Other than the obvious future firmware update, I don't see a way to do this. In any case, it would have to be from WD as they use a Sigma processor in this device. There is some companion software to manage the WD TV for Windows computers.

Ok, it seems like this is kind of like Apple TV minus the wi fi correct? Say i get a blue ray disk, how do i go about ripping it onto my computer and converting it to full 1080p? I guess that's the same question I have for reguar DVD's. I have a DVD ripper but it only rips to a certain file type and I have to convert it to ipod format which would be very small for my TV.

While I haven't "backed up" BluRay disks, DVDDecrypter does the job for most DVDs. You would then make a folder with the name of your movie and copy the VIDEO_TS folder there. Navigate to the VOB file after the menu (usually ending in the number 1) and push play. The WD TV will play the video files in succession, though that may be due to the "Play all" files setting. I haven't been able to turn off the DVD subtitles, and the WD TV doesn't have a setting for that. WD : send us a firmware upgrade.

BluRay ripped/reencoded movies are "out there", but you'll find that most include DTS for audio. So, either you have to reencode the audio or output to a DTS receiver as the WD TV doesn't decode DTS streams. The 1080p ripped files I've tried don't work well either with VLC Media Player on my WinXP machine or on the WD TV in that there are weird decompression blocky problems. The 720p versions I've found play well.

So you can play VOB files on this unit? In that case I will go out and buy this thing right away!!

I'm using the slysoft solution for ripping DVD/Blu ray movies.... its easy, all you have
to do is put the disk into the computer, hit the right mouse key and tell the software
where you want the files to go... then the movie is ripped to the hard drive...

SlySoft AnyDVD HD

I have done this already and have a movie residing om Hard Drive for play with Power DVD. Are you confirming that the WD HD Media player will play the blu-ray files directly to you TV? That would be great but sounds highly unlikely at this point.

Yes. Just navigate to the first VOB in the VIDEO_TS folder.

And buy a BluRay drive ...

The folks at Cineform replied on one of their threads that quite apart from codec issues, these kinds of players (I have a TiVX, with built-in harddrive) are not capable of handling the high bitrate of CFHD avi. I'm sure that will be the case for DVCProHD also.

Yes, they play fine.... I used the WD HD Media player to play the Blu ray movie " Into the Blue " on my projector...., for the hard drive I used the portable WD passport (500gb)

and yes, you do need a blu ray player on your computer to rip the video... :-)

Wooo Hooo my lovely wife has bought me one of these for chrimbo!

so I've been ripping DVDs onto my computer as VOB files but can't watch them? when I click on the file to watch it, it says "This is a file that quicktime doesn't understand". I then tried to watch them using quick time and my DVD programs on my computer overrules it somehow but still doesn't play. Does anyone know what i'm doing wrong?

It's not the same "critter". The WD TV is a very simple small "box", you supply the USB storage media. I'm running HD content on mine from USB thumb drives. A 26 minute project shot in 1920x1080 17Mbps edited in Pinnacle Studio 12 and rendered to a 1920x1080 HD WMV file played beautifully on my 42" LCD TV.

From a thumb drive (file size not quite 2GB).

I really like this thing!

Try VLC Media Player on your computer.

Has anyone fed this thing footage from a Canon 5D Mark II?
That would seem to be a great way of testing its ability to handle high bit rate footage.

So far the only limits I see listed on the Western Digital website are resolution+framerate, not bitrate.