I had indeed read carefully all comments from this youtube video but was still a little bit cautious and on the safe side, since it’s a bit dated now (Oct.14).
But now that you DID confirm that you installed it yourself on your 02.43.10-048 MBL, it potentially clears away my doubts regarding its feasibility.
I successfully installed minidlna on a WD MBL firmware 02.43.10-048 and so far it seems to work like a charm, particularly when streaming media from my LG TV that used to be so awfully sluggish.
It’s now fast (at least 5x to 10x !) and so reliable … like day and night (well, like chalk and cheese in English), really !
I made a few comments of my own in the step-by-step procedure to help those who would also like to take a plunge
You can find it HERE.
A problem occurs in the very last step of the tutorial, though (step #26) : the log shows unexpected errors in the folder scanning process …
For the $20, you’d enjoy Twonky 8 a lot more than miniDLNA. It’s a very functional and flexible media server…much much better than the DLNA server that comes on the MBLs.
First off Twonky has a web based user interface for the user to set all the parameter. MiniDLNA does not, the user must set all the parameter in the text based config file.
Twonky makes it extremely easy to select exactly which shares, folders, file types, etc that you want to media serve. You can set it to display the content by a variety of various methods (album, artist, genre, folder, etc) - total customization.
You can set the library rescan interval to whatever you need so that the MBL isn’t bogged down with doing rescan at times of the day when you need its CPU power for other things.
You can control the serving process directly from the Twonky web interface, sending content directly to a media receiver of your choice (sort of like casting).
You can aggregate all media content across multiple devices and have Twonky serve it all in one giant seamless library.
Twonky even serves audiobooks as a separate media type in addition to the basic three of photo, music, video.
and much more.
I tried many of the media servers out there. Twonky 8 is an excellent choice for the MBL.
That’s quite impressive (compared to the minidlna features) but I don’t understand how these media server powerful features can perform in a MBL ?
Maybe I am confused but the ultimate goal is to update the firmware of a network drive (MBL) so it can perform fast responses in a residential LAN where different clients stream its contents (particularly a sluggish TV like LG).
Where can the Twonky powerful interface take place in this picture ?
I currently run a MBL with the most recent firmware. I have installed Twonky 8 and many other programs (Transmission, OpenVPN, ownCloud, and many others). My MBL is not overloaded at all. In fact it runs at low CPU usage rates. And i have no problems with sluggishness when streaming to two or three devices wirelessly from the MBL Twonky media server simultaneously. That said, I also have a cheap 80mm fan under the MBL keeping it cool. I found that the biggest problem with MBL performance was that the CPU got hot and then became sluggish.
There is an excellent hack called FeaturesPackManager that you should install. It will allow you to see the performance stats of your MBL so that you can determine if you have a MBL sluggish problem or if it is actually just a problem with your device receiving the media stream.
[quote=“wdlive76, post:29, topic:135430, full:true”]
There is an excellent hack called FeaturesPackManager that you should install. It will allow you to see the performance stats of your MBL so that you can determine if you have a MBL sluggish problem or if it is actually just a problem with your device receiving the media stream.[/quote]
Will do !
That’s definitely very interesting, I never suspected the MBL proc overload as part of my sluggishiness problem … !
But yet, how to explain (as I said in headerpost) that streaming the MBL from a PC is not a problem at all (fast and reliable) whereas streaming it from an “improbable” device such as the LG Smart TV makes video watching a real pain (to put it mildly ).
If it were an MBL proc overload, this sluggishness would be the same whatever the client … am I wrong ?
Agree, Twonky is much better than minidlna. My router puts minidlna on the attached drive, and as far as I can tell, there is no way to configure. When it got corrupted, the only way to fix it was to delete minidlna data from drive, and let things start over by reconnecting drive to router. With minidlna, you get what you pay for; not much.
If Twonky does not improve things, it might just be time to look into upgrading to one of the many choices in the My Cloud family of NAS devices (that has Twonky built-in)
You can install Twonky 8 for a free two week trial, and then see if you like it. I personally like it a lot.
Honestly, with Twonky 8 and a good cooling fan for the MBL, you shouldn’t have any problems at all. I’ve been running it like this for 5 years. I have a MBL Duo which has a USB port on the back. From that USB port I have a USB hub. And attached to that hub are 4 additional 4TB hard drives. I have those additional drives full of media content. And Twonky streams it all (the 4 USB drives and the MBLD itself) all perfectly.
The other thing I would recommend for your LG TV is to just forget about the ‘smart’ feature of the TV. There is no TV which is really that ‘smart’. Instead I recommend that you get yourself an android Kodi box and attach it to the TV. This box will really make your TV smart. Kodi will play any type of media you serve it perfectly. Anything. And absolutely no sluggishness at all. Never. I used to have a WD TV Live, but once I tried Kodi, there is no contest. It’s thousands of times better than any ‘smart’ TV, it costs very little, it can be attached to any TV, and it is constantly being upgraded to bigger and better.
I might consider this KODI option after I will have made tests with the minidlna I just installed on my MBL.
In fact, I only use my TV to stream medias from my LAN (essentially the WD MBL) because I soon abandoned WAN streaming or browsing the @ on the LG ‘Smart’ TV … to doing so, I better sit behind my PC !
Your KODI box sounds amazingly cheap and powerful : quad proc + internal memory + multiple connectivity for less than 35USD … I gotta give it a try.
Just an idea : I have seen that some KODI boxes have several USB ports, why not getting rid of my MBL (only 1Tb !) and connect cheap 1-2Tb USB drives to a KODI ?
This is not really good news for WD (unless I buy USB drives from them ) but that might be the best solution considering what we all said about the MBL poor performance and overheating … ?
Yes, you can attach some external hard drives via USB to a Kodi box. It will work fine. I don’t use it like that personally because I have multiple devices on my LAN which need access to the files - so a NAS like MBL works perfectly for me.
Yes, that Kodi box you linked to is what i am talking about. However, i would suggest that you get one with 2GB of memory, not 1 GB, so it will cost a bit more than $35. Something like this Also, if you can follow some basic hacking instructions, you could buy a Amazon TV FireStick ($40) and install Kodi onto it. The Amazon stick doesn’t have USB ports and it is WiFi only, so you need a NAS and a good router, if you decide to go that way.
The LG TV is connected to the KODI thru HDMI
The KODI is linked to one (or several) USB HDs for media storage
The KODI is connected to my LAN/WAN via Ethernet
How does my PC “see” the KODI USB drives in the LAN ?
Can I mount them as network drives and assign them individually a drive letter ?
[quote=“wdlive76, post:34, topic:135430, full:true”]
Also, if you can follow some basic hacking instructions, you could buy a Amazon TV FireStick ($40) and install Kodi onto it. The Amazon stick doesn’t have USB ports and it is WiFi only, so you need a NAS and a good router, if you decide to go that way.[/quote]
My router WiFi is OK (dual-band N) and stands less than 10ft from the TV but as I am not in the US, the Amazon Stick may be not the best solution for me.
Your PC would only be able to see content that the media server built into Kodi is serving to the LAN. Your PC would not be able to see documents, etc. That’s why a MBL is so useful. Kodi is not a Windows server or a Mac server. It is primarily a client program, but it does have media server built in - which i’ve never used. Does that make sense? Kodi (amoung many things) is both a media player (a client) and a media server.
