There are other solutions for streaming video to the iPad. Air Video takes any file on your Mac or PC and converts it on-the-fly to an iPad-friendly format, but requires a computer to do it. Another app named FileBrowser will stream movies direct from, say, a Time Capsule, but they need to be H.264 MP4 files. This probably means you'll have to convert the files first.
What Buzz Player does is connect directly to any SMB or FTP server. From there, you can browse the folders until you meet a movie you'd like to play. Tap it and you can choose to copy the file to your iPad, or just play it. The movies starts right away, and plays stutter free in seemingly any format.
And I mean any format. Not only will it play H.264 MP4 and WMV in a range of containers (AVI, MOV, OGG, DIVX and more), it will handle things like Sorensen, Real Video and Theora. It also supports pretty much any sound format, and allows you to connect over the local network or even via 3G using most networking protocols. Buzz Player even supports subtitles, and lets you tweak not only their appearance but to offset their timing — handy for getting things to sync up.
It's not all great, though. The interface is ugly, unintuitive and looks more like an open-source Linux project than a polished iPad app. Once you get past this, though, it's easy enough to use.
I also get some crashing. Every time I hit the “X” in the top left corner to back out of the current movie or section of the app, it dies. When playing movies and working with the network, though, it is stable.
You really need to read the iTunes description to see just how much this thing can do, but let me just add one more point. You can also load up the app with movies via iTunes, just like any other video player. That way, you have pretty much every possibility covered.
Buzz Player is just $4 for the iPad, $3 for the iPhone and ¥499 (around $6) for Android.
Buzz Player [Bugun Software]
Buzz Player for iPad [iTunes]
