Looking for a reliable degital media usb player

[rocks911]

A friend was looking for a digital media player recommendation and I unfortunately recommended a WD TV HD and out of the box it doesnt work so well. He connected a 1Tb external HDD into the USB and the thing will stop playing video after a few minutes, just completely freezes up. He cant get it to start again without powering it down and starting over. He's tried playing a variety of sources but mostly h264/MKV files and AVI's.

I have the same unit connected to my network through a CAT cable and it works fine but I've never tried the USB function. Apparently when using it's USB feature it heats up quite badly.

The web site for WD is not helpful as the most sophisticated advice I got was to essentially reboot it. One poster suggested I do a reset of the unit....a factory reset for a unit that just came out of the box?!

So can somebody please suggest a digital media player that works through it's USB port reliably?

[theewizard]

ive had a sony media player for about 8 months
i've two different drives connect to it an Acom and the current seagate 2TB

I do wish the menu system had a few more options ( different ways to browse or access files )
but it works perfectly

our out of box WD was most likely damaged before bought it