looks like it should do what I want, unfortunately it can't seem to see .mp4 video files. I put a test folder under Camera Roll with one in and pointed the app at it but just got "no entries found" even though both Moliplayer and Pocket File Manager can see the file in there.

The app itself can see and send .jpg files from the parent Camera Roll folder, so the link itself works. It's just unfortunate that .mp4 files seem to be invisible. That's even with the settings option set to ignore player file restrictions, and the files are fully playable by both Moliplayer locally and the DLNA renderer (a Pi running Kodi/XBMC).

I've emailed the app creator and am awaiting feedback to see if it's a fundamental issue or something weird somewhere in the set-up, as I'd expect .mp4 to be supported if it was going to play video at all.



The developer of that app is very responsive and helpful, luckily. However your inability to see .mp4 files is odd, since it works just fine on my devices. Does xbox video see them? What version of WP are you running?
 

DNHill

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The developer of that app is very responsive and helpful, luckily. However your inability to see .mp4 files is odd, since it works just fine on my devices. Does xbox video see them? What version of WP are you running?

WP8.0 (Vodafone UK and/or HTC haven't deemed my 8X worthy of 8.1 or so it seems).

Both Moliplayer and the in-build video app see and locally play them fine (when put in a suitably accessible folder of course).

I mailed the app developer last night and am awaiting a reply, although I guess the holiday season may delay things a bit too. It's not a major issue as I usually have my Android tablet with me too and that can stream fine to the dongle, but of course having the additional option of doing it from my phone as well would be nice.

If it's just a restriction on the trial version then I'd be happy to pay for the full one, but of course I don't want to do so and then find out that there's something else wrong and I've wasted my cash.
 

link68759

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WP8.0 (Vodafone UK and/or HTC haven't deemed my 8X worthy of 8.1 or so it seems).

Both Moliplayer and the in-build video app see and locally play them fine (when put in a suitably accessible folder of course).

I mailed the app developer last night and am awaiting a reply, although I guess the holiday season may delay things a bit too. It's not a major issue as I usually have my Android tablet with me too and that can stream fine to the dongle, but of course having the additional option of doing it from my phone as well would be nice.

If it's just a restriction on the trial version then I'd be happy to pay for the full one, but of course I don't want to do so and then find out that there's something else wrong and I've wasted my cash.


No, the problem is WP8.0. Get yourself the developer preview and upgrade man!
Moliplayer and pocketfilemanager both actually have special file system access granted by microsoft so they can work better under 8.0, but no other app is given this benefit. 8.1 eliminates the need for this and any app can properly read the file system without special privileges. Under 8.0," you can't compare moliplayer and pfm to other apps because they have been given special treatment.
 

Kevin Rush

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Re: DNHill,
May I ask your use case? DLNA has intrigued me and there are more and more articles about and devices for it. I just can't think of why anyone would actually use it in a purposeful way? Can you help explain?

Best wishes.
 

DNHill

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@Link68759 - I'd like to, but it's a corporate phone and so I'm a little reluctant to do so just for something "personal" like this. They don't mind us putting whatever apps etc we want on there (except Skype), but somehow I think our IT department wouldn't take too kindly to it suddenly ending up on a different version of the OS (especially if it broke something business-critical). I might have a chat with them in the new year about forcing an upgrade, but it's going to take some creative thinking to make a case for something that isn't really needed for basic calls and work email which it has and which works in 8.0.

@Kevin - Example would be for when I'm travelling. I've got a small HDMI DLNA dongle which is USB powered and makes its own wifi hotspot. So the thought would be for example to stick that in the hotel TV, then shoot a movie or two onto the TV from the phone. It's something I do already using my tablet, but as I also use that for general web surfing in such scenarios things get a bit more limited as doing both from the same device (and setting it all up) gets more demanding. My thinking was as I already have the phone with me by default it would be nice to use it that way.
 

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