Best Way to Set up Playing Local Media

WD Legacy Products WD TV Live & Live Plus
1

I just recently set up my WDTV Live Plus.  My network adapter is due tomorrow, so I haven’t gotten a chance to set that up.

I have copied a file to a USB HD and directly connected it to the WDTV and it played great.

I’m trying to figure out the best way to set this up long term once I’m networked.

I have a Wireless N router.  It’s probably a good 50 feet away from the WDTV and through a wall or two.  Not sure what kinds of speeds I’ll get yet.

I’d prefer not to have to use my USB HD directly connected to the WDTV.

Theoretically, should I be able to stream HD video files from my desktop PC’s HD directly to the WDTV?  How well does that work in practice?

If I do have to connect the USB HD directly to the WDTV to get acceptable quality, am I then able to copy files from my Desktop PC wirelessly through the network onto the USB HD that’s connected to the WDTV and then once they are saved on the local drive, play them directly on the WDTV?

Any other options or things I should know about?

2

So does anyone have any thoughts on what might be the best way to set this up for me?

3

On my system, I usually leave the videos on my desktop computer, or on an external USB hard drive that  I attach to my desktop computer. My Live Plus connects wirelessly to my router that is about 40 feet away. I don’t have any problems streaming. If it is conventient to use a wire to connect your Live Plus to your router, that is the best way, but I have had good success with wireless.

4

I hope it works that way for me.  I’d be very happy if I could stream HD videos from my desktop PC to the WDTV Live Plus.

Hopefully, my wireless adapter will be here today and I’ll be testing it out.

5

Streaming from my desktop PC across the network to the WDTV Live Plus box appears to be working great.

Tried 3 movies that I had encoded at 720p and all worked great.

I did get stuttering when trying to play an HD video I recorded on my digitial camera, bu I’ve had stuttering with those files on other devices.

I’ll continue to try different files and see how things work.

Netflix streams HD perfectly as well.

I don’t see any reason to connect a hard drive directly to the WDTV.

6

My reasoning to put all my media (video, music, photos) on an external HD connected directly to the WDTV is portability and a backup for my files that are also on my pc hard drive or externals attached to my pc. There also the hassle of having to boot up the computer just to watch a movie or listen to music.

It is great to be able to just grab the WDTV and hard drive (and the ac adaptors of couirse) can take them to a friends house. We’ve even taken it on vacation where the hotel had a TV with an HDMI port (we asked ahead of time). We have also taken it on an RV camping vacation… set up a sheet with a projector… fun.

The only other reason would be if you pc wasn’t able to to the streaming and allow someone to be playing Halo (or other cpu intensive program) on the computer at the same time.

Other than that… no… no reason. ;O)

Bob

7

I used to have problems with files over 4GB (I later learned it was because of FAT 32  file sytem) when playing local video. Have recently tried the Play To feature of Windows Media Player and it worked great. Both Live Plus and Live Hub are DLNA enabled, ready for video streaming, and it is easier to manage when everything’s sorted out in media center.