Need a non-streaming media box? player?

"media player"

WDTV Live? Maybe you don't need the network abilities, but WD and B-Rad have been good at updating the official and unofficial firmware. Supposedly refurbished units have been as cheap as $50.

There are plenty of others... look up WDTV on Amazon and see the other suggestions. If you have a suitable spare PC or laptop or Raspberry Pi, install XBMC.

I've owned two incarnations of the WDTV, as well as the A-110 Popcorn Hour. They're no slouches, but nowadays, my go-to portable solution (at home, my Samsung TV handles most files very well and streams them over the network, as well play files through a USB connection) is the Brite-View CinemaTube Mini. It doesn't do Netflix, YouTube or any other third-party streaming, and its interface is pretty spartan, but it's tops when it comes to compatibility.

I don't know what brand of Blu-ray player you have, but from my experience, Samsung and LG Blu-ray players also do very well with different file formats including mkvs and mp4s, both over USB and over a network, plus they have Netflix and those other services available, too.

Thank you for your comments. It helps to have a suggestion from someone who knows your actual needs. Gives me something more specific to look at.

I have a Samsung BD-05100 Blu-Ray player, but the TV is a large Toshiba Flat-screen (I don't know the model). So far I haven't played anything other than AVI's with the Blu-Ray. It balked at any mp4 or mkv that I tried, and sometimes it'll balk at an AVI. There have been DVD files -- maybe foreign in orgin -- that I have converted to region-free DVD's that will play on my computer but the Blu-Ray combined with the TV wouldn't play them. I would covert them to AVI's and those would play.

Thank you for your comments.