Last month we reviewed WD TV Live and although it was nearly perfect with vast codec and wireless support, it let us down on the price. However, that is not the case with Amkette’s miniscule Flash TV player. It promises to give the benefits of digital multimedia playback sans wireless but at a very affordable price tag of under Rs. 3,000.
Flash TV package contents include a Flash TV unit, a remote control, manual, power adapter, Composite A/V and Component video cables.
If you’re unacquainted on the working of Amkette’s Flash TV, here’s a quick run. Flash TV is connected to your TV and a USB HDD or memory card is attached to the Flash TV, of course connected storage should contain the video files that you need to watch. Once the Flash TV detects the connected storage it displays all the multimedia content stored on the device. The device currently outputs video at up to 720p and supports most popular multimedia formats like
Video: RM/RMVB, DIVX, AVI, MPG, MP4, XVID, DAT, VOB,
Music: MP3, WMA,
Pictures: BMP, JPEG, GIF, TIFF, PNG
Text: TXT
Talking about the design, Flash TV is really small. It’s lightweight, weighing in at just 43gms and has a chassis made of plastic; however the quality could have been improved. The remote sensor is understandably placed on the front of the device, while the back houses different inputs like DC for power, Coaxial for audio, YUV for Component video and AV for Composite cable. There’s a USB port and SD/MMC slot on the left hand side.
Getting this tiny device to work is a no-brainer. Just attach the requisite cables to the Flash TV and your television, hook in your choice of storage and off you go. I had connected the Flash TV with the Component-out cable so that it would allow me to watch 720p videos. As soon as I fired up the Flash TV, I was surprised to see how fast it was. Comparing it with the WD TV Live, Flash TV’s initial startup was way faster and it also detected connected storage devices and sorted out the content quickly.
The hard drive (formatted with NTFS) was loaded with lots of content with different types of files and Flash TV handled them well. To be clear, the player does not support H.264/MKV and expecting Amkette to give that at such a throwaway price is a bit harsh on them. But with a recent sit down with Amkette, they confirmed the newer version (due Q1 2010) will come with H.264 support as well as have HDMI-out to display full HD content.
Flash TV also features file management support. Although there is only one USB port, a user can put in a USB hub that will allow him to attach multiple hard drives and copy, move or delete files from one drive to another.
To wrap this up, it’s safe to say that Flash TV actually competes with Western Digital’s TV Mini and although both the products have something unique to offer, Amkette’s Flash TV wins over the price. It’s an affordable solution if you want to play most of your multimedia content with minimum of fuss.
Rating: 
Pros: Price, Small Form Factor
Cons: No HDMI, Build Quality
After going through other reviews I can say this article is
small and sensible and direct to the point. Ability of the device
to connect to USB HDD and it’s inability (in the present version)
to handle hdmi are clearly mentioned leaving the user to be better judge. I would like to know what is the difference between recent HDD media player(casing) and the present one
but for the shape? can you please compare these two products
(differences). Thank you very much for the nice review.
Do I need a digital TV to run this .. or a can I run it on a normal one with Yellow Red & White cable pins ?
It can run on both normal crt tvs as well as hdtvs
I had recently purchased this. Practically no problems. Basically if you browse net, we notice that there are many variations (basically a card with all decoding facilities for mp3,mpeg etc etc.,). I had seen a chinese one for ~ Rs1600 with
metalic casing with separate AV jacks .And previously we have seen casings for HDD player in which you can attach an IDE/SATA hard disk. Now this new models directly support USB hard disk(external hard disks). by buying amkette you may have mental satisfaction (warranty etc.,). Cheers
Sir,
I am interested in buying Amkette Flash TV. Please let me know its cost so that I can send you a bank DD. Also I would like to know how to connect it to my Samsung LCD TV.
Thanking you,
Rajen Singh
Darjeeling
The bit of good news is that the newer version will be out with H.264/mkv support…Fantastic piece of hardware otherwise
Hi
Can I connect to my sound system for the sound output?
suvadeep
Hi,
How does this compare to nbox?
Hello, I have been using the amkette flash TV for music and have found that it is unable to handle large music files ie. if I rip a music cd which is approx 500MB using WMA lossless format, then the flash Tv cannot play it.However if I rip the CD in WMA audio or Mp3 both of which compress 500Mb to approx 50MB then the flash tv is ok. Has anyone else experienced this?
sunny
Hi,
I purchased Amkette Flash TV in the month of April, 2010.
I am facing some troubles with this.
–When i used to play videos it hardly run for 1hr and stops. After few minutes again it works. why?
–As it supports Video: RM/RMVB, DIVX, AVI, MPG, MP4, XVID, DAT, VOB, but when i played MP4, it is displaying “Cannot support this format”. why?
–Text: TXT, but unable to open a txt file why?
I have some problem with my Amkette Flash TV too. As what Geetha has mentioned, Flash TV does not play MP4. I also found that the coaxial socket is not a standard one and the standard digital coaxial cable does not fit in well – it is too loose. It looks more like a headphone socket. I have asked for a clarification from Amkette regarding the coaxial cable. Hopefully they will get back.
sir,
i want to buy this ,i want to know the cost if any
distributor in vijayawada,andhrapradesh,india please
let me know
thanku
ravi
Hello,
I bought this recently, however it is not detecting my External Hard Disk of 250GB capacity. Do we need to do any settings? Please let me know if anyone have solution for this?
feature of your product are good and i want to buy that product but becuse of many formet not include and i got many movies in that (mkv , 720p in duel audio) so i want to product which is compitible full fill my requirment in resneble price with after sell service .
right now many fomet comes on and become a common like mkv and duel audio (eng and hindi track in single movies file )and other is as followe
AVI/DIvX (supports DivX3.X/DivX4.X/DivX5) Supports AC3 Tracks
H.264, MKV, MOV, MP4 , MPEG-2 RM/RMVB, TS, TP, M2TS, VOB, DAT, MPG, MPEG (that are all at up to 1080P, compatible to 1080i / 720P)
and support upto 160 gb heard disk which is not include in your product . so if provide that kind of product i am sure buy that product rly me soon
It is a poor product I ever used. I bought this player a month back. If i play very high definition movies, it keeps restarts for every 2 minutes. I gave a complaint to customer care and they replaced the player with another one yesterday. This is also facing the same issue. I think the problem is with the firmware itself. I am using HDMI for video and SPDIF for digital audio. Anybody facing the same issue? You can easily recreate this error by playing very high definition video (one video song more than 350 MB). After that even if you play a small videos it keeps restarts.
it was superb review of the product by the way i lost my adapter sir ,can u plz mention the power input and output voltages of the adapter..