I’ve posted about this before. I thought I had it beat but I just watched about an hour of a ripped DVD (VOB files) over network shares and then it started. I have tried all of the output ports and reduced the resolution down to 720p 60hz. That seemed to work for a while on both composite & HDMI. These WD players are the buggiest devices I’ve ever seen. I thought for sure this would stop when I ran a wire to it. I’ve had 2 WD Live players RMAd for the same symptoms. I just got the latest one back and haven’t had time to evaluate it but I did notice the component port is dead. I wonder what the odds are of one person getting 3 bad units in succession. Somebody please make a suggestion.
There’s a KNOWN ISSUE regarding playing VOB’s over the network, so you’re not going to be able to fix that unless you roll back to firmware 1.03.xx or earlier, or until WD releases a fix.
Playing files over network either wired/wireless will be extremely hard to do. Ive tried every connection to this hub and the ONLY one that works 100 percent of the time is using an external drive-passport, my book, etc… and play my files through that…
Forget about playing large movies over lan…
TonyPh12345 wrote:
There’s a KNOWN ISSUE regarding playing VOB’s over the network, so you’re not going to be able to fix that unless you roll back to firmware 1.03.xx or earlier, or until WD releases a fix.
If pre 1.03 firmware didn’t have this problem then clearly this was/is caused by WD updating their firmware. That being the case (and since they know about it) why don’t they just fix it? What rev will I have if I reset the hub?
heid4055 wrote:
Playing files over network either wired/wireless will be extremely hard to do. Ive tried every connection to this hub and the ONLY one that works 100 percent of the time is using an external drive-passport, my book, etc… and play my files through that…
Forget about playing large movies over lan…
Why do people buy these things if not to do exactly that? That’s exactly why I bought it, both of them. If the product simply won’t do that then WD is guilty of false advertising. Extremely guilty. If the device will only play reliably from local storage they they shouldn’t even advertise it as a network device. Their literature specifically says that VOB files are supported without any qualifications such as “from local storage only”.
Sorry, ya’ll, I got confused as to which product you have.
Only the LIVE / LIVE+ has known issues playing VOBS over the network.
The Live HUB has NO ISSUES playing ANY size files over the network, unless the bitrate exceeds the maximum. But that’s not SIZE dependent.
I have several files that are over 40 Gb and they play just fine.
TonyPh12345 wrote:
Sorry, ya’ll, I got confused as to which product you have.
Only the LIVE / LIVE+ has known issues playing VOBS over the network.
The Live HUB has NO ISSUES playing ANY size files over the network, unless the bitrate exceeds the maximum. But that’s not SIZE dependent.
I have several files that are over 40 Gb and they play just fine.
I have both products so what I said stands. However, If bitrate is my problem with the hub then what do I do about it? Are files created with fixed or variable bitrates or are players able to vary the playback bitrate to suit their abilitiesor is there some other course of action?
ram1009 wrote:
TonyPh12345 wrote:
Sorry, ya’ll, I got confused as to which product you have.
Only the LIVE / LIVE+ has known issues playing VOBS over the network.
The Live HUB has NO ISSUES playing ANY size files over the network, unless the bitrate exceeds the maximum. But that’s not SIZE dependent.
I have several files that are over 40 Gb and they play just fine.
I have both products so what I said stands. However, If bitrate is my problem with the hub then what do I do about it? Are files created with fixed or variable bitrates or are players able to vary the playback bitrate to suit their abilitiesor is there some other course of action?
Variable Bit Rate (VBR) should never be an issue… The vast majority of my stuff is VBR…
First, it’d be a good idea to determine IF bitrate is the problem. The only way to do that that I’m familiar with is to use the freeware MediaInfo tool, which will specify what the overall bitrate of the file is (which is an AVERAGE. It does NOT find the PEAK bitrate; I actually have no idea how to do that.)
If the Overall Bitrate is > 25 to 30 megabits per second, then that’s a likely problem.
You can use Freeware tools like HandBrake to re-compress the file, and usually reduce the bitrate by 60 to 70%.
Uhhhh… How bout we don’t ever decrease the quality for any reason, under any circumstances… Why in the **bleep** would you want to decrease the quality??? This sort of talk drives me nuts!!! Go listen to you crappy sounding MP3’s somewhere else.
Don’t let Hardware dictate your quality… We no longer need to do that. That’s what is so great about this product.
spookster86 wrote:
Uhhhh… How bout we don’t ever decrease the quality for any reason, under any circumstances… Why in the **bleep** would you want to decrease the quality??? This sort of talk drives me nuts!!! Go listen to you crappy sounding MP3’s somewhere else.
Don’t let Hardware dictate your quality… We no longer need to do that. That’s what is so great about this product.
This thread is about video not audio. If you have to decrease the quality of audio files then you are really in trouble.
spookster86 wrote:
Uhhhh… How bout we don’t ever decrease the quality for any reason, under any circumstances… Why in the **bleep** would you want to decrease the quality??? This sort of talk drives me nuts!!! Go listen to you crappy sounding MP3’s somewhere else.
Don’t let Hardware dictate your quality… We no longer need to do that. That’s what is so great about this product.
I’m all ears. What’s your solution to choppy playback.
TonyPh12345 wrote:
Variable Bit Rate (VBR) should never be an issue… The vast majority of my stuff is VBR…
First, it’d be a good idea to determine IF bitrate is the problem. The only way to do that that I’m familiar with is to use the freeware MediaInfo tool, which will specify what the overall bitrate of the file is (which is an AVERAGE. It does NOT find the PEAK bitrate; I actually have no idea how to do that.)
If the Overall Bitrate is > 25 to 30 megabits per second, then that’s a likely problem.
You can use Freeware tools like HandBrake to re-compress the file, and usually reduce the bitrate by 60 to 70%.
I used Mediainfo on one file I’ve had consistent problems with. It’s quite a tool, BTW. Lots of info. It shows the video bitrate in a format I don’t understand. I’ll write it exactly as reported: " 5 532Kbps". I don’t know why there’s a space between the fives. What does this mean to you?
That means roughly 5 megabits per second, which is WELL within the comfort level, as long as your network is in good shape.
spookster86 wrote:
Uhhhh… How bout we don’t ever decrease the quality for any reason, under any circumstances… Why in the **bleep** would you want to decrease the quality??? This sort of talk drives me nuts!!! Go listen to you crappy sounding MP3’s somewhere else.
Don’t let Hardware dictate your quality… We no longer need to do that. That’s what is so great about this product.
What are you talking about? I didn’t say reduce the QUALITY, I said reduce BITRATE. They are not necessarily related.
TonyPh12345 wrote:
That means roughly 5 megabits per second, which is WELL within the comfort level, as long as your network is in good shape.
I don’t know how you would determine the condition of my nework. Here’s one thing yo keep in mind. I have one PC running wireless and on that PC I can watch any file I own without any problems. I haven’t has any reason to question my LAN until I bought WD players. What do you need to know about my LAN?
Ok, a couple of question (and they might sound obvious, but stranger things have happened!)
You said you normally connect via WIRELESS, and have issues, and then you tried running a wire to it, and had the same issue then. Just making sure: When you swapped to a WIRE, did you REMOVE the WLAN card, and change the WD configuration to use the WIRED interface?
On the wireless PC that plays any file without problem, where is that file stored? Is it on the PC, or on the network?
WIRELESS issues can be NOTORIOUSLY difficult to pin down. But if both your FILE SERVER and the WD are WIRED, then the things to check on for network health are:
Try replacing the cables. A bad cable can cause lots of errors on the network which slows performance dramatically.
Make sure that ALL of the connections are 100 Megabit / FULL DUPLEX (usually the LEDs will give this indication.)
TonyPh12345 wrote:
Ok, a couple of question (and they might sound obvious, but stranger things have happened!)
You said you normally connect via WIRELESS, and have issues, and then you tried running a wire to it, and had the same issue then. Just making sure: When you swapped to a WIRE, did you REMOVE the WLAN card, and change the WD configuration to use the WIRED interface?
On the wireless PC that plays any file without problem, where is that file stored? Is it on the PC, or on the network?
WIRELESS issues can be NOTORIOUSLY difficult to pin down. But if both your FILE SERVER and the WD are WIRED, then the things to check on for network health are:
Try replacing the cables. A bad cable can cause lots of errors on the network which slows performance dramatically.
Make sure that ALL of the connections are 100 Megabit / FULL DUPLEX (usually the LEDs will give this indication.)
My LAN is a little more complex than most although I don’t think it’s architecture is a factor in this problem. My gateway router is located in my basement and is a D Link Gaming router, wired only. (I don’t remember the PN). It’s only about a year old and has been running fine. It is wired using cat 5 cable to a Linksys WRT150N on the ground floor. Less than 100 feet of cable. This link has never been a problem. The WRT150N is a wireless (and wired) router, and until last weekend was the end of the line for wiring. There is a local PC wired to the WRT150N which is where most of my movie files reside. The wireless PC I mentioned previously is in a bedroom less than 100 feet away and consistently has 4 out of 5 bars of signal strength even through several walls. There are no movie files on this PC. The WD hub is in another bedroom also less than 100 feet from the WRT150N. Originally I thought to use the WD hub wirelessly but decided to run a cat 6e line because so many people on this forum claim improved performance. Also, the WD hub users manual says to expect slow playback over wireless. Anyway, as you know it doesn’t make any difference. I’m still getting choppy playback. I think I’ve answered most of your questions but I don’t understand one question. You ask if I removed the WLAN card from something. What are you talking about? I did reconfigure the WD hub when I changed from wireless to wired because I had to but it involved only some simple changes in the setup. The hub has never had a problem identifying or connecting to my LAN whether wired or wireless. The cat 6e cable I used was a pre-terminated cable 100 feet long. It is the only thing which could be suspect here (IMHO) however I get the same results with a second length of cat 5e cable. The RJ45s on the 6e cable have the offset contacts which is what I assume you’re talking about when you mention connectors. I don’t think the LEDs on my router know the difference between a 100Mb connection or not. I realize what you’re doing is checking the basics but one thing bothers me. This most recent incident of choppy playback occurred after perfect playback of the same movie for over an hour. It was like flipping a switch. I thought maybe it had just changed chapters to one that hadn’t copied properly so I watched the same files on the wireless PC and they ran perfectly. IMHO everything points to the WD hub being at fault for this either because of a manufacturing flaw or faulty firmware. If not, I’m stumped. BTW, I also tried installing another cascaded router (wired) just ahead of the WD hub but it didn’t help.
Hey ALL! I have an update for everyone.
I tried hooking my live hub on my lan through my router 10/100 ports. It would connect to my desktop on a shared folder but was choppy when playing iso’s and mkv files.
I went out and got a cross-over cable and manually set the nic card on my desktop and the live hub. I was then able to log in through my hub to see my shared folder of movies. I was then able to play my files smoothly and with no issues.
My router being 10/100 was not fast enough… But when I hooked up the cross-over I was able to get a 1 Gps connection… So by eliminating my router ALL WAS GOOD!
Thoughts???
heid4055 wrote:
Hey ALL! I have an update for everyone.
I tried hooking my live hub on my lan through my router 10/100 ports. It would connect to my desktop on a shared folder but was choppy when playing iso’s and mkv files.
I went out and got a cross-over cable and manually set the nic card on my desktop and the live hub. I was then able to log in through my hub to see my shared folder of movies. I was then able to play my files smoothly and with no issues.
My router being 10/100 was not fast enough… But when I hooked up the cross-over I was able to get a 1 Gps connection… So by eliminating my router ALL WAS GOOD!
Thoughts???
“manually set the nic card on my desktop and the live hub” I have no idea what you mean by this. Also, if your computers & hub were plugged into the LAN ports (as opposed to the WAN port) of your router you were never actually using the router portion of your router but rather you were using the “switch” portion. The router actually only connects your LAN to the internet. I’m glad you found something to work for you and I will gladly duplicate it if I can. Please clarify.
Edit: In my caseI have a wireless PC on which I can view flawless playback of the same files that run choppy on my hub which has a wired connection. Go figure.
