Anyone notice longer boot times?

WD Legacy Products WD TV Media Player
1

I’ve noticed (since the last update) that the player will randomly go through an extended boot sequence. This would include getting to the WD logo portion of the boot process, than shutting down, and starting again.

I had major issues with “low memory” issues in the past, where a message stated “system memory is low, reboot now?”. I’m wondering if this is a way around that.

2

I have left my WDTV always ON for quite a few years. Never turn it off unless it needs a reboot. It is just there ready to be used at any time.

3

That’s not an extended boot sequence – that’s what you’ll see if it’s a COLD boot – meaning it was fully powered down. If you look carefully, you’ll notice that the two splash screens are actually quite different.

The “shorter” one is just waking up from standby – not powered down.

4

Yes, to both the question and the comments here. I have always had these occasional two-tier start ups, both before and since the update. I wish it was a cure for the “system memory low” prompt which I hate, it feels really unprofessional for a piece of hardware kit to wait until you’ve negotiated through the library to what you want to play and then, and only then, state that it needs to restart! Wouldn’t mind so much if it checked its memory status at startup, rather than at the point when you’re about to play!

5

I would have to disagree. I always shut my unit down, so it’s always a cold boot. It always a lengthy boot time, but sometimes I get the dual boot.

And as someone said earlier about just leaving it on all the time. I use an attached hard drive, and would prefer to not have that also running 24/7.

6

Not a problem, because both the HDs connected directly to my WDTV have auto sleep mode and go idle after 5 minutes of inactivity. I try not to buy HDs that do not have this feature.

My WDTV is accessed often each day; especially for music, and it does not hurt a thing to keep it running 24/7. Same goes for the Roku, Fire stick, Chromecast and stereo amp. Turning things off an on can do more damage, plus there is the wait time involved.

7

If you’re NOT getting a “dual boot” appearance, then you are NOT shutting it completely down.

When you are thinking you’re shutting it down, what are you actually doing? Pulling the power plug; holding the power-button for more than 3 seconds – using the auto power off function – ?

8

I don’t pull the power cord unless I’m having the ‘low memory’ message. I always power off with the standard remote press.

9

i’m exactly the same as you, diagoro, and I do the same as you. But I don’t “pull the power cord” ever (rightly or wrongly) for low memory, or for anything else. I fail to understand why low memory would be a reason to do so.

10

Just had my first “low memory” message since the update…

11

Yes, on my WDTV Live the cold boot time is now several minutes. It shows the logos but flashes to black up to two or three times between each logo. Prior to finishing the boot up sequence it drops signal completely showing digital static.

Even the “warm” boot is much longer, approaching 30 to 45 seconds before it’s ready to use.

I leave it on to avoid the long boot time but the device often begins to lag and stutter after a couple days of being left on.

12

FYI, I have never had a low memory alert on my WDTV Live Plus players. My player stays on 24/7 for quick and easy access at any time.

13

I wish I had the great luck with my WDTV Live Gen3 you have with yours. I get low memory alerts on a daily basis. If I don’t do a full reboot after watching a movie mine is all but useless and menus are so sluggish that it’s hard to know if it’s locked up or not. I really liked the features it had when it was new. Now that so much functionality has diminished it’s becoming more difficult to praise it.

When I first bought it I was absolutely amazed by it and we used it as our primary media player/streamer. Now that it can’t do Netflix anymore we use the Xbox for that and watch some movies on the WDTV. I’m building an HTPC now but taking my time to keep the cost down and make sure I get it right.

If WDTV made an updated version with fast hardware, support for local streaming, and Netflix and Amazon Prime I’d probably be willing to spend a stupid amount of money on it. But I think the days of “play anything” set-top boxes are long gone. There are plenty that do a little but I haven’t seen any that are as open as WDTV used to be.

14

You should not be putting up with diminishing performance, to state the obvious. Again obvious as a response, doubtless you have already reset to factory conditions, because; what else is there, where diminishing performance is concerned? Other than asking yourself what else, peripherally, has changed? I have my WDTV on a stand (really a skeleton frame) I created from a fresh cut fruit transparent container simply so that I could be sure that air circulates freely all around the unit, and strange as that may sound, I’m proud of how effective it is.

I don’t know what else to suggest for diminishing WDTV performance - the WDTV menu IS sluggish I say, but not markedly so, if yours is markedly sluggish (again to state the obvious) I would take any action I could, all is not well and rather than ignore it or having to put up with it, I would look at the resetting to a factory state procedure in a very detailed way because A/ it hasn’t worked, and B/ it reminds me that once, Googling ‘wdtv factory reset’ I saw a more detailed description, a “how to effect a factory reset guide” (a couple more steps were included, a bit more detailed description of how to best do it) but I can’t remember now what the link was (or whether the link was a Western Digital one), but I suggest that if you can Google your way to that, that would be the way to go.

15

My menus were growing increasingly sluggish before the update, after which they improved quite a bit. Sadly it wasn’t to last. I’m also back with very sluggish menus, and often a videos sound will continue playing after I’ve backed out to the menu. Doing a power reset has helped, but no doubt it’s a cyclical thing. These boxes were just not designed well, simple as that. Never should have used old hardware.

16

What else peripherally has changed? Updates to firmware have repeatedly reduced functionality and decreased performance. It’s a matter of poorly designed, cheap hardware with insufficient memory.

I’ve done resets but that does nothing. The WDTV is just old, obsolete hardware. That’s why WD has essentially given up on it as well.

17

Yes, I do understand how you feel. I binned my first unit, convinced it would never work correctly, and did it knowing I would have to get another and it would set me back eighty quid, but felt there can’t be two units as bad as that one, and fortunately the replacement which I’ve had for over a year, has given me no problems that (with the help of this community) I haven’t been able to solve. The old one felt buggy as heck.
I still don’t know what the actual link was that I googled, the one I spoke about earlier. Whilst looking though, I found a good guide to absolutely returning WDTV to its factory defaults.
http://rth.rockchipfirmware.com/how-to-restore-your-wdtv-to-factory-firmware/

18

This is a Gen3 so that link doesn’t have anything for me, though I’ve used B-Rad before on other WDTVs. It isn’t of any use to me, though it was interesting to play with for a little while.

This unit is destined for the trash though because I’m working on a Kodi-based Raspberry Pi 3 unit.

Since the industry has given in to media corporations and stopped making good set-top boxes I’ll just make my own.

19

Yes, understood. Good you can do that. I was unbelievably cynical about WDTV until I got this replacement one for the one I binned. But this one is working exactly the way it should and of course, it has shown me what they are capable of and the enjoyment I get from it always working as it should is immense. I can’t profess to understand why one’s good and the other felt like a wind up, but I do feel fortunate - whilst recognising that all it points to is; you need to get lucky - NOT good, in fact were it not that they aren’t expensive - it would stink far worse. I have said before on this forum that they should have concentrated on quality. I truly believe if they had done that, they would own the largest market share. Western Digital clearly need to sack some of their folk!