Is this issue solved for most of you, or is this just resignation?
I sent an email to WD and i’m still waiting for an answer when the new firmware comes.
Chief
i’m using a Buffalo MINI USB Adaptor, and sure it is annoying to have drop connection al the time. Hope there is a fix for this serious problem!! 
The work-around is doable but I still get snagged by it, which requires a power cycle, very annoying.
It would be really nice to have this fixed once and for all.
I have an OSX 10.5.5 as the media share. Everything works wired through a Linksys WRT160N but after 4 minutes it starts to stutter. When I open my router in a browser from the media sharing OSX machine to watch the network bandwidth it’s up and down like a heartbeat. BUT … just by looking at the router the playback is smooth again … wait a few minutes the stuttering starts up again, hurry back to the router and there is the heartbeat again. BUT just by accessing the router from the OSX machine it smooths out the stuttering once again. Everytime the stuttering starts I hurry down to the OSX browser and click on the router page and it smooths the playback out again.
I am truely thankful to WD as after having to do this every 4 minutes through a 120 minute movie (30 times up and down the stairs) my legs and breathing are in much better shape ;-) I am thinking about moving the router down the block so I can develop into an Olympic capable sprinter !-D
So I took the notebook and opened up a connection to the browser thinking that would be easy to ‘hit’ the router’ with sitting at the couch but that immediately caused the stuttering to start and wouldn’t even stop when I went to the OSX machine and ‘touched’ the router. Once I shut down the laptop the issue was the same. Every 4 minutes or so.
I replaced the router but that didn’t change a thing. Sorry I don’t have an actual solution.
See the info above on how to contact WD for support on this issue. And congrats on the workout!
I don’t have a solution but I do have data. My connection dropped to the WD TV streaming from my VISTA computer every 5 minutes 30 seconds like clockwork. I changed the Workgroup to WORKGROUP, disable net discovery and everything but the problem persisted until I only had the VISTA computer and the WD TV live on the network alone. When I powered off my XP computer, everything works. Mind you, I have reserved an IP in my router for my WD TV Live already.
My experience would tell me that there is DEFINITELY some sort of discovery of computers going on the network while my XP computer connected wireless-N to the router and this is what is causing the disconnects.
Anyone else?
KeithGP
KeithGP
Try disabling the “Computer Browser” service on your XP computer and see how it goes.
Also, is your XP also configured with WORKGROUP, if not change it as well.
KeithGP
I have almost the same setup as you.
XP PC is wireless g, Vista PC and WD Live is hardwired, I have never had any breaks in streaming. I never switch the WD off as USB and network discovery takes ages.
Before buying the WD I had the Vista PC connected via a SMC usb wireless g stick which dropped the network connection fairly often, the SMC pci wireless card in the XP PC always remains connected.
Folks… just got ahold of 2nd level tech support and talked to a chap by the name of Leonard. Nice guy but unfortunately didn’t know much about this network share problem other than the usual stuff like If XP make sure the DDE service is running, blah blah… I asked him if he has received many calls about this problem and he stated no. I asked him to have his manager call me so I can put some other pressure on hopefully Engineering as well as complain about the fact that Nobody at WD is even looking at their own support website.
Leonard did state that they do have a moderator that looks at this site but I find that hard to believe since I have yet to see any posting from anybody at WD on this problem. maybe they are moderating other websites but definitely not this one.
I personally am about ready to box this thing up and send it back to Amazon.
weitekamper wrote:
I personally am about ready to box this thing up and send it back to Amazon.
- *> NOW YOU’RE TALKING![text deleted] They aren’t going to do anything about this until someone makes them feel our pain.> While we’re at it, posting some negative remarks about their support - or lack thereof - on Amazon’s web site and other places with sterling reviews of the product would be a good idea. I personally bought mine after reading the Amazon review posted by buru buru piggu a happy consumer and tech geek with a lengthy, very postive thread on Amazon’s page for the unit (at least, it had a positive tone when I bought mine, about 2 months ago).> Link to Amazon USA page for WDTV Live> http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digital-Network-ready-Player-WDBAAN0000NBK-NESN/dp/B002KKFP9Y/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1262889080&sr=1-1> Here’s my review, just posted on Amazon. It may take a couple of days for it to appear there.> Buru Buru Piggu’s review of the WDTV Live had me excited over the prospect of owning one myself. Unfortunately, while numerous features of the unit work just as he described in his rave reviews, there are several perplexing problems with the device that have confounded and frustrated many users.
What’s worse, Western Digital seems to be either completely unaware of these problems or too incompetent to fix them.
Since it contains no storage device of its own, a fundamental feature of the WDTV Live is its ability to play media from networked drives and computers. But many users, including me, have found the WDTV Live drops its connections to PC’s running Windows 7, XP, Vista after about 5 minutes. Rebooting the machine will get you reconnected to those PC’s again… for about 5 minutes.
I reported this problem to Western Digital several weeks ago. Since then, I have not received any information about a fix. The tech I spoke with blamed the problem on “Samba,” and said WD was “working closely with Microsoft to find a solution.” So far, there has been no word on a fix, and the problem persists.
Many other owners have experienced this problem and have attempted workarounds. On Western Digital’s “community” forums, one thread on this topic is 9 pages long. Apparently the posting has never been reviewed by a support tech from Western Digital, as there are no postings which offer any kind of solution to the problem.
Another example of the poor support you’ll receive once you buy this device is the firmware update which WD released, and then was forced to withdraw, after many users found it caused their WDTV Live to stopped working entirely.
My recommendation: look around some more. Read the reviews of this device posted here by other users, and compare them with the features and reviews of other similar products. And if you can afford it, buy a nice PC that you can connect to your TV instead of one of these devices. You’ll find it to be much more versatile, and the support will undoubtedly be better!> I also posted this reply to Buru Buru Piggu’s glowing review of the WDTV Live on Amazon.com> I have to wonder how much testing you had done when you wrote:
UPDATE 1: 10/24/09:
1. Streaming from Windows PC’s works great (XP). I turned on folder sharing and the Live saw my media files and sub-folders right away. Right-click the folder, select “Sharing”, then check the box that says “Share this folder on the network” and give it a share name.
Had you tried playing a file that was on the drive you shared in the statement above, you would have found that WDTV Live disconnected from the shared drive after about five minutes. It’s so predictable, you can practically set your watch by it. This is true for me, as it is for hundreds or thousands of users trying to share files from a PC running Windows 7, Vista, or XP.
This problem has been posted on WDTV Live’s community forum, and after 89 replies and almost 3000 views, remains unsolved. WD’s second level tech support told me they were working on a solution to the problem, but several weeks have passed and no solution has been posted. Many people have posted technical information and attempts at solutions, and tried one another’s recommendations, usually with no success.
On another forum devoted to this device, wdtvlive.com, there are more threads about this problem, and someone posted a solution which I found works only for my XP computer. The WDTV Live still disconnects from my Vista computer as a network share. (Using Windows Media Center, WDTV Live sees the Vista machine as a Media Server, but this is a topic for another discussion.)
Had I known about these problems, and more importantly, Western Digital’s sorry excuse for technical support and problem resolution, I would not have bought this unit. As it stands, I can use it now for many of my needs, but getting the unit to perform properly has been a frustrating experience, and I would not recommend it to anyone who was not willing to invest a good amount of time in getting it to work properly. > OK, I’ve tried to set a good example. Now it’s time for you, as a dissatisfied consumer, to do your part!
I’m tired of writing emails to WD without getting answers(on the german website), so if anybody from the WD stuff reads this forum (i still hope so) here is another hint for you:
For another project i set up a Windows 2003 Server (enterprise, x64) and shared a folder.
And what should i say, since the w2k3 server is the masterbrowser i have a stable browselist and the connection is stable. I think the problem is a misconfigured Samba-Server on the WDTVLive (domain master, preferred master, local master, oslevel and so on)
Chief
Yesterday I finally recieved a call from the support manager… guy named Dave…funny no last name though. Anycase he told me that there is a firmware release do out shortly… any day now… couldn’t commit on a date…
2nd they where aware of the network drop out issue with file shares but couldn’t state whether the update will fix this problem.
3rd… Engineering is trying to replicate this problem in their lab… I told him if they where looking for a good lab to use quite a few of us would volunteer to show them their own problems…
4th… why in the he@@ are they not responding to any of our requests for help. He stated that since the last Bricking incicent they where completely inundated with support calls and that engineering is putting 100% focus on a fix… excuse me if I sound skeptical.
Lastly he told me that they don’t contribute to this website because of a corporate governance issue. I told him that having 1000s of customers spread bad press is a bigger corporate issue then some silly governance issue.
Long story short… I took the advice from above, created a negative comment on Amazon’s website… I will be boxing up my unit tomorrow… Any suggestions on what to buy next? OPlay?
So far I like my Patriot Box Office. : )
Wait till March. Popbox looks promising.
^ads
When I first got my WD Live, file sharing and connecting to my network was no problem at all.
But I kept getting the netwerk error when I was watching a shared video.
On my network are 2 desktop pc’s connected with Windows XP. And 3 laptops, also with XP.
On my WD Live is a Sitecom WL-329 wireless adapter connected and my router is a Siemens Gigaset SX551 (Experiabox).
After reading this thread I went to work with the ideas given.
Changed my computer name to WORKGROUP, turned off sharing in the WD Live settings menu, in “services” I started computer browser, Network DDE DSM and Network DDE.
Since I’ve changed these settings I do not get any network drops and youtube is also working fine now.
Happy now with my WD HD TV Live Media Player!
Bravo, at least we have a few people able to use some of their PC’s for networking some of the time.
I wonder what the firmware release is going to fix, if not this networking issue? I haven’t noticed anything else about the player that is screaming for a solution as loudly as this topic.
It is discouraging that WD falls back on a meaningless buzzword like “Corporate governance” as an excuse for their lack of feedback on these issues. But I doubt the support manager has much to do with the assignment of priorities like which issues are fixed first. There’s someone above him, probably two or three levels up, who doesn’t know his [text deleted] from a hole in the ground when it comes to this product. As I’ve said before, the only thing they (the decision makers at the top) care about is sales.
I still think the best solution for everything the WDTV Live does, and more, is a PC outfitted with a robust processor and an HDMI video card. It isn’t in the same ball park, cost-wise, but the functionality will be superior, IMHO.
My suggestion is that we all email the url to this discussion to WD customer support and demand that they fix the issue ASAP!
Hi everybody,
had the same problem and was driving me crazy.
I solved it changing the ethernet cable with a better one (cat5).
Now it’s working like a charm.
Hope it can help.
Hey, everybody! Wendy the Mod came by to remove the three-letter epithet from my posting above (number 97, here: http://community.wdc.com/t5/WD-TV-Live/Network-drops-every-approx-4-minutes/m-p/5032#M2124). But did she shed any light on the problem that’s been eluding us all these weeks? Nooooooooo.
I’m glad for you, OstiazZ. But I’m connecting wirelessly. :mansad:
Also, this is post #100. Congratulations, everybody!
