I am into my third week with the BV-5005HD Mini which is replacing my WD HD Media Player (original version with firmware updates).



I am reasonably familiar with home network setups and have successfully updated my home FIOS setup with a Netgear WNDR 3700. The 3700 broadcasts to our laptop and my LG BD570 while my desktop and LG BD390 are hardwired to the original Verizon router. I have the wifi portion of the Verizon router shut off and the Netgear router cabled to it to serve as the network wireless source. It all works nicely, thank you very much!



I had agonized over choosing a replacement for the WDHDMP and settled on the 5005HD Mini primarily for BD and iso playback along with improved audio (and price point). The networking was seen as a potential bonus.



The Bad:



Setting up the wifi network for this unit proved to be an exercise in futility even with several forum help sources. I was simply incapable of getting a wifi network connection. I then purchased a fifty foot CAT6 cable in order to hardwire it (ala the LG390) and suddenly found out I could do without networking it at all! Needless to say the cable went back to BB!



The Good:



I have four external drives on which I keep my SD and BD movie files. I have two 2 terabyte units, one 1 terabyte unit, and a single 500 Gig unit. They are all USB 2.0. Guess what? They all daisy chain perfectly with the "mini" through either of its two USB ports and a small, inexpensive Targus four port USB hub!



There are no issues or problems that I detected as yet using all four external hard drives that are read and listed separately. I can easily continue to transfer film file and photos to any and all and then access them with a simple ease and reliability that makes the unit a joy to use.



The picture quality on my 40" Samsung LCD is excellent as is the sound through the TV speakers, my "TV Ears" or my Q-Home FX 5.1 surround sound headphones.



I have had very few BD, SD, or iso files come up as unreadable and will redo some of these few to see if that corrects any possible problems with the actual files. The iso's work just fine (though without menus). Update 11/5/2010: I forgot to mention that all of my movie files are either m2ts or vob.



I am very pleased overall (ignoring the networking fiasco) with this unit and have no problems recommending it as a serious consideration for anyone seeking a reasonably reliable and fairly inexpensive media player. I am not using or accessing its "addons" as I want this to function as my primary movie player. I can stream Netflix on either LG BD player.



Based on my experience I would have preferred a non-wifi version of this unit for 90.00 instead of this one for a 110.00 but the ease of daily operation, its reliability, and the quality of its output more than offsets that issue.



I would like to be able to network all of these movie file sources so that I could watch any on either the Samsung in my den or the 60" Sony KDS-60A3000 in the living room. At this point I still feel hardwiring with CAT6 is the way to go for maximum viewing quality. However, I must say that the NetFlix streaming media sent wifi to the LG BD570 works just fine!



BTW, just this week, the original bulb blew on the Sony after three plus years. I ordered a OEM replacement from Bulb Solutions in Illinois on Sunday afternoon, the bulb and cage arrived Tuesday afternoon, and I had it installed and the Sony up and running is less than an hour!



Harry Zee