The new Play follows the template set by the new Apple TV and Roku, with a square housing and a blue bottom. I described the clicker that came with 's WD TV Live as a "wonderful, hateful remote" that despite its reasonable size and feel had tall, rubbery buttons. This year's version is much improved with buttons that are much easier to press and a simplified layout -- the colored buttons are gone, for example. The WD's apps include Facebook, Twitter!
While there is a games app on the WD -- which perhaps gives the device its "Play" name -- the games are less diverting than most smartphone apps. It boasts a "tabletlike user interface" that actually is both configurable and easy to use. Apps such as Spotify and Weather still use the old Mochi interface with its large tabs, while the Netflix interface is the same as used by most other set-top boxes.
The interface is very configurable, with a My Favorites page that lets you choose which of the 30 apps you want shortcuts to. Photo slideshows and music files worked just fine as well. Mirroring a Windows 8. The wireless connection between the Windows 8.
Miracast could also be a good way to workaround the lack of certain video streaming apps on the WD TV, but it's less than ideal. App load times were an issue. They varied from about two seconds for local media apps to over 20 seconds for online video streaming apps like YouTube and Hulu. With its focus on files and seemingly half-hearted support for apps and streaming services, the WD TV is meant clearly for people who have a collection of videos on a hard drive somewhere.
Its file support is hard to beat and its handling of enormous video files is fantastic. If you want lots of apps, stick to Roku. For the person who is looking for a front end to a local media library, the WD TV is an excellent choice.
The picture quality was frustratingly dire. Flickr's implementation lacks polish, you can only see photo streams and not collections or sets, plus photos often have the wrong aspect ratio. The Twitter and Facebook apps also lack refinement, requiring additional zooming to read complete messages and postings. We also found that the WD TV Play box sometimes took an age to start up, and couldn't be guaranteed to work at all if the USB had a flash drive in it at boot up. Media streamed from a home network or from local storage is presented in an inefficient and rather dull fashion, with folder structures often not recognised.
One of the arguments in favour of Apple's ecosystem is that compatibility is determined by the client - in other words, if it plays in iTunes, it plays on Apple TV. We were able to play a wide selection of other files reliably and stably from a flash drive, though, including MKVs with embedded subtitles. The remote control and user interface offer a fair degree of customisation, and the smartphone app is a highly rewarding way of operating the box.
Eventually you could learn which files the box prefers, so of more concern is the instability when using video on-demand apps, especially BBC iPlayer. Other apps also lack polish. As long as your TV supports one of those inputs, it will be compatible. Additionally, Western Digital offers an Android and iOS app that turns practically any smartphone or tablet into a smart remote.
There are also third-party Live-specific remotes that work as well. WD stands for Western Digital, and while the company may be most known for its mechanical hard drives, it also makes many entertaining products, such as this media player.
This media box lets you enjoy local media and stream remote media while also adding many smart features to your home-entertainment setup. The affordable WD TV Live media box has been available in a number of configurations, including the:.
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