WD TV "High Definition Multimedia Adapter" - Part 2

[MarkTaylor]

Continued from Part 1 :

http://www.avforums.com/forums/strea...a-adapter.html

[thesilverfox]

Martyn, is output set to digital perchance?

[energy80s]

Originally Posted by Andy Wheels

First up, good two pass encoded xvid/divx files look great. No way are they 'crap' quality. I have a fair few and they look particularly good playing on the WDTV through the hdmi port into our plasma tv.

My WDTV isnt slow to react. It's not ligthning fast but it's certainly a lot faster than 1-2 seconds. Someone else on the thread said it was faster than the popcorn hour.

To view a slideshow you need to press the play button, not the enter button. It works fine. It amazes me that you're suggesting it doesn't when it's a simple, well documented function.

To view the files in a list format, go into the setup page and select list format. Again, It's really not hard.

Probably the best advice I could give you is RTFM! It's all documented.

Thanks for the reply. I got the slideshow working, although it is the most basic slideshow I have yet seen - with no transitions or pan/zoom fx on the images.

To be honest, most of my complaints could easily be fixed with a decent firmware update ie. the handling of .iso's and proper image manipulation. I suppose that I was expecting the WDTV to be more multimedia friendly out of the box. If I didn't have XBMC or an old Freecom Media Player (both of which out-preform it) I wouldn't have been so critical of the WDTV. So far, it is the cheapest way to view HD files - and the other players cannot do this.

Oh, and as I am a member of the male species ... I NEVER read any manuals!!!!

[Mr Lazy]

Originally Posted by energy80s

I got the slideshow working, although it is the most basic slideshow I have yet seen - with no transitions or pan/zoom fx on the images.

I agree they need to add more transitions in a future update but hopefully they'll put more important updates first. There is a fade transition available through the menu but I turned it off as the fade is not very smooth at all.

[Mr Lazy]

When I put the WD TV into 'standby' via the power button on the remote, is it best to Eject the HDD first or will that make no difference? I'm finding that even with only 50GB or so of content it takes about 30 seconds for the WD TV to scan when it is turned back on, but I read on the avsforum that some guy was getting a 4 second scan time with 4TB of content! (with media library turned on)

[thesilverfox]

Originally Posted by Mr Lazy

When I put the WD TV into 'standby' via the power button on the remote, is it best to Eject the HDD first or will that make no difference? I'm finding that even with only 50GB or so of content it takes about 30 seconds for the WD TV to scan when it is turned back on, but I read on the avsforum that some guy was getting a 4 second scan time with 4TB of content! (with media library turned on)

I always eject first before turning it off - I think it's the reason that it takes a while to scan otherwise. Same as if you don't safely remove the device from the PC before plugging in to the WDTV for the first time - it can take an eternity.

I have 290GB+ data and my startup scan first time took about 4 seconds and since, takes about 2, as the WDTV leaves a couple of files on there for you. It can't hurt to press two buttons instead of one I guess!

Otherwise, library mode isn't all that in my opinion. Could just turn it off and have no scan at all, unless you rely heavily on metadata.

[PAUL7331]

Can anybody tell me a way to fix the aspect ratio on most avi's and mkv's?? My PS3 used to play avi's for example a lot larger than the WD does! The only option I can see on the WD is for me to ZOOM in which cuts heads off etc! Any other suggestions? And yes I have tried 'widescreen' and 'normal' settings. The videos just seem small!

[thesilverfox]

Originally Posted by PAUL7331

Can anybody tell me a way to fix the aspect ratio on most avi's and mkv's?? My PS3 used to play avi's for example a lot larger than the WD does! The only option I can see on the WD is for me to ZOOM in which cuts heads off etc! Any other suggestions? And yes I have tried 'widescreen' and 'normal' settings. The videos just seem small!

What's your output resolution set to on the device? If it is set to auto, it might be causing the small size.

Otherwise, I've heard the zoom in and then zoom out can fix this.

[celtic_fc]

Wondering if anyone can help.

I've got two external hard drives (1tb and 500gb) and looking for something that will allow me to watch the films on them through a optoma hd65 projector.

Would this work? And is it easy enough to use?

[digitalera.co.uk]

I dont see any issues.
and Yes the WD TV is very simple to use.

[PAUL7331]

Originally Posted by thesilverfox

What's your output resolution set to on the device? If it is set to auto, it might be causing the small size.

Otherwise, I've heard the zoom in and then zoom out can fix this.

Output resolution is set to 720p 50HZ as this is the only setting I could find that would work with my 720p infocus projector. I tried auto setting and the picture would not even be displayed!!!

Do you know anymore settings that would work with my 720p projector that would allow the aspect ratio to be normal size? Instead of me using 'Zoom' which cuts off heads!

[deefadog]

My WDTV is on it's way, should be with me tomorrow But i have just noticed my TV has only one HDMI port (thought it had 2) The HDMI port is used by the Sky HD box.

So I need a switch, but If i used a splitter then i would have the SKY & WDTV signals going together to the TV, but would it work if one was off as if one was off the other would be on which i can set on the Harmony remote? would be easy that way than rather than manually switching.

Any advice most appreciated

[Scoop940]

Borrowing one of these devices off a mate to try it out at the moment, like the simplicity and the fact it plays pretty much everything. I did find last night that the movie media all appears in a list wherever it is sat on the drive. Is it possible to split or sort this in anyway?

My plan would be to get one of this boxes and a 1TB drive and put all our DVD's and the kids ones on it however it would be good to split them up to kids films and our films. Is that possible?

Gonna play some more with it over the weekend, any advice/tip welcome, just got to convince the wife it's what we need!

[thesilverfox]

Originally Posted by Scoop940

Borrowing one of these devices off a mate to try it out at the moment, like the simplicity and the fact it plays pretty much everything. I did find last night that the movie media all appears in a list wherever it is sat on the drive. Is it possible to split or sort this in anyway?

My plan would be to get one of this boxes and a 1TB drive and put all our DVD's and the kids ones on it however it would be good to split them up to kids films and our films. Is that possible?

Gonna play some more with it over the weekend, any advice/tip welcome, just got to convince the wife it's what we need!

If you use the folder view instead of the library view, it will display files in the exact hierarchy of the hard disk. For example, on the root of my drive I have: Films>x264>720p/1080p

You can dump them in whatever folder you like, and follow the file structure. This is what I do, as the library view isn't my cup of tea, as I like to split 720p and 1080p.

[bytesize]

Just ordered one of these units, should be arriving tomorrow. But not sure if i'll get rid of the trusty Xbox and XBMC ... dont get me wrong I cant wait to play HD content ... easily .. and gone indeed are the days where people stream content, its just not worth the hassel when you have devices such as these around. Trouble is i'll probably end up buying one for the bedroom as well at some point.

Now where to download 1080p trailers ....

Roll on tomorrow...