Prayer's Answered? Western Digital HD TV

Although you can connect it up to an SDTV I really wouldn't recommend it for most applications. Composite is pretty terrible in terms of picture quality. Shame it doesn't have 'proper' RGB scart or even s-video really.
 
I'm really rather tempted by one of these, could either use it in the bedroom where I have a 22inch LCD currently hooked up to an Xbox with XBMC or I could use it in the lounge where I currently have a 32inch CRT which is hooked up to the PC via S-video but am intending to upgrade to a larger flat screen at some point soon. would be very handy for accessing all my music which I currently do with my PC using a front end called Media Engine, and for playing any videos etc that I've downloaded such as trailers etc ;o)
 
valve90210 said:
I'm really rather tempted by one of these, could either use it in the bedroom where I have a 22inch LCD currently hooked up to an Xbox with XBMC or I could use it in the lounge where I currently have a 32inch CRT which is hooked up to the PC via S-video but am intending to upgrade to a larger flat screen at some point soon. would be very handy for accessing all my music which I currently do with my PC using a front end called Media Engine, and for playing any videos etc that I've downloaded such as trailers etc ;o)
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I have two, one in the bedroom and the other downstairs in the lounge. The one in the bedroom is hooked up to a 1TB My Book. My media is ripped mainly to H.264/AC3/.MKV container. Around 1400mb a file. It also runs HD 720p/1080p without any problem.

Downstairs I use it with passport drives. WD & Seagate, 250gig/320gig respectively. It really makes life easier not having to mess around with discs, and it leaves the area looking clean.

The one in the bedroom I take with me to friends/family occasions/holidays with one of the passport drives. They take up no room at all and weigh next to nothing. You can even use them to view your stored music/photos :).
 
how is the menu for navigating. Lately i have been adding all my vids and tv shows to plex, which i believe is a mac version of xmbc. I really like the way the vids get laid out etc and how it organises it for you etc, im guessing this sort of thing cant be achieved? mainly i guess due to lack of internet access
 
zhx said:
how is the menu for navigating. Lately i have been adding all my vids and tv shows to plex, which i believe is a mac version of xmbc. I really like the way the vids get laid out etc and how it organises it for you etc, im guessing this sort of thing cant be achieved? mainly i guess due to lack of internet access
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I have it set up using folders naming each genre, horror etc. Then they are in alpha order. If you want to find something quickly the remote has a search button where you just type in the file name :).

You can just have it so it lists everything on the drive in alpha order. These will be split up into video/music/photos.

I don't bother using the media library, apparently it is pretty slow if you have a lot of data.

The menu itself is easy to navigate and looks pretty good. Lots of vids of it on the net.
 
Pinkeyes said:
If your mkv has a DTS soundtrack though, it will not send it through the HDMI cable, it must go via the optical out and into a surround amp.
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I was under the impression that it doesn't output DTS at all. This was from my research on AV forums.

That is one reason that i haven't bought it as some hi-def files are in DTS.
 
kennyhkw said:
I was under the impression that it doesn't output DTS at all. This was from my research on AV forums.

That is one reason that i haven't bought it as some hi-def files are in DTS.
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I wasn't able to test this on Friday as we had no AMP, but everything I have read says it will not send DTS from a movie file through the HDMI cable, it sends it via digital (optical) only.

If you google "Wetern Digital TV DTS" all the results appear to confirm that.
 
Pinkeyes said:
I wasn't able to test this on Friday as we had no AMP, but everything I have read says it will not send DTS from a movie file through the HDMI cable, it sends it via digital (optical) only
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Correct.

It will output Dolby Digital/PCM over HDMI. DTS requires use of the digital optical out. There are software tools around that will convert MKV DTS soundtracks to Dolby Digital. Check the AV Forums thread mentioned earlier.

I've had one of this since Christmas. It's a great little bit of kit even though the price has shot up recently (I paid under £70). Not found anything it can't play video wise, only audio thing on my wishlist is Monkey's Audio (similar to FLAC).

For typical use it's got 95% of the functionality of the NMT/Popcorn Hour boxes but for a lot less money. The lack of networking isn't a major issue for me as the transfer rate over ethernet to my mates NMT is dog slow (3.5MB/sec) so it's far quicker to copy media to the USB HDD (20MB/sec) and plug it in the WD.
 
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MagicBoy said:
Correct.

It will output Dolby Digital/PCM over HDMI. DTS requires use of the digital optical out. There are software tools around that will convert MKV DTS soundtracks to Dolby Digital. Check the AV Forums thread mentioned earlier.

I've had one of this since Christmas. It's a great little bit of kit even though the price has shot up recently (I paid under £70). Not found anything it can't play video wise, only audio thing on my wishlist is Monkey's Audio (similar to FLAC).

For typical use it's got 95% of the functionality of the NMT/Popcorn Hour boxes but for a lot less money. The lack of networking isn't a major issue for me as the transfer rate over ethernet to my mates NMT is dog slow (3.5MB/sec) so it's far quicker to copy media to the USB HDD (20MB/sec) and plug it in the WD.
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You know had a feeling it might be quite slow via ethernet guess its a lot easier just too have a 2.5 sata caddy or a fancy 16gig pen drive and just whack it on there :)

Am really liking this WD player I must try and buy one lol
 
I bought one of these a few weeks ago. From my point of view, it was a fantastic investment and I haven't looked back.

The unit has played every format I've thrown at it thus far, although the real selling point for me was its ability to play 720p and 1080p mkv (x264) files, of which I have many. All I have to do is connect my WD 500gb MyPassport HD (no AC power required) and everything plays without a hitch, i.e. no skipping!

For the price I cannot recommend it enough. The only things I would say are that you should connect it to an amp capable of decoding DTS audio (which most amps in the last few years are). If you don't have an amp, you'll struggle to play audio on HD files unless they've been decoded using AC3/MP3. The second recommendation is obviously to install the update (as per the WD website) which sorts out a few issues.
 
Just thought I'd bump this thread..

My brother had acquired a WDTV on the weekend, so I popped over to have a look.!

He's already got an A110 PCH, this was as a cheap second unit to stick in his front room.

Well, I was quite surprised to say the least, instant on from standby, and quite responsive to use with all the 1080p MKV's we could throw at it working well!.

As a bonus we flashed the alternate firmwares and tried a Linksys USBM100 usb-ethernet adapter to see if we could stream from one of his PC's.
Amazingly it worked, and with little fuss, but after a few mins of a 1080p it started to flag a bit, and looking online this is expected with that particular 10/100 adapter, but it shows the concept works!

He's ordered the Belkin Gigabit usb-ethernet adapater, which reportedly works very well, and he is now thinking of selling the A110!

I'm still on a HTPC myself, as I have many original BR/HD-DVD's, and won't probably switch until I can archive these in a reliable format so as not to miss the HD audio tracks.
 
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