WD TV Live Plus: Western Digital's Latest Media Player Reviewed
by Cameron Butterfield on July 29, 2010 1:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Home Theater
- Media Streamer
- WD
- WD TV Live Plus
The WD TV Live Plus is easy to setup, especially if you are utilizing the HDMI port that is capable of carrying all your audio and video signals at once over a single cable. Getting the WD TV Live Plus to lay flat after plugging in a heavy duty cable can be a bit of a challenge, as the weight and tension of the cable seems to make it flip to the side until you play with it for a while, but you can hardly blame WD for making such a slim and light device. However If you do purchase this device, you may want to invest in a roll of velcro or double sided tape to keep it in place.
Once seated and connected, the WD TV boots up quickly and you are provided with dark and light blue color scheme menu system that is very easily controled by using the arrow keys and a back, forward (OK) control scheme that is very reminiscent to the PSP, or PS3 menu system or Windows 7 Media Center. Western Digital did a good job of making the UI on this device familiar and easy to use for end users, they also have provided a screensaver mode that automatically blanks the screen and displays a WD logo in random areas.
When a USB device containing compatible media files is first inserted, the media library compilation process begins (if it is enabled), and media is sorted out into their respective media categories, namely Music, Video, or Photo. This feature allows you to use the search functionality rather than simply browsing around inside folders to find your media. In addition, the WD TV Live’s menu system provides file organization features as well, allowing you to move and copy your media and folders around on your connected storage devices. These are welcome features and gives the WD TV somewhat of a unique advantage over other media players that do not have these types of organizational features.
You can browse each of the sections (Video, Pictures and Music) using different viewing modes; thumbnails or list. The thumbnail view will show images for folders that have a FOLDER.JPG file within the folder, MP3 files with embedded artwork, photo files themselves, and mp4 files with user generated thumbnail images. This viewing mode works well for Music and Photos, but can be a troublesome viewing mode for videos. Since most videos do not have embedded images, the end result of viewing a folder full of videos is that you are unable to distinguish the videos from each other very easily, and when scrolling through the list of videos, the default thumbnail image is the same which creates a static visual effect where you can’t tell if you are actually scrolling through the video files or not. Sticking to the list or preview view on the video menu is recommended unless you are only viewing mp4 files that you have already generated the thumbnails for.
Western Digital also deserves some recognition for their efforts in providing a comprehensive manual for the WD TV Live Plus product. I was impressed with the level of detail and instruction on how to perform tasks on the device. Each step was outlined clearly with not only instructions but also many screenshots outlining each step and showing the action taking place on screen. This attention to detail makes a big difference in the user’s learning curve as it is much easier to translate screenshots into actual device usage rather than just text on a blank white page.
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ganeshts - Thursday, July 29, 2010 - link
Niall,Have you tried playing Blu-Ray backups in MKV or M2TS formats on the Amlogic chipset? I believe the Amlogic chipset uses IP from Chips & Media, and that IP is just not powerful enough to decode Blu-Ray spec encodes (high bitrates). Admittedly, the last time I did research on this was 6 months back.
That said, we will try to get hold of such devices for review here provided they have a presence in the US. One of the Realtek streamers is up next :)
Decaff - Friday, July 30, 2010 - link
Care to announce which Realtek streamer that is?ganeshts - Friday, July 30, 2010 - link
The only one supporting Netflix :) No guarantees when it is going to appear though :Ptech6 - Thursday, July 29, 2010 - link
Another great home theater review - keep them coming. AT is one of the very few sites that actually does any meaningful testing of HT devices beyond taking them out of the box and switching them on.EddyKilowatt - Monday, August 2, 2010 - link
Agree. The tech-blog scene needs more *reporters* and fewer *stenographers*.I've read several reviews of the WD Live family, and this is pretty much the first time I've seen the Video Quality issues mentioned, at least in any objective way.
I'll be picking up one of these gadgets in a few months, but sure hope they'll fix the networking bugs as I'll mostly be streaming from a Windows Home Server.
Mumrik - Thursday, July 29, 2010 - link
"For those who value low power consumption this device certainly fits the bill, consuming almost 8 times less power than an HTPC at idle and 5 times less power at load."That kind of expression really does make no sense at all when you talking about using LESS. One time less would be zero - are you talking about 1/8 and 1/5 of the power?
SlyNine - Monday, August 2, 2010 - link
And yet, our amazing human mind made perfect sense out of it. Also it didn't detract from the article at all.But I guess technically you are correct.
Ninjahedge - Thursday, July 29, 2010 - link
I have an older model. I primarily use it when going down to the shore.It is TINY and fits easily into a backpack. the only problem being file storage. Getting the external HD, power cord and other things can be a real PITA.
But that may also be a thing of the past as SD gets cheaper. Carrying a few 32's and an adapter may make bringing Anime and the like much easier.
The only problems I have with the older one was lack of network connectability. It is all USB. Having something that can be hooked up to a router and stream whatever you have (along with custom subs) is a godsend.
I am just pissed that most of these guys came along AFTER I made my $700 Shuttle box a year or two back!
I have not read the full atricle yet, but I am guessing the Pandora Playing is just their Pay service (like Slimline?)
Has Logitech jumped on this bandwagon? Can we get comparitive reviews soon? Can you mow my lawn?
;)
puckalicious - Thursday, July 29, 2010 - link
I noticed the test suite contains only 1 test for DVD playback, and only from an ISO file. What about DVD video_ts folders on a hard drive?ganeshts - Thursday, July 29, 2010 - link
puckalacious, We will add this in the next version of the test suite:1. DVD folder playback
2. Blu-Ray folder playback
Thanks for your suggestions.