Network issues playing 720p and 1080p files (was Play 720 and 1080p over wifi??)
#16
(2012-08-24, 21:44)unabatedshagie Wrote: Copied the file to the media center using the file manager in XBMC. The transfer speed was roughly 760 Kb/s.

Copied the file to the media center and it played fine so it would seem it's a network issue however apart from connecting the two computers together with a crossover cable I need to go through the router (BT Homehub v3)

I've no idea what to try next.

Undecided

Are you still using the powerline adaptors or wifi now?
If its powerline you could have a faulty adaptor, a slow adaptor (you do have the fast 200mbps + ones don't you?), a faulty ethernet cable or just bad or incompatible house wiring.

If its wifi try the following:-

Sorry I don't have BT so don't know what settings the Homehub allows you to change, but these are the general things I had to change on my router to get full speed wireless:-
Change the security protocol to WPA2,
set the encryption to WPA-TKIP or WPA2-AES
Set the network mode to wireless N only (only do this if you are only going to connect wireless N devices to your network otherwise leave it on mixed but you may find your wifi connection slows down to the speed the slowest device is capable of)
change the speed setting to 300mbps (or on some routers the channel width to 40mhz)
change the channel from auto to a set channel (you might have to experiment to find a clear channel but for me 11 worked)
Turn off UPnP

There were probably some other settings I changed but those are the ones I remember making the most difference

I recently helped a friend move from homeplugs to wifi, he has a similar setup to you in that he wanted to stream from downstairs to high upstairs, the only thing I had to do to achieve perfect results was add a cheapish high gain wireless N usb adaptor to his upstairs pc (it was around £13 if memory serves me correctly) as the built in wifi on his pc was very weak.
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#17
I was using the powerline but getting buffering issues so I've moved the media center upstairs next to the main pc. The media center is plugged directly into the router the main pc is plugged into.

I'm still getting buffering issues when I play any 720p+ files.

So I've ruled out the powerline adapters as the buffering is happening without them.

So it's either my main pc, my router or my media center pc that's the bottleneck.

And now I'm not sure how to proceed in figuring out what's the cause of the problem.
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#18
If you haven't already tried it try a different ethernet cable from the pc to the router, and also a different ethernet port on the router,
also the ethernet connections on your pc and media centre are 10/100/1000 aren't they?
I used to have a sony media centre that was only 10/100 and it would stream 720p fine but struggled big time with 1080p.
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#19
(2012-08-25, 12:05)unabatedshagie Wrote: So it's either my main pc, my router or my media center pc that's the bottleneck.
Do you have any other PCs that you can use to play the video files over your local network from your main PC? If you do and if the buffering occurs with this third PC as well, then the problem probably isn't with your media center PC.

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#20
It plays fine on my laptop through vlc over wifi.

That would make me think it's the media center pc.

Probably an issue with OpenElec.
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#21
Try your laptop with the powerline adaptor and if it still works you'll know its definately a problem with the media pc, be it software or hardware.
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#22
They buffer slightly only in action heavy sections.
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#23
Hmmmmm I'm not an expert on networking and I don't use openelec so I don't know what hardware it supports,
if it was me with this problem and I'd established wifi is working ok I think I'd search or ask at the openelec site what usb wireless N dongles it supports and go and buy myself one,
you can tear your hair out for ages to try and fix this or go with a cheapish solution.
Hopefully someone with more knowledge than me may come along and advise you the correct way to proceed.
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#24
Hmmm, just to give it a try I unplugged the cable and enabled the wifi.

Baring in mind the media center is sitting 2 foot away from the router the 720p file plays fine. Haven't watched it all the way through so it might get buffery in action heavy sections.

I'd ideally like to hard wire it as moving the media center downstairs will decrease the wifi signal.
(2012-08-25, 16:14)stammie Wrote: Hmmmmm I'm not an expert on networking and I don't use openelec so I don't know what hardware it supports,
if it was me with this problem and I'd established wifi is working ok I think I'd search or ask at the openelec site what usb wireless N dongles it supports and go and buy myself one,
you can tear your hair out for ages to try and fix this or go with a cheapish solution.
Hopefully someone with more knowledge than me may come along and advise you the correct way to proceed.

The media center has built in wifi. Which I just tried in the post above this one.

I'll move it back to where it usually sits and try it again and see if the wifi is enough to play the files with the reduced signal.
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#25
Well, just moved the media center PC back downstairs to the main PC. Am using wifi but the files are just as unplayable as before.


I guess I'm just going to have to not play 720p or 1080p files unless I can figure out why the wired solution is so poor.
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#26
(2012-08-25, 14:17)unabatedshagie Wrote: It plays fine on my laptop through vlc over wifi.

That would make me think it's the media center pc.

Probably an issue with OpenElec.
Hmm, is it possible to boot your media center PC with an XBMCbuntu CD/USB stick in "Live" mode and see if you can smoothly play your videos over your network? That could help isolate whether the problem is with OpenELEC or with the media center PC hardware.

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#27
(2012-08-25, 19:32)unabatedshagie Wrote: Well, just moved the media center PC back downstairs to the main PC. Am using wifi but the files are just as unplayable as before.


I guess I'm just going to have to not play 720p or 1080p files unless I can figure out why the wired solution is so poor.
What are your media pc's specs? Is it a system you built or a box you bought?
If a box you bought I go back to my earlier point of buying an inexpensive high gain wireless N dongle,
my limited experience of pre built media centre pc's is that they are great boxes with weak built in wireless.

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#28
(2012-08-25, 21:11)stammie Wrote:
(2012-08-25, 19:32)unabatedshagie Wrote: Well, just moved the media center PC back downstairs to the main PC. Am using wifi but the files are just as unplayable as before.


I guess I'm just going to have to not play 720p or 1080p files unless I can figure out why the wired solution is so poor.
What are your media pc's specs? Is it a system you built or a box you bought?
If a box you bought I go back to my earlier point of buying an inexpensive high gain wireless N dongle,
my limited experience of pre built media centre pc's is that they are great boxes with weak built in wireless.
There is a link in the first post. Not sure what the specs are.
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#29
Well as a last resort I've tried to get NFS working without much luck.

Tried FreeNFS but can't get anything to show.
Tried haneWin NFS but it doesn't buffer but the 720p and 1080p play like an image slideshow.

I've no idea what else to try apart from upgrading my hardware.
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