DLNA: what is it and how to use it

When buying modern multimedia equipment, you can see the DLNA logo. This means that this device can be connected to a home network for the transmission and reception of a variety of media content. And all this will happen in real time.

How it works

To better understand how DLNA works, what a home network is, and what advantages the use of this system gives, imagine such a situation. You downloaded the movie on the Internet and want to watch it on your TV. But to do this, you need to burn the movie to a disk or a USB flash drive. And if you use a disc, then to play it you need a multimedia player. So it was before, now with the help of a special protocol of information exchange, called DLNA, you can forget about all unnecessary gestures. This protocol provides communication between all supporting devices, which, in fact, allows you to create a home network. In this case, a personal computer acts as a kind of server, and a TV or other device as a client.

The main advantage of this scheme is that you can instantly without any complicated operations gain access to data stored on any your home device. The movie was downloaded to a computer - and you can immediately watch it on your TV. If you make a beautiful photo on a digital camera or phone, you can immediately evaluate them on the computer screen or arrange a spectacular slide show with a TV. Even greater opportunities open up for lovers of good music, because now it is enough to write down a song you like on any DLNA-compatible device, then listen to it with the help of a music center.

Creating Your Network

First of all, you need to understand that there are two types of devices that support this protocol. More precisely, the DLNA client and the DLNA server. What is a client, you probably know. This is a device for receiving a signal. But the server, on the contrary, is designed for data transmission. Most modern TVs can be used as a DLNA client, and those that for some reason do not have such a function can be connected to the network using a media player that supports the required protocol. Network storage will always be only servers, but computers, smartphones and tablets are both servers and clients.

Both wired and wireless connections are used for signal transmission. To create a DLNA server for Windows, you probably will not even need to install additional software. It's enough just to make one of the folders or the whole hard drive open for viewing by other devices. A few more problems will be with other operating systems. To turn a Linux or IOS-based computer into a DLNA server, you need to install specialized software, which may well be paid. Approximately the same situation is with all mobile devices, for which there are many relevant applications. By the way, if you need a DLNA media server , it is reasonable to use a network storage for these purposes .

Connecting devices

As mentioned earlier, most modern TVs and music centers initially support DLNA. What is this support? In fact, this means that the TV can connect to a wireless or wired network without additional devices. Well, accordingly, he is able to receive data on DLNA-protocol. At the same time to access the common files it is enough just to press the corresponding button of the console, after which the TV will independently find the DLNA-server. Next, you select the desired movie or other media file from the list that appears.

disadvantages

Among the main disadvantages of this technology, the compatibility of different software delivers the most problems. Solve this problem most often by installing the software that is recommended by the manufacturer for this particular server or TV model.

Also, when downloading movies from the Internet, remember that most TVs support only certain formats, among which are usually mpg4, avi and wmv. Other types of codecs can be unreadable for some models. But this problem can be solved by buying a multimedia player.

If a wireless network is used to transfer data, a weak signal from the Wi-Fi receiver may cause delays in the playback of the movie. Especially if you watch high quality videos. You can solve the problem in two ways. By amplifying the signal of the router, pushing it closer to the TV, or connecting the TV to the network using a wire.

Conclusion

Now that you know how you can use DLNA, what file sharing is and how it all works, setting up your own home network should not be a problem for you. And this means that you will be able to fully enjoy all the benefits of sharing files.