DLNA or Direct External Drive

[zunebuggy]

I bought an LG 47LK530 HDTV and really like it. It has DLNA and USB support. I have a 2TB hard drive and have connected it both directly to the TV and via DLNA using Windows Media Player 11. Both worked well for playing MPGs and AVIs.

Which one is better to use? DLNA or connecting the drive directly?

AND

How can I get a jpg to display as the movie cover art? When I use either DLNA or it connected directly, it uses the LG built in menu and it displays an icon of a film reel or in some types of movies it will show a thumbnail of the movie. I created folders for each movie and placed the jpg in the folder. I tried naming the jpg (for example for mymovie.mpg I name the jpg mymovie.jpg, mymovie.mpg.cover.jpg and mymovie.mpg.jpg) and none of these scenarios worked. In these scenarios, what displays is the movie without the cover art and a the jpg is a separate image in the folder. Is there no way to do this on my TV or is there another way to name the jpg I haven't tried?

Thank you. :)

[flagstone]

You know, I've had mixed success with DLNA. I have a PS3 and a Sony Bravia Internet TV, both of which support DLNA, and I have a Mac and a Windows laptop which both have DLNA servers (and in fact I've tried out several different servers on the Mac). I've had only moderate levels of success with the setup - there are video files that will play through the PS3 but won't on the TV, or the TV will be able to browse files using one DLNA server but not another, and so on. It doesn't seem to "just work" for me. I have a moderately stable set-up now through the PS3, but the Bravia still more often than not doesn't want to deal with video files.

The cover art problem is kind of the same thing. It is hit and miss for me, and also can vary across servers. I don't know if this is a gap in the DLNA standards, bad client implementation or bad server implementation, but it is the kind of "fit-and-finish" thing that needs to be cleaned up for the general consumer market.