With more and more of our entertainment coming from digital content it should be no surprise that media players have a large market and
Western Digital is one of the biggest players. Today we are looking at their WD TV Live, which is an update to the successful WD TV line. In the past WD had offered several models of media players with varying feature sets, today they have simplified their product offering to just two. Either you purchase one with a hard drive (WD TV Live Hub) or you purchase one without, as in this review.
Even though this WD TV Live is the cheaper of Western Digital's offerings, it is not a stripped down player. In fact it has built in wireless supporting b, g and n networks, wired Ethernet, HDMI, composite and optical audio output as well as (2) USB ports. These capabilities allow you to easily stream your personal digital media, as well as media from multiple sources online. Before we get into the details of the review, let's take a look at some published information for this unit as provided on the
official product page on the Western Digital website.
Features and Specifications:
» Brand: Western Digital
» Model: WDBHG70000NBK-HESN
» Color: Black
» Features:
» Full HD 1080P capability via HDMI 1.4 connection.
» Easily connected to network storage devices including DLNA media servers via either wired
Ethernet or built in wireless with b, g and n support.
» (2) USB ports provided for local storage, supporting FAT, FAT32, NTFS and HFS+ file systems.
» USB also supports keyboards and access to content on digital cameras.
» DD and DTS output.
» Over two dozen apps.
» Also supports composite output for those with older TV’s.
» Supported Formats:
» Video - AVI (Xvid, AVC, MPEG1/2/4), MPG/MPEG, VOB, MKV (h.264, x.264, AVC, MPEG1/2/4, VC-1),
TS/TP/M2T (MPEG1/2/4, AVC, VC-1), MP4/MOV (MPEG4, h.264), M2TS, WMV9, FLV (h.264)
» Photo - JPEG, GIF, TIF/TIFF, BMP, PNG
» Audio - MP3, WAV/PCM/LPCM, WMA, AAC, FLAC, MKA, AIF/AIFF, OGG, Dolby Digital, DTS
» Playlist - PLS, M3U, WPL
» Subtitle - SRT, ASS, SSA, SUB, SMI
» Note:
» MPEG2 MP@HL up to 1920x1080p24, 1920x1080i30 or 1280x720p60 resolution.
» MPEG4.2 ASP@L5 up to 1280x720p30 resolution and no support for global motion
compensation.
» WMV9/VC-1 MP@HL up to 1280x720p60 or 1920x1080p24 resolution. VC-1 AP@L3 up to
1920x1080i30, 1920x1080p24 or 1280x720p60 resolution.
» H.264 BP@L3 up to 720x480p30 or 720x576p25 resolution.
» H.264 MP@L4.1 and HP@4.1 up to 1920x1080p24, 1920x1080i30, or 1280x720p60 resolution.
» An audio receiver is required for multi-channel surround sound digital output.
Compressed RGB JPEG formats only and progressive JPEG up to 2048x2048.
Single layer TIFF files only.
Uncompressed BMP only.
» Package Contents:
»WD TV Live Media Player
»AC adaptor
»Remote with batteries
»Composite output cable
»Quick start guide
