Western Digital WDTV Live Hub Review
by Ganesh T S on October 26, 2010 7:38 AM EST- Posted in
- Home Theater
- Media Streamer
- Gadgets
As evident from the box art, the UI of the WDTV Live Hub is a sea change from what used to exist on the previous generation products. WD has tagged the UI engine of the WDTV Live Hub as Mochi. An XML based engine, WD claims that it is very customisable. There are also plans to officially host a collection of user created themes down the road. The responsiveness of the menu was no cause for concern, and overall, the interaction was much better compared to what I had with the earlier WDTVs. A sampling of the user interface screenshots from the official user guide are provided in the gallery below.
Consumers who are used to interacting with their media collection using XBMC and other such software often lament the lack of proper media library / cover art / scraping support on media streamers. The WDTV Live Hub has a media library feature which scans and consolidates all accessible media content into a library with a comprehensive database. This enables users to easily browse and locate media based on metadata such as title / genre etc. One of the interesting aspects of the WDTV Live Hub is the fact that the metadata need not be generated on a computer (as is done with YAMJ and other such software). It is unclear as to where the unit downloads the metadata from. In case of multiple matches (or an unclear filename), a prompt appears upon accessing the file presenting the various options. There is also an option to rescan the metadata in case of a faulty inference by the resident software. This feature merits more investigation. For our review purpose, suffice to say that it is a big leap over what used to be supported in the previous WDTVs.
An interesting aspect of the hardware is that some of the remote keys can be programmed for particular operations from within the menu. In addition, a USB keyboard can also be attached to one of the USB ports. Specific key combinations act as shortcuts for the WDTV Live Hub menu, and text entry is also made very easy through this. Another interesting development over the previous WDTVs is the appearance of a Web UI. This enables control of the Live Hub even in the absence of the remote (assuming it is connected to the network). Simply entering the IP address of the Live Hub on a web browser opens up the sign-in page for the Web UI (the default password being 'admin'). 'Remote' is one of the menu options, and selecting it presents a picture of the remote in which the buttons can be clicked and various options navigated using the mouse on the computer.
The Web UI remote is definitely a welcome addition, and should enable easy creation of iPhone / Android apps for controlling the Live Hub. That said, the WebRemote feature on media streamers such as the TViX Slim S1 offer more functionality over the web interface with respect to media playback on the streamer itself. This is probably something the WD engineers should look into for the future. The 'Media' menu option is another interesting aspect which we will touch upon in the next section.
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ganeshts - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - link
I know these aren't in the piece yet. I will try to get those figures in as soon as possible.casteve - Wednesday, October 27, 2010 - link
Ganesh, when you do have a chance to add the power and noise levels...be sure to include power used when off/sleeping/idle. Thanks!ganeshts - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Sorry for the delay, but the power consumption numbers are as below:1. Power off, adapter connected to the mains (WDTVLiveHub visible on the network) : 7.7W
2. Power off, transferring files to WDTVLiveHub drive over the network: 9.4W
3. Power on, running 1080p video / playing Netflix: 10.7W
4. Power on, running 1080p video, transferring file to internal drive at the same time: 11.3W
dman - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - link
I'd be interested if it had recording capabilities at this price point. Well, I'm sure a lot of people would be... I just say it because I really don't need the built in HDD on this device since it's not recording anything.It's nice that they've updated the interface, something the previous generation of WD devices have been asking for, however, with Google and Apple getting serious in this space I think WD has been moving a little to slowly here.
Lastly, did they finally include a 30s skip function or is it still just FF/RR while watching shows and the huge 10 or 20 minute (I think) skip?
ganeshts - Wednesday, October 27, 2010 - link
The LiveHub has the ability to navigate to any time instant in the video file. There is an option for a x16 forward / rewind too. No explicit 30s skip as far as I can seeblckgrffn - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - link
Really? That's getting up into well-connected blu-ray player pricing - not to mention the nettops you can put together for nearly that much...dandar - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - link
I have an Iomega Home Media NAS. It has gigabit port and it's also limited to an average of 10.6 MB/s. I was getting slightly above 8 MB/s on 100 megabit router so it's a slight upgrade, but a far cry from what I expected (ie 50+ MB/s). They both must have similar bottleneck between the HDD and the network interface.Aikouka - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - link
If I'm understanding your setup properly, you have a computer and the Iomega Home Media NAS plugged into a 100 Base-T router. Regardless of your NIC's capable speed, you'll never transfer faster than the hardware **between the two points** allows.A 100 Base-T system is theoretically capable of up to 12.5 MB/s (100 / 8).
dandar - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - link
No, I had it hooked up to 100 megabit router, then I hooked up a gigabit switch in preparation to wiring my house up for nas serving a PS3 and Cinematube. To transfer the files I hooked up my laptop to the switch as well. I haven't tested read speeds yet, but write speeds increased from 8+ MB/s with both my laptop and NAS on my 100 megabit router to 10.6 MB/s with both on the gigabit switch, which incidentally meets what Anandtech got with this box and what other websites got when testing WD Mybook World.Ps. The switch shows both devices connected with gigabit protocols so getting write speeds equivalent to what you could get on a good 100mbps connection is pretty disappointing. Having said that, read speeds should be around 27-30 MBps. Anand or should I say Ganesh should test that and update this review.
Samus - Tuesday, October 26, 2010 - link
That shitty 25mm (sleeve bearing?) fan is going to get really loud, really soon. It's too bad they didn't keep it passively cooled.