Streaming different shows to different tv's

Hi guys,

I’m fairly new to all of this.

Basically I am in the process of renovating a house and I have a huge TV and movie collection all on hard drives,

while renovating I have installed new data ports in all rooms of the house and put new tv’s in 3 rooms and a projector in another room, all tv’s are smart tv’s and either have wifi or hard connections to the LAN.

What I would like to know is, is it possible to watch different movies etc on different tv’s at the same time from one source.

I am considering the EX4 with 12TB of storage to move all my files to.

will I need WD TV connected to all tv’s to have access to the the files and will I be able to watch different movies on different tv’s at the same time.

I would also like to be able to controll what I’m watching in any room via a tablet

Is any of this possible and if so how difficult will it be?

any help would be great 

Thanks

Yes, a WDTV would need to be dedicated to each TV.  You could reach a point where your system could bog down with too many streams happening, but I have done some stress tests for this and all worked fine.  Need wired connections; a fast gigabit won’t help in this case since the WD is not a gigabit device. Fast rpm drives will help, tho.  Not sure about what the tablet can do for you, but hey, the player’s remote works fine.

mike27oct wrote:

Yes, a WDTV would need to be dedicated to each TV. 

Sorry mike27oct,  i have to disagree with that

The EX4 12TB is DLNA & UPnP compliant and like my WDTV Live Hub (also DLNA & UPnP)  also features an inbuilt Twonky Media Server

http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/AAG/ENG/4178-706085.pdf

If you have a Smart TV that is also DLNA & UPnP compliant it will see and stream the Media Content from the EX4 just like it does from my WDTV Live Hub

eg. My Panasonic TV in another room in the house …

Press Viera Tools Button > Select Media Server > and presto … The TV now sees all the Media Files on my WDTV Live Hub and can Stream them.

No WDTV device attached to my Panasonic Smart TV at all.

And since the EX4 12TB also has Twonky Media Server Software (v7.2) it will / should do the same.

I did a “3 Different Movie Stream Test” 

Local TV with WDTV attached

Smart TV (No WDTV attached… Streaming Only *wired*)

Android Tablet (Streaming Only *wireless*)

They all played fine… playing at the same time.  But it will depend on the movie media file

eg. 3x 1080p movies with high bitrate are most likely gonna choke.

yeah, it’s definetely possible, but there’s a lot of variables to consider, and a lot of different ways to do this

lets think about how much data you will be moving at once

dvd content maybe 4 mb/s x 4 = 12 mb/s total

average bluray 25 mb/s x 4 = 100 mb/s total

large bluray 45 mb/s x 4 = 180 mb/s total

I haven’t looked into 3D, but possibly higher bit rates

potential bottlenecks

hard drive - what if all 4 streams are located on the same drive ?

fast rpm drives and a raid array are possible solutions to help with this

cpu in EX4 - is it capable to pushing that much data that fast

I don’t know about the EX4, but some low end NAS units would have problems pushing 4 bluray streams

network - can your network handle it

wired is recommended

while wireless is possible it’s easy to run into wireless limits

additional considerations

what protocol would you like to use?

NFS - unix clients only, but fast and stable

CIFS - windows shares, slow but wide compatibility

DNLA - compatible with anything DNLA, allows 3rd party apps on tablet to control streams

but will also increase the load on the cpu, under DNLA the EX4 will be actively pushing all 4 streams

  • instead of passively allowing clients to access the data

what does each client support

WD SMP - supports all 3 protocols above

a smart TV, might only support DNLA

there’s probably quite a few other issues I haven’t brought up

but to sum it up

is it possible = yes, and many of us here are already doing it

are there issues to consider = yes

Joey, thanks for setting me straight on the EX4 situation.  I was basically describing a “traditional” setup with WDTVs like mine where two TV’s each have a WDTV attached with drives, each can play media from their own drives and from one another’s drive via network shares.  With WDTVs w/drives, and a Roku on each “dumb” TV, for all intents and purposes they are now “smart” enough for my needs since I use network shares (not media server) exclusively to play my media… 

mike27oct wrote:

I was basically describing a “traditional” setup with WDTVs With WDTVs w/drives, and a Roku on each “dumb” TV

I agree with the “traditional” setup if you have “Dumb TV’s”

But, since the OP stated his 3 TV’s are “Smart TV’s” they can already stream via LAN wired or wireless straight out of the box.

So, all he would need is his existing WDTV connected to the projector and Not have to purchase an addtional 3 WDTV’s for each of his 3 Smart TV’s. 

Spending about an extra $255*  for something the Smart TV’s can already do … is a bit silly.

“Smarter” to use that money towards the purchase of the EX4 12TB.

* http://www.amazon.com/Live-Media-Player-Wi-fi-1080p/dp/B005KOZNBW

Agree, Joey – I figured that out after your comment.  Hmmm, could smart TVs mean the end of WDTVs going forward?

mike27oct wrote:

Agree, Joey – I figured that out after your comment.  Hmmm, could smart TVs mean the end of WDTVs going forward?

Nah …

the only thing with my Panasonic Smart TV is the interface is pretty basic … it does the Job, play streams movies fine if thats all you want   but …

The WDTV has a better GUI and extras like metadata, file sorting, moviesheets etc

If the OP wants “more” than a basic interface, then yes i would recommend a WDTV for each TV.

Example: this is my Panasonic Smart TV “Media Server” Interface

mike27oct wrote:

Hmmm, could smart TVs mean the end of WDTVs going forward?

Given their lousy codec support definitely not.

Thanks guys,

My Panasonic 54" plasma Viera is a 2010 model – not that “ancient” yet, and the thing still works perfectly  So, not in the market for a new one yet, but I suppose all the better new models are Smart ones today, so that is what one buys now.  Even so, I can watch anything on my current one using my media player and streamer, so I don’t feel deprived.  Anyway, I also use my WDTV for playing all my iTunes format music through the stereo system using easy to select playlists.  Don’t know if a Smart TV can do that.  Lots of useful life left in the TV and WDTV.

Techflaws wrote:


mike27oct wrote:

Hmmm, could smart TVs mean the end of WDTVs going forward?


Given their lousy codec support definitely not.

Panasonic have fairly decent Video Codec support … haven’t found anything it can’t play that the Live Hub can

Page 91

http://www.panasonic.com/content/dam/Panasonic/support_manual/Color_TV/English/TH-P42GT30A_Operating_Instructions.pdf

I will concede the Panasonic doesen’t offer as much support for Music Formats as WDTV

So, i guess it all depends on the consumer needs … what will the device be used for mainly

(me personally in the 3 Years of owning a WDTV Live Hub … ive used it to listen to music about 4 or 5 times. I purchased it to watch video and movies … which it gets used daily for that purpose)

Joey, you really ought to listen to more music – it’s good for you!   :smiley:

I have a large music collection, and quite a bit of it is digitized (12,000+ tracks) and in my iTunes library.  It is real easy to make playlists with iTunes, and I copy both the music and the playlists to the WDTV drive and have my own digital jukebox.  Mostly, I listen to random playlists this way, and via my Pogoplug on a tablet (or phone) via internet when out and about.  Very handy – and cool to listen to all these tracks of music and not any of it wasting space on my mobile devices…

@Joey

What about audio support like DTS-MA and embedded PGS subs?