# Playing Media Files Through TV



## johnb2006 (Mar 10, 2009)

Hello,

I was wondering if anybody could help me, I have a brand new Samsung HDTV series 8 tv..It has the capability of plugging a USB Device into the side of the TV where we can stream media files directly on the TV without needing to purchasing a DIVX player with USB support etc..

I have a 500gb harddrive where I download everything to, When I plug the external hard drive straight into the TV nothing happens and it will not recognize the device! But a normal 2GB USB works fine?

Can anybody help me to get this set up so i can just plug the external harddrive straight to the TV??

Much appreciated,

Jon


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## Raylo (Feb 12, 2006)

I have a Samsung LN52860. I had not thought to try directly connecting a USB hard drive... interesting. I'll check back to see if you get it to work.

One thing you could try if your set has DLNA like mine is connect the hard drive to a computer on your network, install the Samsung DLNA software, and access the content via the TV's DLNA source. Of course the TV has to be plugged into the network via its ethernet port. I haven't actually tried to see if it will map external drives connected to a computer but it does map internal drives just fine. It should work.


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## bilbus (Aug 29, 2006)

I use a tv to output my media center pc, i use hdmi out from a pc to a tv.

I don't think the tv will be able to decode media .. i think the usb is for pictures.


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## csc2000e (Sep 1, 2008)

You need something like this in order for that to work:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136325
You hook up the hard drive to that box, and the box to your tv, and it decodes the videos and such to be able to play on your tv.


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## bilbus (Aug 29, 2006)

All of those media players generaly suck, and most can not play all formats .. and you have to reencode things.

Hooking up a windows pc running WMC or media portal usualy works much better.

If you are good at linux, myth tv works also.


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## piccard (Jun 1, 2009)

I just purchased a WDTV unit and a couple of 2TB USB hard drives to do the same thing.
I transferred all of my downloaded media from DVD's to one of the drives.
I have tried several of the media files and it works great.
I'm sure that some of them won't work, but I can recode as required when I come across them.


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## yustr (Sep 27, 2004)

yes those unit sound interesting. Have you loaded a DVD or Blu-ray disk to it? I could get rid of a lot of shiny plastic disks if it works.


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## Raylo (Feb 12, 2006)

Yes indeed some TVs with USB will play media through them (off thumb drives or HDs) if the firmware supports it. I just bought an interesting product. I had a POS laptop motherboard die and I wanted to get some data off the hard drive. While shopping for a typical USB enclosure I found a Thermaltake Black X 2.5"/3.5" ESATA HD docking station that connects to a PC via USB 2.0or ESATA. Could conect to TV via it's USB. This thing is pretty cool. Just pop any ESATA drive in there. They can supposedly even be hot swapped. So in theory I could just dump GBs of media from my network storage onto a one or more HDs and connect to TV and off I go. Or even have 2 of them, one connected to TV and one to network to save from having to move it. It would take only a couple of seconds to pop a HD out of the one on the network, walk over and pop it into the one at the TV. They are on sale at Worst Buy for $45... cheap enough to get 2.


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## Raylo (Feb 12, 2006)

Well, I put out some bad info in my last post. I tried to play media files off a USB HD (Apricorn 2.5" HD enclosure with EIDE HD) connected to one of my Samsung LN52A860 wiselink USB ports. It didn't work. The drive powers up but the TV doesn't see the device. It does detect and play media files from a USB thumb drive just fine, though. The TV comes up with a menu to select the type of media file (photos, music, movies, etc). You select the type and the TV will list the files of the selected type on the drive, if any. This is the same menu you get by accessing the TV's DLNA source to play media files from network connected PCs.


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## karkate (Aug 4, 2009)

Hi..
Install the Samsung DLNA software, and access the content via the TV's DLNA source. Of course the TV has to be plugged into the network via its ethernet port. I haven't actually tried to see if it will map external drives connected to a computer but it does map internal drives just fine. It should work.


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karkate
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