I am an electrician by qualification. I have been caught a number of times with simple cable connection problems. I use a direct connect crossover cable to eliminate all known error possibilities. You can go direct LAN to LAN port without anything in the single path.
A crossover cable eliminates the hub, router and any possibility that the network card auto detection circuit is defective or incompatible. That is one less path in the signal chain to worry about.
I purchase factory made Cat 6 networking cables. I have had a few problems with plugging those network cables into the WDTV Live box. I have found some cables are tight fitting, don’t mate properly and sometimes they need an extra push to click into place. They make a distinctive click sound when they mate properly. Sometimes they are tight and very hard to remove. In the long term, the WDTV Live LAN connector may be the source of LAN signal dropouts.
