Review of the Western Digital TV Live Media Player

As part of my Cable Cutting Challenge I bought a media player to replace my comptuer running Windows Media Center. I looked at quite a few and landed on the Western Digital Live TV. I compared this to several options inluding, Apple TV, the Roku, Popcorn Hour, and a few others. I chose the Western Digital based on a few factors including cost, features, size, and reviews by others.

The media plyer I chose had to have some specific features. It had to be a small foot print. It had to be able to work with my Logitech Harmony remote control. It had to support a USB attached drive, It had to do Netflix and Hulu Plus. It had to be able to play my movie library from the USB drive as extracted from the DVD. And finally, it had to be less than $200. Most of the media players out there meet most of these features. Some do not support locally attached USB drives, others are more than $200, and some didn't support both Netflix and Hulu Plus.

I know everyone raves about the Apple TV media player, but it does not support locally attached media. I could have gone with a Mac Mini, but that was more than $200. The Pop Corn Hour media players are great and have an eco system all their own for apps and configurability, but it was over the $200 mark for hat I wanted. Finally, the Western Digital TV Live fit the bill for all of the features needed. The one downside is it does not know how to play Blu-Ray ISO files properly. The issue is that it cannot deconstruct them properly to play.

Unboxing the Western Digital TV Live was pretty easy. It was neatly packed in its box with some piano black accents on the top and front. The device was about 5 inches squared bu about 1.5 inches tall. It was very compact. The power cord and basic instruction manual were included. The full manual is available online only, but is an easy download. The only reason you need it is to confugre the advanced settings in the device and to answer questions of what certain advanced settings do.

The device has an HDMI, Optical, USB, and power port in the back. The front has a USB port and power indicator light. The light is an LED white light instead of the typical blue I have seen on Western Digital devices of the past. It's not overbearing and is a subtle status indicator for drive scanning activity with a steady blink when reading drive contents.

I had some initial trouble getting my Lacie drive work with the Western Digital TV Live. The status light would blink for several minutes and then it would become nearly unresponsive to remote control commands. After performing some troubleshooting and reading the full manual for connecting drive I determined the USB connector on the Lacie drive holder was bad. I bought a new drive holder, placed the hard drive in it problem solved. The status light blinked for about 1 minute and then my entire movie library was available.

The one thing I have to complain about is the source for dvdid.xml files the Western Digital TV Live uses. The dvdid.xml file displays a picture and synopsis information for movies. It has a GUID in the file that pulls this information from an Internet based database. Unfortunately, barely half of my movies are showing this information, when I had about 98% coverage from Windows Media Center. I can only add new loaclized sources for picutre and synopsis conent. I need to research this more to see what else can be done here.

I have been watching things on Netflix and Hulu. The picture qaulity is actually better than watching it on my DirecTV. I have noticed pixleation coming through DirecTV on HD content, whereas on Netflix and Hulu it's been raw HD content. It's a noticeable difference. We had a DirecTV technician come out for service on our dish on the roof and he saw what we were watching and asked how it was comgin through without the dish in place. We told him about the Western Digital TV Live and even he was impressed with the picture. He said he had never seen a show look that clear before on DirecTV! I'd say that speaks a lot to the picture value.

We have owned the Western Digital TV Live now for about 3 weeks. It's been solid. I've had to change some configuration settings to get the best experience I can get. I use HDMI for video and optical for the audio. I have found this works best for all content. My Logitech Harmony remote can control the device fantastically! The USB attached hard drive has been flawless in playing most of my content. The only content it has not played well are the Blu-Ray ISOs. There is apparently work around for this that involves extracting the ISO and recompiling in a different format that puts all of the playable sections in order. Since the Western Digital TV Live cannot do this on its own, the ISO does not play well. The wireless connectivity has been operating perfectly. It picks up my signal from about 70 linear feet away through several walls. I have not had any Internet based content pause, drop, or buffer on me due to my wireless signal.

The navigation is pretyy simple with arrows on the remote used to mive from selection to selection. An OK button selects the item and takes you there. I needed to program my userid and password for each of the services I access. Don't worry, though, it saves that information for the next time it is accessed, even if I unplug the device. Updating it also pretty simple. I was ntoified of new firmware update after getting connected to the Internet. It was a major update as it completely changed the look and feel of the online services menu options. It also added new services that were not available at the time of initial setup, like MLB TV. I don't subscribe, but it was nice to see this option. Since it's so late in the year, it's not worth the $99 annual fee. I may do it for next season, though.

If you are looking for a media player to fulfill the needs I have outlined above, then give the Western Digital Live TV a try. It's easy to setup, navigate and even update. It automatically checks for new firmware updates. Western Digital also has a user forum that is regularly patrolled by technicians offering assistance and tracking potential bugs to resolve in future releases. It's a good thing when the manufacture regularly tracks input from end users and incorporates suggestions and bug fixes into their future releases. This process is usually not so visible through other manufacturers.

The next update will include how my new HD antenna will pick up channels around here. I'm no more than 12 miles from the farthest broadcasting station so I epxect to get everything in my region. Stay tuned as I continue to edge closer to my deadline for initiating the Cable Cutting Challenge.