Does this new player model output FULL Dolby Vision to a DV display, especially if you have ripped a 12 bit FEL dual layered 4k Blu-ray from your collection to MKV? In the past these kinds of media players had trouble with Dolby Vision compatibility even though they listed Dolby Vision in the supported HDR formats.
Thanks for watching! We went ahead and tested this with a Braveheart 4K Blu-ray rip which has a 12-bit FEL Dolby Vision enhancement layer, and it did properly trigger Dolby Vision on our TV just as a Blu-ray player would.
@@TwoGuyzTech I was looking through a certain website I won't name here and they explained what the Zidoo is doing. It will read the dual layered DV stream and only send the metadata, triggering the DV display. It cannot read the video part of the Full Enhancement layer nor combine the HDR10 layer with the differential layer to reconstitute the 12 bit DV file. So, in summation: 10 bit MEL or 12 bit FEL Dolby Vision rips will only play back as 10 bit MEL because of a limitation of the SOC being used in their current players.
Thank you for the info. We would appreciate it if you could name and link the source of this info so we can research into this ourselves. We feel this is an important issue that needs discussion, so we decided to pin your comment.
@@TwoGuyzTech The main reason I am hesitant to name names is that even though we are simply trying to have a way of archiving and playing back the files from discs we own, that could still cause the site blowback from a Digital Millennium Copyright Act strike against them. U.S. laws are draconian and overly deferential to studios compared to Europe where they allow backups to be made for personal use.
Im so happy I found this channel during the pandemic, if we're ever in a situation like that. This is the guy I need to get my info on home theater tech. For sure!
Shield è ottimo per lo streaming. Ma per i file locali quando superi i mkv 1080p h264 è un disastro. Senza contare che è pieno di pubblicità e non ha un lettore mediaplayer dedicato. Io li ho avuti entrambi e ti posso dire che per mio gusto personale il Dune è il migliore di tutti...
I have had a lot of devices and ran Plex on them. Then I got a Ziddo and totally left Plex in the Home Theater! I have the Z9X Pro for NAS and Apple TV (2023) for Apple Music in Atmos and then the Nvidia Shield Pro for streaming. Love the Ziddo!
Absolutely! Same experience here. We really feel like the Zidoo players are a much more convenient and bulletproof solution for in-home streaming. Thanks for watching :)
The quality is always going to be alot better on the zidoo like the zapitti they both dont use the internet to play the movie, its the harddrive stored in the player , a high quality disc player.
I am seriously thinking about purchasing this player for my 4K HDR, 4K Dolby Vision, 4K Dolby Atmos .mkv rips Long story short, I recently bought a NVIDIA Shield Pro and it was a terrible. It was doing weird stuff to my Soundbar so I sent it back. I don't need any streaming devices because I have my Apple TV 4K for streaming. I need something to play my collection of 4K Blu Ray rips and I think I found what I was looking for with the Zidoo Z2000 Pro.
A lot of people don't know that Zidoo makes the Eversolo DMP-A6 audio streamer that's so hot right now. I've had their Z9 models and in my opinion they're the best Android boxes around. I just wish I could figure out how to set up SMB on my Windows computer because in my experience it seems like an absolute nightmare to do!
For quite a few years I have used HTPC for my movies and music. But quite frankly I now just use a Synology NAS and play the movies on my Sony TVs with VLC media player. I also have audiophile grade music systems in different rooms and now I just use WIIM music streamers. Other than a pretty interface I no longer see the reason for spending money or this type of product.
Great review and thanks for the comparison with the Shield! I'm surprised that the upscaling is better since the Shield is famous for its AI upscaling. I just wish these ran Android 12 or newer, perhaps they will get an update.
Thanks for watching! I was really surprised that it looked better than the Shield as well. Android 12 would be a nice upgrade but since they've done so many customizations to the OS it might not make much of a difference outside of sideloaded app support for example.
I do have 1 question. How do you do the series on zidoo? That's the only problem I have. I already have them on the nas, but on zidoo shows as (a,b,c) and so on. I don't know what season and what episode I am looking at.Thanks
Hi! Thank you for the excellent, in-depth review! I was wondering if I would be able to play 4k UHD movies from an external SSD, via the USB 3.0 port on the back of this media player? Thanks!
The Z9X is the better deal than the 2000 IMO. It has the same chip, same RAM, but twice the internal storage. It also has a SATA port for ext drives. For me and even the example you mentioned, I use it to connect to my NAS so there is no need for extra drives or even the 32Gb internal storage it has. I would get the 2000 or 5000 based on looks alone. Honestly, I did not see a big difference from the Z9X to the Z9X Pro with the better chip, more RAM , and more storage. I kept it any way, lol. Maybe the Z9X will go in the bedrom.
I think your first comment was referring to Z9X Pro, not Z9X? Z9x has older android version, and only 2GB RAM vs 4GB on Z9x pro. All of the new Zidoos have 32GB eMMC (uhd500 has 64gb). iF you are just connecting to a NAS then 9x pro makes sense with SATA external connection that is no included on the Z2000, but cant you just watch your NAS library over ethernet instead like TwoGUyzTech did?
The Z9X Pro (and Z2000 Pro) is in another league when it comes to reading disc menus from full disc rips. The older generation can take minutes to pull up the menus and often fails. The newer models sail through loading the menus and I've had no issues so far. Also, browsing the library is much faster with most poster art quickly loading.
hello guys, I have the zidoo z9x with my oled C2 and I am happy in general, I only use it to play via network from my nas and I was thinking of upgrading to the uhd2000 pro...but I was wondering if there would be an improvement in image quality since otherwise I don't need more, neither covers nor more fluidity in the menus since I only want it to play...regards
i am just starting my local streaming journey. Would you suggest purchasing a Synology NAS and doing some sort of backed up Raid setup on two drives, or just buy the Z2000 and install one 16TB internal drive? Can i back up the16TB drive over a network cable as well to my local network? I dont think i will ever have more than 150 movies as i am pretty picky.
You could go either way here. We use a Synology NAS with SHR for redundancy, which works well for us. If you put a drive into the Zidoo, you can share from it over SMB and back it up to other locations on your network.
Great video! Thanks for posting! Can this unit or more specifically the UHD 5000 be used on multiple tvs throughout the home if it’s located in a rack in the basement?
Is there an option to view individual posters rather than collecting them? I'm not asking about manually deleting collections. and How can I clear the currently watched list? Thanks in advance
Does this unit have region lock for products that are outside of the US? I think the most important factor is uncompressed audio, which no other streamer provides nvidia shield or others. It's the same as streaming from your TV and the audio is always compressed. Sounds like it's not a difference, but if you compare the two you will notice right away. *This is for multi channel home theater enthusiasts, not sound bars.
Beautiful looking devive with a nice interface... I have multiple home theaters running and use firestick 4k,roku ultra and appletv 4k boxes on them..they are all networked and can stream froma central computer share...The thing with this really cool device here is, yes, you can do dtshdma and true hd while the devices I have will only do that format as 8 channel pcm...However,the output is discrete and it will Sound the same and its a hell of alot cheaper.. for 560 plus bucks, you could get a decent pc which could be used to play ur collections thru tv and hometheater and still easily do all the HD audio formats and More...If this device was 150.00, it would be a bargain and absolutely a great alternative to nvidia shield with its capabilities...
Thank you for the video. Can you tell us does this media player has an option to turn off Dolby vision and just watch in hdr10 because some of us prefer. the hdr10 format because it's brighter than the DV? Also, if you could make another video where you go more detail into the settings and show us how to enable eARC etc.
Thanks for watching! Yes you can configure your preferred HDR/Dolby Vision settings in the HDR Configuration menu of the player. As for your second question, eARC is not a function of any media player/streamer device since that is handled between your TV and your AV Receiver/processor, so the Zidoo does not have an option to enable that, nor does it need it. It will automatically use the eARC channel between your TV and your AV processor/receiver if you have that enabled on both of those devices. Hope this helps!
What I’m really interested is what happens if you turn off the wifi and Ethernet connection of this device and start a Dolby vision title or hdr10+ title it still plays in this mode or downgrade on HDR ?
Hello! I'm planning to buy a Zidoo media player, but I can't decide between Zidoo Z2000 Pro and Zidoo Z2600. Can you or somebody help me? Does somebody can explain the pros and cons of each model apart from the difference in price?
Once your Movie /TV Shows & all metadata is added to Zidoo "when Online", Can the Zidoo Z2000 Pro Media Player Display & Play all Movie / TV Shows including all Metadata OFFLINE ? (with no internet connected) Great Overview, thanks for sharing, cheers 🍻 👌
Thanks for watching! Yes once you have scraped for metadata, the player will work without an internet connection, but of course if your movies are on a NAS, you will still need to have a local network connection to play back content. Hope this helps! :)
@@TwoGuyzTech That's Great news, Thanks👍 I'm currently using 2 x 16TB HDD for Media Storage, Currently using Zappiti Neo Internal Drive Dock for HDD & other 2nd HDD in a OWC Dual DriveDock. Zidoo does sound much better regarding its offline use. Zappiti was limited by its Full time Online CLOUD Based Server that "required internet full time". I mean it does have an offline mode but each time you add new movies (online) then switch back to Offline it would then need to Rescan my "entire collection" again. This setup really sucked if your collection was large. Anyway, depending on Zappiti new upcoming App & if there offline setup is fixed I may just upgrade to the Zidoo Z2000 Pro. It does sound much better for Users who live on a property or rural & have limited internet signal such as myself. Cheers for the quick response, enjoy you movies & quality setup. 😊📽🎞🍿🥤👌👍
What about the music player? I noticed that all of the Zidoo reviews do not cover the Music Player. I use Plex on my Nvidia Shield for both movies and music. It falls short with movies but music sound great. Would it be possible for you to cover the music player?
Thanks for watching! We'll cover this more in our comparison video between the Z2000 Pro and the UHD5000, especially since that model has the dedicated analog output so there's more to discuss in that regard.
Just received my uhd 5000, but doesn't stay on when try to turn it on, Nothing is happening. I haven't even done the initial setups yet. Any ideas? Thanks
Excellent review. Does this player send Dolby vision signal to a projector like the HDfury ? Also how does the video through the zidoo compare to the physical copy ? Thanks in advance and keep up the great content.
Thanks for watching! Yep you should be able to do this by programming a custom EDID which is a feature available from the settings in the player. You can also use the VS10 engine to get a similar effect. In our testing, the picture from the Zidoo is superior to the quality of our physical copies through our Sony UBP-X800. Hope this helps :)
@@norbpoggio2833 When you rip a DVD, Blu-ray, or 4k Blu-ray from your own collection, you need to do a bit-for-bit rip. Then the quality of the media file is exactly the same as the disc.
Can you side load Kodi on the Zidoo? If so, how does running Kodi on the Zidoo compare to running Kodi on the 3rd gen FireTV cube? I've found that the 3rd gen FireTV cube with it's 8-cores (4x ARM Cortex-A73 @ 2.2Ghz and 4x ARM Cortex-A53 @ 2.0Ghz) runs Kodi 20.2 beautifully with amazing performance. Browsing a large movie library (5000+) is super snappy and the fanart all loads instantly when scrolling through walls of movies, etc. Running Kodi 20.2 on the 3rd gen FireTV cube with a media library vs NFS/SMB seems to be the absolute best solution that I'm aware of so I'm wondering how the Zidoo might compare?
I added a hard drive to the Zidoo z2000 pro but I can't see it on the Zidoo? I copied 200 UHD Blueray movies to the drive. But I don't see the drive when I turn on Zidoo?
Thank for the great video. Would I need an expensive NAS for a zidoo or will a budget one work fine? I’ve heard some Plex servers needs a higher end NAS to do the transcoding.
Thanks for watching! If you do want to stream over the network, you will need a NAS, but since the Zidoo does all of the decoding on its own rather than relying on any transcoding from the NAS, you could use a very inexpensive NAS, like a Raspberry Pi for example. If you purchase a Zidoo with a hard drive bay, you can also add up to a 16 terabyte hard drive right into the unit itself with no need for a NAS. Hope this helps :)
Best review for this player out there, thanks! Anyone able to use a harmony elite to control the Z2000 pro? Thinking of pulling the trigger and this info would help, thanks so much.
Thanks for watching! Yep the Harmony Elite works just fine, there are a lot of buttons so some less common functions are in the device menu, but for general use it works perfectly. Hope this helps! :)
For the layman, would this be a step up from the latest Amazon FireTV Cube for streaming or is there a better option if I'm not playing any local files?
Thanks for watching! We feel this would be a step up from the FireTV Cube for streaming local content within your network - but if you're not playing any local files, the Zidoo might not be the best choice. In this case we can highly recommend the NVIDIA SHIELD Pro Android TV, it's been a great device for us. Hope this helps :)
The Zidoo media players are not meant to be 'OTT streaming' players, although they can. Their primary function is to playback CD, SACD, DVD, BD, and UHD rips and for this, the Zidoo players are probably the best option available.
I am considering buying one but one question i want to ask is regarding my files is on a Terramaster D5-300. Basically a 5 bay hdd and not a NAS. What should i do to connect the contents of those drives to this? Or do i just plug my 16tb HDD into this? Reason why I don't is because I have 2 of them right now and its really full of movies and likely have to buy a 3rd one soon. Yeah no NAS yet. Planning to but i thought it best to buy this one first as many of my movies are having buffering issues with PLEX.
Thanks for watching! Yep, in our testing this should work. We created "BD Backup" folders from MakeMKV, which should have identical contents to ISO files, and they did allow us to play the movies with full menu functionality. From other sources we've also heard that ISO files created with other programs work absolutely fine. Hope this helps!
It stores it on a drive in a file you can backup. If you have a huge movie collection I will recommend you to use a program called Tiny MediaManager to recognized the movies and download the graphis for the poster wall. Then you stored these data in a map with each movie on your server. So you server or NAS will contain a single map for each movie containing all the media info files. After that you tell the zidoo to look locally for the info instead of scraping it off the internet. It will save you lots of hours of helping the Zidoo to recognized the movie and put the right posters on the poster wall.
Great review does the Zidoo have IR. Thats my one gripe with the Nvidia TV shield pro. I want to put the Nvidia TV shield pro on my all in one remote but cant due to the Shield pro lacking an IR blaster. Also how are the Zidoo's streaming abilities? I love how Nvidia can do it all. Including streaming Netflix and Prime and giving me true uncompressed passthru 4k dolby atmos audio for my Monolith HTP-1 to process nothing no other streamer like Roku or Apple or Amazon will do.
Does anyone know how to install an internal hard drive to the 2000? I've seen many people online have the same issue, but my 2000pro does not see the drive. It will only work via smb and a direct usb 3.0 connection via external, but the internal drive bay will not detect a drive. Anyone have any ideas? Thanks
Based on what I have gathered the only difference between the two is that the 5000 is built in DAC and extra balanced analog audio output (XLR), It also has some MQA and lossless audio filtering which are all useless for most people, If you have a decent AVR connected via HDMI to Z2000 you're covered, Alternatively if you don't care about AVR processing and analog outputs and just want to connect to a TV with built in speakers or sound bar, the extra money for the 5000 is just a waste.
As far as we understand and from what we experienced, yes the two units have identical capabilities as far as playing back movies. We had a few other reasons for going with the UHD5000 as well - like the comment above mentioned, the built-in DAC and balanced analog output, we also appreciate the dual HDD bays and dual power supplies (for any difference that may or may not make) and we just like the full sized form factor which looks a lot better in our AV rack. Hope this helps :)
Thanks for the review. I've been very intrigued by this device and hear nothing but positive comments. Will you also do a review of the music section? I use my Shield for music playback and the experience via Kodi is less than ideal. If the music support is equal to video, I just may make the move.
Thanks for watching! You can setup a network share from the Zidoo that will allow you to copy files to its internal HDD over the network. Then you can just drag and drop movies from any compatible PC just as you would with any regular NAS. Hope this helps :)
Love the video. I have synology Nas linked to my Zidoo z2000 pro. However, when I play some of my Dolby atmos files, they came out with no audio, while other files are working just fine. Any thoughts on the setting that I need to tweak? Thanks.
Thanks for watching Matt! This isn't the first one, we got the UHD5000 before this unit, which we bought with our own money, but still very happy with both units :)
I didn't see anything in the Poster section that demonstrated it had more flexibility than Plex. Can this organize movies into mini-collections like Plex?
@@TwoGuyzTech Well, they are wrong. Zidoo is just lazy and have not updated their site since 16TB hard disks were the largest size available. I personally use 20TB hard disks with a Z1000 Pro and I'm sure the newly launched 24TB and 28TB Hard Disks will also work just fine. There is no technical reason why they shouldn't.
At this stage in my life i try to determine how a piece of electronics adds to my capabilities. I dumped my Media Server PC because my Sony TV utilizing VLC software accesses my movies and tv shows on my server. This works perfectly. What capability am I missing. Pretty pictures representing the movies. I'll save the money and not buy this product.
Does Zidoo offer a model with an internal DVD drive plus removable hard drive so we can rip our movies? Seems like the only opyion like that is Zapetti & its ridiculously overpriced NAS with a rebranded DVD drive. Btw, wish TGT would rerecord your guide to ripping our DVDs, but with an external USB drive instead.
No. You would use your computer and a proper 4k Blu-ray computer disc drive with the correct firmware and ripping software. If you choose right, it's not hugely expensive.
Questions: I have a Zappiti and while ok, does not live up to the hype and now questionable future. So this is interesting. Long story short my home network needs improvement and I can't do 4K over it. I have to use USB attached drives. Does the Zidoo act as an SMB server to at least transfer the rips onto the attached drives? Second with mine I have my drives on a USB hub connected and it works fine, same with the Zidoo? Lastly is about the USB 3.0 port and not a USB 2.0 port. On the Zappiti after about an hour on the USB 3.0 port it resets and has to find the drive again. Not good when watching a movie. USB 2.0 port doesn't encounter this problem. Does only having the 3.0 port cause a similar problem on the Zidoo? Lastly is the misidentified titles. Besides title search, can your search via the TMDB number found in the TMDB website URL when finding the movie? This has came in handy in the past on the Zappiti. Setting control and user interface looks snappier than what I encounter with the Zappiti.
@@Espiritiv No clue. I know Dune software coding was used in Zappiti, or at least claimed, in their iso playback. Same with Dolby Vision, so they must be closely related/sharing. All I know is earlier this year they entered into something like France equivalent of chapter 11 bankruptcy. Also earlier their US webstore was taken down.
@@dan_hitchman007 Official today. They sent an email out to dealers saying it is over. I ordered a Zidoo Z9X Pro today to see if I like. For only $250 compared to what I paid for my Zappiti seems worth the risk.
@@TwoGuyzTech Apple TV costs about 2 bills. Infuse uses nas; smb; plex; mostly whatever.. It lacks music capabilities is why I mentioned phone mirroring.. aside from that it's an astonishing setup for videos w an impressive OS and chip that will handle anything... reply is just to clearup that it's not ecosystem only . and for two bills compared to what these in the vid cost . . . no no... I've tried many things throughout the years windows media center; wd; shield; roku etc.. this by far the most elegant/or flat out best (and w trailers).... vs 6 bills or a G... I know it's all about those sponsors but yeeeesh lol
It's not "about the sponsors". If you would have watched the whole video, you would have seen that we spent our own money on the $1k Zidoo UHD5000 player before we ever received this unit for review. And, once again, we're not into the Apple ecosystem - which would of course require the purchase of a compatible phone for your aforementioned casting solution - which can be quite a bit more than a "couple bills". If you're not interested in this solution, feel free to use a solution that works best for you. Honestly, we don't care.
@@theorystube Not all people are versed into Apple products, the majority own Android in fact, Plus a lot of folks like myself don't like to use their iPhones for entertainment needs, You get a phone call and everything stops, Sure it's a good solution for a student or a person on a budget but it will not integrate well into a home entertainment system.
Does this new player model output FULL Dolby Vision to a DV display, especially if you have ripped a 12 bit FEL dual layered 4k Blu-ray from your collection to MKV? In the past these kinds of media players had trouble with Dolby Vision compatibility even though they listed Dolby Vision in the supported HDR formats.
Thanks for watching! We went ahead and tested this with a Braveheart 4K Blu-ray rip which has a 12-bit FEL Dolby Vision enhancement layer, and it did properly trigger Dolby Vision on our TV just as a Blu-ray player would.
@@TwoGuyzTech I was looking through a certain website I won't name here and they explained what the Zidoo is doing. It will read the dual layered DV stream and only send the metadata, triggering the DV display. It cannot read the video part of the Full Enhancement layer nor combine the HDR10 layer with the differential layer to reconstitute the 12 bit DV file.
So, in summation: 10 bit MEL or 12 bit FEL Dolby Vision rips will only play back as 10 bit MEL because of a limitation of the SOC being used in their current players.
Thank you for the info. We would appreciate it if you could name and link the source of this info so we can research into this ourselves. We feel this is an important issue that needs discussion, so we decided to pin your comment.
@@TwoGuyzTech The main reason I am hesitant to name names is that even though we are simply trying to have a way of archiving and playing back the files from discs we own, that could still cause the site blowback from a Digital Millennium Copyright Act strike against them. U.S. laws are draconian and overly deferential to studios compared to Europe where they allow backups to be made for personal use.
@@dan_hitchman007 The laws in the US allow a person to copy his legally purchased copy protected media for personal use.
Just got this player a week ago.
Love it!
I've been very pleased with Zidoo since I first purchased the Z1000 pro 2 years ago. Much better experience than the Zappiti experience I had
Im so happy I found this channel during the pandemic, if we're ever in a situation like that. This is the guy I need to get my info on home theater tech. For sure!
Hey thank you so much for your support! We appreciate it :)
Would like to see side by side to a shield pro. Hard to believe $559 media player does that much better than a $200 shield running plex.
Shield è ottimo per lo streaming. Ma per i file locali quando superi i mkv 1080p h264 è un disastro. Senza contare che è pieno di pubblicità e non ha un lettore mediaplayer dedicato. Io li ho avuti entrambi e ti posso dire che per mio gusto personale il Dune è il migliore di tutti...
Zidoo is the way to go if you have movie files on a hard drive
I have had a lot of devices and ran Plex on them. Then I got a Ziddo and totally left Plex in the Home Theater! I have the Z9X Pro for NAS and Apple TV (2023) for Apple Music in Atmos and then the Nvidia Shield Pro for streaming. Love the Ziddo!
Absolutely! Same experience here. We really feel like the Zidoo players are a much more convenient and bulletproof solution for in-home streaming. Thanks for watching :)
The quality is always going to be alot better on the zidoo like the zapitti they both dont use the internet to play the movie, its the harddrive stored in the player , a high quality disc player.
I am seriously thinking about purchasing this player for my 4K HDR, 4K Dolby Vision, 4K Dolby Atmos .mkv rips Long story short, I recently bought a NVIDIA Shield Pro and it was a terrible. It was doing weird stuff to my Soundbar so I sent it back. I don't need any streaming devices because I have my Apple TV 4K for streaming. I need something to play my collection of 4K Blu Ray rips and I think I found what I was looking for with the Zidoo Z2000 Pro.
A lot of people don't know that Zidoo makes the Eversolo DMP-A6 audio streamer that's so hot right now. I've had their Z9 models and in my opinion they're the best Android boxes around. I just wish I could figure out how to set up SMB on my Windows computer because in my experience it seems like an absolute nightmare to do!
Thanks. Is the fan totally or almost silent?
For quite a few years I have used HTPC for my movies and music. But quite frankly I now just use a Synology NAS and play the movies on my Sony TVs with VLC media player. I also have audiophile grade music systems in different rooms and now I just use WIIM music streamers. Other than a pretty interface I no longer see the reason for spending money or this type of product.
Cant wait for Z2000 vs UHD5000 comparison. I really only care about theater playback and dont care about 2 ch audio.
What about just using Apple Tv with Jellyfin?
Get the 5000UHD!!!
@@jonnykhoa7205 well they just came out with a new model UHD8000 so I'd have to get that one now ☺️
Great review and thanks for the comparison with the Shield! I'm surprised that the upscaling is better since the Shield is famous for its AI upscaling. I just wish these ran Android 12 or newer, perhaps they will get an update.
Thanks for watching! I was really surprised that it looked better than the Shield as well. Android 12 would be a nice upgrade but since they've done so many customizations to the OS it might not make much of a difference outside of sideloaded app support for example.
Good review. Thank you! I do wonder why they limit the HDD to 16 TB? I look forward to the UHD 5000 video.
Good question! I imagine it's a limitation of the SATA controller they use, but we can't say for certain. Thanks for watching!
I do have 1 question. How do you do the series on zidoo? That's the only problem I have. I already have them on the nas, but on zidoo shows as (a,b,c) and so on. I don't know what season and what episode I am looking at.Thanks
Zidoo z9s for many years, now Z9X Pro .. .great player.. but i´m missing "aspect ratio in HT view"..
Will this player be able to access movies on a Zappiti NAS like a Zappiti player? That’s the big question.
I have z1000 pro and it is excellent
Does it support 5.1 dts over optical cable? On older versions of this brand the dts did not work on optical. Good video!
Hi! Thank you for the excellent, in-depth review!
I was wondering if I would be able to play 4k UHD movies from an external SSD, via the USB 3.0 port on the back of this media player?
Thanks!
The Z9X is the better deal than the 2000 IMO. It has the same chip, same RAM, but twice the internal storage. It also has a SATA port for ext drives. For me and even the example you mentioned, I use it to connect to my NAS so there is no need for extra drives or even the 32Gb internal storage it has. I would get the 2000 or 5000 based on looks alone. Honestly, I did not see a big difference from the Z9X to the Z9X Pro with the better chip, more RAM , and more storage. I kept it any way, lol. Maybe the Z9X will go in the bedrom.
I think your first comment was referring to Z9X Pro, not Z9X? Z9x has older android version, and only 2GB RAM vs 4GB on Z9x pro. All of the new Zidoos have 32GB eMMC (uhd500 has 64gb). iF you are just connecting to a NAS then 9x pro makes sense with SATA external connection that is no included on the Z2000, but cant you just watch your NAS library over ethernet instead like TwoGUyzTech did?
The Z9X Pro (and Z2000 Pro) is in another league when it comes to reading disc menus from full disc rips. The older generation can take minutes to pull up the menus and often fails. The newer models sail through loading the menus and I've had no issues so far. Also, browsing the library is much faster with most poster art quickly loading.
I just got the Zidoo Z2000 pro? Do you need to format the 3.5 SATA drive in NTFS before putting it in drive on Zidoo?
hello guys, I have the zidoo z9x with my oled C2 and I am happy in general, I only use it to play via network from my nas and I was thinking of upgrading to the uhd2000 pro...but I was wondering if there would be an improvement in image quality since otherwise I don't need more, neither covers nor more fluidity in the menus since I only want it to play...regards
i am just starting my local streaming journey. Would you suggest purchasing a Synology NAS and doing some sort of backed up Raid setup on two drives, or just buy the Z2000 and install one 16TB internal drive? Can i back up the16TB drive over a network cable as well to my local network? I dont think i will ever have more than 150 movies as i am pretty picky.
You could go either way here. We use a Synology NAS with SHR for redundancy, which works well for us. If you put a drive into the Zidoo, you can share from it over SMB and back it up to other locations on your network.
Great video! Thanks for posting! Can this unit or more specifically the UHD 5000 be used on multiple tvs throughout the home if it’s located in a rack in the basement?
Is there an option to view individual posters rather than collecting them? I'm not asking about manually deleting collections.
and How can I clear the currently watched list?
Thanks in advance
Does this unit have region lock for products that are outside of the US?
I think the most important factor is uncompressed audio, which no other streamer provides nvidia shield or others. It's the same as streaming from your TV and the audio is always compressed. Sounds like it's not a difference, but if you compare the two you will notice right away. *This is for multi channel home theater enthusiasts, not sound bars.
i hav n older model z9x pro and works great with hdr or hdr 10plus or dv i love it speacially its vs 10 engine upscale 1080 to dv or hdr 4k uhd
Beautiful looking devive with a nice interface... I have multiple home theaters running and use firestick 4k,roku ultra and appletv 4k boxes on them..they are all networked and can stream froma central computer share...The thing with this really cool device here is, yes, you can do dtshdma and true hd while the devices I have will only do that format as 8 channel pcm...However,the output is discrete and it will Sound the same and its a hell of alot cheaper.. for 560 plus bucks, you could get a decent pc which could be used to play ur collections thru tv and hometheater and still easily do all the HD audio formats and More...If this device was 150.00, it would be a bargain and absolutely a great alternative to nvidia shield with its capabilities...
Thank you for the video. Can you tell us does this media player has an option to turn off Dolby vision and just watch in hdr10 because some of us prefer. the hdr10 format because it's brighter than the DV? Also, if you could make another video where you go more detail into the settings and show us how to enable eARC etc.
Thanks for watching! Yes you can configure your preferred HDR/Dolby Vision settings in the HDR Configuration menu of the player. As for your second question, eARC is not a function of any media player/streamer device since that is handled between your TV and your AV Receiver/processor, so the Zidoo does not have an option to enable that, nor does it need it. It will automatically use the eARC channel between your TV and your AV processor/receiver if you have that enabled on both of those devices. Hope this helps!
What I’m really interested is what happens if you turn off the wifi and Ethernet connection of this device and start a Dolby vision title or hdr10+ title it still plays in this mode or downgrade on HDR ?
Hello! I'm planning to buy a Zidoo media player, but I can't decide between Zidoo Z2000 Pro and Zidoo Z2600. Can you or somebody help me? Does somebody can explain the pros and cons of each model apart from the difference in price?
What makes the UHD5000 better? TY I SUBSCRIBED
Great video! Can you add more than one server to this unit? Or any Zidoo. TIA
Can you transfer from your nas to your uhd5000 over net
How big external HDD can I connect to my Zidoo Z2000 Pro through the USB 3.0 port? 16 TB or 18 TB?
Once your Movie /TV Shows & all metadata is added to Zidoo "when Online", Can the Zidoo Z2000 Pro Media Player Display & Play all Movie / TV Shows including all Metadata OFFLINE ? (with no internet connected)
Great Overview, thanks for sharing, cheers 🍻 👌
Thanks for watching! Yes once you have scraped for metadata, the player will work without an internet connection, but of course if your movies are on a NAS, you will still need to have a local network connection to play back content. Hope this helps! :)
@@TwoGuyzTech That's Great news, Thanks👍 I'm currently using 2 x 16TB HDD for Media Storage, Currently using Zappiti Neo Internal Drive Dock for HDD & other 2nd HDD in a OWC Dual DriveDock. Zidoo does sound much better regarding its offline use. Zappiti was limited by its Full time Online CLOUD Based Server that "required internet full time". I mean it does have an offline mode but each time you add new movies (online) then switch back to Offline it would then need to Rescan my "entire collection" again. This setup really sucked if your collection was large.
Anyway, depending on Zappiti new upcoming App & if there offline setup is fixed I may just upgrade to the Zidoo Z2000 Pro.
It does sound much better for Users who live on a property or rural & have limited internet signal such as myself.
Cheers for the quick response, enjoy you movies & quality setup. 😊📽🎞🍿🥤👌👍
What about the music player? I noticed that all of the Zidoo reviews do not cover the Music Player. I use Plex on my Nvidia Shield for both movies and music. It falls short with movies but music sound great. Would it be possible for you to cover the music player?
Thanks for watching! We'll cover this more in our comparison video between the Z2000 Pro and the UHD5000, especially since that model has the dedicated analog output so there's more to discuss in that regard.
That will be great. Overall this was a great review. I look forward to the next one
Just received my uhd 5000, but doesn't stay on when try to turn it on, Nothing is happening. I haven't even done the initial setups yet. Any ideas? Thanks
This seems to tempting to try out in replacement of a Apple TV 4K and Plex Server but at the cost, I just dont think it'd be worth it.
Excellent review. Does this player send Dolby vision signal to a projector like the HDfury ? Also how does the video through the zidoo compare to the physical copy ? Thanks in advance and keep up the great content.
Thanks for watching! Yep you should be able to do this by programming a custom EDID which is a feature available from the settings in the player. You can also use the VS10 engine to get a similar effect. In our testing, the picture from the Zidoo is superior to the quality of our physical copies through our Sony UBP-X800. Hope this helps :)
I just got this on Friday. I had to find the right software to ripped my UHD Bluerays
How did you find the video quality if the ripped file played through the Zidoo compared to the disc on DVD player ? @@MrBjorn6
@@norbpoggio2833 See two comments up. He says he belives Zidoo is suppier to his Sony UBP-X800
@@norbpoggio2833 When you rip a DVD, Blu-ray, or 4k Blu-ray from your own collection, you need to do a bit-for-bit rip. Then the quality of the media file is exactly the same as the disc.
Can you side load Kodi on the Zidoo? If so, how does running Kodi on the Zidoo compare to running Kodi on the 3rd gen FireTV cube? I've found that the 3rd gen FireTV cube with it's 8-cores (4x ARM Cortex-A73 @ 2.2Ghz and 4x ARM Cortex-A53 @ 2.0Ghz) runs Kodi 20.2 beautifully with amazing performance. Browsing a large movie library (5000+) is super snappy and the fanart all loads instantly when scrolling through walls of movies, etc. Running Kodi 20.2 on the 3rd gen FireTV cube with a media library vs NFS/SMB seems to be the absolute best solution that I'm aware of so I'm wondering how the Zidoo might compare?
I get a feeling Kodi will run on this device since it is has a certain feature that runs on this device.
Does this play SACD disc?
so my question is if I ran jellyfin on an extra pc I have with a Nas hooked up to that already would I need this?
great review! thanks
Thanks for watching!
I added a hard drive to the Zidoo z2000 pro but I can't see it on the Zidoo? I copied 200 UHD Blueray movies to the drive. But I don't see the drive when I turn on Zidoo?
Thank for the great video. Would I need an expensive NAS for a zidoo or will a budget one work fine? I’ve heard some Plex servers needs a higher end NAS to do the transcoding.
Thanks for watching! If you do want to stream over the network, you will need a NAS, but since the Zidoo does all of the decoding on its own rather than relying on any transcoding from the NAS, you could use a very inexpensive NAS, like a Raspberry Pi for example. If you purchase a Zidoo with a hard drive bay, you can also add up to a 16 terabyte hard drive right into the unit itself with no need for a NAS. Hope this helps :)
Awesome. Thank you for your help. Exactly what I needed.
Please help. Can i upload movies/files over the network to the hdd inside in one of these devices?
Is there any possibility to stream Atmos Video/Atmos Music or Spotify etc. ?
Why not just get a powerful mini pc with soundcard, and Bluetooth small keyboard with track pad? houldnt the bang for buck be much higher?
Without owning a PC, what to use to rip blurays to a NAS?
Thanks for watching! Unfortunately you need a computer to do this.
Best review for this player out there, thanks! Anyone able to use a harmony elite to control the Z2000 pro? Thinking of pulling the trigger and this info would help, thanks so much.
Thanks for watching! Yep the Harmony Elite works just fine, there are a lot of buttons so some less common functions are in the device menu, but for general use it works perfectly. Hope this helps! :)
For the layman, would this be a step up from the latest Amazon FireTV Cube for streaming or is there a better option if I'm not playing any local files?
Thanks for watching! We feel this would be a step up from the FireTV Cube for streaming local content within your network - but if you're not playing any local files, the Zidoo might not be the best choice. In this case we can highly recommend the NVIDIA SHIELD Pro Android TV, it's been a great device for us. Hope this helps :)
The Zidoo media players are not meant to be 'OTT streaming' players, although they can. Their primary function is to playback CD, SACD, DVD, BD, and UHD rips and for this, the Zidoo players are probably the best option available.
I’ve gotta know what is the % likelihood this gets bricked like zappiti?
I am considering buying one but one question i want to ask is regarding my files is on a Terramaster D5-300. Basically a 5 bay hdd and not a NAS. What should i do to connect the contents of those drives to this? Or do i just plug my 16tb HDD into this? Reason why I don't is because I have 2 of them right now and its really full of movies and likely have to buy a 3rd one soon. Yeah no NAS yet. Planning to but i thought it best to buy this one first as many of my movies are having buffering issues with PLEX.
Would it play DVD and BD ISO files in full menu functionality?
Thanks for watching! Yep, in our testing this should work. We created "BD Backup" folders from MakeMKV, which should have identical contents to ISO files, and they did allow us to play the movies with full menu functionality. From other sources we've also heard that ISO files created with other programs work absolutely fine. Hope this helps!
Have check out the z3000 let
Thanks for watching! No but we are currently working on a video comparing the Z9Xpro/Z2000pro and the UHD5000.
Where does the Zidoo Z2000 Pro player stores the movie covers? Internal memory, on the same hard drive of the movie or where else?
It stores it on a drive in a file you can backup. If you have a huge movie collection I will recommend you to use a program called Tiny MediaManager to recognized the movies and download the graphis for the poster wall. Then you stored these data in a map with each movie on your server. So you server or NAS will contain a single map for each movie containing all the media info files. After that you tell the zidoo to look locally for the info instead of scraping it off the internet. It will save you lots of hours of helping the Zidoo to recognized the movie and put the right posters on the poster wall.
Great review does the Zidoo have IR. Thats my one gripe with the Nvidia TV shield pro. I want to put the Nvidia TV shield pro on my all in one remote but cant due to the Shield pro lacking an IR blaster. Also how are the Zidoo's streaming abilities? I love how Nvidia can do it all. Including streaming Netflix and Prime and giving me true uncompressed passthru 4k dolby atmos audio for my Monolith HTP-1 to process nothing no other streamer like Roku or Apple or Amazon will do.
Does anyone know how to install an internal hard drive to the 2000? I've seen many people online have the same issue, but my 2000pro does not see the drive. It will only work via smb and a direct usb 3.0 connection via external, but the internal drive bay will not detect a drive. Anyone have any ideas? Thanks
Great review
Does this mean that the z2000 pro and UHD5000 have 100% identical video quality when playing movies?
Based on what I have gathered the only difference between the two is that the 5000 is built in DAC and extra balanced analog audio output (XLR), It also has some MQA and lossless audio filtering which are all useless for most people, If you have a decent AVR connected via HDMI to Z2000 you're covered, Alternatively if you don't care about AVR processing and analog outputs and just want to connect to a TV with built in speakers or sound bar, the extra money for the 5000 is just a waste.
As far as we understand and from what we experienced, yes the two units have identical capabilities as far as playing back movies. We had a few other reasons for going with the UHD5000 as well - like the comment above mentioned, the built-in DAC and balanced analog output, we also appreciate the dual HDD bays and dual power supplies (for any difference that may or may not make) and we just like the full sized form factor which looks a lot better in our AV rack. Hope this helps :)
Thanks for the review. I've been very intrigued by this device and hear nothing but positive comments.
Will you also do a review of the music section? I use my Shield for music playback and the experience via Kodi is less than ideal. If the music support is equal to video, I just may make the move.
How do you get movies on an HDD inside the player
Thanks for watching! You can setup a network share from the Zidoo that will allow you to copy files to its internal HDD over the network. Then you can just drag and drop movies from any compatible PC just as you would with any regular NAS. Hope this helps :)
Love the video. I have synology Nas linked to my Zidoo z2000 pro. However, when I play some of my Dolby atmos files, they came out with no audio, while other files are working just fine. Any thoughts on the setting that I need to tweak? Thanks.
on zidoo your audio setting must be at raw does your avr support d atmos or dts xll ?
Is this the first Zidoo in your setup?
Thanks for watching Matt! This isn't the first one, we got the UHD5000 before this unit, which we bought with our own money, but still very happy with both units :)
@@TwoGuyzTech so no prior model? I thought you guys had one prior.
If not, welcome to the wonderful world of Zidoo!
Nope, not until these two units! Thank you though!! We're really enjoying them :)
I didn't see anything in the Poster section that demonstrated it had more flexibility than Plex. Can this organize movies into mini-collections like Plex?
It supports 20TB hard disks. I don't know why people keep saying that it supports only up to 16TB.
Because the Zidoo website say's it supports 16TB.
@@TwoGuyzTech Well, they are wrong. Zidoo is just lazy and have not updated their site since 16TB hard disks were the largest size available. I personally use 20TB hard disks with a Z1000 Pro and I'm sure the newly launched 24TB and 28TB Hard Disks will also work just fine. There is no technical reason why they shouldn't.
Please confirm me, can it play bd3d iso file?
WHAT IS THE CAPACITY OF STORAGE DOES IT SUPPORT VIA USB 3 IN THE BACK?
The internal bay on the '1000 pro' supports 20TB drives. So, there's no reason why the USB 3 input won't support 20TB or even larger sizes.
At this stage in my life i try to determine how a piece of electronics adds to my capabilities. I dumped my Media Server PC because my Sony TV utilizing VLC software accesses my movies and tv shows on my server. This works perfectly. What capability am I missing. Pretty pictures representing the movies. I'll save the money and not buy this product.
Where do you buy these players ??
Amazon
A $500 media player without dedicated HDMI Audio Out?
Umm no thanks.
Does Zidoo offer a model with an internal DVD drive plus removable hard drive so we can rip our movies? Seems like the only opyion like that is Zapetti & its ridiculously overpriced NAS with a rebranded DVD drive.
Btw, wish TGT would rerecord your guide to ripping our DVDs, but with an external USB drive instead.
No. You would use your computer and a proper 4k Blu-ray computer disc drive with the correct firmware and ripping software. If you choose right, it's not hugely expensive.
Weird. $1000 vs $199 no brainer. Though I would like a review of the player only. Don’t need a hard drive I have a UNRAID NAS.🎉
This player plays plex with all codecs?
Questions: I have a Zappiti and while ok, does not live up to the hype and now questionable future. So this is interesting. Long story short my home network needs improvement and I can't do 4K over it. I have to use USB attached drives. Does the Zidoo act as an SMB server to at least transfer the rips onto the attached drives? Second with mine I have my drives on a USB hub connected and it works fine, same with the Zidoo? Lastly is about the USB 3.0 port and not a USB 2.0 port. On the Zappiti after about an hour on the USB 3.0 port it resets and has to find the drive again. Not good when watching a movie. USB 2.0 port doesn't encounter this problem. Does only having the 3.0 port cause a similar problem on the Zidoo? Lastly is the misidentified titles. Besides title search, can your search via the TMDB number found in the TMDB website URL when finding the movie? This has came in handy in the past on the Zappiti. Setting control and user interface looks snappier than what I encounter with the Zappiti.
So di Zappiti get bought by Dune? Their players look very much like a Zapitti now.
@@Espiritiv No clue. I know Dune software coding was used in Zappiti, or at least claimed, in their iso playback. Same with Dolby Vision, so they must be closely related/sharing. All I know is earlier this year they entered into something like France equivalent of chapter 11 bankruptcy. Also earlier their US webstore was taken down.
@@jjchmiel78 I have heard that Zappiti is indeed folding its tent.
@@dan_hitchman007 Official today. They sent an email out to dealers saying it is over. I ordered a Zidoo Z9X Pro today to see if I like. For only $250 compared to what I paid for my Zappiti seems worth the risk.
Full of bugs and no new firmware since July, though...
SMH no, AppleTV + infuse .
Music = mirror to AppleTV from phone .
We're not invested in the Apple ecosystem, don't own any iPhones, but if it works for you, great. we prefer a dedicated unit for this.
@@TwoGuyzTech Apple TV costs about 2 bills. Infuse uses nas; smb; plex; mostly whatever.. It lacks music capabilities is why I mentioned phone mirroring.. aside from that it's an astonishing setup for videos w an impressive OS and chip that will handle anything... reply is just to clearup that it's not ecosystem only . and for two bills compared to what these in the vid cost . . . no no... I've tried many things throughout the years windows media center; wd; shield; roku etc.. this by far the most elegant/or flat out best (and w trailers).... vs 6 bills or a G... I know it's all about those sponsors but yeeeesh lol
It's not "about the sponsors". If you would have watched the whole video, you would have seen that we spent our own money on the $1k Zidoo UHD5000 player before we ever received this unit for review. And, once again, we're not into the Apple ecosystem - which would of course require the purchase of a compatible phone for your aforementioned casting solution - which can be quite a bit more than a "couple bills". If you're not interested in this solution, feel free to use a solution that works best for you. Honestly, we don't care.
@@theorystube Not all people are versed into Apple products, the majority own Android in fact, Plus a lot of folks like myself don't like to use their iPhones for entertainment needs, You get a phone call and everything stops, Sure it's a good solution for a student or a person on a budget but it will not integrate well into a home entertainment system.
And can't do Dolby Atmos TrueHD or DTS:X. Very low volume for height channels compared to others with Atmos.