CyberLink PowerDVD 12: Complementing Your Mobile Lifestyle

At the business end of the review, we have to say that CyberLink has got its strategy right. At present, they seem to be the only vendor in the HTPC Blu-ray / DVD software space with a strategy for the next generation of media playback devices. In fact, CyberLink also showed their softwares in action in the Windows 8 Metro UI during CES. CyberLink deserves a lot of credit for moving ahead quickly in this area. However, all the components have scope for improvement, and we also have some suggestions on possible features to integrate in the future:

PowerDVD:

1. The software needs an option to turn off Internet access unless explicitly requested by the user (as in the case of BD-Live). Whenever one tries to resume a movie, PowerDVD fetches information about the latest Blu-rays and displays it in a pane on the right side while presenting the Resume / Restart screen. Frankly, I don’t see too many consumers actually being interested in looking at the new offerings when trying to restart their movies.
2. The software could implement native support for Blu-ray / DVD ISOs, thereby making it unnecessary for users to mount them in a virtual drive. Compatibility with folder rips could be improved.
3. It would be nice to have the audio playback method (bitstream / decode / downmix) selectable from the context menu during playback. By default, most users with A/V receivers would be setting the audio method to bitstream. When watching PiP video, it is necessary to decode the primary audio and mix it with the decoded secondary audio. Unfortunately, PowerDVD keeps bitstreaming the primary audio and there is no way out other than to go a couple of levels down into Settings and Audio to fix the issue. In my opinion, the drop-down approach from the AV Center used by Total Media Theater is much better.
4. It would be good to have PowerDVD bypass the sound processing by Windows (particularly when decoding, say, a 5.1 channel FLAC to LPCM, Windows expands the 6 channel LPCM from PowerDVD to a 8 channel LPCM stream to the AV receiver, rendering the AVR incapable of doing its own channel expansion)
5. Auto change to 3D mode is a bit dicey, particularly for 3D photo files, but one can’t find too much fault with PowerDVD for that.
6. It is interesting to see premium media outlets like 7Digital adopting PowerDVD as a distribution medium. Having used PCs as their stepping stone, premium OTT services such as Netflix now treat them as poor second cousins. 1080p HD quality and multi-channel DD+ audio are reserved for streaming STBs. Some of the reasons cited for this are lack of playback apps on the PC with the required codec licenses and security of the data stream. Given that PowerDVD is secure enough for Blu-ray and also has the required codec licenses, it would be nice to have the highest quality streams from Netflix, Vudu and other similar services made available to consumers

PowerDVD Mobile:

1. Despite CyberLink’s claims of real-time transcoding to enable DLNA playback, we could get transcoding to work only when saving the media stream to the mobile device. Also, this transcoding doesn’t seem to be taking advantage of QuickSync.
2. Multiple player engine support is crucial. Currently, the app relies only on hardware decode (using the default playback settings of the local device as defined in the OS/image of the tablet/smartphone). I found a number of dedicated uPnP playback apps which played more media formats in a reliable manner compared to PowerDVD Mobile.
3. Media can only be arranged by folders or in an all-inclusive view. Support for arrangement based on other factors (like date, size etc.) would be a nice feature to have.
4. The app already supports local media. It would be nice to extend this support to media files residing on SMB and NFS network shares also.
5. The app could be made more responsive. Currently, it feels very beta in nature. Performance was acceptable, but not great. It is not clear whether the issues were with the platforms or the app itself, but I did find other dedicated uPnP playback apps a pleasure to use.

PowerDVD Remote:

1. The app could have a landscape mode option along with orientation auto-detection.

Wrapping things up, PowerDVD 12 is a laudable attempt by CyberLink to adapt to the evolving lifestyle of the consumers. As the tablet and smartphone platforms become more pervasive, CyberLink seems to be best poised to provide users with compelling offerings. Given that almost all Blu-ray / DVD software players come in at approximately the same price ($100), it looks like a no-brainer to go in with PowerDVD 12 because of the various mobile apps (unless you can purchase the competition's offerings at a much lower price).