Stream (almost) Any Video Type in HD from your Computer to Your Xbox 360 via Transcode360
This tutorial is for anyone running Windows Vista or Windows Media Center 2005. In case you haven’t noticed, the Xbox 360 is very limited to the video types that it is able to play. These types include .avi (only certain ones), .mpeg, and .wma. I think it’s pretty lame that they don’t natively support more. So you will need to download the following files to get most video types to play on your 360.
Download and install both applications before continuing. Make sure that your Xbox is already interfacing with your computer via Windows Media Center. If you don’t know how to do that, read this post.
Connect to your PC with your Xbox 360
Open up the Media blade in your Xbox 360 Dashboard and Select Media Center (Sorry the only decent screenshot I could find was in Japanese).
2. Select My Videos from the menu
Press the X button on your controller to get the context menu and select More
Now Select Transcode
At this point the video file should start playing. If you plan on transcoding high-def files (.mkv, .orb, etc…) make sure you have a fast PC. I tried this with a lame celeron 1.4 and 512 ram and could not get past the first 10 seconds of the high-def videos. Regular videos worked great though.
Windows Media Center only recognizes a handful of video types, so if you navigate to your video folder and don’t see anything, you need to add that video type to the registry. Read this post to learn how to do this. Good luck!
Troubleshooting
One of our readers (Mike) has solved the issue of .mkv files playing for only a few seconds and then ending. The solution is quite simple acctually. The way transcode 360 works is, it takes the video file and writes to a temporary file (or buffer) that’s in a format your 360 can understand. This file then gets sent to be played via your Xbox 360. The problem is, the Xbox 360 is playing the video file faster than Transcode 360 can encode it. So basically what is happening is your 360 is reading from that file and reaches then end of it. The solution… Once the video file starts playing, hit pause on your remote or use the controller to navigate to the video menu. Allow maybe 5-10 minutes. This will give Transcode 360 time to buffer the video file. After that hit play and you should be on your way to HD glory. If the video freezes again at some point. Just hit pause again and allow the buffer to fill up again. That’s all. It’s so simple. Thank you to Mike for the tip. Happy Xboxing!
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Feb 15th 2007
Hi. I have a question about streaming… Following your guide, I can now stream divx avi to the xbox 360 via transcode. Problem is, I tried your other tric to play .ts and .mkv trhough the 360 and that doesn’t work. I can see the .ts and .mkv files in Media Center, they even show the first frame as a thumb, but when I play them (with or without transcode), media center says the file is corrupt of the codec is missing. Weird part is: it does show me the first frame as the thumb, and on the desktop pc, WIndows Media Player Classic plays these files just fine, so the codec seems fine right? Any ideas? THANKS
Feb 15th 2007
It sounds like it still is a codec issue. Did you download the combined community codec pack? A good way to test is to actually try to play the files in windows media center on your computer. If that doesn’t work, WMC may not be using the codecs. Let me know if that solves the issue.
Feb 15th 2007
Hi! Yep, installed the codec pack. The .mkv files play perfectly when I play them in Windows Media Center on the computer (without using transcode, so simply by clicking the file directly from withing WIndows Media Center).
Doing the same thing on the Xbox 360 returns the error that the selected file is corrupt or the system is missing a codec.
One more hint: when I try to use transcode on the .mkv file (still using the MC on the X360), the MC on the X360 hangs, and I have to return to the X360 dashboard via the Guide-button.
So, in short, the file plays perfectly directly in WMC on the desktop (no transcode), but fails to play with and without uring transcode on the X360……. Weird huh?
Feb 15th 2007
Hmm that is strange. What are the specs on your computer. I have a Celeron 1.5 ghz with 512 ddr (yea i know time to upgrade) and i can stream video in any format except high def video to my 360 which start for like 5 seconds and then error. remember your pc is doing all of the processing when streaming the video to your 360. Sorry I could not be of more assistance.
Feb 16th 2007
Thanks for the reply
I have a rather fast pc: dual core 2, 2,4 ghz / 2 gb ram.
It’s pretty frustrating, since I have no idea where to look for the solution for this problem
Feb 16th 2007
Hi Brandon, I found something. The memcoder.exe that came with transcode360 may have been old? I downloaded a newer version of memcoder.exe and replaced the older one. Next, I tried a few other MKV files and when I play these using transcode, the file plays perfectly for about 10 seconds, then skips a few seconds, plays a few more seconds and then it says the file is finished and I am thrown back into media center….. I’ve tried this with several mkv files, they all do exactly the same…
So this is a step in the right direction, but where to look next?
Maybe you have any ideas? Thx!
Feb 17th 2007
Mike,
That is exactly where I am at with my Xbox. I figured it was just because I have a slow pc. However, since you have a fast pc and are having the exact same issue, that leads me to believe its also a software issue on my end and not hardware. I will continue to research this and post anything I find. If you figure it out, please let me know as well. Talk to you soon.
Feb 17th 2007
Hi Brandon, I thought it sounded like your problem. Guess it’s not that uncommen, but I can;t find anything about this specific situation in the internet. If you want, we can correspond via e-mail:
m [dot] koenen [at] gmail [dot] com
Mar 6th 2007
Hello
Well ive done everything you saud including the register hack i have a 2.1 duo and 2GB ddr ram when i donr the register hack i found that i can now view the files including the thumbs in windows media centre on my pc but when i look at the 360 they dont appear really frustrating as ive tried to do everything ie cccp coec pack the register alterrations and still no joy please help its driving me nuts
Thanks
Mar 6th 2007
Hello
Well ive done everything you said including the register hack i have a 2.1 duo and 2GB ddr ram when i donr the register hack i found that i can now view the files including the thumbs in windows media centre on my pc but when i look at the 360 they dont appear really frustrating as ive tried to do everything ie cccp coec pack the register alterrations and still no joy please help its driving me nuts
Thanks
Mar 16th 2007
Hi Brandon
I am running Vista Ultimate with Media Center connected to my xbox 360. On this guide when you say press ‘X’ and goto the context menu on the 360 I don’t get that menu with ‘More’ on anymore. Are you sure that’s not XP media center only? Admittedly my graphics card in the pc is only a Radeon 7000 which has no vista drivers so at the moment in device manager I only have Standard VGA Graphics Adaptor.
But if you’re streaming content does that mean that it is the 360’s graphics processor decoding the info or the pc’s?
Cheers
Mark
Mar 16th 2007
Hmm thats strange that you don’t get the more menu. Are you sure that you have the video you want to play highlighted. Have you installed transcode 360?I believe you need a different version for Vista. Also, I am running Windows Media Center Edition 2005 so Im not 100% sure how will work for Vista Ultimate. One of of our other writers is working on getting trancode working for Vista. He will post the tutorial as soon as he has it functioning.
To answer your last question. Yes, the computer is handling most of the load since you are transcoding. Basically, by using transcode 360, your computer literally converts (in real time) the video file into a format that is readable by your Xbox 360. If you do get it working, check out your CPU usage when you are streaming the video file, it should ping way up. Not to mention, Media Center is fairly resource intensive on its own. Sorry that I can’t offer you more assistance on this issue. I will talk to JJ (our other blogger) and see if he has a solution for you. Also if you come across a solution to your issue, be sure to post it, we would love to hear it.
Mar 17th 2007
Hi Brandon
Right I’ve found the context menu. I was using the 360 remote and you have to press ‘Title’ button to bring it up. Went to more and found Transcode. However when trying to run it it says: “Invalid Application. unable to launch transcode360 UI Add-in”
Any suggestions?
Cheers
Mark
Mar 18th 2007
Hi, a shot note: I solved the problem with the video showing for a few seconds and then stopping playback. E-mail me for more info!
Mar 23rd 2007
Hi Brandon
I’m a bit of a Noob when it comes to technical stuff, and I’ve just upgraded my OS to Vista Ultimate(with a great deal of effort I might add). Having set up everything exactly as you instruct above to stream media to my Xbox 360, I have tried numerous times to Transcode files and each time I receive the message ‘Please edit BufferLanShare in the service configuration file’ if you could advise me (step by step if possible) of how to do this, it would be very much appreciated.
Many thanks
Paul
Mar 24th 2007
Hey Paul,
The version of transcode 360 that I link to in this tutorial is not intended for Windows Vista. The version of transcode 360 for Vista can be found here. I have not yet had time to play with it so I can’t offer too much support, but it is worth a try. Let me know how it turns out.
Brandon
Mar 24th 2007
Cannot thank you enough. Followed the link and installed the vista version of Transcode360 to run as a service on my PC, and it works like a charm.
Apr 1st 2007
i was wondering if anyone found out anymore about streamin the .mkv video format 2 your xbox360 coz i have the same problem where it stops after a few sec’s and its drivein me CRAZY please could u let me know what i need 2 do A.S.A.P
nice one!
A Klass
Apr 2nd 2007
Still no joy??? anyone??
thanks
A Klass
Apr 3rd 2007
A solution to the freezing problem has been posted.
Apr 10th 2007
I have windows Vista home pro, so I downloaded transcode 360 for vista. But when I try to watch an avi file on my 360 I keep getting this error “Files needed to display video are not installed……….” the same error you would get if you tried to play an avi file on the 360. I tried watching the files on MC on the computer and was able to watch it so the cc codec pack is working. Some one please let me know what I am doing wrong, or what are my other opions in watching a movie on my 360.
Thanks
Will
Apr 11th 2007
Hey will, you didn’t specify in your post. Are you actually telling Media Center to Trancode the video when you are connected via your Xbox or just trying to play it as usual? (Im referencing the part of the tutorial that states “Press the X button on your controller to get the context menu and select More”). If you are getting this error, for some reason transcode 360 is not being invoked. Let me know.
Brandon
Apr 16th 2007
Hello, Thankx for the answer. Well at first I tried going to MC on my computer and telling it to transcode but for some reason it would just restart my MC without giving me a reason why. So then I figured was doing it wrong and tried to have my Xbox transcode it by hiting the X button on the movie I wanted to watch, then going to more and then transcode. Thats when I got the error I described earlier. Maybe I am going about this the wrong way and another piece of info, I have two PC’s on my network. The movies are on the hard drive of a PC with windows xp, and my second computer has Vista. I shared the movies folder from my XP computer and can view them on my Vista. When i go to MC on my Xbox I can see all the shared movies and thats how i am trying to watch them. I dont think that would be the cause but to be safe do you think I should i try moving a movie to my Vista computer?
Thank You for any help you can give me
Will
May 4th 2007
Where can I get the latest version of mencoder.exe?
May 7th 2007
Will~
Did you ever get your issue resolved? I am having the exact same thing.
May 7th 2007
Ryan, One of our readers did solve this issue. I posted the solution above under the troubleshooting section. Thanks for reading.
May 20th 2007
Nice work Brandon. Out of all the sites Ive visited yours was the most helpful.
Thanks.
May 22nd 2007
Hey, this was really useful for me! I’ve got it all working well and everything, however when the transcoder finishes transcoding the file to stream tot eh 360, which it does whilst the 360 is still playing the file, it suddenly stops and makes a leap of about 30 seconds or so. It did do this before before i set it up properly and lowered the bitrate etc, but I’m wondering why it’s doing it once the PC has finished transcoding the file?
I have a Core 2 DUO 1.66ghz CPU, 1GB RAM, running Windows Vista Home Premium. cheers!
May 28th 2007
Sancez, try pausing the video for around 5 minutes before you start watching it. That usually gives your pc to transcode the whole video before the extender (360) actually thinks there is no more video to play.
Hope it works.
Jul 11th 2007
Hi I’ve followed most of this and can view certain files on my 360 and the MKV files play fine on my PC, but when I go through MC on the 360 it finds the folder but thinks it’s empty and can’t see the MKV file. I’m on Vista home premium. Any ideas?
Jul 13th 2007
this is so cool
Aug 1st 2007
when i go to the registry i dont see the mkv extension how do i add it???
Aug 8th 2007
I am using windows vista ultimate can play the avi file through transcoder 360 in Xbox360. However, it can not play the real media file. anyone can help me to solve it ?
Sep 25th 2007
Hi,
I added the program and can see the tumbnails, but I also get the message that a codec is missing. I noticed your reply up here but can not find the troubleshooter section with the answer, anybodey care to help me with it? Sytse
Nov 13th 2007
Hi could you point me to a solution to the problem of the trancoded video only playing for a few seconds please?
Ta
Steve
Nov 14th 2007
Steve,
The solution to that problem is posted under “Troubleshooting”
brandon
Nov 19th 2007
I changed the Transcode engine to the newest version and it works like a dream now even please MKV HD Content in Full 1080 amazing quality! go to http://www.Transcode360.co.uk and lookin the forum section for the link to the new versions of the memcode.exe.
Memcode is the process hat converts the video to the 360. install Transcode 360 (as normal),
then download a new version and replace the componants. there are differant versions for Pentium and AMD CPU.
Apr 3rd 2008
hi, just hooked up my computer to my 360. Im using WMC to stream my media, and streaming videos like divx & avi works fine. But NOT mkv. Ive tried everything said and written here. One strange thing though, I have about 10 mkv movies shared, none om them worked, exept one. the movie 300 buy the way:P but it still didnt play accurate. picture was all weird, and every 3 seconds the picture dissapears. could this be because im trying this on a 22″ old ass tv (not even flatscreen) , and it cant handle highdef videos
I do exactly as im directed to do.
choose what videofile i wanna watch, press more, then open with transcode. and like i said, 300 played,
but the others didnt. Media center tells me ,unable to “cue” videofile for transcoding and streaming
I already have CCCP codec and Core AVC installed.
Someone please help! Going NUTS!!!
Apr 3rd 2008
Alexander,
Are you running Windows Vista or Windows Media Center Edition?
Apr 9th 2008
Hello, I’m running Vista Ultimate SP1 and this guide worked well. As for those that don’t see the “more” option, it is slightly different than the one shown. You need to go to video library where your videos will be shown, have the video you want to transcode highlighted and then click X, “More” is shown there which brings you to the transcode screen.
I have no problem with that and I know my computer’s processor isn’t good enough for flawless playback at 1.6GHz single core Centrino with 2GB RAM. I have to pause it to get it to work which is fine. The problem I am having is that the video, even after being paused for a while, is pixelated and it almost looks like a refreshing issue like seen when you stream from the internet sometimes. Is there any way to fix this? It seems no length of pausing seems to help with this.
Thanks!
Apr 22nd 2008
Is it possible to play mkv files by streaming from Windows Media Player? Since I don’t have WMC 2005 I just do Media Sharing from Windows Media Player…