Netgear WNDR3400v3 N600 is driving me crazy

1QWK96GT

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Jul 9, 2011
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Hey guys,

I am having some what of a dilemma and need some help. I have a Netgear WNDR3400v3 N600. I also have 2 Vizio TV's one is a E650i-B2 model while the other is a E600i-B3. The router has a USB spot on the back to share your hard drive media via ReadyShare (which is a netgear proprietary media server) well for what ever reason the TV does not pick up ReadyShare. I have tried multiple things. I even tried using PLEX but I think you have to pay for it now as it wouldnt let me stream to my TV unless I got a monthly subscription. (im cheap). Then someone suggested reflash my router with dd-wrt. Even though it technically did not support WNDR3400v3 I found where someone had taken the code and altered it to work with a WNDR3400v3. So i flashed it with the dd-wrt mega build, but there was no samba support which I was told is what i need. Basically under USB/NAS support there was no section to turn on samba. Then someone suggested reflash to a tomato firmware that would work and had samba support. I reflashed and turned on samba and everything but it still will not show up on the tv under media. The hard drive is completely empty formatted ext2 format (which I was told was the format for all this). Maybe I am chasing the wrong thing and I should be looking for trying to set up a DLNA?

Thanks,
 

smitbret

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Most devices like SmartTVs, BD Players that support playback of local content don't support streaming directly from network shares. You'll most likely need to set up a DLNA/UPnP server like Plex, Mezzmo, Twonky or Serviio.
 

1QWK96GT

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I was trying to avoid leaving a computer on all the time as that would be easy to do over a computer. I was trying to do it straight from the router to tv/computer/etc. My question is do these services you talk about work just on the TV/blue ray player/ etc? Also is there a fee associated with them?

Thanks for the help!

 

smitbret

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The first thing you'll need to do is make sure your TVs support DLNA streaming over the network. I have a M261VP in my bedroom that doesn't. It has all of the services like NetFlix, Amazon, etc. and it can playback music and photos from a USB drive but there is nothing in the firmware that lets me stream from a network source. I looked up your TVs and couldn't find anything definitive other than the "MultiMedia" tab and I don't know what that contains.

Some routers have a DLNA server that can be turned on and share files from a connected USB drive. Keep in mind that the USB connections on most of these routers is much, much slower than you get with the same drive connected to a PC and that particular model doesn't have that. It has a ReadyShare feature that I'm not familiar with that would allow you to share content over the network but I really, really doubt that would work for your situation. If your TVs were able to get the Plex app then you would be covered but the info on Vizio's website has a big, fat "No".

I know the WD MyCloud series of devices hosts a DLNA server that could work but like I said, you are really gonna want to double-check that your TVs support what you want to do.

Ultimately, I think you are looking at a couple of boxes that are plugged in to the TVs that perform these functions for you. Something like a pair of WDTV Lives with one of them having the HDD plugged into it. Then you can skip the whole DLNA/UPnP thing and just play across network shares. Incidentally, the WDTV Lives have a UPnP server if it is something you end up needing.
 

1QWK96GT

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The television definitely supports DLNA streaming as i can set up a PLEX server no problem but I am cheap and did not want to pay for a "plexpass" to play my media from the USB plugged into my router. I think the issue comes in that my Netgear N600 does support DLNA out of the box. Whether I could reflash it with a dd-wrt/tomato build and stream over DLNA im not sure. I believe that readyshare is only for files over computer network or something because it certainly wont show up on the tv. I am unfamiliar with uPnP. I tried setting up a Samba server but could not get it to work successfully. Thanks for the help!
 

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