7 out of 7 people found this review helpful.
WD HD Media Player - True HD
Date of Review: Jun 7, 2009
The Bottom Line: Excellent quality with very good video playback. Easy to use, plays everything I've thrown at it, and looks good. I am pleased with the purchase and it's an excellent buy.
I purchased this player after purchasing and using an Iomega ScreenPlay HD for approximately 6 months. The ScreenPlay is a small portable player with a bland older DVD-player like interface (blue background, no effects). It does not play HD video formats. While I still like the unit, I decided to upgrade to a new player and chose this WD HD TV player.
The Western Digital HD TV Media Player is a portable device with two USB ports for connecting external storage devices (hard drives, USB flash drives) that connects to your TV to play audio, video, and pictures. It contains Composite (RCA) Audio/Video and HDMI connections. The Composite connections provide a fall-back for those using an older TV, but the true magic of this device is in the 1080p HDMI connection. I am currently using the device connected to a media player I previously used (as the USB external storage with 500GB) and with an HDMI connection to my 720p LCD TV. It's a small, black unit that is nearly invisible in my TV stand. It comes with a small remote control, and I've used the learning function in my universal remote to store all of its functions. The player lacks physical controls on the front of the unit, so don't lose the remote.
After purchasing the unit, I immediately upgraded the firmware. Western Digital is consistently releasing new firmware upgrades, demonstrating that they support the device and are interested in keeping it up to date with new video file formats/codecs, bug fixes, and features. Some recent firmware updates have added subtitle language support, additional audio format support, bug fixes, improving navigation, adding video file format support, as well as other updates. Hopefully this track record will continue.
The interface is truly plug and play. I opened the box, plugged in the AC adapter, connected my HDMI cable (it doesn't come with one, make sure you have or purchase one) and connected the USB cable from my external storage device. The unit starts up reasonably quickly, and scans the attached hard drive. The interface is aesthetically pleasing, but I feel its use of fading and effects add unnecessary delays making it slower than desirable to navigate. I immediately went to the setup (one of the main menu options) and made sure all settings were correct. I then went to the video playing section. You can search for a video, see a list of recently played videos, list all videos in alphabetical order, or navigate through the folder structure of the hard drive to find a video.
Once a video is selected, it begins playing immediately. There is an on-screen interface during video play to see time elapsed and total video time, the name of the file playing, and a visual bar. Again, these effects are aesthetic and better than most DVD players or other media players I have seen or used. Also of note, if you stop a video, the next time you go to play it the player will ask you if you want to resume playback or start over from the beginning.
The fast forward and rewind functions leave something to be desired. Both are slower than I would prefer, and I would like to see "instant replay" and "instant fast forward" buttons that would allow you to jump in 5 or 10 second increments at a time. This feature was on my old media player, and I use it often. There is also no slow-motion option on the remote. Another feature I was looking for after I began using the player was a way to play all videos in a particular folder in order. There is an "option" button on the remote and while a video is playing if you hit it icons appear at the top of the screen. There is a "repeat" icon that I expected to let you toggle a continuous play repeat or a single video repeat, but it doesn't. I have not checked the manual, but from testing it appears to have two settings that do the same thing, and neither is a continuous video play.
Video formats - I've used AVI and MKV container formats. The AVI videos with lower resolutions appear better than when played on my previous media player, which was also connected via HDMI. MKV files are true HD (720p or 1080p) and are absolutely crystal clear. It plays MPEG 1, 2, and 4, WMV9, AVI, MKV (H.264), MOV (MPEG, H.264). It will also play ISO and ripped DVD files directly off the hard drive.
Audio formats - I've only used it with MP3s for just audio, and a variety of encoded formats in videos, but it will also play WMA, OGG, WAC, AAC, FLAC, Dolby Digital, AIF, and MKA. One thing to note - it does not decode DTS. If you attempt to play a video with DTS encoded audio only, it will not play any audio unless the player is connected to a receiver that decodes DTS audio. This is a major shortcoming of the player in my opinion, as converting a DTS track to Dolby Digital or some other audio format is not that straight forward.
It can be used with external drives with FAT32, NTFS, and HFS+ file systems. FAT32 allows for wide compatibility, NTFS provides compatibility with Windows machines and large file sizes, and HFS+ provides compatibility with MacOS machines and provides similar benefits over FAT32. It contains two USB ports to allow connecting multiple hard drives for increased total storage, or using a flash drive and hard drive in tandem.
One other thing to consider: This play does not connect via WIFI for transferring or streaming content off of a computer wirelessly. You must unplug the external hard drive from the player, connect it to your computer, transfer media files to it, disconnect from your computer, and plug it back into the player and wait for the player to read the drive.
