Can you connect a WD type USB HD to a android tablet and watch movies?

[Jay726]

Hi

I'm new to this field of tech, only having a laptop and iphone. Basically i need a small single layer type system (i.e not a laptop that opens up book style) that i can connect a western digital passport external hard drive from and watch movies from, and also just do a little wifi internet surfing on and that's it whilst i am away.

I travel with the forces quite a bit and need something small and compact around 8-0 inch but i need to connect the exernal HD to it. I download all my movies from the net in AVI format (purchased of course) and watch them on my laptop through media player but all i need is a screen really as the rest of a laptops uses doesn't get access whilst away. Can this be done with an android based tablet or will i have to go for a windows based or even a small netbook with swivel screen like the dell inspiron duo?

any help would be greatly appreciated

Jay

 

[gurgle]

You can, but you do not say what Tablet you have or considering. Some tablets are more friendly than others. The IMPORTANT thing to remember is the External drive must have an external power supply generally. This is critical to understand. The Tablet's battery generally do not have enough amperage to power anything other then Flash storage.

 

[redcloud]

You can, but you do not say what Tablet you have or considering. Some tablets are more friendly than others. The IMPORTANT thing to remember is the External drive must have an external power supply generally. This is critical to understand. The Tablet's battery generally do not have enough amperage to power anything other then Flash storage.

I use a 1TB Seagate usb 3.0 HDD with my Acer Iconia A500 to watch movies, but I keep the tablet plugged into power to aid in powering the hard. My recommendation is to put the movies on an SD card and run them from there. If anyone out there has a better solution, sure would love to hear your ideas.

 

[Jay726]

Thanks for the replies, I'm looking at getting an Archos 70 as it seems to tick the boxes, unfortunately the HD i'd like to use is a none self powering, however archos reckon it may power it, but also i would really be using the battery, i will always have a power source to hand so could plug the 70 in and use mains, do you reckon this would work?

 

[tobydell]

gurgle is correct, the usb power is certainly 5v or thereabouts on a desktop or laptop any external drive might work on a DT or LT as long as there is enough capacity in the 5v power supply, but it is often better to hook the external drive up to a 5v supply to ensure it works, as far as android tablets are concerned, a flash drive should be recognised and will not draw much current, as long as the format of the movie is acceptable to the android tablet you have, similarly it should work,
I just tried with my allwinner a 13 tab and a kingston datatraveller 4gb flash drive, with a normal dvd copied to it (which works on my domestic dvd player (sumvision) )
I could not find it in the gallery, however with an avi movie copied to the stick, it showed up in gallery and plays fine the stick is fat32, so a basic tablet running android 4 should work for you