Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player - a HTPC replacement??

My WD TV live has been acting weird(I will explain the problems in details later) for some time now, initially i thought its because of the new firmware.
But even after a factory reset, the problems remain!
The problems
- It randomly stops detecting the External Drive I have attached to it.
- It hangs and then the only solution is to cut the power and restart the device. This can happen two-three times in a typical 2 hour run
- It suddenly comes up with a message "An external wireless adapter detected. The WD TV will use this adapter for wireless connection. If you do not wish to use this adapter please remove it from the WD TV." To be clear, the only thing hooked up to the player is a WD My Passport 1TB External HDD. I do have my home Wi Fi network details fed into the WD TV, but I think this is an erroneous message and should not come up.

The factory reset has reduced the Hard Drive detection problem, but the hanging and the error message is still there.
My unit is out of warranty and when I called up the customer care, the only help they could provide was to ask me to do a "Reset", which, I had already done!
Is anyone aware of any solution to these kind of problems? If not, then what is the next best step that I can take?
 
My WD TV live has been acting weird(I will explain the problems in details later) for some time now, initially i thought its because of the new firmware.
But even after a factory reset, the problems remain!
The problems
- It randomly stops detecting the External Drive I have attached to it.
- It hangs and then the only solution is to cut the power and restart the device. This can happen two-three times in a typical 2 hour run
- It suddenly comes up with a message "An external wireless adapter detected. The WD TV will use this adapter for wireless connection. If you do not wish to use this adapter please remove it from the WD TV." To be clear, the only thing hooked up to the player is a WD My Passport 1TB External HDD. I do have my home Wi Fi network details fed into the WD TV, but I think this is an erroneous message and should not come up.

The factory reset has reduced the Hard Drive detection problem, but the hanging and the error message is still there.
My unit is out of warranty and when I called up the customer care, the only help they could provide was to ask me to do a "Reset", which, I had already done!
Is anyone aware of any solution to these kind of problems? If not, then what is the next best step that I can take?

Try rolling back to the previous firmware that worked fine. See if that helps in resolving the issue.The latest firmware is giving mixed results for some folks it is working great, for few they have faced issues while and post upgrading.
 
Will give that a shot and see if it works.
The current situation is that the player is able to run smooth for only 20 odd minutes, post which, it refuses to work for more than 5 mins :sos::sos::sos:

Try rolling back to the previous firmware that worked fine. See if that helps in resolving the issue.The latest firmware is giving mixed results for some folks it is working great, for few they have faced issues while and post upgrading.
 
Will give that a shot and see if it works.
The current situation is that the player is able to run smooth for only 20 odd minutes, post which, it refuses to work for more than 5 mins :sos::sos::sos:

Is it getting heated up, please check how how the player body is. May give an indication of some issue.
 
Rolled back the FW to 1.16.13 and the problems seem to have vanished.
Used the player for two days almost continuously for 8-9 hours without any hiccups.
 
Would it be possible for WDTV Live Plus player to passthrough digital signals through both HDMI and optical simultaneously?

I was trying this yesterday and it appears it can transmit through only one connection at a time. Even the menu options says so 'Digital Passthrough Optical only'/'Digital passthrough HDMI only'.
 
Have encountered a major issue with my WDTV Live Streaming player.

My connections are as follows

WDTV - (HDMI) - Yamaha 473 - (HDMI) - TV

The WDTV is configured to pass digital audio through HDMI. Yesterday I switched on my WDTV after around 4-5 days. All of a sudden, I noticed that after the initial WDTV logo startup screen (the one with the clouds), the screen kept flickering as if the HDMI is losing connection. I tried the following steps and none of them worked.

1. Changed the HDMI cable. Same behavior
2. Change the HDMI input on the AVR. Same behavior
3. Keep the AVR in standby mode - video works. The moment I switch the AVR, I lose the HDMI signal. It keeps flashing on and off with a lot of 'snow screen' in between
4. Soft reset the WDTV. Same behavior
5. Connect WDTV directly to the TV. Video works fine
6. To double check the AVR, I connected by BDP to the same HDMI input. That HDMI video signal works fine both in standby and otherwise.

I am not quite sure whether the issue is with the AVR or WDTV. Unfortunately I don't any option to check this thing out on a different AVR.

Can you guys suggest anything else?

I am going to try out the following today
1. Hard reset WDTV. Not sure whether this would help
2. Connect HDMI directly to TV and get the digital audio via the optical out. This is the last solution I want to try as I don't want to have the video directly going to the TV.
 
Have encountered a major issue with my WDTV Live Streaming player.

My connections are as follows

WDTV - (HDMI) - Yamaha 473 - (HDMI) - TV

The WDTV is configured to pass digital audio through HDMI. Yesterday I switched on my WDTV after around 4-5 days. All of a sudden, I noticed that after the initial WDTV logo startup screen (the one with the clouds), the screen kept flickering as if the HDMI is losing connection. I tried the following steps and none of them worked.

1. Changed the HDMI cable. Same behavior
2. Change the HDMI input on the AVR. Same behavior
3. Keep the AVR in standby mode - video works. The moment I switch the AVR, I lose the HDMI signal. It keeps flashing on and off with a lot of 'snow screen' in between
4. Soft reset the WDTV. Same behavior
5. Connect WDTV directly to the TV. Video works fine
6. To double check the AVR, I connected by BDP to the same HDMI input. That HDMI video signal works fine both in standby and otherwise.

I am not quite sure whether the issue is with the AVR or WDTV. Unfortunately I don't any option to check this thing out on a different AVR.

Can you guys suggest anything else?

I am going to try out the following today
1. Hard reset WDTV. Not sure whether this would help
2. Connect HDMI directly to TV and get the digital audio via the optical out. This is the last solution I want to try as I don't want to have the video directly going to the TV.

Looks like a HDMI handshake issues between the WDTV and AVR. Try and update the WDTV to the latest firmware if not already done so.
 
It is running the latest firmware. I am now going to try and revert to an older stable firmware. What surprises me is that, I was running this rig without any changes since the last few months. Looks like Mr. Murphy has decided to play with me a little :)

I have made one change in the last few days, but I cannot fathom how that would affect the behavior. My WDTV has two USB inputs, I have connected a 1 Tb (for movies) + 500 Gb (for music) HDD to each of them. A few days back, I have swapped these connections so now the 1Tb HDD is the one which is connect to the USB port next to the HDMI port instead of the older 500 Gb one. I wonder whether the higher (?) power requirement of the 1 Tb HDD is causing the issue. I will try and swap the connections back.

One other issue may be the fact that I have placed the WDTV on my Tata Sky HD which is on standby for the better part of the day which causes it to heat up a bit. As per my understanding the heat is not much to cause any damage to the WDTV placed on top of it which is not flush against the surface but has minuscule rubber legs. Just as a safe practice, I am going to put a rubber mat or some kind of a foam pad below the WDTV.

I am going to spend some more time on this but I am need to know if there are any more options that I need to try out before I can deem the WDTV faulty.
 
It is running the latest firmware. I am now going to try and revert to an older stable firmware. What surprises me is that, I was running this rig without any changes since the last few months. Looks like Mr. Murphy has decided to play with me a little :)

I have made one change in the last few days, but I cannot fathom how that would affect the behavior. My WDTV has two USB inputs, I have connected a 1 Tb (for movies) + 500 Gb (for music) HDD to each of them. A few days back, I have swapped these connections so now the 1Tb HDD is the one which is connect to the USB port next to the HDMI port instead of the older 500 Gb one. I wonder whether the higher (?) power requirement of the 1 Tb HDD is causing the issue. I will try and swap the connections back.

One other issue may be the fact that I have placed the WDTV on my Tata Sky HD which is on standby for the better part of the day which causes it to heat up a bit. As per my understanding the heat is not much to cause any damage to the WDTV placed on top of it which is not flush against the surface but has minuscule rubber legs. Just as a safe practice, I am going to put a rubber mat or some kind of a foam pad below the WDTV.

I am going to spend some more time on this but I am need to know if there are any more options that I need to try out before I can deem the WDTV faulty.

I highly doubt if it is because of the changes you did...I am sure it isn't because of that...

If your WD TV is within warranty period, req you to log a call immediately with western digital & explain the issue...

I had a different issue with my WDTV live hub.... Suddenly the 1TB hard drive inside the media player was not detected which i think is because of frequent power cuts.... luckily was inside warranty period & got it replaced....

After i got a new one, after a year or so, there was a problem with optical output :mad:.. By then i had bought my new AVR... so didn't use the optical port...
 
Unfortunately it's been bought from the US. Someone had carried it for me and I think it should be out of warranty by now.

Yes, the USB ports is not the issue. I tried quite a few things yesterday again

1. Revert the firmware. Same issue
2. Hard reset WDTV. Same issue.
3. Set the video output to HDMI - 720p 60Hz instead of Auto. Same issue
4. Change audio output to Stereo. Same issue
5. Change audio output to digital via optical. Same issue

Finally I had to connect it via HDMI to the TV directly and send the digital audio via optical to the AVR. This worked fine, somehow I am not quite comfortable with this setup as this means that there's something wrong with the AVR!!

When the HDMI is via AVR, strangely during the flickering, when I power cycle the AVR twice as follows,

1. Video flickers in AVR standby mode
2. Power on the AVR. Flicker persists
3. Power off the AVR to stand by. Video displays fine !!

I am not able to pinpoint why this is happening. This means that somehow the AVR is the culprit, but I tried to eliminate the issue by doing the following

1. Connect BDP via HDMI to the same AVR HDMI In. Works perfectly
2. Connect WDTV via HDMI to a different AVR HDMI In. Same issue persists.

Maybe I need to change the AVR to TV HDMI output cable? I am not sure whether that would help as it's a standard Amazonbasics cable and my Tatasky and BDP is working fine. Unfortunately the worse part is I don't know anyone having an AVR where I can take my WDTV and test this out !!
 
If you had got it from US, there is no international warranty

Looks like you have given your best to revoke the WD TV Live....

There are plenty of FM in Mumbai... If you know someone who owns an AVR with HDMI, i think you can check it...

Else, you can take it to the same Yamaha Dealer where you bought the AVR & check there...
 
Because of this issue, yesterday I spent some time looking out for media players available in the market and the best option that I found was WDTV Live. The Asus mini only has a single USB connection and does not transmit DTSHDMA. The WDTV does that with it's new firmware. The price is a bit steep at 7K, but the features are quite convenient and it does support a lot of file formats.
 
Because of this issue, yesterday I spent some time looking out for media players available in the market and the best option that I found was WDTV Live. The Asus mini only has a single USB connection and does not transmit DTSHDMA. The WDTV does that with it's new firmware. The price is a bit steep at 7K, but the features are quite convenient and it does support a lot of file formats.

I would suggest that you build a HTPC if possible rather than purchase a media player albeit at a higher cost. But it would be future proof and forget about these kind of issues as if you encounter these kind of issues you can readily replace that part either in warranty or outside. If you are not comfortable in assembling then you can take the help of FMs from Mumbai who has built it.
 
Assembling a HTPC would not be a problem and I am aware of the virtues of a HTPC, but I am not able to convince myself about this because of multiple factors. Convenience, form factor, ease of use (for novices in the house), overall cost vis-a-vis the advantages. Even though I am comfortable using PCs, I am not sure if I would be able to consume all the advantages of a HTPC as compared to a media player. Currently my usage is limited to watching movies/listening to music from a HDD or via Wifi. I understand that at least for listening to music, it would provide some convenience in terms of playlist management, I may not end up utilizing it to it's full extent. I still am fascinated by XBMC but instead of a HTPC, if I can get some device having embedded software running XBMC (unlike Raspberry Pi), I would be quite happy.

One other factor is the overall cost and despite the modularity of the PC, it's minus point would be the multiple points of failure. I have had my share of reinstalling OSes, swapping hardware, etc. and it's just a hassle that I want to avoid.
 
Assembling a HTPC would not be a problem and I am aware of the virtues of a HTPC, but I am not able to convince myself about this because of multiple factors. Convenience, form factor, ease of use (for novices in the house), overall cost vis-a-vis the advantages. Even though I am comfortable using PCs, I am not sure if I would be able to consume all the advantages of a HTPC as compared to a media player. Currently my usage is limited to watching movies/listening to music from a HDD or via Wifi. I understand that at least for listening to music, it would provide some convenience in terms of playlist management, I may not end up utilizing it to it's full extent. I still am fascinated by XBMC but instead of a HTPC, if I can get some device having embedded software running XBMC (unlike Raspberry Pi), I would be quite happy.

One other factor is the overall cost and despite the modularity of the PC, it's minus point would be the multiple points of failure. I have had my share of reinstalling OSes, swapping hardware, etc. and it's just a hassle that I want to avoid.

Yes I understand, then I think your best bet would be Xtreamer player which I think come bundled with XBMC. I remember seeing a mail from them sometime back but I think the overall cost of the Xtreamer was around 16 or more.
 
I would suggest that you connect the HDMI out from the WD directly to your TV, and you connect your AVR to the WD by Optical audio.

Thats the setup I have, and it works perfectly.

In my view, TVs have far better image processing capabilities than AVRs. I have not seen any benefit in passing the video signal through my AVR (I have a Denon AVR).


Rgds.........Argho
 
That's beyond my budget. For around 5-6K (if carried from the US), WDTV Live is a beautiful product. Yes, it has it's own set of issues but none of them was affecting my usage (till now that is :)). Right now it still works but with HDMI output to the TV and optical output to the AVR. I plan to use it like this for as long as it works. But I am going to keep an eye out for some cheap products in this category within the 5-7K range.
 
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