⏹ Preface
In the past two years, I have tossed a lot of NAS, in addition to file storage and backup, more to help my family solve the needs of watching movies, and unconsciously built my own home film and television library. There is a film and television library,How to manage huge film and television resources has become a problem again,The earliest through SMB mounted to TV,Every time you watch a movie, you have to rummage through a folder,Later, I also tried to install software such as Kodi with a cheap box to generate a poster wall,The process is a lot of tossing。
As the film and television resources in the film and television library at home become more and more high-definition, in order to have a better viewing experience, it has become "natural" to start a professional player, so there is this content.
In this article, we will give you a detailed introduction to the detailed experience of buying a Zhidu Z9X PRO.
⏹ Count analysis
Like mobile phones, NAS and other digital products, the video player is also applicable to the law of "hardware only determines the lower limit of the use experience, and system optimization determines the upper limit of the use experience", and the software and hardware configuration of Zhidu Z9X PRO belong to the T0 level among products at the same price.
FIRST OF ALL, LET'S TALK ABOUT THE HARDWARE HIGHLIGHTS OF ZHIDU Z9X PRO:
1️⃣CPU: Using RTD1619BPD processor, compared with the RTD1619DR used by the previous generation Z9X, the process is increased to 12nm, the main frequency is higher, and the GPU performance is also stronger.
2️⃣ Memory: Large 4GB RAM + 32GB RAM is used to ensure that the system runs more smoothly, and 32GB memory can install more third-party APPs.
3️⃣ Network: Support WiFi 6, wireless maximum rate 1201Mbps, convenient for wireless users, and support Bluetooth 5.2 protocol.
4️⃣ Interface: The HDMI interface has been upgraded to HDMI 2.1, which supports up to 4K60Hz and 12Bit output.
The advantages of the software are also clear:
1️⃣ Poster Wall 4.0: Version 4.0 Poster Wall supports custom classification and management, and supports movie trailers and soundtrack music. It can be said that it is the best and easy-to-use poster wall at present, and it is really ready to use.
2️⃣ Format support: Added AV1 decoding support, BD/UHD original disk (BDMV/SO), 3D MVC (Blu-ray, MKV), MKV. M2TS, MTS, TS, MP4, MOV, AVI, MPGMPEG, VOB, FLV, 3GP, TP and other full formats are supported.
3️⃣ Dual Dolby support: Support Dolby Vision, Dolby Audio dual Dolby, Dolby Vision VS10 image processing engine blessing, not only can play dual Dolby resources, but also can light up the Dolby logo.
4️⃣ Multi-network protocol support: Support SMB, NFS, UPnP and other network protocols, and support WebDAV to mount cloud disks, you can directly scan the code to log in and mount Baidu network disks, Ali network disks, which is very suitable for users with NAS and network disks for dual repair.
⏹ Unpacking the product
Although this article focuses on the use experience of Zhidu Z9X PRO, but the process still has to go, first of all, a brief introduction to the appearance of Zhidu Z9X PRO player.
ZhiduZ9X PROfuselage adopts an integrated all-aluminum alloy shell,The black fuselage has been sandblasted and oxidized and colored,The texture is still very good,The top of the fuselage is engraved with Zhidu's LOGO,There are various audio-visual support and certification logos printed below,4K、HDR 10+、dts、Dolby Vision、Dolby Audio, etc.,You must know that only officially certified and authorized devices can print these logos,Each Zhidu player,The cost of these certifications alone is not low。
The front of the machine is relatively simple, equipped with an LED display, which can display the system playback information when in use, such as the playback time, display clock, etc.
There is a SATA port on the left side for external hard drives, and two USB 2.0 ports on the right side, with a reset hole in the middle. Personally, I feel that this SATA port is redundant, and it can only be connected to an external 2.5-inch mechanical disk and an SSD, and a 3.5-inch mechanical hard disk requires additional power supply.
The back interface of the player, from left to right, are: an RJ45 wired network port, a USB3.0, an HDMI2.1, optical fiber interface, AV output interface, RS232, and DC 12V power interface, Z9X PRO is equipped with a separate power switch button.
The two wireless antennas are non-detachable and support 2.4G+5G dual-band WiFi, but it is recommended that you can use network cables to use network cables first, and the stability of wired is definitely better than that of wireless.
Let's take a look at the remote control,ZhiduZ9X PRO has multiple versions of the remote control to choose from,I started withV11 full-function infrared remote control,The remote control function is very comprehensive,The size of the remote control is also relatively large。 The key travel of the remote control is moderate in software and hardness,There are many keys and rich functions,Support backlight,So that you can control the movie at night,In addition, this remote control is also configured8Infrared learning buttons,You can learn the common keys of TV,In this way, you can control the TV and the player with a remote control,Don't switch remote control back and forth when watching movies。
In addition to the player and remote control, there is also an additional HDMI certified cable, a power/data 2-in-1 SATA cable, and a manual.
⏹ System experience
The system of Zhidu Z9X PRO is based on Android deep customization, and the latest system is based on Android 11.
The system of Zhidu player focuses on a concise, very refreshing interface, modular design of the main interface, the information is concise and clear, and it is very easy to get started. Presumably, everyone is now disgusted by all kinds of advertisements in the TV system and the operator's set-top box system, and the Zhidu system is completely zero advertising, so to speak, users spend money to buy professional.
You can see the system information in [About], the system version is the latest version (v1.0.52), the memory is 4G, the flash memory is 32G, and the Android version is 11.
There are not many native built-in apps, and there are no free apps that "come with" a mess of free apps, so it's all about giving the choice to the user under the premise of ensuring professionalism.
Zhidu does not have any restrictions on the installation of third-party applications, and careful readers should also see it in the screenshot above, Zhidu's [Application Installer] supports the free installation of third-party APP through U disk or web.
In comparison,ZhiduZ9X PROThe function settings are very comprehensive,Especially in the playback settingsN multiple options,Users can set it according to their own playback device,Let's briefly talk about this setting。
⏹ Video settings
【Playback Settings】
【Playback settings】【Auto Frame Rate】Select【Match Frame Rate and Resolution】or【Match Frame Rate】OK,After opening, the player will output a picture at the same frame rate as the film source,After turning on the frame rate synchronization,HDMI needs to re-shake the handshake protocol at the end of playback and end,The TV will be black for a few seconds。
【Display Settings】
In the [Display Settings] option, select [Enhanced Format] for HDMI signal format, which can enable the 18Gb bandwidth of HDMI 2.0, and select YUV 12BIT priority for all three of the above three items to maximize the video output bandwidth.
[HDR] Select [Auto], so that the SDR source is still output in SDR, and the HDR10/10+ source will automatically enter HDR mode. The following VS10 engine is a rendering engine developed by Zhidu on the basis of Dolby Vision, which improves the contrast between light and dark areas while retaining the color accuracy of the original video. This feature has a bonus for some pictures with light original colors, but some videos will be over-rendered and not realistic enough, so it is not recommended to enable it here.
【Dolby Vision compatibility mode】Choose according to your own TV,If the TV supports standard Dolby Vision,Here select【Standard mode preferred】,The main differences between the two modes:
Standard mode is the standard mode of TV decoding,The player will transmit dynamic HDR data to the TV,Let the TV dominate Dolby Vision decoding;
LLDV is dominated by the player, the player will convert the dynamic HDR into static HDR picture frames, and the TV is only responsible for display.
It is generally recommended to use the standard mode, where the TV dominates the Dolby Vision decoding and mapping.
【Audio Settings】
If the sound bar and amplifier fully support audio decoding, you can turn on [Source Code Transparent Transmission] in HDMI audio, and after turning on source code transparent transmission, the player will completely transmit the audio to the audio device, so that the audio device can play the maximum effect to get the best sound experience. Of course, if your sound bar does not support DTS full audio track decoding, you can choose [Auto] here.
If you are an audio device connected via SPDIF, you need to set it in SPDIF.
In addition, if you are like me, the sound bar product you use is relatively old, and the hardware cannot decode the lossless TrueHD and dts-HDMA audio tracks, so you need to turn on the audio degradation option.
The sample rate control is set by default [Auto], and the player and sound system automatically shake hands to coordinate the audio sample rate.
[Volume pass-through mode], select On, so that the player will output at maximum volume, and hand over all volume control to the audio playback device.
[Other settings]
In [Other Settings], it is recommended to turn on [HDMI CEC], so that you can use the TV remote control to fully control the Zhidu Z9X PRO.
⏹ User experience
Poster Wall 4.0
The poster wall can be said to be one of the core competitiveness of ZHIDU, allowing users to completely save the time of tossing third-party software poster walls.
Let's take a look at the overall UI first,The top end is the movie that is being watchedBanner,It will use fanart to display the movie you are currently watching,And it will display the current viewing progress,In the middle is a circular classification icon,Users can customize settings。 The UI design of this part of the first screen is very consistent with the system UI style of Z9X PRO, and it is not so gorgeous.
The secondary page display of the category is much more gorgeous and beautiful, and you can see the complete poster wall display.
Of course, it can also be set to card mode, the presentation is also very good-looking, and the video information display is more comprehensive.
It's the same with TV series.
ZhiduZ9X PRO poster wall,Movies and TV have the function of automatically collecting collections,It's very cool for users who like to chase American dramas。
Movies can also be automatically included in the collection.
In general, in the poster wall display, Zhidu poster wall 4.0 does a good job in page layout and information presentation, but in the main UI design, it is a little too simple like the main interface of the system.
However, the core competitiveness of Zhidu poster wall 4.0 lies in the scraping of film and television information.
Friends who have played KODI and PLEX before must know that it is actually very troublesome to toss movie posters and information scraping, the naming of movie files should be according to the rules, and the network at home must be able to access the TMDB database normally, or the scraping will fail, and the video information cannot be matched correctly. In the film information scraping, the Zhidu poster wall is still very worry-free, not only the scraping speed is super fast, but the data accuracy is far beyond other playback software, which is also because Zhidu is based on TMDB data, and a lot of film and television information data is placed on the domestic server.
When I tested it, the movie files in my library were very messy.
But the success rate of Zhidu's scraping is still very high, whether it is a Remux movie, a TV series or a Blu-ray original disc can be scraped correctly, of course, it is not 100% can be scraped correctly, and if it is not scraped correctly, it needs to be manually matched.
The poster is also very complete in information, posters, fanart, trailers, movie introductions, directors, actors, movie videos and audio tracks and other information at a glance, and can also display the film trailer, and it is displayed in Chinese.
After clicking the More button, you can also display the detailed information of the video, audio, and subtitles of the video, including the audio and video encoding type, bitrate, HDR type, etc.
The overall experience,Zhidu's poster wall is really good,Whether it's the difficulty of scraping,Or the comprehensiveness of the information,It should be the best among players in the same price range。
In addition, the scraping settings of the Zhidu poster wall are very comprehensive, and the degree of freedom is very high, and the scraping settings are recommended:
1. Douban is recommended for scoring, for Chinese people, I personally think that the Douban score will be more referential than Rotten Tomatoes and TMDB.
2. Scraping source recommendation or TMDB is preferred, the best movie database at present.
Playback capability
As the strongest professional player at present, in addition to a powerful poster wall, comprehensive video format support and media source access are also the specialties of Zhidu.
Conventional H264、H265Encoded videos are not a problem at all,It should be noted that,If you want to getHDR、Dolby Vision/Audio and other effects,You need your TV support,In the case of TV support,With ZhiduZ9X PRO can bring a perfect viewing experience。
If the TV supports Dolby Vision, use Zhidu Z9X PRO to directly light up the Dolby Vision logo. For TVs that do not support Dolby Vision,Use ZhiduZ9X PROThe effect of normal playback can also be achieved,Z9X PROThe powerful Dolby Vision VS10Image processing engine,It can retain normal color conversion when automatically converting SDR。
For example, the Dolby Marvel blockbuster downloaded before,Use my TV at home to play the picture color when I don't use Z9X PRO,Use Z9X PRO Although you can't experience the effect of the native Dolby Vision,But you can also display colors normally。
Let's take a look at the ultra-high-definition Blu-ray playback ability, here we use dual Dolby encoding (Dolby Atmos and Dolby Vision), file size78.92GB, average bit rate can reach 57.65mbps, 4K resolution of the original disk REMUX "Fast Pursuit 4" to demonstrate, for daily family viewing, this quality video is very good.
The actual playback is very smooth, and it is no problem to drag the progress bar at any time. BY THE WAY,MY VIDEO IS STILL IN ALIYUN DISK,LET'S TALK ABOUT HOW TO MOUNT THE VIDEO IN ALIYUN DISK TO Z9X PRO。
Multi-source access
In addition to strong playback ability, Zhidu Z9X PRO supports the use of a variety of ways to mount videos, not only through the SATA interface and hard disk connection, but also through the USB interface to mount mobile hard disk and other storage media.
Of course, for gamers who like to watch movies in high definition, NAS is definitely indispensable, and the Z9X PRO supports the use of SMB and NFS protocols to mount LAN devices.
I used the SMB protocol to mount the Polar Space NAS I was using to the poster wall.
At the same time, in addition to supporting internal storage, external storage, SMB, NFS and other management methods, it also supports WebDAV, Baidu network disk, and Alibaba Cloud disk mounting. However, WebDAV, Baidu Netdisk, and Alibaba Cloud Disk can only be mounted to the media center, and do not support direct mounting to the poster wall. I also tested the Ali cloud disk before, and it's no problem to play.,And it supports lighting up double Dolby.,But the direct network disk mount here doesn't support poster wall scraping.。
I used CloudDrive to mount the network disk to the local computer.
Another advantage of using CloudDrive is that CloudDrive uses a multi-threaded download mechanism, which is faster to read, and can achieve almost the same experience as local disks under the condition that the network bandwidth is guaranteed.
And CloudDrive supports a variety of deployment methods,Support Android TV to directly install applications for deployment,But root permission is required,I am directly deployed on NAS,So that other devices at home can also be used directly if necessary。
I mounted the Alibaba Cloud network disk to the poster wall through CloudDrive, and when playing the high-bitrate original video, for example, the file size is 78.92GB, and the average bitrate can reach 57.65mbps.
It can be seen that it can basically achieve zero-buffer playback, and there is no stuttering during playback.
The actual experience, whether it is NAS or network disk, can be perfectly connected to the Zhidu Z9X PRO poster wall, this kind of multi-source access, automatic scraping, and the experience of playing at any time is really cool.
⏹ Summary.
As an entry-level professional player under Zhidu,Z9X PROThe actual experience can be said to be able to meet the needs of the vast majority of ordinary users,Full format and full media playback capabilities,Plus professional and easy-to-use product experience,For users who don't like tossing,Pursue pure audio and video playback experience,ZhiduZ9X PRO is very suitable。
The price of more than 1,000 is inevitably compared with ATV,Compared with ATV, it is better at streaming media,Need a variety of account support,Personally, I think Z9X PRO is more suitable for domestic users who like to use network disks and are used to playing local resources。