Popcorn Hour A-210, the succssor of PCH A-200, is a leading network media jukebox (NMJ) for the time being. It pumps out virtually any video format, including various video, audio container formats and ISO, IFO file and support for more than 100Mbps bitrate- that’s meet the specification of Blu-ray movies. However, Popcorn Hour A-210 does not naturally support Blu-ray Disc playback due to licensing. To get the Popcorn Hour NMT A-210 play Blu-ray movies, you have to crack the Blu-ray copy-protections and rip Blu-ray to HDD first.

There are different ways for backing up Blu-ray- you can rip a Blu-ray to BDMV, BD ISO, MKV or .m2ts streams without degrading the Blu-ray quality. The Popcorn Hour A210 and A-200 are capable of playing all of them. Actually the A-210 is a very good BDMV media player. And they perform even better when playing MKV files.

Here I’d show you how to rip Blu-ray to ISO for NMT A-210/A200 Playback:

Software for Windows: Pavtube Blu-ray Ripper trial for Windows, ImgBurn for Windows
Software for Mac: Pavtube Blu-ray Ripper trial for Mac

A. Rip Blu-ray Disc to BDMV and CERTIFICATE folder with Pavtube Blu-ray Ripper.
Step 1. Just connect BD drive to your computer, and place in source Blu-ray Disc. Run Pavtube Blu-Ray Ripper software. Click “BD/DVD ROM” to import Blu-ray movie.

Step 2. When the movie is loaded, click “Full Disk Copy” button to make a quick and full copy of the Blu-ray movie. Once it’s finished you’ll get two directories, one is BDMV and the other CERTIFICATE.

B. Create Blu-ray ISO from BDMV and CERTIFICATE folders with ImgBurn
A detailed guide is provided in a previous post. Click here to learn how to make Blu-ray ISO for Popcorn Hour A210/A200 playback.

Some tips for playing Blu-ray with Popcorn Hour NMT boxes:

1. The PopCorn Hour A210/A200 does not play Blu-ray menus (not yet, but probably will). So when playing Blu-ray ISO, the NMT A-210/200 plays the MAIN FEATURE ONLY. If you copy Blu-ray to .m2ts streams, you can copy the main feature only, leaving out menus and extras. This will save some storage for you.

2. The PopCorn Hour A-210/A-200 does not play the Blu-ray subtitles (PGS encoded .sup subtitles) either. So you’ll have somee troubles understanding the lines when a foreign language is spoken- like Navi language in Avatar Blu-ray movie. I’ll wirte a post later to explain how to rip Blu-ray for PopCorn Hour A-210/A-200 with playable subtitles. Keep an eye to my blog if you’re interested in playing Blu-ray movie subtitles with PopCorn Hour A-210/A-200.

3. A Blu-ray movie can contain Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS 5.1, PCM 5.1, Dolby True HD 7.1, DTS-HD 6.1/7.1 audio. So better check out your A/V sound system before you rip a Blu-ray and make sure the audio can be played correctly. It’s not a plesurable thing when you play a ripped Blu-ray without hearing sound from speakers. Make sure your AV receiver decodes the audio before ripping, or convert the Blu-ray audio to something that can be handled, e.g. AC-3 5.1 audio. Many Blu-ray rippers can encode Blu-ray. If you’d like to trans-code audio without changing the orginal video, Pavtube ByteCopy is your choice.

Related Links:
2 clicks copy/rip Blu-ray Disc to BDMV with Pavtube Blu-ray Ripper

ImgBurn- Best Freeware to Burn Blu-ray ISO from BDMV

Popcorn Hour A210 vs A200: what’s the difference?

Review: Popcorn Hour A-210 (NMT+ HD Meida Player)

Can WD TV Live Plus play Blu-ray in ISO, M2TS(BDMV) and MKV format?

Related posts:

1. Can PopCorn Hour A-200/A-210 downmix the original Blu-ray HD audio?
2. [BDMV/MKV/M2TS playback solutions Review]Play Blu-ray with Popcorn Hour A-200