unfortunately, i don;t think there is anything you can do. I believe that it is designed to work like this-streaming from a PC or Mac uses Chrome, Safari or IE9 over HTML5 and the files need to be in MP4 format. what would be cool is if there was a way to redirect the stream to an external player like VLC.

on Android, it streams through an external video app like Moboplayer, Rockplayer, vPlayer and those can support AVI.

the way it;s "supposed" to work is that your pogoplug is supposed to transcode the files into MP4 format for you in the background and seamlessly. however, if you have read the issues we have all had, this "feature" doesn;t work well and sporadically at best.

the only thing I can suggest is to use a program like Handbrake and transcode your files on a PC. yeah, it;s an extra step but it might save you some hair pulling and frustration....

goodluck!

Hi kartouche,

This is Christopher, head of Customer Outreach here at Pogoplug.

Allow me to try to clear something up. Pogoplug, Pogoplug Pro and Pogoplug Business only support .avi's encoded with the H.264 codec. The full explanation of the transcoding logic is found in this KB article http://bit.ly/tQMHkE

Pogoplug Premium Software DOES support real time transcoding so you can stream directly FROM your computer.

If you can play the same files on your Android, as madman999 suggests, you likely have another player installed which can handle .avi's natively.

Similarly, with Pogoplug Free Software AND an .avi compatible media player installed on your computer, you can playback your Pogoplug videos displayed in your file browser. If you aren't familiar with Pogoplug Software, take a look here http://bit.ly/q9Doko

Hope this makes sense

Kind Regards,
Christopher
on behalf of the Pogoplug Team

Hi madman999,

Thanks for helping to clear this up.

Regarding your one comment about downloading versus streaming 'double click on the AVI file and it would play in an external player like VLC or Windows Media player, ect. However, this is not streaming, it;s downloading the entire video file from the pogoplug pro unit onto your computers disk storage and then playing it.'

We just want to be clear that caching behavior is determined by the media player and NOT Pogoplug. But you point is well taken that remote playback of video using VLC, WMP or similar from Pogoplug does have performance implications.

Kind Regards,
Christopher

kartouche

Is you want to playback your .avi's try this:

1) Install Pogoplug Free Software
2) Login to your Pogoplug account so your Pogoplug attached drives show up in Finder or Windows Explorer
3) Under Windows, select the .avi you want to view and playback using Windows Media Player
4) Under Mac, first install VLC and select the .avi you want to view and playback using VLC

Christopher