Videos Preview in a Window as You Scroll Through Your File List
Video AutoPlay is another way the WDTV Live Plus makes it easy to find the file you want. As you scroll through your list of videos, you will see a preview pane to the right of the file list. When you stop on a file for a few moments, the video automatically begins to play in the small window as a preview of the movie.
The preview lets you know if this is indeed the file you want to play. This is particularly helpful for obscurely named video files, or those FlipShare videos that you saved to your computer but never renamed. Once you find the video and click on it, the video begins playing in full screen from the beginning.
Similarly, I like the “on deck” song notice. That is, when playing a song in a playlist or album, the name of the next song is displayed in the corner of the screen.
The Good and Bad About Working with Photos
The Good
The WD TV Live Plus HD media player can transfer a full high definition 1080p video signal. Likewise, high megapixel photos are stunning on a 1080p HDTV.
Once you find your desired photos, it's easy to start watching photos as a slideshow. Simply press the play button on the remote and the subsequent photos will be displayed in order. If you want music to accompany the slideshow, start the music playing before starting the slideshow.
The music accompaniment is not limited to the songs in your music library. If you start playing a Pandora or Live365 station, it will continue to play as you navigate to the photo menu and start your slideshow.
The Bad
Finding photos is time consuming as there are only ten thumbnails of folders or files displayed onscreen at a time. Even in the file list mode, only ten files are listed. Western Digital's next model up, the WD TV Live Hub, gives the user the option to view smaller file icons, which makes it easier to scroll through large photo libraries and find the photos you want to view. This would have been a helpful feature on the WD TV Live Plus.
While the Live Plus HD Media Player connects to Flickr, you can't log into your account like you can on other network media players. To see Flickr photos, you must search for the photos you are publicly sharing under your user name.
Compatible Files Mysteriously Won't Play
There is a long list of file formats compatible with the WD TV Live Plus. In fact, just about the only files that aren’t compatible are those with copyright protection --protected digital video file formats that play on only one computer or “Protected AAC” songs bought on iTunes.
However, several times when I chose a file type that was listed as a compatible format, and a message appeared that it couldn’t play that file. It was not easy to find the source of the problem, as other files saved in that same file format would play. Also, the videos that do not play on the WD TV Live Plus, do play on other models of compatible network media players. If you have this problem, I would recommend converting the file to another format (transcoding).
Bottom Line
The WD TV Live Plus HD Media Player is a good choice when buying a network media player. Once you find your way around the menus, it’s pretty easy to use. It is compatible with a large number of file types so it’ll play most media you throw at it. The price may be high for its capabilities at $129.99 but it's a good value at its commonly found price of under $100.
It's 2 USB ports are convenient as you can connect an external hard drive with a stored media library at the same time you connect a USB keyboard or camera. You’ll be able to play your files from DLNA devices and Windows 7, access internet music and movies, and maybe learn a little Japanese through MediaFly.
Still, if you have it in your budget, upgrade to the WD TV Live Hub that has an elegant user interface design and can sync and store your media to its hard drive.
*Note: Hulu Plus is slated to be added to the WD TV Live Plus, but the unit tested did not have the service.