Own a WDTV Live or Live Plus and feeling left out now that the appilicious 1TB WDTV Hub has arrived? Well, WDTV hasn’t forsaken you. Their latest firmware update brings new apps including Facebook, AccuWeather, and Flingo. Additionally, USB keyboards are now supported to facilitate text entry — I assume this includes wireless HID keyboards. Lastly, the WDTV Live Plus (our review) also receives that Blockbuster Video on Demand service found on the Hub. (However, they’re not long for this world.)
Installing the update is as simple as firing up your networked set-top box and awaiting the upgrade prompt. Alternately, a USB update option will be available soon. Which doesn’t make much sense (beyond disaster recovery of a bricked device).
(Thanks, Sorin!)
While I appreciate them bringing new features to older models, I didn’t really need Facebook on another device. I would have prefered better thumbnail support or the Hub’s better interface (I wish clicking on video would just open the previous source).
I borrowed a WD TV Live Hub over the weekend, and it’s definitely a great value if you need the 1 TB of storage. I think it’s the best streamer for the price right now as long as you don’t need WiFi. (without spending the money for XBMC on a Revo or until Boxee gets Netflix)
Facebook – meh. But do they have DVD menu navigation yet?
Funny, they just came out with a firmware update a week or 2 ago for my Live+. I had hoped that they would fix the problem with playing .mpg converted from .Tivo files but no luck (video is fine, no audio because of something with 2 channel vs 5.1 channel audio being mixed).
@Link, yes, they do support DVD Navigation. They did with the firmware that came on my unit that I bought within the past month.
DVD support seems to be very erratic. I only discovered last night that I can play a lot of files (of all kinds, including FLACs) via network share but not via media sharing. (I’m using Playback on Snow Leopard as my server.) Still, some VIDEO_TS folders jump right into the main feature and some of them go to menus. I would love to like this box, but this stuff just baffles me.
Dave, thanks for suggesting the possibility that HID keyboards might work. I got one of those iPazzport deals from Woot a while back, and I’ll see if that works tonight and report back if no one else has by then.
@Bob, I found similar behavior if I tried to play the VIDEO_TS folder, however, DVD navigation seems to work if I go into that folder and play the first file (I forget what its called — the one that has the menus). I let it start playing then select (something – I forget the menu name) from the WD-Live Options menu. As you can guess, I’m not quite in front of the box now to tell you what the 2 different somethings are :) but it does seem to work consistently.
Thanks for that advice, Michael; I’ll give it a try. I hope someday WD irons these interface issues out.
Anyway, if nothing else, I can confirm that my iPazzPort keyboard is recognized, as long as I add the dongle after the WDTV has booted. It wasn’t recognized when I added the dongle before powering up.
Incidentally, I’m now playing around in the Blockbuster menus, mostly for the novelty, but I’m finding that when I try to play a trailer the WDTV (I have the Live Plus) tells me it can’t play videos in that format and points me to the WDTV support site for help. And when I try to browse left or right beyond the five default movies, I get an error message there too.
The WD live plus seems most like the internet media player I would like to replace my Mac Mini some day. It would need 2TB of (inboard) storage and the bugs ironed out. The rest in this field don’t have inboard storage, so I think WD is going in the right direction.
FYI… I got email from playon that says this version of firmware breaks playon.
Also anyone able to play DVD ISOs (6 – 8 GB in size) over the network with WDTV Live plus? Really struggling to get my ISOs to play without stuttering. Using powerline networking. Just wondering.
I pretty much soured on WD after their infamous firmware update bricked my WDTV. I now have one of the Realtek units (a Viewsonic) and am pretty happy. There are two other companies that make what seem like identical units, Brite-View and Zinwell. The new Brite-View CinemaTube Mini has networking, and PlayOn support. I may give it a try. Anyone have one?
I LOVE my HUB.
@Elan – just get a USB WiFi card. works like a charm.
@Link – Yes
I would like to see a place for homemade Plugins so that I don’t have to use Playon. But it does interface very well with Playon, so I’m not at all unhappy with it.