Bit Stirrer

This week Western Digital launched their new WD TV HD Media Player - and I was excited to see it.  It look, at first, to be a brilliant device - well worthy of replacing my now-decrepit TViX.  However, upon closer investigation, it seems that the WD TV is seriously lacking in two ways:

1. Network - at first, this does not seem like much of an issue, but the more I think about it, the more I realise that network support is almost crucial - and would certainly make the difference between a mediocre product and an excellent product.  Hopefully Western Digital will add ethernet support in a subsequent model.  All I ask is for NFS support - so I can keep massive (noisy) harddrives in another room, with this nice complete-solid-state WD TV box in the lounge room.
2. Browse Movies by Genre - one of the most brilliant aspects of this new WD TV device is that it creates a media database, which then allows the user to browse media, such as music, by properties such as artist or genre.  This is, to me, the most compelling feature.  However, I was extremely dissapointed to read in the manual that you cannot browse movies by genre - even though you can browse music by genre!!  Well, hopefully this is just a mistake in the user manual, but if not, then Western Digital will need to fix the omission in a firmware update before I will seriously consider buying this product.

So, in short, I think the WD TV is a winner.  If Western Digital adds browse-movies-by-genre, then I will purchase one.  And, hopefully, Western Digital will also add ethernet support in a future model - that will make it near perfect!!