There’s a potential problem here: these connectors are all crammed closely together, and the rather chunky HDMI cable that we used to connect the WD TV to our Samsung HD TV had to be jammed quite tightly into the narrow space at the back of the unit before it sat properly in the HDMI slot.
The WD TV has its own Media Library UI
Even then, the HDMI cable encroached on the adjacent USB port, so some people might end up having to buy new cables simply to get everything plugged in properly. There’s no HDMI cable supplied with the WD TV, though you do get a set of composite-video leads.
That HDMI interface can output video at full 1080p resolution, producing very good image quality on an HD television – provided the video files stored on your hard disk are of that order of resolution too.
When you connect the WD TV to your TV set it displays its own Media Library menu system on the TV screen, with all your files automatically organised under separate headings for music, video and photos. The Media Library also allows you to browse in other ways, perhaps looking at the most recently played files, browsing photos by date, or music by genre or artist.
There’s also a Settings menu that allows you to quickly switch resolution from 1080p right down to 480i, select 16:9 or 4:3 resolution, or switch to digital audio output through the Toslink connector.
Access your backed-up content
The WD TV can play most common file formats, and it coped easily with an assortment of MP3, AAC, AVI, MP4, M4V, and WMV files that we threw at it. The only obvious omission here is that it doesn’t support DivX video for the BitTorrent brigade. However, WD does include a copy of ArcSoft’s MediaConverter software - for PC only - to deal with file formats that aren’t supported by the WD TV itself.
COMMENTS
Audio Sync
Abstract8
I use an external 2.5" HDD and have played two hour programs in xvid format with no audio sync problems.
Your thumb drive is not up to supplying the speed or the files are encoded at very high bit rates.
So far my only problem is losing hdmi setup and having to redo and the HDD not powering down when the unit is switched off. I hope a firmware update will address these minor niggles. I did have to reformat my USB HDD from ext3 to fat32, but that was no big deal.
I think it is a great device and the video quality at 1080p is superb even when playing back content encoded at lower resolutions.
Moaning
It looks like there is now a good, and pretty cheap 1080p media player which plays lots of formats (that we want, xvid, mkv/x264 etc).
And now all people can moan about it.
ITS GOT NO ETHERNET (if it did, and then moan it doesnt have smb or something (which I would prefer of course)
ITS GOT NO HDD (its got 2x USB ports, stfu)
Isn't this something that could be brought out on newer versions, internal hdd, ethernet, wireless(for 1080p, have fun)
This is the first WD hardware I have seen (I think), and if thats the case, it looks like they are onto a winner from the start.
Support Ext2/3 in the future would be nice. More people should start supporting this to remove the evil of NTFS (Search IFS Ext2 everyone...)
new firmware released. WD keeps its promise to support this device
Western Digital has released today a first firmware upgrade.... with a significant list of improvements. (pdf link: release notes: http://www.wdc.com/en/products/wdtv/releasenotes/WDTVreleasenotes101.pdf)
they've also stated that further upgrades are forthcoming, and have pledged to support this product for some time to come (as posted by user "ScottWD" on http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=15342049#post15342049 , who has signed some messages as Scott Rader, product marketing manager at Western Digital)
Containter vs Codec
"Video -MPEG1/2/4, WMV9, AVI (MPEG4, Xvid, AVC), H.264, MKV, MOV (MPEG4, H.264)"
So it can play Xvid in AVI but not Xvid in MKV? 264 on its own or in MOV...
Slightly poorly formatted "video" list there.
I don't get it...
The first and most important thing I don't quite understand:
Why would the company that produced hard disks that (through their software) would not allow you to copy music and video files onto them produce a player that plays music and videos from a hard disk? It's completely hypocritical!
The things that I've pieced together through skimming the comments:
.iso rips of DVDs don't work properly - playing the main movie only seems unlikely - surely it plays all the legal warnings and everything, otherwise WD would have a massive legal fight on it's hands...
I don't see support for rips of blu-ray discs, so that's out.
I haven't seen any mention of being able to update/add any codecs - I know this isn't a generally available thing on media players - but surely it's past time that it is?
No ethernet - by now media players should be putting Gb network cards in these players.
I'm not particularly interested in a new player until I see something that can play my blu-ray collection rips (ok, the blu-rays I will start buying once I can rip and play them from images).
Too many media players seem designed to play downloaded rips of poor-quality movie files, or just poor-quality rips of owned DVDs, or poor-quality recorded videos recorded off TV. Personally, I want quality.
