I'm rarely this enthusiastic about a product. There are definitely downsides, but nothing significant enough for me to really feel there are major flaws. I owned (and still own, actually) the regular TV and loved it, but really disliked the lack of networking support. I went to a trade show and Western Digital was there. I mentioned this to their representatives and he told me they were releasing a version with networking support in a couple of weeks. I had to pick one up as soon as possible.
What I expected was the original with the ability to access network shares via SMB, but I also expected the UI to still be a little slow and difficult when setting up the network. I was very surprised at how simple it was to set things up. I decided to go the WiFi route rather than Ethernet and it really just involved finding a compatible WiFi adapter on WD's compatibility list (I picked a Belkin because it had a stand) and plugging it in. It found my router right away, I entered the password and I was connected very quickly. I had absolutely no issues streaming anything over the WiFi, which was very surprising. I figured huge 1080p MKV files would be an issue, but they played incredibly well. The UI was extremely quick and responsive. Previews even worked quickly over the WiFi. Connecting to shares on my computer was absolutely no problem. I am just in awe of how well it works. After using an AppleTV, which in theory should work better because it's so limited in its network functionality, I just figured there would be problems. Western Digital really got it right. Plus there's YouTube support and it works really well, too.
The downsides are few but they do get kind of annoying here and there. The main issue that bothers me the most is that when I add something to a folder on a network share, it doesn't update on the WD TV Live. This is understandable to and extent, but there ought to be a reload button or function of some kind to work around this. Currently the only way to reload the folder is to click home and reconnect. It's not a huge deal, but it would be really great if it wasn't necessary. Other annoyances fall under a lack of options, mainly. For example, thought preview mode work exceptionally well (where you have a list of videos and it shows a little window that previews the selected video) you're required to have sound along with the preview. That's useful if you're not sure what the video is, but if you already know and you're leaving the television on for a few minutes before watching (like you get a phone call, for example) then you have sound playing constantly. There are obviously two work-arounds: mute the TV or select a folder or photo rather than a video file. Nonetheless, it would be nice to have the option to simply turn off sound and only have a visual preview mode. In terms of setup options there aren't many. You don't have as much control over the WD TV Live as you do with the regular WD TV. This is unfortunate in some ways, because options are always nice, but in others it makes the setup really simple. I'd feel very comfortable recommending the WD TV Live to a novice more so than the WD TV because it's much more simple to setup. The thing is, this sort of device probably doesn't appeal too much to a person who doesn't know much about media files because it doesn't provide any means of content acquisition (like the AppleTV does with the iTunes store). It assumes the user has content already, which means they're either generating it themselves or acquiring it on the Internet without the assistance of the WD TV Live. Neither of those things are necessarily simple (in the same way the WD TV Live is) and so I think it makes more sense to add a little complexity through additional features and settings rather than remove them for the sake of simplicity.
Overall, however, there's very little to complain about. Though I don't use this for photos and music and can't really comment on how well those aspects of the WD TV Live work, I'm extremely pleased with nearly all aspects of video performance and would gladly recommend it to others.Get more detail about Western Digital WD TV Live Network-ready HD Media Player WDBAAN0000NBK-NESN.
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