Not playing some MKV files (wd tv hd media player generation 1)

Hallo everybody.

Suddenly, after 5 years that I have the player, I have the same problem with the other colleagues.  Some MKV files play fine, while some other do not play when selected. i.e the time bar shows as 00:00:00/00:00:00, and fails. 
After the WD fails to play a file, it does not play any other file (that used to play before) unless I do a factory reset.

I reed in FAQ 4 (Playback Issues) H & I  that firmware 1.03.49 solves the problem. But I have wd tv hd media player (generation 1), so I cannot download firmware 1.03.49. The last firmware I can download is 1.03.01 and I have downloaded it already but the problem is still here. What else can I do?

Thanks in advance.

Im curious, did the problem started to happend with new MKV videos. Or some of the old ones that used to play fine are also giving you problems?

The files probably have ‘header removal compression’ which your player cannot cope with. You need to run them through mkvmerge with the compression turned off. It’s very easy and it does not take long.

http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoolnix/faq.html#header_removal_compression

mkvtoolnix

http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoolnix/downloads.html

When running mkvmerge, go to file / options and tick box at bottom of list which says Disable header removal compression etc. Add your mkv and then press remux, within seconds or minutes a new file will be made without header removal compression.

I will try your solution, thanks anyway. I have to say that it is very annoying and WD has to fix it for generation 1 too.

Files that do not play first time, do not play any time. Those that play first time play again.