A few questions about the WDTV Live...

[DVinci]

Hello, I'm interested in knowing a few things about the WDTV Live...

- how frequent are firmware updates released
- does it accept flash usb drives?
- can it play english subtitles? srt/sub/idx
- can I tell it to go to a specific time in a video like with a DVD player? (I've researched other media players and none seem to have this, must be normal?)
- does it have an audio equalizer setting (preset jazz, bass, treble, etc)
- since Pandora is BLOCKED in Canada, would it also be blocked with the WDTV Live?

Thanks,
DV

[redwudz]

1) Not too often. I think there have been about three so far.
2) Yes, USB flash drives work fine.
3) Some subs, not sure of the formats at the moment.
4) I don't think so. That would be rare. Some players can return to where you left off after last viewing, though.
5) It doesn't do anything but play back the audio. The audio amp would have those controls.
6) Unless it hooks to the US site, probably blocked.

And I'm just guessing with a few of those replies. I don't have the unit in front of me at the moment. But others may have better information.

[RdM642]

- can I tell it to go to a specific time in a video like with a DVD player? (I've researched other media players and none seem to have this, must be normal?

Most of the streamers except the WD models allow you to move by chapter advance.
An Asus for example will allow you to use the remote to push the skip button to move ahead in chapters and you can also move ahead in various rates of skip (5, 10, 20 minutes)
WD, through a series of key allows your to move ahead in ten minute intervals.

- how frequent are firmware updates released

There have been four so far. The second bricked units and was withdrawn, the third update was only to fix the problem of new firmeare bricking units, the fourth (most recent) main change was to reduce YouTube utility as the main effect was to remove any ability to playback YouTubes HD files. Which is to say very few updates, and you would have been better off if you never applied them. Lack of firmware upgrades and lack of attention to the top five or so requests for desired fixes (as indicated in their fixes request popularity rating on their own forums) is a sore point among users.

- does it accept flash usb drives?

Yes, as do all the competing products.
The WD dos have more problems for me recognizing hard drive enclosures then do my Syabas (Popcorn) or Asus, seeing several them them as "camera" and therefore not working without reboots, but they usually work

[jman98]

I have the original WDTV player. It should be the same as the WDTV Live.

In my experience SRT subs work fine. However, SUB/IDX does not work 100% of the time. Every time I've tried to use them, the player always drops about a random 20% of the subs. I've had to convert SUB/IDX to SRT as only SRT seems to work reliably with the player. Maybe the WDTV Live is better in this regard, but I wouldn't count on it.

Whether or not Pandora is blocked probably depends on your IP address. It's rather trivial to do lookups on IP ranges and if the range you are in is assigned to a Canadian ISP, I would expect the WDTV Live to also block Pandora. Or to put it another way, if you can't get to Pandora via your home internet, I don't think there is any chance that the WDTV Live will fix that.

Note that non-self powered USB disk drives may or may not work. Smaller form factor driversare reported to work. Larger form factor drives are reported to not work. Self-powered USB enclosures should work reliably. RdM642's problem may be related to this.