The program was recently added to the AppStore and has version number 1.0 so it does have some flaws, but they are not critical and I hope they will all be fixed in following versions. First thing, you see when application starts is a quick tutorial showing that file controls are behind a swap drawer. Then you end up with a blank screen, which is a little unusual. Then I’ve realized that it is my local application storage which is, of course, empty for now. So I started digging around and found many interesting features. First and most important feature is that FSPlayer was able to handle ALL media files that I’ve tried to play. I do mean ALL video, audio and image files, including AVI and MKV. For FREE app it’s itself pretty amazing, so I’ve decided to research some more and the longer I was researching the more interesting it was getting. The next thing I’ve noticed is that it can work with DropBox, Google Drive and Filestream.ME clouds. I’ve immediately connected my DropBox and Google Drive to see what I can do with them. The options were not surprising. I was able to see the content of my clouds and download files to my iPhone’s local storage for future playback. Then I got curious about Filestream.me and found that service rather interesting. I won’t go to details about Filestream.me cloud storage now, but it does have some unique features to offer. Must Check: Filestream Cloud Storage Review So, back to FSPlayer. Developer claims that it can stream media files directly from clouds but the feature currently works with Filestream.me cloud only. I hope that they’ll make that feature available for other clouds too. The next interesting feature was WebDAV and FTP support. It made me absolutely happy. The thing is that most of my friends don’t have iOS devices, so they don’t have iTunes installed on their computers and Bluetooth transfer between iOS and other devices doesn’t always work. So if I see an interesting file that they have and ask them to share with me, it becomes a problem. So how can FSPlayer help you in that situation? – You may ask. It’s simple and smart: you start FTP service and your iPhone becomes a fully functional FTP server that shows you the IP address to which you can upload files from any computer using your computer’s file manager. If you don’t know how to use FTP, you start WebDAV service inside FSPlayer and it gives you an IP address that you can connect to with your computer’s Internet browser (Safari, Chrome, Firefox, IE), see files on your computer using standard browser controls and upload files to your device. Very nice. OK. Let’s move on. The next impressive feature was DLNA support. DLNA is a protocol that allows transferring of your media content to any remote devices connected to the same network as yours, and supports multicast playback (Computer, notebook, SmartTV, HDMI media player, etc.). I have a SmartTV that is connected to my WiFi router, so with DLNA I was able to transfer any video from my iPhone to my big screen TV. Moreover, with Filestream.me cloud I was able to transfer video file located in my personal Filestream.me cloud directly to my SmartTV without downloading it to my iPhone first. I don’t have AppleTV device, so I was unable to test the AirPlay feature that FSPlayer also supports. If you have AppleTV you can give it a try and send me a feedback. I will update the post, and will include your experience.
FSplayer Review
Screenshots
My conclusion about FSPlayer is:
Pros:
- It was able to handle all types of media files + Can connect to clouds + FTP and WebDAV are amazing + DLNA and AirPlay + It’s FREE
Cons:
– Still has some interface bugs. – Interface becomes stretched on iPhones 6 and 6+ P.S. User (sanuelsonjan) has tried AirPlay and wrote me back. It works. But in porder to work correctly you must have Mirroring turned ON on your iOS device. If you turn it Off you will lose video on your TV. You will hear the audio track but won’t see any video. So have MIRRORING ON on your device while streaming to AppleTV P.P.S. User (bigone857) has reported that DLNA feature does not work correctly with some SAMSUNG TVs.
