Pre-purchase Qs: mostly about using WDTVLH as SMB or DLNA server

WD Legacy Products WD TV Live Hub Discussions
#1

Hi all:

The WDTVLH looks like it may offer a good solution for me, but I have a couple of questions that I’ve not been able to find authoritative answers to yet, and I’d appreciate any information forum members could offer.

  1. Can the unit stream files stored on a newtork share to a DLNA device, or can it only do so from its own internal (or USB) discs?

  2. If I attach 2x 2TB drives to the unit, are these, and its internal 1 TB all available for access via SMB?

  3. Can HFS+ format discs be used via USB?  Can they be shared by the unit via SMB for both reading and writing? What about journalling: is that an issue as it seems to be with the WDTV Live HD?  Ideally, I’d use HFS+(journalled) as I could then just move the drive to my Mac if need be.  NTFS and FAT32 are not options.

  4. When operating as a NAS only, will the unit spin down discs , including USB, when idle?

  5. I tried Twonky for a time on my Mac, but the interface is not to my liking at all.   Am I right in thinking that the unit uses Twonky to provide DLNA services?  Is it something that can just be set up once, or will I have to deal with the silly interface on a regular basis? Can DLNA services be controlled through the remote, or only through the (Twonky) web interface?

  6. Can USB hubs be attached to the unit - my research suggests that despite the claims of unlimited storage expansion, they cannot.

Thanks in advance to all who take the time to read and respond.

#2

  1.  From what I can tell, it’ll only stream from its local storage, not network shares.

  2. Yes.

  3. Yes, as long as journaling is disabled on those volumes.   I THINK that if Journaling is enabled, the drive is mounted READ ONLY, but I’m not sure about that.    As long as journaling is disabled, it’s Read Writeable.

  4. Not sure.    I think so, but the thing is so quiet, I can’t tell.

  5. You shouldn’t have to use the Twonky interface unless you’re changing configuration, or you need to force a re-scan.   It’s configured only through the WebUI.   The ENABLE/DISABLE part is configurable via the remote.

  6. Officially, no.   But several people have reported that they do work, but you CANNOT attach more than one drive per host USB port.   So you could use a hub to do HD / WiFi / Keyboard, but not HD / HD.

#3

(4)…  Usb and internal disk remain on and spinning. They only stop with Hard shutdown.

#4

Thanks for the replies.

There are a couple of disappointments there unfortunately; I’m not sure if they’ll be deal-breakers though.

  1. I have a DLNA TV, and the only DLNA server I can get for my old G5 iMac using 10.4.11 is Twonky, and I find it just a bit clunky.  I was hoping the Hub would be able to do the job for me.  Seems it can for local files, but not in the general case. 

  2. Great!

  3. That’s what I’d suspected - I can work with that.

  4. Disappointing.  I can understand the rationale mind you - who wants to wait around for a disc to spin up? Still, in this setting, where the server may be idle for all but a few hours a day, the option of having the drives spin down would be nice.

  5. That’s OK, but given Issue 1 above, the DLNA server aspect looks to be a bit weak for other reasons, especially coupled with what looks like a 5TB hard limit on local storage.  (I know - 5TB is a lot – it’ll probably be enough.  If I exceed that, then I’ll have to bite the bullet and put in a proper NAS/DLNA server at considerably greater expense.)

  6. Well - that’s a disappointment too, and gives an effective 5 TB limit on storage. Again though maybe it’s enough - except that I’ve got about 2.5 TB of TS files after about 6 months, which is why I’m looking for the next step to take.  Compression is an option, except that it is slow, and I’ve got some compatibility issues in terms of what the SW I have can produce, and what the devices I have can decode - another reason for looking at the WD TV option - as a gateway.

New business:

  1. I’m trialling a WD TV LIve HD now, and it’s quite nice.  It’ll do most of what the hub will do (DLNA being the biggest exception; and a 4 TB limit).  I struck a snag last night with the fast forwarding mechanism however.  On returning to play after FF, it would start not at the position I thought I had stopped, but perhaps a minute either side of it.  This is with the current firmware.  I have read other reports of this on the web.

 My question 7 is, does the hub suffer from this problem?  That could be a deal breaker: I abandoned using it to watch something last night as I just could not skip over the ads efficiently.

#5

 

  1. Well - that’s a disappointment too, and gives an effective 5 TB limit on storage. Again though maybe it’s enough - except that I’ve got about 2.5 TB of TS files after about 6 months, which is why I’m looking for the next step to take.  Compression is an option, except that it is slow, and I’ve got some compatibility issues in terms of what the SW I have can produce, and what the devices I have can decode - another reason for looking at the WD TV option - as a gateway.

 

You can always add NAS storage.  The WD My Book Live HDDs work very will with the Hub - I have 2 of the 2TB Lives on my network - and have higher transfer rates than the Hub for copying and moving files from your PC. Other NAS will work fine as well.

#6

NAS storage may ultimately be part of the solution, but it’s a bit pricey for me at the moment to do it properly.  It also doesn’t answer the multi-format compatability aspect.  It’s a combined NAS/DLNA/multi-format player I want, like those WD makes.  The problem is, they seem at the moment to have what for me is a deal-breaking bug with handling fast-forwarding.  I’ve got a support call open with WD over that.

If I give up on that part, the My Book Live may be an option, although it too seems to have “issues”.   One is that the 2TB version is said to be expensive (and I haven’t yet found a supplier here (NZ)); another is that the alleged “daisy chaining” of drives is at most 1 link long (some chain!), giving a maximum storage of 3 TB (or possibly 4 TB); I haven’t confirmed yet, but I doubt if it supports multiple dirves on a hub; another is that it has an older version of Twonky apparently, one with MKV problems (although any server function at all is really a bonus in this scenario).

Let’s see what WD have to say about the FF/RW problem.

#7

About point five,

Why do’t you get network storage device, so that all you media is available to the WDTV LH?

I use Seagates GoFlex Home with 3TB on borad and another Seagate GoFlex Desk (USB plugged into the GoFlex Home unit) . This makes 6TB available to all on the network.

#8

Principally cost.

Independently, I have a need for a device to  play multiple video formats.

Also, DLNA services would be useful.

The WD offerings, on paper, address these needs.  The practice is proving a bit different.

I’m just getting annoying irrelevant static from the WD person handling the support request I sent.  It was a pretty simple question about whether the WD TV Live Hub has the same problem with FF/RW as the WD TV Live HD.

So far, in two rounds, I’ve been told to reset the WD TV Live HD, to update its firmware, or to return it.  No comment at all has been made about the WD TV Live Hub, or about the status of this problem in general!

Even if the FF issue wasn’t a deal breaker, this unresponsive support could well be.

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