It refuses to connect to my network shares (Vista 64 bit). I can connect them only using net.mounts, but I need an USB pen drive inserted.

B-rad!
About ntfs-3g, when you say “to determine if its better at handling high speed writes” and “possible unforeseen consequences–which there might not be any, but you are forewarned”, my question is, will I get better performance on reading also and with only reading will I face, possibly, those consequences?

Thanks

<<< edit: What part of : I won’t provide any information on using it and if you want to try you are on your own and for power users to test with NTFS drives to determine if its better is misunderstood? You’re on your own, I don’t use NTFS. Consult the forum if you want help, because I’m not going to give it in this case. –b-rad >>>

Nice update! Tks for all the effort & time.

Didn’t know about the new update until my supervisor stopped off and asked if I’d seen it.

You planning on going to the Winter games?

<<< edit: Cheers. I plan on staying as far away from the games as possible. A bit of protest and bit of keeping away from 100k tourists, got enough of them to deal with on my island all the time as is –b-rad >>>

Does your mod support scheduled wakeups of the wdtv-live? I ask because items in rss feeds have a habit of slipping by if you don’t catch them in time. It would be great if it could wake up once or twice a day to let the rss feeds get caught up before things cycle off the list.

Thanks for the great work so far!

<<< edit: It’s always awake. The remote just shuts off the display. –b-rad >>>

I am addicted to your firmwares. Thus, I just upgraded to your latest firmware. The problem is that when I shut it down with the remote, the device is unable to start again. I have to take it out off the plug to start it working.
A point to note is that despite the upgrade, my password was not reset.
Which is the best way to erase everything and have everything clean/default?

Awesome job with the firmware updates, my man! I’m starting to see the tremendous power that can exist underneath all of this … just out of curiousity, however, do you know of any way to hack into the actual GUI to make modifications to the on-screen menu system? That is one of the biggest downfalls of these boxes in my opinion … while the GUI does its job it ultimately has a low wife-acceptance factor.

Thanks again, great work!

Got the update & installed – Very nice work, am looking forward to a long weekend, with plenty of things to play around with!

Understand that! From White Rock – Summers were always a pain!!!

First of all thanks a lot for your work, i installed this firmware and everything went smooth.

I am having problem setting the timezone.
Whatever i set using the S00Custom-options it keep the date/time.I checked the file /conf/config and the setting is there Even manually executing the script /etc/init.d/host-config which is supposed to set the timezone the date do not change but manually executing on the shell the content of the above file the time is updated.
I noticed the command echo $TIMEZONE > /etc/TZ and that file actually contain the correct timezone after the boot but i also noticed the link /usr/share/zoneinfo/localtime pointing to /etc/localtime which not exists

I have just managed to do the firemware update to 0.3.4.1 what I don’t understand is that I cannot see any difference from the original firmware except the background and screensaver. videos that didn’t play properly before are still the same, I still cannot access my ReadyNas that I can access from win XP and vista machines. I cannot find anything in any menu that is different at all.
I understand that I maybe doing something wrong but for the life of me I can’t work it out.
I am willing to donate to this to get it better.
I thought I would get one of these to replace my old xbox/ cracked XBMC so I could do HD so far it is struggleing to do much at all can’t even find my ReadyNas . Please help

<<< edit: Go to a forum. –b-rad >>>

Hi B-rad,

just an idea, but is it possible to have full development package (gcc, …) in form of .bin attached during boot?

I’m trying to recompile slimart but I’m stuck in point, where I need to compile binary (HTML::Parser) which relies on perl and this I’m unable to compile outside of the box (win toolchain can’t generate make config).

Or any hints “how to”?

Thanks
Regards
T.

hi, i’d love to see support for ralink rt2500 wireless chipset. Is that possible? Thanks for all the effort & time.

<<< edit: It’s possible if you compile it and send it over to me –b-rad >>>

Hi B-RAD,

Thanks a lot for your superb improvements on the firmware!

I’d like to ask that would it be possible to include the high-performance version of ntfs-3g, optimized for embedded devices? It’s from the some company who develops ntfs-3g. There are some performance data at http://www.tuxera.com/products/tuxera-ntfs-commercial/performance/

Regards, Francesco

<<< edit: Are you offering to pay the expensive licensing charges for the thousands of users? –b-rad >>>

B-rad!
This is a great firmware indeed but a little to buggy. It wont accept thumbnails size change on S00custom-options and I get something that did happen once or twice before this last release…I’m seeing a MKV movie, stop it to go make a pee but I still got sound from the movie, the movie continuous to play while I navigate to menus and even when I go and select another movie, nothing happens, e.g., the movie that I’d stopped comes to the screen and loose all the passed minutes of it, of course. Just for you to know. For now, I’m with oficial 1.01.17. But great work, really.
Cheers!

<<< edit: I just changed my video thumbs, music thumbs, and list item number in one go with S00custom-options. It does work. I haven’t heard anyone describe a problem like you describe with the phantom video except in original WDTV, and it was an NTP issue causing the problem. The OSD doesn’t like time being changed on it. –b-rad >>>

Ah! and the synchro buttons of the remote for asserting synchro subtitles doesn’t work at all.

<<< edit: sub synchro still works as evidenced by debug messages output via serial cable. What you have found is a consequence of disabling the annoying audio channel display that pops up at the start of every video. Disabling the audio channel bit disables the display of sub sync–but its still doing it. –b-rad >>>

B-rad!

I tried out 3.4.1 (flash and live) but again NFS throughput is very low, so I can’t play any movies from my NFS shares. However using NFS with debian works perfect including 1080p. What is the difference of the NFS Client in 3.4.1 and the one I install via apt-get nfscommon on the debian? Unfortunately I have only a MacOSX NFS Server, so I can’t tell whether this is a MacOSX specific NFS Server problem or not. Any hint how to identify the root cause would be much appreciated.

Regards

Peter

Hi,

it would be nice to include the latest version of NTFS-3G, ntfs-3g-2009.4.4-1 is quite old.

http://www.tuxera.com/community/release-history/
Latest is STABLE Version 2010.1.16 (January 16, 2010)

Latest version fixes a bug that would sometimes cause NTFS volumes manipulated by NTFS-3G to become inaccessible by Windows Vista/Server 2008 and even Windows 7.

Thanks, keep up the great work!!!

<<< edit: Go compile it yourself and send it to me then –b-rad >>>

Why bother including Paragon or NTFS-3G, what did the WDTV’s original firmware come with?

That worked fine for read/write. I’ved used it before using your firmware.

<<< edit: Paragon is what the original firmware uses. I bothered including ntfs-3g because people wanted me to, so they could test its performance. –b-rad >>>

Ah ok, I’ll stick with the regular Paragon, since any NTFS-3G version except the very last version 2010.1.16 will randomly cause NTFS volumes to become unmountable by recent Windows OSes(Vista and up).

MS has a hotfix that makes CHKDSK recognize the issue and repair it.

Thanks again for all your work, NFS streaming is a must!!!, SMB is so much slower and quite flakey compared to NFS.

Also,

I since Pandora is only available in the US, and Live365′s free stations aren’t exactly great.

Do you have any plans to put in Shoutcast support?

There are a ton of free and great shoutcast stations out there?

Thanks and again, keep up the great work, you are making our WDTV Live boxes more usefull with every release.

It’s sad that the WD people don’t provide a firmware that allows users to use their device to it’s full potential.

Then again it allows projects like yours to pick-up where the vendor stopped caring. Like DD-WRT on various Linux based routers

Also, just wanted to point out an issue I had with xmount as opposed to simply creating the folder in /tmp/media/usb and just using plain mount.

I’m exporting my NFS shares from a Mac laptop running 10.6.
I wanted to export the DVD volume. It contains a space in the Volume name.
so if I try:

xmount host:/Volumes/Volume\ with\ spaces DVD nfs rsize=16384,wsize=16384

It fails, however if I simply create the folder /tmp/media/usb/DVD

and then use:

mount -t nfs -o rsize=16384,wsize=16384 host:/Volumes/Volume\ with\ spaces /tmp/media/usb/DVD

It correctly mounts.

So it seems xmount doesn’t handle escaped spaces while plain mount does.

Thought I’d point it out.

This is my last post for today

Take care!

Ciao,

Hi Cpuroast,

I had the same issue, but instead trying to fix xmount I just put this in my net.mounts

mkdir -p “/tmp/media/usb/DVD”
mount -t nfs 192.168.173.242:/Volumes/\ with\ spaces /tmp/media/usb/DVD -o nolock

Regards

Peter

Hi, b-rad!

Thank You for Your work!

I have managed to do the firmware update from 0.3.2 to 0.3.4.1 and I have found that additional Cyrillic encoding support (windows-1251) stop work properly. Files in attached USB HDD (NTFS) with cyrillic names can’t be opened, and those names are shown incorrectly.
But when i access to device via FTP all names are shown properly.

Old firmware 0.3.2 does not have this problem.

Thanks,
Ru.

b-rad,
As you may be aware, the entire WDTV lineup suffers from a glaring picture quality error in that content which does not specifically set the BT.709 flag will cause the WDTV’s to use the incorrect Rec.601 decoding matrix. This is a major problem because 90% of the HD media out there is unflagged and thus the WDTV’s show false colors the majority of the time.

How hard would it be to add an option in the Video settings to allow us to choose which decoding matrix to use for unflagged content? This is the only feature I strongly care for and I believe if others knew their WDTV’s even had this problem they would care too. I would certainly donate if was told you were working on adding this to the new firmware.

Thanks for your time

correction to my comment above. Apparently, it is just the WDTV Live that has this problem as this colorspace issue is in the Sigma Designs SDK.

Hi B-rad,

It is possible to put in the one of the next releases deluge 1.2.0 ( now is RC4 ; and some trackers do not allow me to connect with RC and beta versions) since this is written in Python and you don’t need to recompile again.

Thank you in advance

Quote cpuroast: “Why bother including Paragon or NTFS-3G, what did the WDTV’s original firmware come with?

That worked fine for read/write. I’ved used it before using your firmware.”

The NTFS driver en WDTV Live totally fucked up a newly created, native NTFS system on a new disk with no bad blocks. It is buggy as hell.
Now, alternative drivers might be buggy also, we can only speculate and experiment. For now, I am avoiding NTFS writing with WD TV Live and sticking with ext3.

Nice update!!!!
Can our machine be a web browser;;

B-rad!
You said “I haven’t heard anyone describe a problem like you describe with the phantom video except in original WDTV, and it was an NTP issue causing the problem. The OSD doesn’t like time being changed on it” and if so what must I do to solve the problem with your firmware because it happened what I described. I enabled NTP on my S00custom-options.

About “What you have found is a consequence of disabling the annoying audio channel display that pops up at the start of every video”, how can I did this? Or it’s with your firmware, I don’t understand. Can you point me, please?

But as I said I allways used your firmware, great work and I’m a software developer, so I’m being honest.

Hi, b-rad;

Thanks for great work!

I have one problem with my WDTV-live after upgrade to 0.3.4.1. Originally I was using the official firmware (version 1.01.11) and I created one NTFS patition and one EXT3 partition. Both the NTFS and Ext3 works well.

After upgrated to your release 0.3.3.1, I found the NTFS coun’t be mounted. Then you released the 0.3.4.1 which exactly resolve the NTFS mount issue by using the Paragon NTFS driver. After upgrade I found it do can mount the NTFS partition correctly, but all the file on that partition were missing. Actually it was there (I telnet to the wdtv-live and using the du command to check the disk usage), just can not see them.

So do you have any idea why this happen?

FYI:

1: It seems the first boot after upgrade can see those files properly.

2: If I create some new files on the NTFS partition, it seems those new creaeted files can be recognized.

Hi B-rad,

At first: Thanks for your huge job on this firmware.
There is a nice downloader for OneClick Hoster is called “downloaddaemon” (http://downloaddaemon.sourceforge.net/). I’ve started to compile the daemon but I’ve seen it will cost a lot of time to setup a proper cross compiler environment. The php client runs well on the wdlxtv-live webserver. I tested it with a running daemon on Ubuntu.
Now my Question: Are you interested to put the DownloadDaemon in your firmware? I’ve seen that you have nearly all necessary libs in the system and it will complete the downloader apps on your wdlxtv-live firmware.

thanks

sberg

B-rad!
Ok, about my last comment, I get it now, it has to do with the including of Rezmus patch, right? But despite not showing on screen everything work as it’s suposed to be.

But my line config_tool -c THUMBRESO=150×200 on S00custom-options doesn’t work at all, it allways asume config_tool -c THUMBRESO=180×240. If I go to Telnet and execute the command manualy, everything is fine.

hello

maybe anyone help me

how to mount my wd NAS to WD tv live

\\wdstorage\download\
how to

thank you …

Great work, I appreciate what you have succeed with the updates so far.

Is it possible to have an http browser in this device?

Thanks for all work.

BR/P

Hi. I’m looking for a firmware, if possible, that’ll let me load dvd menu files as a functioning menu? Like a real dvd?

Is this possible? Does it exist? Or is it possible to make?

Thanks.

Carlos Matos, like all the config_tool commands, they only need to be issued once unless you reset all settings to default , they can be issued either via terminal, ssh or by un-commenting the S00custom-options line, rebooting and then commenting it back again.

The config is stored in the same place the WDTV live stores it’s own preferences.

I never had any luck with the S00custom-options file, so I simply use that file as a reference to the commands and simply copy/paste em into ssh, which works great.

As they only need to be executed once, the options file on the USB isn’t really required if you have telnet or ssh access to the wdtv live.

sxp,

if your NAS is on the same network as the WDTV-Live and it’s SMB(Samba, Windows) shares are probably configured, it should show up in the network section of the WDTV-Live interface. It will then ask you for username and password, which you have setup in your NAS config. It should then list the NAS’ shares and you can play anything from them.

If you want to use NFS(Faster) which your NAS might have, you’ll have to use B-Rad’s NFS interceptor. Or if you want to have the shares show up in the Local drives section(handles thumbnails better) instead of Network, you’ll have to use or use the net.mounts file(This requires to have a USB key or drive, even an empty one connected at all times for the shares to show up.

obut how to mount network drive ?!?

i use deluge download network driver .. work ?

because my WD nas not very strong
i maybe use deluge becuse wd tv live faster HW ..

Cpuroast, you answer to Carlos matos will help me too.

But just anybody knows why the S00custom-options dont execute when reboot the WDTV Live.

I Try everything, a clean firmware update, then only a fat/fat32 USB pendrive attached with S00custom-options changing only the default background and 4 tumb for video and nothing happens after unplug / plug from electricity?

Why dont load?

I have another Question, i change my WDTV1 for a new WDTV LIVE.

who i put a custom background in the way WDTV1, putting the file on root dosent work.

S00custom-options dont load too.

Hey b-rad! Thanks for this amazing mod. So useful.

I was wondering if in the next version of the software if you could include a symlink to each USB device with an easier name? such as symlin them to /USB1/ and /USB2/ in the root dir, instead of having to use the long unique usb serial strings in all our commands. It would help out the newbies and make remembering the path to your usb drive a little easier , thanks for your awesome work!

Keyboard Support ?!

Mirror of 1.01.11_B-RAD.CC_WDLXTV_LIVE-0.3.4.1.zip
http://www.multiupload.com/QUS26YA5I4

can any one do a favor and post on all the procedures and methods of installation firmware and the application .

on youtube or other similar

this will be the best and simple way to guide .

regards
swapnil

any hopes of support for a USB video adapter? It would be very nice to control/navigate a media player via an auxiliary monitor while reserving the hdmi for the HD video on a cinema digital projector.
As a systems software programmer, how feasible is it to expect to mod the firmware myself?

<<< edit: I don’t know your abilities, go the the forums, read up, then see what you think. –b-rad >>>

Hi B-rad!

Thanks for your work. Is it possible to mount a webdav share from the wdtv live box?

Is there a way to make more permanent the changes of the S00custom-options. I mean I need the usb port to connect an WIFI adapter so I always boot the WD live with the pendrive with the S00custom-options connected then unplug it and connect the adapter.

¿Maybe copy the S00custom-options using ftp to a location on the WDTV were it will be always boot until I ftp it again?

P.S. Sry. for my spelling

<&lt< edit: If you are 134% positive that your S00custom-options is valid and bugfree, then copy it to /conf/S00user-script. After that its persistent. –b-rad >>>

hello,
is anyhow possible start videos in command line?
like i do somekind of script that start every time i switch on wdtv ?!

at first: Thank you for your excellent work. The Firmware runs perfectly.

Would it be possible to integrate Truecrypt? And would be the performance of the WD_Live strong enough to decrypt 1080p movies?

This update 0.3.4.1 and 0.3.3.3 dont switch off hard disk after off WDL. The 0.2.2.1 work perfectly with wd mybook 2tb but this not. Meaby only I have this problem?

Hi B-Rad:

First off, the firmwares have been fun to toy with…my only real end goal is to have stable access to network drives (which seems to work when I mount them at boot in S00..) and to have local drives via a USB hub (they are NTFS and 1 TB each). Ironically my problems seem to be with local drives while network seems flawless.

I have noticed that since moving from 0.3.2 to the current 0.3.4.1 that my local HDDs have become “unstable”.

First off, they are NTFS and are also using a hub(though I have tried without)…but they did work fine previously.

Everything is fine until about 10 minutes into a video, the video will then stop. At that point the volume will still show up under USB1 but I can only get the “no media” message.

When I ssh in the device (say, /dev/sda1) will still show up as a mounted device…but the mount point is just an empty dir. Any attempt to umount says the device is busy.

Any thoughts anyone?

i’m using curlftpfs, 1080p (up to 50Mbps and more) seems to work perfectly!

Great work,
thanks

(sorry, my english is not very good

thomy_pc!
Can you please say how do you manage to do that?

Thanks

Hi,
Shall I request, Shall I create file with translation ” custom-language.po “record to the root usb but translation there isn’t, arrangement I’m reboot plus changes will not disply manifest, may I call in ? All else functions first – rate.
I am sorry for his English

Lokalnet

B-Rad,
I have the same problems with the phantom video that Carlos Matos describe.
Please can you tell me what I can do that my WDTV works without this bug with B-Rads firmware?

Thank You from Germany
Nick

Hello,

I own two WD TV Live boxes as I have two HD TV’s (one in living room, one in bedroom). I play my movies from a Debian Linux box via Samba share, it works great. But I have one major problem: Obviously, not all video files use the same fps (some has 23.97, some has 24fps, some has 25fps, etc.) If I set my WD TV Live to HDMI “Auto” under Video settings menu then most of the video files play back terribly bad with jumpy video. If I manually set the frame rate on the WD TV to let’s say 1080p 24Hz then 24fps movies play fine perfectly. When I want to play a 25fps movie then I have to go into the Video settings menu again and change the setting to 1080p 50Hz, etc. This is very annoying because I need to keep changing the playback frequency (24Hz, 50Hz, 60Hz, etc) on a regular basis. Besides, I have no idea which video file uses what fps, so I need to walk to my PC first and use MediaInfo software, open the video file, check the fps of the file, walk back to my WD TV Live, go to the Video setting menu, set the playback frequency and only after all this I can play that video file back without experiencing the jumpy video. In other words HDMI “Auto” does not work at all! It seems to me that HDMI “Auto” setting sets the HDMI output frequency on the WD TV box to the highest setting that my TV is capable of receiving? On both of my Panasonic HD TV’s this is 1080p 60Hz. And regardless which video file I play back, WD TV keeps using the same output frequincy (60Hz). And therefore if the video file has other than 30fps then the video playback will be jumpy. My question is this: Is there any way you can make the WD TV determine the correct output frequency for the actual video file I am selected to play back and switch the output frequency on the HDMI output to the correct setting before starting the playback of the file automatically (when HDMI “Auto” is selected)? This would be a great feature!

Also, most of my video files are encoded in 720p with 23.976fps. My HD TV in my bedroom is just a 720p capable TV (it’s not full HD). So on that TV the WD TV should output 720p 23.97Hz signal on its HDMI output when I play back such 720p video file and NOT 1080p 23.97Hz signal. My bedroom TV is capable of reveiving 1080p signal, however the plasma panel only has 720p pixels (vertically). I assume that now WD TV upconverts the 720p movie to 1080p, sends the upconverted 1080p signal to the TV, then the TV downconverts it back to 720p to display it on its 720p plasma screen. These two conversions are totally unnecessarily for a 720p video file. Why upconvert the original 720p video to 1080p when the TV’s display is 720p only? But I must use 1080p to avoid jumpy video playback, ’cause there is no 720p 23.97Hz setting inside the manual Video setting menu of the WD TV Live unit! And as I said, “Auto” setting for the HDMI just doesn’t work. Auto setting always sends 1080p 60Hz signal to both of my TVs, regardless of the TV’s plasma screen’s physical property. This is really annoying… Can the “Auto” HDMI setting be fixed to handle this case also?

If fixing the above issues are not at all possible for whatever reason, then at least the WD TV should display the fps information of the video file it is currently playing back, not just the file’s name and the video codec’s name. Then I would be able to see the file’s fps info there and I could then manually switch the HDMI output frequency to the right setting to match the file. All this without having to walk to my PC just to check fps, my PC is in another room… Can the firmware modified to have this fps info displaying capability?

Thanks,

Zoltan

<<< edit: not easily. –b-rad >>>

Hi,

First thank you for your effort into making this wonderful product, it really has turned a media player into a home server.

Would it be possible to include an option to keep alive samba while the device is on standby? (ssh/Deluge works while on standby but switches off) I use attached HDD for TimeMachine backups so it would be nice to be able to do backups even when the device is on standby.

<<< edit: already done –b-rad >>>

Hi b-rad,
1) The NTFS issues are gone. The problems with special chars (ěščřžýáíé) remains, but I’ve solved it by renaming the files and folders again. I don’t know if the files was named under bad character coding, or if your firmware mounted the ext. drive with different characted coding. But whatever. After renaming it finally works.

2) I can’t get the custom-translations to work. Can you confirm, that it work for you? Try-out this file please: http://www.marakoss-web.unas.cz/custom-language-01.po . I’ve even tried to compile it to .mo using msgfmt (but still named as .po). Nothing. And lots of readers of my blog had the same issue.

Thank you for your work

B-Rad, something to add to your WDLXTV-Live if possible:

http://www.rogueamoeba.com/airfoil/linux/speakers.php

It’s free, would be great if it worked.

It would allow people to send audio from a mac or a pc to it. Giving it streaming radio at the same time, ok not standalone like live365 or pandora or proper shoutcast support, but still a great option.

Since the WDTV stays on even when someone turns it off, this would be a great way to send audio to a home stereo system.

Thanks again for your awesome work.

The WDTV-Live has so much potential, yet WD isn’t doing anything about it.

WDLXTV-Live rocks and it keeps getting better!!!

Hi, B-Rad
thanks for your work for us, it is possible to move the subtitles in the picture below, are quite high.? I know that some DVD players it is in firmware, this can also WD? Or some other option?

Thanks so much for the reply

Petr

<<< edit: nope. –b-rad >>>

Is it possible to password enable certain directories on an attached USB drive? i.e. implement some sort of basic parental control function. It won’t access the directory unless you type in the pwd.

If it’s possible, how much would you like as a bounty for that functionality?

<<< edit: I could make you a password protected functionality of some fashion, for about $50. –b-rad >>>

Hello, I am using the WDTV-Live, and tried to connect my storage tower (addonics 5 disk array w/ hardware port multiplier from eSATA to USB)
The drives show up nicely on my computer, but when plugged into the WDtv-Live, it seems to only read the first drive.
Is there a way or fix that will allow the WD live to see all five drives from the storage tower?

It looked like the WDLXTV mod you made had support for USB hub, not sure if that would solve my problem, or if that is even part of the WDLXTV-Live mod.

Any advice is much appreciated.
Thanks

<<< edit: Unless you buy me one of these addonics disk arrays anything I say is pure speculation. WDLXTV-Live has hub support, but no clue if it applies to your device. –b-rad >>>

Hi again, thx for your quick answer
I will compile the rt2500 driver myself but.. i don’t know how.. i’m not a developer just a user Can you help me by pointing me to a url where i can learn that? Thanks in advance.

<<< edit: Search the forums. There used to be a detailed guide on compiling your own wireless drivers. –b-rad >>>

Hmm… I’m confused.

Does WDLXTV work with the Gen2, or only Gen1 ? And if it does, then how do I downgrade my firmware to v1.01.11 from v1.01.17

I sure hope it works on Gen2 aswell, cause it look REALLY cool

<<< edit: downgrade instructions are in the README. Gen2 is on the way eventually. –b-rad >>>

Ok, just read through most links and text – seems it is not yet Gen2 compatible, think I will donate a bit to the ‘WDTV Gen2 firmware development fund’ – and urge others to do the same

Hi b-rad, great job.
I want to point out a couple of issues I found
(using 0.3.4.1 and an officially supported usb wifi dongle Buffalo Mini):
- If I plug the usb dongle into the side usb port it is recognized (although it is initialized only after boot is finished so I cannot link external servers using scripts at boot, I have to use delay…)
- If I plug the usb dongle into the rear/back port IT IS NOT RECOGNIZED !? Any ideas? Is it known?
- if I browse a media device (either usb, curlftp, server…) and I have subfolders I cannot browse to subfolders if I don’t have at least one compatible media file in the root because I get the “no media” message.

Best regards,
Lorenzo

<<< edit: I don’t have a wireless dongle so can’t test your slot issues. The no media error is with the official firmware, its pretty much always been there. –b-rad >>>

I’m sure someone already asked but, is there any plan to add support for wireless keyboard/mouse? Or has this been done?

Also, if it all goes for a sh!t can I downgrade to the vendor firmware?

I plan to try the firmware today. Thanks for your efforts! I’ll try to contribute where I can.

<<< edit: wireless keyboard mouse operation is a little unclear in this sense, besides making it do things that are not possible atm. Theres valuable information in the README about downgrading. –b-rad >>>

Would it be possible to hack in feature so we could change video brightness?

Thanks!

<<< edit: maybe someday, probably not soon. –b-rad >>>

Hi Brad,

I have usefeull (?) tip to add to your firmware. Do you think that is possible to make your firmwares aware of something like /tmp/lib to include this when searching for libraries? This could be used on runtime to copy libraries for various app.bin and fulfill depdendecies as needed.

Thanks

T.

<<< edit: no offense, but thats a bit ridiculous of a hack . If an app.bin is designed correctly and has files in the correct locations everything is picked up and included correctly. If you have SomeApp.app.bin, then any libs located in /apps/SomeApp/lib will be added to the ldconfig path automagically when the app.bin is loaded. Look at any app.bin I’ve made for examples. Similarly /apps/SomeApp/bin and /apps/SomeApp/sbin are included in executable search PATH. –b-rad >>>

If it is so, I’m happy Agree that this is much better approach I was unaware of. Thanks. T.

Sweet firmware. Why is it that custom firmware always outperforms the stock firmware?? Is there anyway to implement other linux software on this? I would love to watch my mlb.tv subscription on my wdtv live… the software can be found at http://sourceforge.net/projects/mlbviewer/ but I didn’t know if it was possible to be included.

A couple of people have asked. I’ll ask too…how to display a web browser on screen through your firmware? Is it possible?

<<< edit: no, now stop asking –b-rad >>>

I’ve searched forums etc but simply cannot find an answer to whether (and of course how!) to stream live TV to the WD device from my computer, which happens to be a Mac using VLC to stream from my cable box. So I have cable box –> firewire –> VLC on Mac, which can then stream the MPEG 2 data either as unicast or multicast. Any way to see such a stream on the WD TV Live, or trick it somehow to accomplish the same thing??

Thanks, and fantastic work on the firmware hack! Sorry if this was the wrong place to post…

Joel

B-Rad,

Awesome work. I have a request. I am trying to cross-compile mailx and msmtp since I want to run a script that emails updates. I am unable to get either to cross-compile.

Could you please tell me the steps on how to compile directly on the device? I have searched the forums (including your postings on the cross-compile thread for fuse, owfs, etc.) but I haven’t found any steps.

Another question. I have ext-boot-live running. Can I just grap the Debian Mipsel packages and expect them to run?

Regards,
Kid

Nice work B-Rad, i’m very happy with the option to play Shoutcast now under webend. You (and Mr Miyagi) made my day…

Q: is it possible to mount a streaming site as a local drive (like http://www.divxcrawler.com or so…). I suppose so, but can’t get it to work… (and yeah, sorry, i’m a newbie at this stuff…)
Thanx in advance

Hello,
new update is coming ? based on the last firmware ?

Thanks for your works !

<<< edit: yes, keep checking –b-rad >>>

Hi Brad,
is it possible to run Tor on your alternative firmware? I would like to receive Pandora Radio on my WDTV Live in Germany by pretending being an American using a special exit node. Another possibility would be a VPN connection. Would that be possible with your firmware? Greetings from Germany, best regards fhilly

Hi B-Rad,
I live in Germany and want to be able to listen to Pandora Radio streamed over the web. The relevant services are geographically crippled. I can do this by using a VPN proxy server in the USA, connecting to the VPN service using a Windows VPN connection. However – unfortunately, this means I have to sit in front of my my PC while listening.
Have you got any idea how this could work directly in the WDTV LIVE? Is there any possibility to establish a vpn connection with your alternative firmware?
Best wishes
Sylvia

<<< edit: yes, get me a US VPN –b-rad >>>

Hi,
I have some questions about torrents:
1 – can anyone say what is the download speed for torrents?
2 – after download completes, they seed?
3 – are there any issues?

<<< edit: Ask on the wdlxtv forums –b-rad >>>

Hi B-Rad,

Really looking forward to a Gen2 release, and appreciate your hard work!

Quick question though… Are there any dead giveaways as to whether I have a WDTV Live Gen2 or not? I assume if it does DTS, it’s a Gen2. My model # is WDBAAN0000NBK-NESN, but I wasn’t sure if that gives any inkling to which generation it is.

Again, I thank you and look forward to your latest release!

Jamie

<<< edit: WDBA = gen 2 WD TV HD. –b-rad >>>

hey thanks for awsome firmware just wondering when making a bg pic what size should it be to be full screen thanks

Hi B-rad!

Awesome firmware, I’m running already a long time your firmware and it solved the problems I had with streaming 40 GB MKV from my Synology CS407.

Unfortunately this week my WDTV won’t start up anymore, I was watching a movie and the next day I wanted to see another movie but it only show the WD TV Logo and after that the screen goes blank.

I can ping the WDTV but can’t FTP or something, is there any solution for this or do I have to send it back to WD?

Thanks!!

<<< edit: Have you tried connecting through composite? Debug further on the wdlxtv forums. –b-rad >>>

B-RAD,
Thank you for your great effort.
I have some questions about your firmware for WDTV Live.

Is there a way to change the following?
1- Arabic Font for the subtitle
2- Interface language (to Arabic interface)
3- location of the subtitle (Up or Down)

<<< edit: 1) no. 2) maybe, if you can make a translation in UTF-8 that is. 3) install wdlxtv-live-0.4.2.0 –b-rad >>>

To all WD TV Live owners.
Please help! My new WD TV Live manual HDMI setting reverts back to “auto” when the WD TV Live HD Media Player’s power is reconnected. Is it malfunction? Before power is reconnected, player worked with manual setting more than 3 hr. and all was fine. Firmware version – 1.01.24.

<<< edit: Ask on the wdlxtv forums. –b-rad >>>

Is this site dead? No update tot 0.4 overhere??

<<< edit: lots and lots of testing New version, very stable and new features coming very soon –b-rad >>>

thanX 4your great work B-) should be great to be able use a new wdtv gen2 in a wlan surrounding, soon *** any chance? that’s what i bought one for …willing 2 donate, too *** GreetZ

<<< edit: Cheers, usb ethernet & wlan are on the way. Any donations expedite developments efforts for sure –b-rad >>>

can someone please explain to me how to setup my password via telnet -

<<< edit: http://wiki.wdlxtv.com/Set_SSH_password –b-rad >>>

Hello b-rad,

First of all, thanks for the great work. I started to use last week your latest firmware and it rocks.

Quick question concerning nzbget web, if I try to upload a nzb larger than 2 megs, i go an error telling me I should update upload_max_size_file in file php.ini . What is your advice ?

Best wishes

<<< edit: check the forum for maintenance releases. New major release coming soon! –b-rad >>>

Hi b-rad,

After upgrading to the official firmware 1.01.24 my WDTVLIVE box does not boot anymore!

I do not see anything unfortunately via the HDMI interface on my screen. The screen remains blue –> no signal!

I already tried the reset button but does not solved the issue.

Do you have any idea how to recover the firmware? Do you have a recovery script to boot from a USB stick for example?

thanks a lot for your help
thx
thrillseeker

<<< edit: This error is unrelated to me? You have tried connecting the composite cable, right? Your only option if something bad has happened, and you’re running an official firmware, is if you have a serial cable and a decent amount of skill&confidence. WDLXTV has mechanisms built in to require almost nothing in the firmware section to be able to boot a recovery image, only one binary and three libraries need to be valid. Good luck! –brad >>>

there is free space in the flash ROM to implement the excellent plowshare? still lacks a app.bin barely decent for this type of purpose. have integrated in the firmware would be great.

<<< edit: nope, requires about 20MB of dependencies. –b-rad >>>

And how about Tucan Manager? Seems to be much lighter at the level of dependency (maybe wrong!), obviously considering only the console mode, which is very convenient to use. Did you ever taken a look? Keep it up! Good work!

Hey, guys if install this b-rad firmware to my wdtv live would it recognize my 2 bay drive set that is 4tb ?

Hi… I’ve the older version (WD00 w/o network onboard, only USB network) I usually get the first version.

Can I get the Live version and sent it to my WD ? Or should I keep with this version >> http://b-rad.cc/wdlxtv/

thanks

<<< edit: Have you ever considered flashing the firmware from your microwave into your refridgerator? Different devices are different devices. –b-rad >>>

Hi B-Rad,

thanks for the awesome work!

But now I got a problem.
I updated to the latest 4.1.9-6 today.

I can not connect to my samba server on my linux machine anymore, which always worked.

I tried
smbclient -L
and got the following:

params.c:OpenConfFile() – Unable to open configuration file “/home/andy/WDTV/villa_1.02.14/src/libs/../../build/binary/third_party_build//lib/smb.conf”:
No such file or directory
smbclient: Can’t load /home/andy/WDTV/villa_1.02.14/src/libs/../../build/binary/third_party_build//lib/smb.conf – run testparm to debug it
Connection to ___192.168.2.101 failed (Error NT_STATUS_BAD_NETWORK_NAME)

any idea? (who is andy?)

Then after a while it asks for a password and
displays my samba shares, so that seems to work.
But connecting from the gui does not work…
what should I do?

Thanks!
- t

<<< edit: You should debug on the wdlxtv forums –b-rad >>>

ok, SMB works fine now by mounting via net.mounts.
Somehow NFS does not work properly.
The box always freezes if I start a video from the nfs share.
-t

<<< edit: Some NAS’s misbehave and require option proto=tcp to be passed to them at mount time. Add that in there and it should fix you up. –b-rad >>>

You know, many people wants this device (WD tv live) but the BIG problem is that this device don’t play dvd menu in .ISO file.

I challenge you man, if you are really a true hacker, then hack WD tv live or any model of WD to be able to play DVD MENU. Because this is the 1st that should be hacked and needed by the customers.

YOur donation box will be full once you did it.

I challenge you because i know that you have a capability and best knowledge to do this. YOu are working compare to the HANDICAPPED and DEAF HEAR employees of Western digital. YOur updates have more sense compare to their update. Thank you.

Hi i have just bought WD TV LIVE and when i connect to my TV from HDMI there is no signal and i can’t play movies from HDMI. I can play only from component. My tv model is sony Bravia KLV-32/550A full HD. Pls help.
Sunil

<<< edit: This is not the place for support. forum.wdlxtv.com is. –b-rad >>>

plz tell me..
when i connect a pen drive with a movie in .mpg format to my sony KLV-40V550A (40 inch) LCD TV it reads the contents but when i play it shows playback not available.wat could be the reason and how can i resolve it.i run the pen drrive in video2 mode.

<<< edit: Refer to forum.wdlxtv.com for support. –b-rad >>>

Hi b-rad;

I installed new versiyon of your firmware. 192.168.1.2 is ip number of wd tv live. When I try to access web inferface via IE or FireFox, I get an error message that incorrect username and password. You can help me.

thanks for all .

You work is absolutely impressive to me. I wonder will you be able to do a miracle with WD TV Live Hub. I think, at least, a bittorrent client would make it much more useful. Thanx

<<< edit: eventually yes, but I’m not a fan of permanently throwing away key features of a device so I won’t be releasing a wdlxtv-hub until I have figured out how to work around the new policy of deleting hw keys if you go homebrew. –brad >>>

I know this is probably a dumb question and I am pretty sure I know the answer. But you don’t know if you don’t ask. I have a WD live. Will the WD live + software work on the WD live. If not is it possible to make it work on the WD live?