I had submitted a trouble report to WD supporet a short while ago. It had to do with the fact that when my WDTV Live is idle for some time it loses it’s network connection. They told me to do this:
1. Push the hardware reset button on the unit.
2. Go into the setup menu and select the item that resets all your settings back to default.
3. If all above doesn’t work, revert to a previous firmware version.
This is the most stupid response from a support engineer that I have ever heard. It’s like they don’t have a clue so try all these things and maybe one of them will work.
If this is an example of WD support I should just get an RMA from Amazon a return it. By the way, my response said as much.
If this is an example of WD support I should just get an RMA from Amazon a return it. By the way, my response said as much.
I cannot understand why more people that are on here complaining don’t just do that. Certainly whenever I buy any networked or in fact any electronic device, I am aware that there is some chance it won’t work right for me. So, I plan to try it for a few days and if it doesn’t work right return it (thus I am careful about packaging, etc.). E.g., for the SMP, I wanted at least two units in the house, but I first bought one to try out. It worked for me with videos with <5min setup and functioned much better for Netflix than what we then had, so I kept it and only then bought another. I would not have spent the hours and hours and hours of frustration that some people on here claim they have gone through with their SMPs. Life is too short to waste like that. Just return the device and buy something different to try next. No big deal, and I doubt anybody here cares if that is what you do (other than WD employees perhaps).
As a side note, what I have found over the last few years of reading reviews of networking products I was researching to buy is that for every single device I looked at, there were always some people who claimed it worked immediately/perfectly, and other people who claimed it did not work at all. A good example is our current wifi router. Some reviews said it had the best signal strength, speed, etc. of any wifi router they had tried, but other reviewers claimed it had the worst signal strength or that they couldn’t even get devices to connect to it, etc. See a similar pattern on this forum?
Well, there is something to be said about this. Today, I tried installing a different USB3 PCMCIA adapter in my Win 7 laptop. First one I tried a while ago was a disaster; same goes for today’s attempt. To begin with, I don’t read Chinese well – if at all --. so, a few screen shots of Windows’ Control Panel boxes all in Chinese characters was pretty hard to decipher. Got past that, and the instructions did not say install card or driver first. I selected driver. Wrong! So, I reversed course and stuck card in and then set up driver. Success. Next, try and read a portable USB3 drive. Won’t spin up, so try drive with own power supply. It spun up, but drive was not detected. Get the idea?..no joy.
Either I or my laptop don’t know how to make this thing work, so out it came, uninstalled driver, returned PC to my restore point I always make beforehand when dealing with these sorts of things. Got my PC back to home plate again. Whew.
Next, pack it up and return it to Amazon! for refund But,my next solution will be a pricey one – get a new laptop with 4 built-in USB3 ports and that fixes that!
I do think the OP’s problem could be same as some others are having right now with shares – apparently bad firmware from WD. Tsk, tsk.
LOL you just don’t get it. WDTV live is a bit player. Apple TV, Roku, and WDTV in a pie chart for market share? You’d need a magnify class to see the WD sliver of the pie, yet they have what, at least 10x the number of complaints that networking doesn’t work?
The expectation is that this isn’t a rocket science degree needed type of product. The spinning wheel/no networking is a total fail, so of course people get upset. They don’t want to “just do that” and send it back. Time is money, for under $100 you expect it to work, maybe not perfectly or elegantly, but it should work. That is the issue, quit being so myopic.
Maybe you “don’t get it” instead. Many people have no problems, until recently, so either there is a bug in current firmware, or in rare cases they got a bad unit. But, for the most part, most of us have no problem with our units. So, either the cause is mentioned in above comments, or just maybe the end user is not doing something correctly.
To talk about market share is irelevant, because my Roku, or someone’s Apple TV cannot do half the tricks a WDTV can do. The Roku and Apple TV are pretty limited and dummied-down products. To use a WDTV requires more technical skills than the avg person posesses. To make my point more clear: I would never give a gift of a WDTV, but I would give a gift of a Roku or Apple TV, and I have.
LOL you just don’t get it. WDTV live is a bit player. Apple TV, Roku, and WDTV in a pie chart for market share? You’d need a magnify class to see the WD sliver of the pie, yet they have what, at least 10x the number of complaints that networking doesn’t work?
The expectation is that this isn’t a rocket science degree needed type of product. The spinning wheel/no networking is a total fail, so of course people get upset. They don’t want to “just do that” and send it back. Time is money, for under $100 you expect it to work, maybe not perfectly or elegantly, but it should work. That is the issue, quit being so myopic.
Well you are entitled to your opinion obviously, but in my lifetime I have had many, many things that I have purchased not work out (I am relatively old). I choose to cut my time losses and move on (one reason I don’t use Windows at all anymore :smileyvery-happy:). But hey, if your expectations are that a $100 computer-based, networking device must absolutely definitely work to your expectations under your setup conditions, and if not, you are going to waste your time **bleep** and moaning about it all over the Internet, well then I wish you luck with that.
Oh, yeah, myopic: “a lack of foresight; shortsighted.” But I am the one that assumes that many purchases might not work out to satisfy me and so plan things so that I don’t end up getting stuck owning unsatisfying purchases. You on the other hand?
This is the most stupid response from a support engineer that I have ever heard. It’s like they don’t have a clue so try all these things and maybe one of them will work.
It’s rather that you don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m doing 2 resets every time I upgrade the firmware (before and after) and so far haven’t experienced ANY of the weird issues people are having that suddenly get fixed when they do a reset. And as has already been pointed out, for some people 2.01.86 made networking worse so going back to 1.16.13 might actually fix this.
dcb917 wrote:
You’d need a magnify class to see the WD sliver of the pie, yet they have what, at least 10x the number of complaints that networking doesn’t work?
You are comparing apple and oranges, because Roku and Apple TV are media STREAMERS, whereas a WDTV is a media PLAYER. Do you understand the distinction here? There are not any devices that do what a WDTV does by being able to play the myriad varieties of one’s own media files.
When was the last time I could play an ISO file on my Roku? Never. But, I don’t care, because I have a WDTV that can! When was the last time I could access Amazon Prime on my WDTV? Never. But, I don’t care, because I have a Roku that can!
I did do a reset. It didn’t help the problem. Asking someone to revert to a previous firmware version seems ludicros. What other fixes do I lose by reverting back?
I had the same issue several months ago. I rolled back to the older firmware and haven’t had a problem since. I think it’s a lousy fix to the problem but to me the unit worked fine for my uses so I don’t need and upgrade unless they just add something amazing to it.
