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WD TV Live

Gabriel1

iPF Noob
Joined
Mar 11, 2011
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Cranbrook, Kent, UK
Finally got round to setting up my WD TV Live that I have had for over a week now. I really should have done it before because, like the rest of the gadgets that I have been setting up recently, it was almost to easy!

So what is a WD TV Live? Well, it's a small box, not much bigger than an Apple TV. It has a couple of USB ports, HDMI port, an Ethernet port and a couple of other ports for separate audio output, etc......and that is about it apart from the fact that it is also wireless.

What does it do? It will play many internet TV channels, Netflix, iPlayer, YouTube, MLB, etc. You can also connect USB drives (thumb drives, external HD's, etc. to the USB ports and the WD TV Live will read them and make your video, photo or music files available through your TV set. It also searches your network (NAS) drives and plays content from them on your TV. All at up to 1080P, assuming your content is saved in HD. There are also games that play on it. All the content is accessed from a nicely produced menu screen, not quite as nice (IMHO) as that of the Apple TV but still, very nice indeed.

Now I have your interest, let's see what it looks like, it comes in this box......

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Complete with remote (and batteries), power plug and a cable for connecting to a TV, if you have a an HD TV then throw the supplied cable away and get yourself a cheap HDMI cable, it is by far the best way of using this little beast. I left the remote and connecting cable in the box, more of that later.

Now, onto the black box itself......

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That is it, bottom left of the box. So, how big is it, well I took a picture with my iPad of it on a DVD case to give some kind of scale......

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So you see, it really isn't much bigger than the diminutive Apple TV, in fact they look rather nice together under my TV.

As I mentioned earlier, I left the remote in the box as Western Digital have thankfully supplied an app to control the WD TV Live, called the WD Remote it Is an iPhone app but I have installed it on my iPad and run it at 2x as I tend to do with most iPhone apps. Here is what it looks like......

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Obviously when you use it, it is spun round by 90 degrees. You will also notice that it has a keyboard icon in the top right, this brings up, unsurprisingly, an onscreen keyboard which has already proved useful.

So how hard is it to set up, not hard at all, plug an ethernet cable between the WD TV Live and your router (although you don't have to as it has on board wifi), and HDMI cable into your TV and the power lead into the wall socket and it springs into life. Choose the correct channel on your TV and your screen will light up with WD TV goodliness! The first screen shows it connecting itself to the network, then it checks for updates (which there was) and it downloads and installs the update.

Ideally I would have shown some pics here of the display on my TV but the light is just appalling today, so it's a no go I'm afraid.

Now your WD TV Live has indeed, burst into life it prompts you to let it search your drives which it does with much more efficiency than I expected. Now you are ready to go, if you have loaded .jpg's of the DVD covers or film posters these will appear on the screen.....which is always a nice way to view your film collection. Choose a film with the remote control and your film starts after 2 or 3 seconds (I will try it out over wifi at some stage to get a comparison).

Of course this is all wonderful, but what does it look like on the screen, well, my ripped DVD's are every bit as good as the original DVD's and there was better to come, I tried BBC iPlayer and the picture was way better than BBC iPlayer on my BT Vision box, I got the same results with the other online content.

So, there we have it. My personal verdict, I love it, I may even buy another for using with the bedroom TV! The price, well I picked this one up for around £72 at Amazon which is the best price I could find for it.

Ok, I have played around with the WD Remote App and to update this post I have got a few skitches and screenshots together so here goes....(once again, apologies for the orientation, it's fine in use in portrait)

To access the online services on the remote you tap what looks like a reception bell on the left hand side of the remote.....

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Which brings up these pages.......

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So for the UK users, that is a choice (if my maths is correct) of 23 online services to play around with. If you touch the i at the bottom of the screen it will add the actual name of the service to the icon.......

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Now, to access settings and menus and various other functions, tap the button on the right hand side of the remote.......

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Which brings up this screen......

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And finally (for this update) the top button here......

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Brings up a screen showing which WD TV devices are available to you (you could have one in the lounge and one in the bedroom).......

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I will update this guide/review as I get to use the WD TV Live a bit more.

The Archangel
 
Last edited:
I've been wondering what to buy myself for my birthday. This could be a pointer in the right direction. Thanks, Gab.

Sent from my iPad 4 HD mini
 
Hey Gabe--all your electronic toys have now come in...when can we all come over for a creature feature double feature night!! :)

By the way, can't believe how much this WD TV does! Surprisingly seems fairly easy to put together based on your instructions! Thanks for sharing!
 
I can stream media from the usb drives attached to my wdtv live to my ipad and iphone using the filebrowser app. This gives me access to all my media from anywhere in the house. Movies must be mp4 format.
 
tyreless said:
I can stream media from the usb drives attached to my wdtv live to my ipad and iphone using the filebrowser app. This gives me access to all my media from anywhere in the house. Movies must be mp4 format.

I do it slightly differently, I load all the movies on my NAS drive, that way I can watch them on any computer/device anywhere in the world yet still play them on my TV via the WD TV Live. Personally I see this as the ultimate option especially as NAS drives are almost as cheap as external HD's now (my 1TB WD My Book Live was only £99).

The Archangel
 
leelai said:
Gab this is just wonderful....thank you so much.

KevinJS said:
I've been wondering what to buy myself for my birthday. This could be a pointer in the right direction. Thanks, Gab.

Sent from my iPad 4 HD mini

skimonkey said:
Hey Gabe--all your electronic toys have now come in...when can we all come over for a creature feature double feature night!! :)

By the way, can't believe how much this WD TV does! Surprisingly seems fairly easy to put together based on your instructions! Thanks for sharing!

fleur07 said:
I could even set this up! Great job Gab!

Thanks folks, I'm almost completely gadgeted out now......you may not see me here on Tuesdays as that is the day I have to go to the Gadgetaholics Anonymous meetings...."my name is Gabriel, I'm a recovering gadgetaholic"!

The Archangel
 
Gabriel1 said:
Thanks folks, I'm almost completely gadgeted out now......you may not see me here on Tuesdays as that is the day I have to go to the Gadgetaholics Anonymous meetings...."my name is Gabriel, I'm a recovering gadgetaholic"!

The Archangel

We could all be your sponsors Gab!

Although I'm afraid we'd all jump on that wagon with you!
 
leelai said:
We could all be your sponsors Gab!

Although I'm afraid we'd all jump on that wagon with you!

Bugger that! I'm an unrepentant addict, with every intention of getting worse.
 
First post updated to show more about what you can do with the remote app and what online services are available.

The Archangel
 
I'm using WD live tv since a couple of months and I'm happy so far, streaming videos, pics, music from a NAS or external USB dive - no problem.
Meanwhile I got an iMac and an iPad. The pad sees and can handle the WD box. But - the problem I have: How can I play my iTunes songs from the Mac via the WD and show aperture pics via the WD box? WD can see the Mac but no contend, although I shared all necessary folders.
Any idea?
 
CHNP said:
I'm using WD live tv since a couple of months and I'm happy so far, streaming videos, pics, music from a NAS or external USB dive - no problem.
Meanwhile I got an iMac and an iPad. The pad sees and can handle the WD box. But - the problem I have: How can I play my iTunes songs from the Mac via the WD and show aperture pics via the WD box? WD can see the Mac but no contend, although I shared all necessary folders.
Any idea?

Hi there and welcome!

Unfortunately the WD TV Live doesn't currently support iTunes format files. Personally I use an Apple TV alongside my WD TV Live to cover just about every eventuality. I'm unsure about Apperture files, do they have a specific format (like .pdf, .jpg, etc)?

The Archangel
 
Does anyone know if the WDTV will do airplay-type mirroring of the ipad screen. So, for example I could fling video playing in the browser over to a TV, if there is no specific app like youtube or iplayer for it.
 

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