Receivers than can decode AAC 5.1 are rare or even non-existent, although there are ways to convert to AC3 on the fly (I guess wdtv live doesn’t do it).
You can always set it to output to stereo (and not digital… at least you’ll have sound!).
PL
Have only had the unit for 2 days and have random problems with the TV screen going comotose (no picture or sound) but the WD unit is still playing. This occurs regardless of the media source USB / Wired / Wireless. I have to switch off the TV and on again and then movie appears as normaI albiet advanced by the amount of time to resatrt the TV.
This happens on all encoding types and once it starts the frequency of this issue tends to increase. This is only a problem if output is through the HDMI interface. Composite has no problems although I have not tried component.
I have now set video display HDMI to 720p /50Hz an the problme appears to have been resolved. This is workaround and not a fix. My plasma cannot display High Def but I believe WD need to investigate a firmware solution.
Hope this helps someone or anyone.
Exactly the same problem has the wd (generation 2).
As we know the wd live and wd generation 2 have the Microprocessor Sigma 8655.
same issue here! Please, WD, do something about it…
I have set mine to 720p 60hz and still have the problem…I will try 50hz
what good does that do if you wanna watch a 1080p movie which the media player claims to be capable of… got the same problem also with 720p, anyway
I also have similar problems with audio while playing video and mp3 files. I connected using HDMI, I have to try analog and optical sound to isolate the problem. I’ll post more as I gain experience. I’m not sure if this happens to only WD HD TV Live media player only.
Sometimes i notice this problem only happens when you user the fast forward or rewind function. If you let the move run from the start it syncs fine
I have the same issue with AAC in MKV with a different files. It looks like a problem with firmware. The only solution at this time is to reencode AAC track to AC3 with FAAD+Aften.
I have the audio problem, although it doesn’t result in any loss of sync - just a slight pop or very brief silence that happens randomly. I seem to get it most with AAC audio (stereo and 5.1) and to a slightly lesser extent AC-3. Haven’t noticed the problem with MP3 or Vorbis. Only have a 1080i hdtv, but occurs with both 720p and 1080i - haven’t tried any lower resolutions. Most of the video I have is x264, but this problem occurs for all resolutions pretty easily - so I don’t think it has anything to do with hd versus sd content.
Would be great if some firmware upgrade could correct this. Seems like this has been a problem for a few months now and fixing this is much more important to me than updating the youtube interface.
ugh this box sounds like a mess of a nightmare. I realy wanted to like this box as im wanting to build a portable media player. I guess this isnt the time yet. I hope you guys get some fix’s for it soon, its no fun to have a closet full of paperweights.
It’s not just the Live – lots of devices have issues with AAC 5.1 (which isn’t a “standard” in that regard). AppleTV, for one.
AC3 and DTS surround sound work fine. And conversion to one of these standards takes seconds and is easy.
I don’t have any problems with the Live, most of the movies I aquire are AC3 the odd one that is AAC is simple to convert to AC3 within a few minutes using Popcorn.
It does what I want it to do, As far as youtube is concerned, I could do well without it, I have a wireless Internet connection that isnt suited to watching video over the net, no matter how compressed the video is.
You really think I want to watch youtube on a HD TV :smileyvery-happy:
I am also facing this issue i.e. wd live unable to play sound- AAC 5.1 Channel.
Can anyone point me to documentation what are supported audio types (encoding), video types.
Ok. As per the docs AAC is supported.
https://westerndigital.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=735
Dont know why AAC 5.1 does not work?
I thinks docs covers this as well. Open http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=735 and click on specifications and you will see
“An audio receiver is required for multi-channel surround sound digital output”
In short WD live currently doesn’t do this:
Please vote tor this idea:
http://community.wdc.com/t5/WD-TV-Live-Ideas/Live-decoding-AAC-5-1-gt-PCM-5-1/idc-p/26209#M2343
If you do not have an Apple device connected to a discreet 6-channel receiver, you really should not be using AAC 5.1
MP4 and MKV containers support ACC 5.1 passthrough for a tue surround sound into a discreet 6-channel receiver only. Otherwise, you can mix it down to Dolby Pro Logic II or Dolby Surround.
Check the following link for good information:
http://trac.handbrake.fr/wiki/SurroundSoundGuide
This is the Audio help section for HandBrake H264 encoder.
The way to go is to use AC3 passthrough (whic is supported by MP4, but for using with WD TV Live, it is MUC better to use MKV). This is what the WD docs cover when they mention "“An audio receiver is required for multi-channel surround sound digital output” NOT some obscure discreet 6-channel receiver catered by the Apple monopoly.
HandBrake offers a high quality one way re-encoding from MP4 (and/or AAC 5.1) to MKV AC3. I have yet to have the slightest issue playing such files correctly.
A sound format such as AAC 5.1 that would only play correctly on some discreet device that I have never seen in my life is not fit for use. Apple is reinventing the wheel for some unkown reason other than being smart a**es. Life is too short to waste ob such things guys 
use something like HandBrake to re-encode into MKV and enjoy your movies.
Yeah Handbrake is a good tool however it does not allow video passthrough. I am still searching for a good Audio only transcoder so that i dont need to go through video re encoding.
I found MediaCoder and I am going to try that
Actually, using FFMPEG is really the way to go if you can handle a command line interface.
9 times out of 10 most freeware (and about half of all commercial software) uses FFMPEG as it’s engine anyway, so you might as well use it yourself. Translating just the audio is a piece of cake (and if you have problems I can give you the commands you’ll need, although there are plenty of tutorials out there).
If you have an MKV and need to recode just the audio to AC3 (the original track could be DTS or AAC 5.1), check out HeartWare’s Audio Converter.
http://audioconverter.heartware.dk/Tutorial/
Works really well and is completely free. To get full functionality you’ll need to download several free DLLs and plugins but all the links are within the program to do so.
It only works with MKV files, so if you have an MP4 you’ll need to run it through MKVmerge GUI and create an MKV first (only takes a minute).
