Was browsing for a new multimedia player, and saw the WD elements multimedia drive 3TB was on special. $200 Seems like a good price.
WD Elements Play 3TB $200 Delivered
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Just a warning - this specific model does not perform DTS decoding of files with DTS encoded sound.
i.e. you will require a separate amplifier that has a DTS decoder. Other WD players have a built in decoder that can then output non-DTS Dolby Digital or Stereo.It's good of you to alert people, but what you're saying is incorrect. Gen1 didn't support DTS decoding, but Gen2 does. If you look at the specs, it mentions "DTS 2.0", which means decoding DTS to stereo. Also, check this out from the DSE web site..
http://dicksmith.com.au/product/GM1003/wd-elements-play-2tb-…
If you look at the picture the box says "DTS 2.0+digital out" in the top right corner in the green section. Hence, it definately does support DTS decoding. You must be thinking of Gen1.I stand corrected!
(I bought a Gen1 at the time and returned it bitterly for the no-DTS reason)
That's kinda a let down considering the cheaper models can. Thanks almost jumped the gun on this deal.
Personally I think you're better off getting the WD Streaming media player on special from Amazon for $US91. It can do what the Elements Play can do, but also:
- Play files from the network (supports wired Ethernet and WiFi)
- Supports a lot of streaming video sites/services
Sure, it doesn't have a built in hard disk, but it's less than half the price, and you can plug a USB hard disk in (or stream content from a NAS or PC).Personally I think you're better off getting the WD Streaming media player on special from Amazon for $US91.
Sure, it doesn't have a built in hard disk, but it's less than half the price, and you can plug a USB hard disk in (or stream content from a NAS or PC).
You would have to buy a 3TB ext HDD to make price comparison fair. How much does one of those cost? I'm willing to be the 3TB ext HDD + WD Streaming ($91) will cost more than the $200 for the Play 3TB.
not if you got this deal… heck you could even get a couple of them for redundancy
http://dealnews.com/Hitachi-2-TB-Touro-Desk-USB-3.0-External…2 of those + $91 comes to $224. Granted it's 4TB as opposed to 3TB, but there's something to be said for the convenience and elegance of an internal HDD. No need for anything dangling off it, everything is all in one place.
I'm a bit late to the party (cause I check OzBargain around 10am every morning) but the Hitachi deal has expired :-(
Not only factor in the 3TB drive, but also factor in the lack of network functionality. You can always add storage to the Live Streaming unit, but the Elements unit will never have streaming/network functionality.
A non-technical workmate has the Live Streaming unit and it prompts him with firmware upgrades.Upgrading is very easy. Whereas I could imagine with the Elements unit you'd have to manually download it from the WD website. Not so easy for a non-technical person.
What would pros and cons be of using one of these as opposed to a streaming device? We've never had the need to use streaming; at this point, we have the laptop connected to the tv via a HDMI cable, and an external hdd connected to the laptop.
I feel our setup could be better, I'm just not sure which route to go… we don't have a smart tv yet, and using the laptop to access everything seems silly. WD TV Live streaming media player, or this Elements Play thing?
In my opinion, get the streaming device. It has more functionality, except for the built in HDD, but you can instead get an external USB HDD for it. Or, simply share the folder with your movie/music files in it on your laptop and stream them over the network.
Thanks for the advice :)
We've tried to stream through the PS3 a few times, but we always run into issues, either with the media content not showing up at all, or videos skipping and not playing smoothly. Can anyone guess what would this be caused by? And if we went the streaming route, is this something that can happen every now and then?
media not showing up on ps3: it doesn't support .mkv files
files skipping and not playing smoothly on ps3: will happen if you try and stream over wifi. ps3 only has wireless G if I recall correctly, and you'd need wireless N, and good clean reception, to get smooth playing of high definition files over wifi. try plugging it in over ethernet cable instead.a streaming media player should avoid these issues if it has wireless N, preferably dual band, and your wireless router also supports it, and/or plug it in with ethernet cable.
Yeah no .mkv support unfortunately.. I have recently gone thur this process.. you need to use something like this: http://www.mkv2vob.com/ It will convert to mp4 I think it is which does work, or I now DL stuff in mp4 format for stuff I dotn need top of the line quality.
We also bought a NETGEAR WN2500RP DUAL BAND WIRELESS RANGE EXTENDER so the PS3 using ethernet to that, and then it the extender is dual band wireless N. Never had a ny problems streaming.. and unlike our Samsung TV, we can fast forward, even if it does "pause" occasionally when going like 100x or whatever it is.. way better than no fast forward on the TV streaming. Only other issue I had was a movie that after 15 mins or so it came up it had some protected or copyright audio and stopped playing the audio.. I am sure I can get around that somehow.
Also media not showing up can be your NAS or media server settings. I noticed mine was refreshing every 60 mins, so I put a valid file on the NAS but I could not then see it on the PS3. Changed this to every 10 mins and all good.
Nah, it wasn't individual files, it just wouldn't detect our devices, or if it did, NO media at all would show. We were testing music, mostly, but the few .avi files we tried were skipping and stuff when they did work. Like our said, our setup (and equipment) is kind of crap.
Will look into it all more after work, thanks for the tips :)
WD TV Live is cheap and easy. Add a NAS to that and your laughing
Advantage to having an internal hard disk: You can take all your movies and TV shows anywhere, and watch them anywhere. My media player has been half way around the world, half way way around Australia and all around Sydney many times, so I can watch things at my friend's house or on the big TV in a hotel.
Disadvantages to hard disk only devices (no network streaming option): If your computer is in a different room to your TV, you'll have to pick up the box and physically move it every time you add a new movies. Even if the computer is right next to the player, you can't watch a movie while connected to the computer via USB. This can be a pain if somebody is in the middle of watching something using the media player, but you want to copy something new to it. You have to stop watching TV, hook up the USB, wait while the files copy, then disconnect and wait for it the media box to restart. Not so bad if you watch short TV shows, but if you just ripped a 25GB BluRay to your computer and want to copy it to the box, you'll have to wait 25 minutes or so (USB2) while it copies.
Disadvantages to streaming only devices (networkable with NO internal hard disk): You can ONLY watch things at home, or places where somebody has a network server with movie files on it, and have a network connection near their TV. Unless your friends are all tech-heads, you probably won't be able to take your box anywhere to watch things. SOME streaming only devices have USB ports to watch media from USB drives, but some don't.
Having a network port AND a hard disk (and a USB port for an external USB drive/memory stick) is obviously the best way to go, then you can copy content onto the hard disk while watching things, and stream from the box onto another device, and stream direct from your computer if you're at home and don't want to bother copying the files to the internal hard disk.
If you'll never need to take your movies elsewhere and you always leave your computer or file server turned on, a cheap ~$50 streaming player is probably fine for you. If you ever want to take movies and watch them at your mate's place, you need an internal hard disk player (or something that has a USB port and can read movies from a USB stick or HDD.) Network streaming + internal hard disk makes copying files to the hard disk so much easier, as you don't have to disconnect the box every time, it just sits near the TV.
See, that's why I liked the internal version. It just seems like a little box I can take anywhere, plug it in and it's good to go (in a sense) rather than lugging around a streaming device plus an external hdd or laptop. We only have one tv, so moving room to room isn't an issue.
Unplugging it to put movies on it isn't a big deal at all. There are only two of us, and we only watch movies/tv shows a couple of times a week. I think we'd be good to chuck everything on it over a few days at the start, then unplug it once a week to put some new stuff on it if necessary. Transfer speeds aren't an issue either, we don't mind waiting a while.
The idea of streaming just seems unreliable to me. I've never had much luck setting up networks and such with my HP, and we both format our computers several times a year, and having to do it over and over again isn't ideal. I definitely get why people would like streaming, it's handy and very easy… I just don't think it's for us. Hopefully this deal will last until tonight at least so I have a think.
This is where WD Live HUB comes into play. You can stream (networked) and it has an internal drive.
I just copy my files across the network like any other file, and it doesn’t effect playback of videos already playing.I have had a couple of different streamers and always came across issues: not as wife friendly, if host computer is under the crunch processing something else the stream can be affected, 2 devices
are running not one (who am I kidding, I have so much turned on at once it is dumb).
The Live Hub is wired only (I think you can use a wireless dongle) which is fine by me as I run everything via gigabit anyway.
It only has a 1TB drive, and that can fill up damn fast if you are loading lots of large movie files and many many TV shows.
It costs far more – Staticeice says $210 - http://www.staticice.com.au/cgi-bin/search.cgi?q=WD%20TV%20L…
I was lucky enough to get mine form this OZB post for $129 - http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/76689, wish I could have gotten more than one.
I don't own this device but have the WD Live Streaming with 2 exsternal hard drives connected to it via USB. I'm contemplating getting this for the bedroom to compliment the yamaha sound projector (http://au.yamaha.com/en/products/audio-visual/dvd-players/ya…) I'm planning to purchase for my bedroom (overkill I know, but these sound projectors sound awesome).
I use the WD Live with my YSP-2200 (http://au.yamaha.com/en/products/audio-visual/dvd-players/ys…) in my lounge. It is an absolute treat to use and the two of them are all the kit I need at the moment.
Why did I choose the WD Live? I have heaps of digital media, lots of movies, tv series, concerts etc. in various formats such as MKV, TS, AVI, MP4, WMV. The WD Live plays virtually all file formats and the combination of this with my YSP-2200 ensures not only I get surround sound (it works pretty well bouncing sound waves off the walls to create a surround effect), almost all sound formats are supported. I especially like how the WD Live plays .ts and .mkv at fullHD with no fuss at all, besides supporting streaming of content over wifi.
All in all, it's been a positive experience for me and every now and then the firmware upgrades have offered a little bit more without causing any issues.
Just my two cents…
cheers,
rusty
I am seriously considering a WD TV Live as well for wifi streaming off my NAS. One thing I am consideringis getting a 4GB Xbox, given it should be about $60 more and can then also game with.. any big downsides to doing this over a WD TV Live other than price. I dont need the console really, as I have a Wii and PS3, but some friends only have Xbox so it would open up the chance for some different online multiplayer… just not sure if there are dramas doing the streaming via the Xbox.
I have a 2TB version of this.. doesn't play MKV properly. The video is fine, get no audio. Movie is fine when tested on any other player or software. That was with latest FW btw.
It's possible they have fixed it now with later models, esp with 3TB, but just a word of warning.
EDIT: This might be related to TommyC's comment actually. I have no idea if the audio in the MKV I tested was DTS or not. I didn't test out other MKVs. Maybe they work fine as long as it's not DTS.
You most likely have a Gen1. You can check whether the media files use DTS by using MediaInfo http://mediainfo.sourceforge.net/en .
If you have a Gen1, and want to be able to watch DTS movies without getting a new media player, or without buying an external DTS decoder you can use Popcorn MKV AudioConverter to convert that DTS audio to AC3.
http://audioconverter.heartware.dk/Tutorial/Both utilities above are free.
Why isn't anyone producing cheap mini computers (about the size of the above product) with xbmc installed on it or mythtv? it's honestly gotta be better than the firmware of these things right? Anyway rant done.
Who the hell needs 3GB of storage? Do you guys document every aspect of your lives?
You mean 3TB. Backup of movies, tv shows, anime, music, and photos.
Blu Ray movies are about 5gb a movie now, so it kinda adds up if your into downloading/backing up films.
I can download full 1080p movies at approx 1.5GB.. PM me if you want the link, can't post it here :/
3TG of storage is fine, but this player only offer USB 2.0, which is way too slow to transfer 3TB data.
Wow… this is an amazing deal!
Almost brought, but….
Re: WD Elements Play..
by b-rad.cc » Sat Jan 08, 2011 7:04 am
theres no wdlxtv for it and no plans for one if thats what you're asking.
2TB at Jb for $175
http://www.jbhifi.com.au/computers/storage/western-digital/e…