Everything seemed to be working great, especially streaming from my PC, then went to the part I bought this for - Netflix. I’d previously been streaming through my Wii without issue, but wanted the extra functionality of this and keep the Wii in my daughter’s room.
I activated through Netflix and went to try to stream. It says “retrieving” then the video cuts out to snow and then occasionally you’ll see a bit of video, then it will cut to snow. It’s almost like a bandwidth issue, but I tried with the Wii and it plays fine.
I’m hooked up to the TV using HDMI with the WD Plus if that makes any difference. Has anyone had similar issues? Is there some other “setting” I should be using?
Overall I thought this was a pretty good deal at Best Buy for $119 - as a tip when going to Best Buy, ALWAYS check the websites price first. They tried to ring this up at $139, but I showed the cashier the price on my iPhone for their own website and he changed it right away… those sneaky scammers!
You theory was sound and had all the indicators that such thing might have been the issue. However, I tried all the potential settings with the same results.
What’s bad is that the second that it appears (before it immediately goes to a snowy interference looks) looks pretty good.
I have the very same issue with Netflix. I’ve given the WD TV LIVE PLUS a week to get this fixed since I last reported it and nothing has happened… Time to take it back to Best Buy before I run out of options. I can’t wait for the Boxee!
Did you try either the composite or component outs?
We know that when Netflix starts up composite it switches to 480p (for security reasons) and that *sounds* like something that is happening here (some kind of switching going on). Haven’t seen anything to indicate that it affects HDMI but it could. If so, then you might try another HDMI cable (not all are created equally). Or it might just be the combo of the Live and your TV (HDMI does a handshaking that sometimes does not work on some sets. For “normal” output you can overcome it with a manual HDMI setting, but if Netflix is doing a resolution change automatically it might need that handshaking to occur).
Testing it on another set would also help determine what the problem is (if it doesn’t work there then it might just be a defective Live unit).
Well, it works with composite. That’s too bad because it looks so much better with HDMI.
I don’t have another HDMI cable to see if it’s the actual cable - and those cables are crazy expensive. Thing is, everything else works with HDMI, so it’s Netflix that’s doing it with the switching, right? I’m just wondering WHO I should be bugging with support. Is the WD’s issue or Netflix?
I mean, I want to use HDMI, it’s why I have a hi-def TV. I hate it when things don’t just “work”.
You need another cable (and they are *dirt* cheap – don’t believe the hype).
Just pick one up on Amazon.com (they even have them for as low as $2 and they are fine cables, but the shipping bump that up some. I have Amazon Prime and got another HDMI cable for free shipping just yesterday for $9 and it’s superb).
I’ve got the same problem. I tried a different HDMI cable, plus took it out of AUTO and played with the manual video settings. It works great with the component cables provided, but Netflix doesn’t like HDMI. Why why why?
My television is a Philips 42PF9630A/37 42" Plasma TV. It’s over 4 years old. I attached the WD TV Live Plus directly into the television. I have (2) HDMI ports on this TV. The other one is occupied by my Cable DVR box, without any issues.
Select a video, next page loads start the playback
Title in the middle of the screen, retrieving bar at the bottom (do not see this progress)
screen goes black for a second
title and progress bar visable between snowy screen and black screen
Alternates for the duration between snowy screen and actual video every 1/4-1/2 second (sound only when the video is displayed)
I have not experienced Macrovision on Netflix before but if the implmentation is similar to the old one in VHS days there is a continual flashing (in the case of VHS it was a boost of chroma or color as the AGC was overdriven). I thought there may have been a connection between Macrovision implmentation and the effects I have.
Some kind of communication breakdown in the handshaking either purposely (in the case of encryption protection) or through a bug.
I did try the (RGB)Component output and it has no issues (composite also fine) but, the reason for this box was to enjoy HDMI quality video and there is a distinct loss of clarity and color between the analog component video and that served by HDMI.
All the videos I tried (about 6 so far) were SD I believe but I also tried Lost Season 1 (in HD) and that also had snowy flashes between split seconds of video and sound.
My issue is EXACTLY as tboneus notes word for word. I’ve ordered another HDMI cable from Amazon that was highly rated and should have that in a few days.
My TV is also about 4 years old… (Dell W3207C) and hooked directly to the TV, no AV system. I’ve hooked up other systems through HDMI with no issues.
To make matters worse, it keeps telling me now that my “Instant Queue is temporarily unavailable.”
Can someone experiencing this issue please post photos or videos of what happens? I’d like to investigate this bug but it is not reproducible on any of our TVs.
Can someone experiencing this issue please post photos or videos of what happens? I’d like to investigate this bug but it is not reproducible on any of our TVs.
I have just shot a quick video of the system displaying netflix firstly using the hdmi source, then using the component video source. The display for the netflix interface is fine but as you can see the problem occurs around 52 seconds when the actual video is supposed to play. At 1m17s the hdmi is switched to component and the video resumed plays fine. At 1m50s the video is playing without the flashing snow found when using the HDMI input.
Hopefuly you should be able to see the video ok, if not let me know and i’ll try again.
One comment made was that there could be an issue with throughput (or bandwidth) with regard to the HDMI output. As the Netflix data switches from one resolution to another when the selection transfers to the actual streaming (or at least this has been suggested is the case) I ran a test using a 1080P HD clip playing from the extrenal harddrive. This played without issue on the HDMI output so I would think that if the cable has enough bandwidth for a video file it would have enough for a video streaming from Netflix.
