AC Ryan Playon!HD Essential

UPDATE 28/02/2011: Wi-Fi support was brought by an update released on 26/02/2011. The review has therefore been updated accordingly.

The AC Ryan Playon!HD Essential media centre is aptly named because the essential is all you get here, namely multimedia playback and that's it. There's no network option, no LCD display or digital HD tuner. Just a media centre that can house a hard drive and USB/SDHC peripherals. AC Ryan has designed it for users who want to keep it simple.

Design and build: a nice-looking interface but too slow

The casing is sober and very good quality plastic is used. There's no display on the front, just an on/off button. There's a fan to extract heat given off by the various components. The fan's hiss is quite audible, perhaps too much so for those looking for absolute silence. During film playback, this isn't a problem, but it's a bit worse when it comes to photos.


You can access the hard drive mount by unscrewing the four screws under the device. You can mount 3.5-inch drives up to 2TB. The remote is small and of average quality. The battery cover slips a bit too much and the buttons are not responsive enough. You really have to press hard and this becomes annoying very quickly.


The Essential is also the first AC Ryan centre using the 'Playon!GUI 2.0' (see inset). This breaks with the old interface, and so much the better we say. The graphics are really well designed and overall it's much less old school than before.


Unfortunately, the processor isn't beefy enough to ensure satisfactory fluidity. It takes two seconds from when you've pressed a button - when the button is registered, that is - to when the device acts on it. Often, you'll find yourself pressing a second time on the button and finding yourself an extra folder in. This is obviously frustrating and we're looking forward to seeing this interface in a media centre with a sturdier chip.

Compatibility: the only thing lacking are the Blu-ray menus

Although the decoding chip is an entry level model, compatibility is entirely satisfactory. It plays HD videos without blinking, including heavier 1080p videos (55 Mbps max. for MKVs).


We particularly liked the fact that you don't have to wait long between displaying two photos (hardly a second) or for full decoding of DTS and Dolby Digital formats. You can decode them in stereo or 5.1 or send them in bitstream to an external amp. This last mode also allows you to send HD DTS versions and Dolby.


On the down side, note the incompatibility with Blu-ray menus, which are replaced by a standard menu. There's also a bug with DVD menus which are systematically displayed at 4/3. The film is then played in its original format.


There's a 24p mode (not 23.976) for videos at this throughput, but you have to activate it manually. You can also move subtitling in the time line, but not the audio track for a film. Upscaling isn't at the same level as the other AC Ryan models. You could even call it a disaster. There's a flagrant loss of detail.

Connectivity: the strict minimum but with SDHC

At the back of the media centre, you have sufficient connectivity for connecting an SD (composite) or HD (HDMI) TV. In addition to the HDMI, the audio can be sent across the optical and coaxial outs.

On the right, there are two USB Hosts and an SDHC card reader, so you can link up USB keys and external drives to read their content. File copying is also on offer if you're willing to accept the anaemic rate of 5.2 MB/s. A 4 GB HD video therefore takes over 12 mn to be copied. Once again, plenty of patience is needed.

The Essential can also be linked up to a computer via a standard USB cable. It's then recognised as a standard external disk drive and transfer speeds are fine as far as USB 2.0 goes (over 20 MB/s).


AC Ryan has sacrificed the network socket so as to be able to cut costs, but it is possible to plug in a Wi-Fi USB key if you want to connect the device up to the web. UPDATE 28/02/2011 Unfortunately this must be planned for a forthcoming update as none of our three dongles worked, including one branded AC Ryan. However, you do have to use the manufacturer's own branded Wi-Fi adapter, available to buy as an optional extra. Once connected, you can play content over a network but the bitrate is too low for playing HD videos.