WD TV Live transcoding issue

[ysbinns]

Mezzmo transcodes everything when streamed to my new wireless WD TV Live. I used a hard drive for the WD TV Live. Everything played fine. The external hard drive is full and I wanted to stream to the WD TV Live like I already do for my Playstation 3s and my XBOX 360s. I noticed that everything was being transcoded. This does not need to be done. I only use 2 different video file formats. Here's MediaInfo excerpts for my 2 formats:

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Video
ID : 1
Format : MPEG-4 Visual
Format profile : Advanced Simple@L5
Format settings, BVOP : Yes
Format settings, QPel : No
Format settings, GMC : No warppoints
Format settings, Matrix : Default (H.263)
Codec ID : 20
Duration : 1h 16mn
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 1 356 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 15.1 Mbps
Width : 640 pixels
Height : 480 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 23.976 fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Compression mode : Lossy
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.184
Stream size : 743 MiB (91%)
Writing library : em4v 4.1.6.5
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2010-07-05 16:52:28
Tagged date : UTC 2010-07-05 17:09:38

Audio
ID : 2
Format : AAC
Format/Info : Advanced Audio Codec
Format profile : LC
Codec ID : 40
Duration : 1h 16mn
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 129 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 155 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 70.5 MiB (9%)
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2010-07-05 16:52:28
Tagged date : UTC 2010-07-05 17:09:38

**********

Video
ID : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L4.1
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames : 3 frames
Codec ID : avc1
Codec ID/Info : Advanced Video Coding
Duration : 1h 39mn
Bit rate : 612 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 4 070 Kbps
Width : 1 280 pixels
Height : 720 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 23.976 fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.028
Stream size : 435 MiB (82%)
Writing library : x264 core 80 r1376M 3feaec2
Encoding settings : cabac=1 / ref=3 / deblock=1:-1:-1 / analyse=0x3:0x113 / me=hex / subme=7 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.0:0.0 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=16 / chroma_me=1 / trellis=1 / 8x8dct=1 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=1 / chroma_qp_offset=-2 / threads=6 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=1 / mbaff=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=3 / b_pyramid=0 / b_adapt=1 / b_bias=0 / direct=1 / wpredb=1 / wpredp=2 / keyint=250 / keyint_min=25 / scenecut=40 / rc_lookahead=40 / rc=2pass / mbtree=1 / bitrate=612 / ratetol=1.0 / qcomp=0.60 / qpmin=10 / qpmax=51 / qpstep=4 / cplxblur=20.0 / qblur=0.5 / vbv_maxrate=50000 / vbv_bufsize=50000 / ip_ratio=1.40 / aq=1:1.00
Encoded date : UTC 2012-01-03 01:34:38
Tagged date : UTC 2012-01-03 01:36:10

Audio
ID : 2
Format : AAC
Format/Info : Advanced Audio Codec
Format profile : LC
Codec ID : 40
Duration : 1h 39mn
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 128 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 177 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 91.2 MiB (17%)
Encoded date : UTC 2012-01-03 01:35:44
Tagged date : UTC 2012-01-03 01:36:10

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I stopped (turned off) all transcoding by Mezzmo and tried streaming these movies again. Everything played fine and nothing was being transcoded.

So is the only solution to my problem is to stop all transcoding? Or is there a Profile fix that will allow my videos to be played without transcoding?

Thank you for your time. Steve

[Paul]

Hi Steve,

If you wish to turn off transcoding just for a particular device, go to the Media Devices dialog in Mezzmo and edit the device. In the Device Settings dialog, go to the Transcoding tab and turn off the transcoding checkbox.

[ysbinns]

Hi Paul,

Turning off transcoding for everything works and so does turning off just the device. To me these 2 approaches are just a work-around. Is there a profile fix that will tell Mezzmo that my files are WD TV Live compatible and transcoding is not required?

[Bodders-11]

Steve,
what profile do you have assigned to the WDTV? I have a WD TV SMP (Gen 3) and I do not get transcoding of the MKV and MP4 files. Of course these have been created so as to be compatible with the WDTV SMP. I have one or two movies that have Audio that is NOT compatible and therefore transcoding occurs for those files only.

Bodders

[Paul]

Hi Steve,

What WD TV Live model do you have? As Bodders suggests in his post, there are a few WD TV Live device profiles in Mezzmo to choose from and they each have different format support - depending on the model. You can set the device profile in the Media Devices dialog in Mezzmo.

[ysbinns]

Hi Paul, Bodders,

The box says it's a WD TV Live Streaming Media Player, P/N WDBHG70000NBK-01, Model WDBHG70000NBK-HESN. The device says the same thing, nothing more to futher identify it. It's the newest one that is available from Best Buy here in the US. The Device Profile used is WD TV Live (Gen 1). Like I said I have transcoding turned off for everything and everything we've played through it has played just fine. I can leave the settings just the way they are, I was just hoping that there was a real device profile solution to this transcoding problem that someone was aware of.

[Paul]

Hi Steve,

A better match for your WD TV Live model is the "WD TV Live Streaming Media Player" device profile. Go to the Media Devices dialog to change it. Turn on transcoding again and see how you go.

Let us know if any of your files are unnecessarily transcoded that can be played natively. We'll tweak the WD device profile to include that particular format. To help us, send us the FFmpeg information on the file that can be played natively. Right-click on the file in Mezzmo and click 'Get FFmpeg Information'.

[ysbinns]

I did not even think of checking to see if there was a better match for my WD TV media player. Me bad..... I'll give it a try and see what happens. Thanks for the insight !!