Page 4 - Performance and Conclusion
Audio/Video Performance
Digital multimedia handling and output quality of UEBO's M400 is generally excellent. As far as video streaming is concerned, the media player works as advertised -- it plays almost every video file in my library that I've thrown at it, and I noticed no lag or drops when streaming videos over my high performance home network. Conditions for network test setup include files located on my QNAP TS-559 Pro II network attached storage with UPnP Media Server enabled. Video playback is very smooth and consistent regardless of the source files, from standard definition videos and all the way up to 1080p high definition files. Since the UEBO M400 has a built-in Wireless-N adapter, I have noticed streaming with no wires attached is just as good as it is with a cable connected.
As far as analog performance is concerned, I have performed subjective audio testing with the digital optical output to my Yamaha receiver, and then constantly switched between its component analog inputs. A digital connection is not necessarily dependent on the device itself, because the signal is converted to analog on your receiver rather than relying on the DAC and operational amplifiers on the UEBO M400. Obviously, video quality decreased significantly when compared HDMI; that is to be expected. I would not have expected anything else. Audio output quality is also slightly lower than my receiver's digital to analog conversion from my experience. Overall, it is acceptably good, but sticking to digital video and audio is probably your best bet.
I tested the UEBO M400's maximum network throughput with a CAT5e cable connected to my Gigabit switch. The UEBO M400 is equipped with onboard Gigabit LAN, so that is the speed it was configured to run at. The performance results were obtained using ATTO Disk Benchmark. To ensure there are no bottlenecks, the drive installed in the M400 is a Kingston HyperX 120GB solid state drive. Generally speaking, as shown in our graphs above, the UEBO M400 is simply too slow as a network attached storage. It is probably useful to copy small amounts of media files onto your device if you are too lazy to do it over USB 3.0, but if you are serious about using it as a file server, with no user access control and slow network throughput, I simply cannot recommend it.
USB Performance
With a SuperSpeed USB 3.0 port, it is probably not surprising to you that the UEBO M400 delivers awesome performance in this area. I don't think many people are actually going to use an SSD with their network media player, but even if you were to plug in the fastest hard drive available in the market today, you are not going to saturate all of the available bandwidth. All in all, if you need to copy lots of media from your computer to the UEBO M400, USB 3.0 is the way to go.
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I know I have said this many times in this review, but the UEBO M400 is unquestionably one of the best looking network media players I have ever seen. The excellent industrial design is complemented by equally as competent hardware under the hood. With Gigabit Ethernet and Wireless-N, along with a wide array of video and audio decoding capabilities, everything looks absolutely perfect on paper. If I were to walk into a store, and see the UEBO M400 on sale for $150, I probably would have bought it on the spot -- this is simply a no-brainer. But as they always say, beauty is only skin deep. Mainly, it is a software problem. For one thing, the user interface is not very appealing. I would like it to be more consumer-friendly, and experience-optimized. Secondly, the operating system is not very well thought out; there are parts that make little sense to me as to why they made it that way. Thirdly, more demanding tasks will cause the player to lag. I have also experienced some unexpected random restarts during use. Lastly, being a network media player and all, it can't even map a password protected network drive -- forcing me to use a UPnP media server instead. I mean, it would have been a nice if a network media player could at least map a network drive properly, haha. Other than that, its file performance as a NAS is not very good, but for the price you are paying, it is one of those times where I can accept they are merely feature that are there, but not for anyone who is actually serious about it. At the end of the day, the UEBO M400 is simply brilliant hardware, by all means priced right, but hampered by overall poor software. Firmware update, anyone?
Update: The latest firmware rectified the network drive mapping problem.
UEBO provided this product to APH Networks for the purpose of evaluation.
APH Review Focus Summary:
6/10 means A product with its advantages, but drawbacks should not be ignored before purchasing.
5/10 means An average product with no real advantages; drawbacks and advantages just seems to cancel each other out.
-- Final APH Numeric Rating is 5.8/10
Please note that the APH Numeric Rating system is based off our proprietary guidelines in the Review Focus, and should not be compared to other sites.
If "looks are what that gets it started, but personality is what that keeps it going", then the UEBO M400 is sure going to attract a lot of people -- until you turn it on. A thorough firmware update will go a long way.
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Page Index
1. Introduction, Packaging, Specifications
2. A Closer Look - Hardware
3. A Closer Look - Software
4. Performance and Conclusion
