WDTV Live Streaming can't see network shares - But not the usual stuff you're used to reading... ;)

WD Legacy Products WD TV Live Streaming
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Hi all,

My WDTV Live Streaming refuses to see my network shares, either Windows shares or NFS shares. But here’s the twist:

  1. It used to work; and

  2. Two other devices of an identical model on the same network work fine, aswell as an older WDTV Live unit

More info:

* Windows 7 Professional, 32 bit runs the “media server” (nothing fancy, just a file sharing setup)

* Windows shares all set up fine (as evidenced by other players working nicely with them)

* NFS shares via haneWIN NFS all set up fine (as evidenced by other players working nicely with them). (An aside: The NFS shares are *much* faster, and seem to be required for full quality wireless streaming of DVD9 or higher quality video to multiple devices over Wi-Fi. I recommend this approach to anyone experiencing video stutter via Windows shares, especially over WiFi.)

* Network discovery enabled and working on the PC

* Workgroup names are most definitely identical, checked many times

* The WDTV sees the Internet fine and accesses online services

* Netgear DGND3700v2 router runs the network as a DHCP server

* Latest firmware was recently installed on the bad device - 12.14 (however the same problem existed on 9.x and 11.x)

* Windows firewall disabled on the PC for the internal network

The WDTV refuses to see either the PC Windows or NFS shares, just showing the spinning arrow of death.

It *does* see shares from the other WDTV devices. That’s no good to me unfortunately. I haven’t tried playing a file from another WDTV device as it’s a bit of a pain to move disks around.

Other devices (including the PC) *do* see shares from the bad WDTV device if Windows Sharing is enabled on it. However seeing is as far as it gets, no connection can be made.

From my PC, I cannot ping the device, the request times out. I can ping the other two identical devices.

From my router, I *can* ping the device. It shows up in the attached devices list and everything looks normal.

Fixed IPs have been defined for all the WDTV devices on the network by the router, but there’s no other fancy networking going on. Changing the bad device’s IP didn’t help. Releasing the fixed IP and letting it go back to a roaming IP didn’t help. Same results at every stage.

Have tested with all other network devices switched off (other PCs, all other WDTVs, printer, etc.). Same results.

Have investigated browser issues in depth and verified that it doesn’t matter what device is the network’s master browser, the same problem happens.

Warm and cold resets have all been performed, aswell as a factory defaults reset. The same results came from tests at every stage: the device can connect to the network and see the Internet, and appears to be working fine in all regards, but it won’t see the network shares.

This device used to connect the Windows and NFS shares for severl months. I moved it from the bedroom to the lounge room when a new TV arrived, and it stopped working right then. I had a network cable in the lounge, but hooking it up to the wired network didn’t help. Same results. (I haven’t verified that wired networking still doesn’t work after moving the device back to the bed room, but I’m sure it’s still the case as there’s no reason to think it would be different in a different spot.)

I suspected hardware problems for a while. But the fact that it’s got a live network and Internet connection doesn’t support that idea.

Netflix is no good to me in Australia and we’re well sorted for music streaming, so this device is a very frustrating brick at the moment. I can’t even give it away in good consience because it probably won’t work for the recipient.

Any ideas?

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Ok, all fixed. It’s been broken for a couple of weeks, and in a final act of trial-and-error desperation I upgraded the firmware on the router. When it came back up, the WDTV was happy again.

The strange thing is I had previously removed all networking settings and cold started the router while all the devices on the network were off and rebuilt the network settings from scratch. (It looked like a network issue all along.)

I doubt it was a router firmware problem. It’s just that the re-installation gave whatever network gremlins were causing grief a kick in the guts. So I still don’t know if this was my PC, the router, the WDTV, or a combination of all.

1 Like
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Good to know you sorted…

Otherwise I’ll have to read the entire post :smileyvery-happy:

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Otherwise I’ll have to read the entire post :smileyvery-happy:

:laughing:

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Hi, hopkin

Don’t suppose you ever sorted out exactly what it was on your system that was causing the problem?

The reason that I ask is that I have the EXACT same problem as you describe so clearly, WDTV Live Streaming, same Netgear router, Windows 7 (only Home Premium in my case but the 64-bit version) on two machines on the network,  etc, etc.  even down to the level that the WDTV worked previously then suddenly lost contact with the Windows shares.  In fact, the only real differences that I can see between your setup and mine are that I only have the one WDTV unit and I’m only using Windows shares not NFS.

Apart from those minor differences, you could have been describing my problem exactly, hence my interest if you ever cracked the details of your solution.  Any feedback appreciated if you did.

Otherwise, thanks for posting that you did eventually get your setup working - gives me some hope that it can be fixed!  Time to follow your “nuclear” option and rebuild the network.

Mike

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Sometimes there ARE gremlins lurking in the network (that was working fine until . . . ), and the best way to purge them is to totally shut down the entire network/ PC system (i.e. turn everything off except the kitchen toaster) and start turning things on again one at a time, beginning with the modem, then router, network switches, PC, and then other gadgets.

This is good practice to do every so often – even if things appear to be working fine; especially after any sudden power failures.  For example, my network seemed fine one time, then I discovered my internet bandwidth dropped to almost nothing.  My wife said her connection was fine.  Hmmm, after some detective work, I found it was bad at two of my PCs; WDTV, Roku, were fine. 

It turned out that the two PCs with problems were attached to two different network switches of the same model.  I removed power from them, turned them back on and problem was solved.  Then I remembered a power failure the day before.  A few days later another storm caused a millisecond power blip (the lights barely flickered, but not dimmed) and darn if those two network switches (that had worked fine for many years) got slammed again.  I reset them again and problem was gone.  So, after power gliches, I always bring down the network and start it back up again to kill off any lurking gremlins… 

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Hi, Mike27

Thanks for the useful advice - I’ll give that a try.

Do I understand you correctly that you did a cold start of the router, i.e., power off, wait, power on? That would certainly be easier than hopkin’s “nuclear option”, which I understood to be a complete reset to factory defaults and rebuild of the entire network.

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MikeDavies wrote:

Hi, Mike27

 

Thanks for the useful advice - I’ll give that a try.

 

Do I understand you correctly that you did a cold start of the router, i.e., power off, wait, power on? That would certainly be easier than hopkin’s “nuclear option”, which I understood to be a complete reset to factory defaults and rebuild of the entire network.

What I described is rather simple: turn everything OFF (i.e. no electricity); starting with the gadgets, PCs, and work your way back to the router, modem.  No resetting of anything to defaults, or re-installing Windows (yikes!) or any of that radical stuff.  Also, “Standby” is not same as “power off” –  ya gotta remove the electricity from the units to be at that state.  Sometimes the power company does this for you – when you least expect it!

Since lots of electronics don’t have actual power switches anymore, you need to pull the plug from the socket for those.  Unless, you have done what I did and buy at Home Depot, a lot of inline ON/OFF switches for many of my gadgets that don’t have an on/off switch.  So now, there’s a plug-in “power switch” between the plug and the wall socket (or extension cord).  Rule of thumb; if unit does not have a REAL power switch, you need to pull the plug.  You may be able to accomplish powering down many units at once if they are all plugged into a surge supressor.  In this case, unplug the surge surpressor.  I do, but I prefer to turn things back on one at a time; hence the on/off switches on certain units.  Some things (like my WD and Roku players) boot back up when electricity is reapplied. 

Just be sure that for any units that have drives attached, you “safely remove hardware” first by dismounting the drive by ejecting it, etc.  BEFORE removing any power.  I always need to go though my mental list so I don’t forget about anything I have like this.  In my case, it is drives for the WD player and a Pogoplug device.

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Mike

Thanks for the clarification.  You’ll be pleased to know that I have already had some success by doing a limited power down of part of my network, specifically a hub that served a number of devices including a PC and a wireless access point.  On powering back up, it had an immediate effect in two ways:

1.  My Windows 7 PC (which was part of the limited power down) was able to construct a much more accurate network map than it had done previously.

2.  My WDTV started to recognise Windows shares again.  The interesting thing was that the WDTV was NOT in the part of the network powered down nor were all the shares that it suddenly rediscovered!

The next step is to do a power down and power up of the entire network as you describe and see what happens.  However, for domestic reasons, that will have to wait for a suitable opportunity, i.e., when nobody is using the network!

I will post the results on here as soon as I can.

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  The next step is to do a power down and power up of the entire network as you describe and see what happens.  However, for domestic reasons, that will have to wait for a suitable opportunity, i.e., when nobody is using the network!

I know what you mean!  I have to do same.  So, send the whole family out Xmas shopping for YOUR presents on Saturday, and then bring the whole thing down and back up.  You’ll kill two birds with one stone.   :wink: 

Glad things are progressing for you so far.