I purchased the WD Live Plus HD Media Player to watch movies from my Windows Home server. I got tired of all the DVD's and no where to store them so I built a WHS from an old computer and ordered the WD Live plus. I ran a CAT5 cable to my LCD, hooked up the WD Live Plus and it automatically connected to my WHS. I was up and running in as little as 5 minutes streaming a video on the big screen. The 1st movie played flawlessly until I started to watch the 2nd movie. Towards the middle of the movie, WD Live started to freeze up. At first I thought it was my server so I rebooted the WHS and was back up and running again. Started to watch the movie and froze again. Now I'm getting very upset. Now I powered off/on the WD Live Plus and same issue. Some movies played with no issues and some movies just locked up. Now I'm getting upset with this media Player. I checked WD's website and could not find any solution to the device freezing so I ordered the "Asus O! Player" unit to replace my piece of crap WD live Plus. I was already to mail it back and connect the Asus O! Player but something told me to check the WD support website one more time before I mail back WD Live Plus HD Media Player.
I found this on their site:
"When playing a movie over a Network location on a WD TV Live HD Media Player, the video may slow down
Problem:
When playing a high bitrate movie from a Network location (computer or NAS), after a period of time, the video may slow down and jitter.
Cause:
Samba (the method the WD TV Live uses to read a network location) cannot play back high bitrate movies.
Solution:
If this problem is encountered there are two solutions:
1. Try playing the content from the Media Server selection on the WD TV Live HD Media Player. This may require installation of a Media Server on your computer. Windows Media Player 11 has a built in Media Server. There are other alternatives such as TwonkyMedia, and TVersity which may also work for these videos.
2. Copy the high bitrate content to a USB drive, attach the USB drive to the WD TV Live HD Media Player and play the content from the local drive".
I said Hmmm, "playing a high bitrate movie from a Network location", well this was my problem. I went to TVersity and they explained how the software transcodes any video depending on your network speed and devices for proper streaming settings. So I installed the software on my WHS. During the installation it prompted to install the additional AC3 codec. So I installed it on my server. After installation completed, I configured TVersity to use my Video folder on the WHS and behold video was streaming to my LCD with no issues. Actually I believe the video quality is slighter better now than it was before.
So I'll take that back about calling the WD player crap. Now I can say I'm very happy with WD Live Plus and will give it a 4 star rating now. TVersity is excellent software for streaming videos and will help any media player handle video streaming. Oh did it mention that it's free! So go ahead and purchase the WD Live Plus HD Media Player and install TVersity on either your WHS or desktop/laptop and the 2 together they'll make a perfect couple.
Enjoy. Western Digital WD TV Live Plus 1080p HD Media Player
I just got the WD TV Live Plus and I have to say that I've finally found the perfect media streamer (for now).
I've had the WD TV Live (not plus version) for about 5 months and it's served me well, streaming up just about every type of movie file that I've ever encountered. When I purchased the non-plus version, the only two features that I really wanted that it was missing was NetFlix support and full DVD menu support.
Yes, I am a bummered that my existing non-plus version can't support NetFlix, but I very well knew that what I purchased it.
Please Note: Most of the non-plus version marketing material says that it doesn't support full DVD menu navigation, but WD just came out with a firmware update that DOES add DVD menu support - Kuddos to WD for listening to their customers and giving them what they want.
Regarding the NetFlix support, the PLUS version has a different chip inside of it that is required for NetFlix support (something about copy protection). The non-plus version does not have the required chip in order to support NetFlix so if you read some rants about WD trying to !@#$% their customers, it's probably non-plus owners who feel cheated that they have to buy a new product to get NetFlix support.
I understand their frustration, but the truth of the matter is that there is nothing WD can do in order to get the non-plus to support NetFlix.
On the other hand, they *have* just added DVD menu support to the non-plus version, so anyone who says that they stop supporting the older products doesn't know what they're talking about.
To the point of the review, the NetFlix supports both queue playing (when you already have stuff added to your play now queue) AND browsing.
This is my first NetFlix player (other than my PC) so I can't really compare it to other NetFlix players. I know the Xbox also supports browsing, but I think that most other stand alone players do not support browsing.
The activation process was surprisingly easy (I just went to the NetFlix site and entered a code the Plus gave me).
Regarding HD content, I'm not 100% sure if the Plus supports this, but last night I was viewing some 30 rock episodes and it looked *really* good, better than viewing a DVD.
When starting to view a NetFlix video, it took about 15-20 seconds from when I clicked on play to when the video started playing. I don't know if this is good or bad. No streaming issues once it started playing. My device is connected directly to my router.
I also played around with the new MediaFly feature. Never heard of it before. Basically it aggregates some audio and video podcasts by topic. I saw some CNN and NPR content which is cool.
Overall I'd say this is the best media streamer ->currently<- on the market.
I emphasize currently as I REALLY wanted to get a POPBOX, which sounds like a better option (at least on paper), but it still isn't out and I got tired of waiting for it to be released.
Lastly, I know I didn't cover other aspects of the PLUS, but other than NetFlix support (and I think MediaFly support) the plus and non-plus devices are identical so go read some non-plus reviews for more info :)
[UPDATE June 21]
A few people correctly mentioned that the DVD menu support for the non plus version isn't officially out yet since it's still in beta.
You can see the entire thread of people who have download the beta version and successfully played DVDs with menus on the non-plus version here:
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