Viewsonic VMP30

With more and more people using their computers to watch live television, recorded video or films, it’s no surprise that many manufacturers are now producing players that can show the same files on a PC.

Viewsonic’s VMP30 is just such a device, and can play files stored on a USB storage device or memory card: SD, MMC, XD and MS cards are supported by its single slot. It connects to televisions using an HDMI cable (one is supplied) and supports high-definition video.

The player can show photos, which are displayed as a slideshow, and play most common types of music and video files. We were slightly disappointed that the device wouldn’t play .M4V videos of the type used by some Apple devices, but more annoying was the discovery that it has trouble with high quality, high-definition clips: the player would sometimes crash when playing these files. It had no trouble with smaller, lower-quality videos, though.

This problem with high definition clips limits the VMP30's usefulness - for showing photos and playing music it's fine, but it's unable to make the most of its high quality output.