How Seagate FreeAgent Theater+ looks and its connectivity?
The FreeAgent Theater+ is a somewhat big equipment and the reason is understandable — there is a slot for plugging in the FreeAgent Go Hard Disk Drive (HDD) like a cassette. There are nearly all sorts of outputs on the back side of the player. You can connect composite video and stereo audio from analogue output with the help of a single jack connection. The component video connection is on three RCA and this is due to possibility of using better cables that can provide better video quality.On the digital section, the player has an optical digital output and an HDMI output; but missing the good old coaxial digital output like most of the newer equipment, as it is undoubtedly the best way of connecting two digital equipment. Apart from one slot dedicated to the Seagate HDD, there are two other USB inputs for you to connect an HDD or a flash drive. There is a LAN port at the backside which gives this player merit against its older version and renders itself a suffix of '+'. This port can let you watch videos on YouTube and let you enjoy some of the other social networking sites. If you make a good use of the LAN feature, then you can use this device to stream content from the network also — just connect this device to an internet switch and access the content from other IP driven HDD or computers.
Features of Seagate FreeAgent Theater+Formats playing capability:
It doesn’t download fronm the web, inspite of having a HDD like many other media servers.
If you save an iSO file onto the hard disk, then there are many players who may not support detailed iconic menus. Almost all the available and possible video formats are also recognized and played through the Theater+. But the FreeAgent+ navigates through the file Just like how one would navigate though a DVD. On the image side, not only common formats like JPEG but TiFF, PNG, GiF and BMP are supported too. On the music front, the player plays most of the formats like MP3, AAC, WMA, AC3, ASF. FLAC, M4A. OGG, RA. RM, RMVB and WAV—the range of formats that the player supports is not very critical, but it is important to understand the navigation menu. When it comes to fifty movies, navigation through the file-list is not a big problem, but this linear menu can get on one's nerves when one has to go through two thousand songs or a few hundred images.
User interface of Seagate FreeAgent Theater+
While the unit is on standby mode, the Seagate logo on the front panel is amber and it glows to white once the user powers it on. As you power the unit on, the menu side displays a list of videos, images, music etc to select. On the overall user interface front, the Seagate fares very well by keeping it small and simple. The Graphic User interface (GUI) is in the matrix form, meaning after you select the options horizontally, for example videos, it gives you options in vertical form to choose from. Options like 'Settings' can be accessed on you calling for the menu items and not on the home menu. This keeps the operation very simple, as the casual user doesn't get into the other things but purely onto the content part and its playback. Every entry and exit into the menu frame is through fade in and out — though a minor point, but this feature is very soothing and pleasing to the eye. With all praises, there is a scorn point too: the play, pause and all the other such playback icons are simply too big for the screen as compared to the rest of the icon sizes.
The absence of buttons on the player makes the use of remote mandatory even for the most basic functions, so take care of that remote, else you could be devoid of the entertainment! No display on the player means that the TV needs to be on while even listening to the music.
User review of Seagate FreeAgent Theater+
It is excellent while playing HD files both 1080p and 720P. On the sound section, while playing MP3 the output is just average.
