Besides limited manpower that has to be distributed economically?


That's not a technical reason.


Also, from what we've seen so far, updating firmwares needs extensive testing to prevent features getting broken, so I'd rather wait before anything is getting rushed.

Nor is that, nor does it pertain to "not doing it" but to "will be delayed" or "in time" - besides, if you end up breaking all kinds of stuff your are not doing it right.

That's not a technical reason.

Nor is that, nor does it pertain to "not doing it" but to "will be delayed" or "in time" - besides, if you end up breaking all kinds of stuff your are not doing it right.I don't know what you are looking for as a "technical reason". There is none. There is no "technical reason" why WD couldn't keep working on the firmware adding features and updating it forever. But the point is, who is going to do that for a product that was discontinued a long time ago and is two generations behind the current product. They are going to devote their resources to their current products that will make them money. Accept the old Live for what it is now because it won't ever be anything more. It was supported well during it's life, but the run is over. If you want more then it's time to get out your checkbook and buy a new model.

if you end up breaking all kinds of stuff your are not doing it right.
I'd rather say that if you really think that any company would continue to support a product indefinitely you're not doing it right, but ok.

I'd rather say that if you really think that any company would continue to support a product indefinitely you're not doing it right, but ok.

Oh certainly not in a greedy capitalist system there the object is to make stuff which doesn't work for long so you can sell people new stuff, but we are far far from infinity. Plus neither of this is relevant for my fairly innocent, and valid question: Is there any technical reason for them not updating. Guess the answer to that is NO - there isn't.

Oh certainly not in a greedy capitalist system there the object is to make stuff which doesn't work for long so you can sell people new stuff, but we are far far from infinity. Plus neither of this is relevant for my fairly innocent, and valid question: Is there any technical reason for them not updating. Guess the answer to that is NO - there isn't.

Its planned obsolescence, a very common practice in capitalism.

I don't know what you are looking for as a "technical reason".


??? A technical reason. Like "not enough memory"

There is none. There is no "technical reason" why WD couldn't keep working on the firmware adding features and updating it forever. But the point is, who is going to do that for a product that was discontinued a long time ago and is two generations behind the current product.


That may be your topic, it wasn't mine, but if you insist. Who? Those who want to build brand loyalty.


It was supported well during it's life,


In your opinion. And its life is by no means over, except in as much as they killed it off.


If you want more then it's time to get out your checkbook and buy a new model.

Yeah the rich have much fun. With the WD attitude of quickly dumping their stuff the next model is not likely to be from WD.

Hi guys,

I'm just looking into having 5.1 on my WDTV Live, with mpeg and M2TS files on my home theater setup. I know most mkvs have 5.1 since when I was converting them to mpegs and used to play them on my PS3, I still had 5.1. Now I'm looking in having 5.1 from my WDTV Live.

Here is how my setup is connected:

WDTV Live ----HDMI---- Denon 3311 -----HDMI------TV (or Epson projector)

In the WDTV Live Menu, only stereo gives me audio. When I select HDMI Passthrough, I have no sound. (Neither with Optical, but this would be normal, since I have no optical cable, right?)

Does this mean I need to hook up an optical cable from the WDTV Live to my Denon 3311?

Thanks for the help,
Fred

Try the optical cable and MOST audio should work. Some of the formats aren't output or at least most 5.1 receivers don't know what to do with them. For those you'll have to use the regular analog or PCM or whatever works directly to the TV.
I think with mine and the new media player I have AAC doesn't play through my receiver but works fine through the HDMI on my TV directly so you'll have to try things out and see what works for your setup.

Hi guys,

I'm just looking into having 5.1 on my WDTV Live, with mpeg and M2TS files on my home theater setup. I know most mkvs have 5.1 since when I was converting them to mpegs and used to play them on my PS3, I still had 5.1. Now I'm looking in having 5.1 from my WDTV Live.

Here is how my setup is connected:

WDTV Live ----HDMI---- Denon 3311 -----HDMI------TV (or Epson projector)

In the WDTV Live Menu, only stereo gives me audio. When I select HDMI Passthrough, I have no sound. (Neither with Optical, but this would be normal, since I have no optical cable, right?)

Does this mean I need to hook up an optical cable from the WDTV Live to my Denon 3311?

Thanks for the help,
Fred

It probably can play the main HD audio track. Have you tried playing a secondary audio track such as AC3? That's if you ripped your movies with any secondary track.

I know my A-300 is having issues with the HD audio track with my rips. I'd lose audio completely, but the movies keeps playing. I've got to switch to my secondary AC3 audio track and it plays fine with surround sound (5.1 or 7.1)

I gave my parents the WD TV Live Streamer for X-Mas, and I know their receiver doesn't have HDMI hook up. I'm hoping optical will work for anything. We'll see. I'll take my external hdd with me, and I'll put several HD and SD movies in there with secondary audio tracks and see how it works. I'll post back later!

So, I will be going to my parent's house to install their new WD TV LIVE Streamer.

They mainly want Vudu so they can watch new movies. However, I will be doing some test by running different formatted rips.

I will be testing the following formats:
M4V, MKV, main movie M2TS, full movie TS/VOB folder structure, full movie blu-ray structure, and main movie blu-ray folder structure.

Software used: Handbrake, makemkv, AnyDVD HD and ClownBD.

Set up:

EXTERNAL HDD VIA USB ---> WD TV LIVE STREAMER ---> TV via HDMI ----> Onkyo A/V via optical.

I will post the results later.

P.S. It should be noted, this is my first time using makemkv, and I must say it is pretty easy, and fast program to use. However, it doesn't let me make a secondary audio track AC3 like ClownBD does, which at lot of times is necessary for me. Other than that I liked it.

I just returned home from installing and testing my parent's WD TV Live streamer. I must admit that I was very impress with the available apps and playing capabilities of this less than $100.00 dollars media player.

I tested Netflix, Vudu, and Pandora for my parents and they all play excellent over a wireless network. No stuttering or buffering at all.

Thereafter, I connected my external HDD via usb to the WD TV Live streamer and it automatically recognized it along with all the folders and media files.

The player played M4V files just fine. However, whenever I tried to used subtitles or another audio track, the video would fast-forward, and the audio would remain fine. I changed the audio track back, but the video kept fast-forwarding. The only way to stop this would be to restart the movie again.

For some reason or another subtitles didn't work with M4V files.

Full movie rip as bd and sd ts/vob folder structure, the player recognized the folder structure just fine, but whenever I played the folder, the movie wouldn't start from the beginning. The movie would start either in the middle, end, or something else.

The player played main movie folder structure, main movie m2ts, and mkv files perfectly. I was able to change audio tracks, spoken language track, and subtitles without any issues.

My mom loved it, and she knows my dad will love it too. I was so surprised by it that I'm actually thinking of buying one for my bedroom instead of the Popbox V8.

This little media player is probably the only media player that I know that is an all in one media player. I WD can make something like this with a jukebox. I would definitely buy one and most likely use it to replace my A-300.

Hi.
I have the 2nd generation of this device but I had a question about the 3rd generation(2011) version.

I was wondering if

1. If they fixed the navigation to allow you to navigate to different parts of the video by pressing the number pad. Traditionally in some media streaming devices, you press 1 to go to 10%, 2 for 20%, 3 for 30%, 4 for 40%, etc....

The 2nd Generation did not have a number pad on the remote so I could not do it but the 3rd generation does have a number pad.

Can anyone confirm that this works for navigation within a video?

2. Many video which normally display as full screen with my popcorn hour A-110 will show up with bars on the side of the video or on the top/bottom of the screen. Basically, I think it is because the video is in the wrong aspect ratio. Does anyone know if the 3nd generation fixed this problem or not?

3. Does it still have the same interface or does it use any type of jukebox interface now?

I was wondering if these improvements/fixes have been done on the 3rd generation besides just the support for some online streaming sites.

Thanks.


P.S.Sorry if this is a duplicate post, I did not realize this device already has its own massive section on here.

Is it possible my WDTV Live is causing ethernet cables to go bad?

My Live is connected to the network via a powerline adapter and I stream video from network storage. Been working fine for over a year. About a month ago I started getting stuttering and network disconnects. I went through normal troubleshooting issues including I replaced the powerline adapter with a spare one I'd never used. The problem persisted till I finally thought to try a new ethernet cable. That seemed to solve the problem. At least till last weekend and the problem started up again. After normal process of rebooting the router and NAS I plugged the original powerline adapter back in and the problem continued. I picked up an old Ethernet cable I had nearby, plugged it in and video streamed fine for about 30 minutes. Last night I plugged in new ethernet cable watched video for about 2 hours with no problem.

So, I have gone through 4 ethernet cables in a month. Could the WDTV Live be burning them out?

Is it possible my WDTV Live is causing ethernet cables to go bad?

My Live is connected to the network via a powerline adapter and I stream video from network storage. Been working fine for over a year. About a month ago I started getting stuttering and network disconnects. I went through normal troubleshooting issues including I replaced the powerline adapter with a spare one I'd never used. The problem persisted till I finally thought to try a new ethernet cable. That seemed to solve the problem. At least till last weekend and the problem started up again. After normal process of rebooting the router and NAS I plugged the original powerline adapter back in and the problem continued. I picked up an old Ethernet cable I had nearby, plugged it in and video streamed fine for about 30 minutes. Last night I plugged in new ethernet cable watched video for about 2 hours with no problem.

So, I gone through 4 ethernet cables in a month. Could the WDTV Live be burning them out?

Test your router?

Test your router?

Since the ethernet cables are not connected 'directly' to the router, I don't see how the router could be the cause of them going bad.

Since the ethernet cables are not connected 'directly' to the router, I don't see how the router could be the cause of them going bad.

I cannot see how with the voltages involve that anything is making the cables "go bad."

I cannot see how with the voltages involve that anything is making the cables "go bad."

I guess that's the real question. I don't know.

To add, I have a PC connected to the same TV and same powerline adapter. After the stuttering incidents, I've played the same video successfullly over the PC with WMC7, but if I use the ethernet cable from the WDTV on the computer, I get the stuttering, and vice versa, if I use the cable from the TV on the WDTV, no stuttering, so I'm confident the cables are going 'bad'.

I guess that's the real question. I don't know.

To add, I have a PC connected to the same TV and same powerline adapter. After the stuttering incidents, I've played the same video successfullly over the PC with WMC7, but if I use the ethernet cable from the WDTV on the computer, I get the stuttering, and vice versa, if I use the cable from the TV on the WDTV, no stuttering, so I'm confident the cables are going 'bad'.

Its a mystery.

Since the ethernet cables are not connected 'directly' to the router, I don't see how the router could be the cause of them going bad.

My bad. I should of asked what was your set up rather than automatically assuming you had it hooked up to your router.

I don't know how those cables could be going bad. I've wired my whole house with Cat5(e), and I've got several cables that go from my router to the outside of the house back to the inside of the house. Those cable has endured 108 Degree and 45 deg. weather, and my dog shewing on it, and I am still getting a good connection.

May be one of the small lines withing the cat cable isn't making a good connection, and you'll have to re-attach the male end portion. I do my own wiring / splicing, and I had one cable that wasn't working, and the cause was one of the color line orange/white was broken. So, I had to cut it and re-attache it.

Is it possible my WDTV Live is causing ethernet cables to go bad?

My Live is connected to the network via a powerline adapter and I stream video from network storage. Been working fine for over a year. About a month ago I started getting stuttering and network disconnects. I went through normal troubleshooting issues including I replaced the powerline adapter with a spare one I'd never used.

Just a thought. I noticed that I would have intermittent stuttering when playing networked bd movies. Apparently the wd tv was disconnecting between uses from the wired (MoCa) network and defaulting to the wireless connection I had started with. Going back into setup and doing an auto connection to the wired network would resolve the problem.

Not sure if the disconnect was caused by power failure or by something with the moca connection.

When you are stuttering confirm that the wdtv is using the ethernet connection.

When you are stuttering confirm that the wdtv is using the ethernet connection.

It is. I don't even have a wireless adapter connected to it.

I am thinking of getting the new WD TV Live mainly because I hate the small remote on the original unit and I think I'll like the new one better.
A friend of mine wants the old unit...however, I have a couple of questions.

Is there any reason I would PREFER the old unit? Ie, something on the old is better or anything?

Also, I assume the new unit plays at least the same amount of different formats and maybe more?

Best price online?

THanks

George

I am thinking of getting the new WD TV Live mainly because I hate the small remote on the original unit and I think I'll like the new one better.
A friend of mine wants the old unit...however, I have a couple of questions.

Is there any reason I would PREFER the old unit? Ie, something on the old is better or anything?

Also, I assume the new unit plays at least the same amount of different formats and maybe more?

Best price online?

THanks

George

Old unit (which I prefer) can be modded with WDLXTV firmware (Google it).
New unit cannot.
They both play the same formats.
Remote size is not a factor for me since I use a Harmony remote anyways.

I am thinking of getting the new WD TV Live mainly because I hate the small remote on the original unit and I think I'll like the new one better.
A friend of mine wants the old unit...however, I have a couple of questions.

Is there any reason I would PREFER the old unit? Ie, something on the old is better or anything?

Also, I assume the new unit plays at least the same amount of different formats and maybe more?

Best price online?

THanks

GeorgeIf someone is willing to take the dreaded old and obsolete TV Live off your possession then consider yourself real lucky because WD has stop supporting the old brick. The new real remote isn't any better, it rocks back and forth when laid down on any flat surface and never seem to be able to sit stable. Any little bump would cause the thing to start rocking, annoying as hell. I flip it upside down with the rubber keys facing down. The only feature I like is the 'Subtitle' button. I can just activate it when watching Netflix (or DVD) w/o having to go to their menus. But then again, I didn't buy the newer player because of its remote.

Well, I'm going to take that as a yes. The remote wobbling thing might drive me nuts too but I tend to put my stuff on a shelf that has a mouse mat on it so hopefully it won't happen or I won't hear it. If not, I might pimp it but I'll give it a shot.

Not sure why "dreaded old and obsolete" but frankly, I love mine and have had more than one. Even had the regular version that came out before the live and liked it too.

Anything is better than the POS Iomega Screeplays I had before that and of which, I had 3-4 units and NONE worked properly and also, their service SUCKS!

I for one am super happy with mine and so are the people I sold my old units to or gave to them.

Well, I guess I'll go ahead and order one then. As for pimping the software, I never had much patience for that so I don't care about it.

Thanks

George

Well, I'm going to take that as a yes. The remote wobbling thing might drive me nuts too but I tend to put my stuff on a shelf that has a mouse mat on it so hopefully it won't happen or I won't hear it. If not, I might pimp it but I'll give it a shot.

Not sure why "dreaded old and obsolete" but frankly, I love mine and have had more than one. Even had the regular version that came out before the live and liked it too.

Anything is better than the POS Iomega Screeplays I had before that and of which, I had 3-4 units and NONE worked properly and also, their service SUCKS!

I for one am super happy with mine and so are the people I sold my old units to or gave to them.

Well, I guess I'll go ahead and order one then. As for pimping the software, I never had much patience for that so I don't care about it.

Thanks

George

I have tried a lot of other boxes. I thought I had found one that would finally take the place of my WD box, but low and behold, it did not play DTS sound on my MKV movies. So I am back with old Faithful

Personally I found my units to be pretty much bulletproof which is what I need.

You may have others that are great with lots of features (that I prolly wouldn't use anyway) but this unit works and performs, every time.

:p

M WDHDTV Live + works pretty well except that it seems to drop the ethernet connection (local network or internet) after 20 minutes or so. The other devices on my network don't do that and I can't think of anything which would cause this behavior. Has anyone else seen this?

I cannot play SUB subtitles on the WD TV Live, only SRT... isn't it supposed to read SUB files?

Thanks :)

I was playing around with my Video Output settings last night and found something curious. When I select HDMI --> Auto, the WDTV defaults to 8-bit color depth. When you try to select 12-bit it doesn't change.

If I select HDMI --> 1080p/24 then I can select 12-bit and it accepts the change. (whether or not I can see the difference between 8-bit and 12-bit is another matter :) )

Can anyone confirm this is normal behavior? After I noticed this I did a factory reset and it was still the same.

Just curious, can the WD media player handle protected folders? Say if you wanted to put some "adult" movies in a password protected folder that only someone that knows password could open.

brickie

I cannot play SUB subtitles on the WD TV Live, only SRT... isn't it supposed to read SUB files?
Several sub formats have this extension only few of which are supported.

Just curious, can the WD media player handle protected folders? Say if you wanted to put some "adult" movies in a password protected folder that only someone that knows password could open.You're thinking too high-tech. Put that stuff on a separate drive and lock it away when not in use. Just don't forget . . .