Western Digital announces WD TV Live Plus HD with Netflix streaming
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted June 9th 2010 10:48AM
posted June 9th 2010 10:48AM
We have even more news from Western Digital regarding its WD TV line (and this time around it doesn't involve bricking your set-top box with a firmware update). Besides the usual suspects (including Pandora, Live365, and YouTube), the WD TV Live Plus HD is shipping with Netflix. Get ready to browse titles, manage your Instant Queue, and stream your favorite episodes of Degrassi: The Next Generation on your HDTV -- in addition to accessing your sizable collection of legally purchased digital media via the device's USB connection and / or Windows 7 "Play To" functionality. Available now for $150. PR after the break.
New WD TV(R) Live Plus HD Media Player Delivers Thousands of TV Episodes and Movies for Netflix(R) Members to Watch Instantly
WD TV(R) Live Plus HD Media Player Enables Consumers to Stream Their Favorite Shows and Personal Content Directly To Their Big Screen TV
LAKE FOREST, Calif., June 9 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- WD® (NYSE: WDC), the world's leader in external storage solutions, today introduced the WD TV® Live Plus HD media player, which makes it easy for Netflix® members to instantly watch thousands of TV episodes and movies on the biggest screen in their home -- their HD television set. The new Netflix interface enables members to browse and add movies to their instant Queue on the Netflix Website right from their TV.
In addition to Netflix, the WD TV Live Plus HD media player also enables users to stream personalized Internet content from YouTube™, Flickr®, Pandora®, Live365™, as well as the MediaFly network which includes daily podcasts from CNN, NBC, MTV, ESPN® and other online content providers(1). Unlike most other Netflix-capable devices, the WD TV Live Plus HD media player also lets consumers enjoy a broad variety of the digital media they already own, creating a unified entertainment experience.
The onscreen menu brings together all of the users' available media in an elegant and simple-to-navigate interface, while the network capability enables users to stream movies from PC or Mac® computers, USB storage devices such as My Passport® portable hard drives, My Book® desktop drives, or network-attached storage such as WD's My Book® World Edition™ and WD ShareSpace™ to their HDTVs. Compatible with Windows® 7, the WD TV Live Plus HD media player enables the Windows 7 Play To feature so users can initiate and control the streaming of video, music or photos to the media player and home entertainment systems from any Windows 7-based PC on their network.
The WD TV Live Plus HD media player fulfills consumers' growing demand for large libraries of digital videos, photos and music. According to research firm Parks Associates, the average broadband household will see its digital media storage needs grow to nearly 900 GB by year-end 2014. And users are increasingly looking for easy ways to enjoy the content on the big screen. Parks' findings reveal that the sales of connected consumer electronics devices, such as connected TVs and digital media adapters, is expected to more than double from 57 million units in 2009 to 115 million units in 2013 (Home Networks for Consumer Electronics 2009).
Similar to the popular generations of WD TV HD media players that preceded it, the WD TV Live Plus HD media player connects directly to a users' HDTV and plays almost any file stored on a connected USB drive such as My Passport portable hard drives. The WD TV Live Plus HD media player features powerful media processing, which enables playback in Full-HD 1080p resolution. WD TV Live Plus HD media player also plays movies, music and photos stored on other popular USB devices such as digital camcorders and digital cameras.
"Netflix has become a 'must have' for consumer electronics devices," said Netflix vice president of business development Bill Holmes. "We're proud to align with WD to include Netflix on WD's groundbreaking WD TV Live Plus HD media player."
"While Netflix can be found on an increasing number of products such as Internet TVs, Blu-ray Players, video game consoles, and other stand-alone devices, the WD TV Live Plus HD media player is unique as it allows digital media buffs to access and play all of their own personal HD media stored anywhere on their network or USB drives. At the same time they can easily stream Netflix, Pandora, YouTube and other Internet favorites to their HDTV," said Dale Pistilli, vice president of marketing for WD's branded products group.
WD TV Live Plus HD Media Player
Features of the WD TV Live Plus HD media player include:
* Full-HD 1080p video playback and navigation with the included remote control and crisp, animated navigation menus;
* Access to thousands of TV episodes and movies to watch instantly for any Netflix member with an unlimited subscription;
* Wireless ready to support wireless network connection to your home network with an optional USB wireless adapter, which is sold separately;
* Supports a wide variety of the most popular file formats with no need to spend time transcoding;
* Play videos, music and photos from the Internet on your big screen TV and discover new music with Pandora Internet radio or listen to thousands of radio stations via Live365 Internet radio, daily podcasts from the MediaFly network including CNN, NBC, MTV, ESPN and other online content providers;
* Ethernet port for wired or WiFi connection(2) to access files anywhere on the network to play movies, music, and photos from any PC or drive on a home network;
* Turns a USB drive(3) into an HD media player and plays content from most popular USB drives, digital cameras, camcorders, and portable media players that can be recognized as mass storage devices;
* Unlimited media collection, just add more USB drives for more space;
* Two USB ports that allow seamless media playback from multiple USB drives displayed in a single list and sorted by media type;
* Windows 7-compatible Play To feature enables users to stream Windows 7 computer files to the TV through WD TV Plus HD media player;
* Transfer files by copying, moving or deleting files stored on a USB drive, a network drive, camcorder, or a camera to the attached USB drive using the on-screen menus;
* Works with digital cameras, digital video cameras and any other digital imaging device that supports Picture Transfer Protocol;
* Advanced navigation options including thumbnail and list views, media library and search;
* Photo viewing to create custom slide shows, zoom and pan and search;
* Movie viewing with fast-forward, rewind, pause, zoom and pan, view subtitles, and search;
* Music playback with fast-forward, rewind, pause, shuffle, repeat and search;
* HDMI® 1.3 port, composite video and component video output(4) for the highest quality HDTV or home theater;
* SPDIF digital output that sends digital signals to your AV receiver for the best surround sound experience; and,
* Ultra-compact design to fit easily into a home entertainment center.
Pricing and Availability
The WD TV Live Plus HD media player is available now at select retailers and online at shopwd.com. Covered by a 1-year limited warranty, the MSRP for WD TV Live Plus HD media player is $149.99 USD.
Hey! Don't be dissing Degrassi: The Next Generation! The Borg was not something to mess around with!
Oh, wait...
so wait. can we firmware update our regular live boxes to get the netflix love? if its only for a whole new player, that is straight up lame. i just checked there site and saw no new update...i will keep my fingers crossed
What is a good cheap media player these days that can play lots of formats from a NAS over LAN or wireless?
@Marko
If you're going HD and you can grab an Xbox 360 for 199 if you don't have a blu ray player then I say a ps3 for 299 xbox has netflix built in but requires an xbox live membership which is 50 bucks a year or less playstation requires a disc for netflix but is free. If HD doesn't matter and you're skill sets are decent you can buy a wii and run homebrew ut will play pretty much anything and you can rip its required netflix disc to an external hard drive as well as videos and backed up copies of games and share with a NAS via wifi its 199 also, hope that helped
@Marko The WD Live that doesn't play Netflix is down to $99 now and besides certain finicky WMV's it plays anything and everything I can throw at it off any network share.
I wish there were a little box like this that I could hook up to other TV's in my home that would act as a mythtv frontend. Cheap and do 1080p would be sweet!
@Marko
I got a Brite-View CinemaTube a couple of months ago for $90. Although it can play off attached storage, I have to connected to my network and it plays off my DLNA-streaming NAS (a QNAP).
I love it. It's played everything I've thrown at it so far (avi/mkv/mp4).
@C64person Now does it have gig ethernet? I have a ton of blu-ray iso rips (legal) that I want to use for the kid's room.
Cant wait for it to show up at work!
You can get it a lot cheaper than 150 on amazon.
I've got one of these, is this going to be included in the next firmware update (the last one caused me no end of problems and I had to downgrade to an older one)?
@admlshake
Never mind, i just saw that it's for the "Plus" model. I've only got the live HD.
Well that just sucks, for me...I just bought the Live HD model a month or two ago! Doh!!
The WDTV is a great media player, and it handles every video I've thrown at it without a problem, but it could really use some UI tweaks. Fast-forwarding or rewinding a movie takes FOREVER...a 5-10 minute skip function is desperately needed!
One last thing that I think would make the WDTV a 1000 times better, wifi remote apps for android/iphone etc...man that would be sweet!
@toptekjon
I have the first WDTV they released, and on that old brick you can use the skip buttons to jump 10 min while forwarding/rewinding - bet you can do that on your newer one.
@toptekjon - while fast forwarding, press next, it should skip 5 minutes
@toptekjon Samee question here. Would I be able to upgrade my live HD to see netflix? Currently I use PlayON for that.
Functionality is good but UI is laggy and dated.
@toptekjon you can skip 10 minutes at a time by clicking on the fastworward >> button once and then clicking on the next chapter button >>| - Hope this helps.
@toptekjon When fast forwarding hit the next button. It will skip 10 minutes forward.
@toptekjon,
The WD HD TV player has fast forwarding - just click FF and then the button below (NEXT), every clicking the (NEXT) button would forward the movie 10 min ahead. This feature was introduced in one of the very first firmware upgrades of the WD HD TV player.
@user777
Awesome, thanks to all for the tip!
.....and god bless the internets!
A completely new unit to stream from an additional source? I hope you're kidding. If Roku can add streaming sources on their current units, I don't understand why WD cannot.
I'll wait for the next Apple TV for $99
So, what happens with the folks that bought the WDTV Live HD? will there be an update to enable Netflix? It is pretty crappy that they released a whole new product when all that is needed is a software patch and the only difference is Netflix and DVD navigation.
What is even more frustrating is that in their forums they indicated that this would be coming to the current batch of WDTV Live devices.
@nekroscope - I'll be pretty pissed if they don't add it to the current WD TV Live HD. You're right that it shouldn't require new hardware.
@nekroscope
Yeah I just bought mine a month ago, and I will be very pissed if we don't get some sort of update that gives us these new features. There shouldn't a single reason why we can't use them.
@nekroscope Exactly. Are they seriously trying to tell us is takes more computing power to stream netflix, when I can stream it via playon if i wanted to on my WD Live? My guess is Netflix want a cut of sales, hence this new device.
I'm really glad I walked away from WD Live and move to my Acer Revo.
I don't see anything in the technical specs of "features" any different from my WD Live.
@nekroscope If they don't, I'm never buying from WD again, cause this is some straight up bullshit. Making a whole "new" player just to add a streaming source is super lame. When you know damn well it could have just been added to the current Live HD model.
My feeling is that they wont offer an upgrade to the "old" HD model because then this new one would be almost exactly the same, so it would have no reason to exist.
@nekroscope The WD TV Live won't ever get netflix, because netflix requires hardware DRM that the Live lacks. But even if you accept that logic, to introduce the upgrade as a surprise only 7 months after the previous model is pretty poor customer relations. Not a first for WD, though.
@jd123 Good to know, I can certainly learn to live without broken-by-design hardware.
Hopefully we can receive an update on this. I currently have the Live HD model and I'm using PlayOn to watch my Netflix movies. It's okay, but the access to it is slow and buggy.
@versedout slow, buggy and frustrating to the point where I gave up on it. The Wii steams Netflix far better than using Playon through the HDTV Live.
Hey Western Digital, how about some firmware updates and UI refreshes for older WDTVs?
Bullcrap. Contains almost all the features requested for firmware updates to older generation hardware.
I guess I'll have to wait and see if the leet haxxors can mod this versions firmware into the older hardware. Do want netflix streaming and dvd menu support. Do not want to fork over another 150 bucks for features that can be added via firmware to my current hardware.
Nice, but I can't help but notice all the comments from people who a bummed that this new model makes the one that they just bought obsolete. When you can get a decent HTPC from the likes a ASUS or Zotac for $250, why would you want to buy something so much less useful and prone to obsolescence? I mean, you can boot straight into WMC or if you prefer XBMC, you can boot into that too using the XBMC-live disc. Both offer a pretty simple interface for the WAF.
@glennS
But it's not obsolete. People on Engadget like bitching and moaning is all. A SINGLE service has been added...one that some are saying they were already getting in other ways on the same device. How is it obsolete if all but one of the features are the same?
@Tes
Because you have to buy a new product in order to get the current feature set vs. a free download. That's why.
@glennS
It's a single feature...one that the guys who bought it didn't buy it for in the first place. There are numerous solutions to getting Netflix on a TV I assume, and people didn't get them in favour of this...now it's "obsolete" because it can't do that which you didn't care if it did or not a couple of hours ago. That's like saying your car is obsolete because the 2011 model is going to have a passenger side airbag while your 2010 model only had the driver side.
@Tes Awesome argument Tes! Well played sir. My thoughts exactly.
@Tes
You are arguing the semantics of the word 'obsolete', which is kind of petty. The point is that WD is not providing a software update to recently purchased products, which is a strong indication that if you buy their current product that is will also not be software upgradable. So if you want to future proof for a little while, then a WD product is a poor choice, while spending an extra $50 for an entry level HTPC is a much safer choice. Anyway, that's my opinion. YMMV.
Will Netflix work on the current WDTV Live? I hope so, if not I might just sell my WDTV live and buy the one with netflix.
@AiRSK
dude. Don't do that. You're basically telling WD that it's okay to pull this kind of crap. I have the Live version and I'm pretty much ticked that they did this without even considering a firmware upgrade. Heck, I would have even paid a *FEE* to do a firmware upgrade as long as it allowed me to stream from Netflix.
What next? Is WD going to release a "Super Plus" version and this one will allow Hulu? Dumb. No more WD products for me.
@Chi The Plus has a different chip in it to decode the DRM, that the Live ( minus ) can't do, it isn't anything they can do just in the firmware, it requires a new processor, which is what is in the Plus version. Which I have 2 and they work wonderfully!
I have been watching Netflix on my WD Live since I bought it. Get a copy of PlayOn and install it on your PC. After that you can watch Netflix and Hulu on your WD Live
I think its really shitty that WDTV live wouldn't include an update to enable Netflix streaming, but instead try to cash in, come one Western digital, I have bought your laptop hard drive, your external hard drives, and your WDTV live, I like your products they work well, (most of the time), give me a update, I'm not cashing out 150 dollars just for the netflix streaming.
So, what will this Plus device bring to the rest of the world seeing as we can't get Netflix? The box taunting me with services I can't access (Pandora) is annoying enough.
@Tes According to this comparison, it now supports DVD navigation.
http://bit.ly/4cIjt
Am I wrong, or does the TV in the background seem to be displaying the Apple TV menu?
@JDVirgil
You're wrong.
@Tes Just did an image search, and I am indeed wrong. I could have sworn I've seen that UI associated with Apple TV somewhere. Oh well.
I would go for the WE TV Live. It's about $99 and can decode 1080p natively. No need to spend more on anything else.
GF has the gen1 version. this new one is a perfect gift for friends who arent very tech savy and we all have netflix.