So , I have the “hub” ( in living room via wired network)and was planning on streaming the contents to the “SMP” via wifi in my bedroom. Results= disgusted. Mkv 1080p movies start playing and after a few minutes becomes unwatchable. Freezing, no audio, slideshow style video :( I was actually thinking of getting a wireless N access point to connect to my Verizon Fios router, but I doubt that will do much. I am coming to the conclusion that I may just have to buy an external USB HDD and copy all the movies on my “hub” to the drive so I could just have access to all my movies in the living room to my bedroom. The whole idea of streaming my content over my wifi network in my home seemed so appealing and I was excited about it. But after reading some posts about stuttering mkv movies on the SMP over the network and that many are suffering from this issue has completely turned me off to the whole streaming concept. THAT and the fact that I cant simply access my HUB content to my SMP without PC interaction as well just makes it even worse. SO, unless theres something I’m doing terribly wrong or if anyone has suugestions I guess I’ll go via the " old school" way and just get a usb hdd and connect it to the SMP and copy the 700gb of mkv’s from my HUB to the external HDD …
Go the old school way with a USB hard drive. Streaming over wifi N when you are doing high bit rate files is still hit or miss. Free up your network bandwidth. I have 1080p files that stream without an issue but if you’re doing very high bitrate MKVs or streaming an entire bluray, you’ll have problems. The Gigabit network isn’t really gigabit speeds in real life. You’ll get about 10mb/s speeds. Good luck.
hey there , i went out an bought a netgear wnr2000v3 N300 router and I noticed a nice increase in wireless speeds, I am about to test the connection to the SMP…but after reading your response I may just return it and get a HDD :) lets see what happens
SUCCESS!! the new router solved the issue of it freezing , it is obvious that my Verizon ALL-in-one modem/router/wifi was the issue as it was not providing enough bandwitch to the smp. I am pleasantly surprised that this Netgear n300 is doing the job because after I left the store I saw the comparison chart on the back of the box showing that the n600 is the “best” for hd video stream and there was no check mark on the model i purchased , so I was worried lol. So far so good with the streaming of a 1080p /DTS mkv file over wifi.
THE ONLY issue I have now is that I still need TWONKY to act as the server from my pc , the SMP will NOT see my live HUB directly, and I “did:” in fact enable DNLA server on the HUB’s setting .
edit : spoke to soon, so maybe I do need the n600? it looks like “I’m getting there” though. The playback lasted alot longer with the new router I can say, compared to my original setup which froze the movie in less than 1 or 2 minutes. The playback is sustained much longer now. So , I’m think better router still? go from the N300 which states up to 300mbps to the N600 which advertises up to 300 + 300Mbps…
issues still persist even with new better router… I will state that my current internet connection is 43mbps down and 80mbps up, So I doubt its my connection. I have finally decided to give up with the wireless streaming and just connect an external hdd to the SMP. I’ll have to copy my 1TB of movies from my WDTV live HUB to the external hdd, so I can simply have a duplicate library from my hub in the living room, to the SMP to in the bedroom. It seemed like such a simple task of purchasing the Live HUb for the living room to store all the data and then buy the Streaming Media Player with WiFi for the bedroom so I can enjoy my content in both room easily. Well, I learned the hard way. Its not as simple and useful as I thought.
By the way, has anyone looked into or know more about Logitech’s Powerline adapters? that connect your wired network over wall outlets anywhere in your home? and can stream 200mbps…
So far I have only tried 1080p mkv’s. That’s really all I want to view. Top notch quality and nothing less. The router( which I’m returning) did in fact play the movies a little longer before the freezing occurred, which kinda lead me to believe at first that all was solved. I am giving it one last try, I ordered the logitech powerline adapters from amazon, which turn your existing wall outlets into Ethernet outlets carrying 200mbps signals. Its like having your home pre-wired for Wired internet anywhere in your house. In my case, apartment. I’m hoping that a steady stream thru is “wired” network would give the SMP in my bedroom all the bandwidth it needs. And if this last chance doesn’t work, I’ll just buy an external hdd, which would be a slight hassle, since I have to copy 1TB of data from the WDTV HUB ( via network which is slow, about 10mb/sec). The 10mb/sec is not so bad when I’m occasionally sending an 8gb mkv to the HUB from my pc, but 1TB would be painful.
I’ll definitely report back with my good or bad news once I receive the powerline adapters tomorrow ( friday 3/16/12).
Not trying to rain on your parade, but wireless streaming 1080p is pretty much a myth, unless your router and SMP are in the same room / line of sight.
A wired 10MB/s connection should stream your hi def videos.
the Powerline solution might work, depending on the wiring between the 2 plugs you choose to put them in. Don’t expect the rated 200MB/s connection. what i have seen in the past is anywhere between 2MB/s and 20 MBs. if you can’t run a direct line this is probably the next best solution, but you may need to play with different plugs ( sometimes in the same outlet box get different speeds) If you can get 2 of the plugs on the same breaker ( if a breaker blows both outlets stop working) it’s your best bet.
just trying to ground your expectations. the WDTV Hub works well, as long as the data gets to it at a reasonable speed.
I tried a pair of Linksys poweline adapters and then when they just quit working I tried a pair of WDs. Neither worked well at all. But in my case I had to jump circuits and had a arc fault breaker on one of the circuits and it just wasn’t working as good as wireless was.
One thing you might check for, since wireless is involed, radio frequency interference. If you have an android phone or tablet you can get an app called “wifi anaylizer” and see what is going on around your location with other wireless networks. There is also “inSSIDer” for the PC. Check around your house/apartment for wireless devices you may be using that could be interfering too. I found a set of wireless rear speakers for my surround sound system was the cause of my problems. It was bad…I ran a check into speedtest.net from the wireless PC and saw I was getting ~5MB download rate. As soon as I turned off the transmitter for the rear speakers I got back to 17mb speed. Lucky for me I could simply change the channel the speakers were using and avoid the problem they were causing.
So far I have only tried 1080p mkv’s. That’s really all I want to view. Top notch quality and nothing less. The router( which I’m returning) did in fact play the movies a little longer before the freezing occurred, which kinda lead me to believe at first that all was solved. I am giving it one last try, I ordered the logitech powerline adapters from amazon, which turn your existing wall outlets into Ethernet outlets carrying 200mbps signals. Its like having your home pre-wired for Wired internet anywhere in your house. In my case, apartment. I’m hoping that a steady stream thru is “wired” network would give the SMP in my bedroom all the bandwidth it needs. And if this last chance doesn’t work, I’ll just buy an external hdd, which would be a slight hassle, since I have to copy 1TB of data from the WDTV HUB ( via network which is slow, about 10mb/sec). The 10mb/sec is not so bad when I’m occasionally sending an 8gb mkv to the HUB from my pc, but 1TB would be painful.
I’ll definitely report back with my good or bad news once I receive the powerline adapters tomorrow ( friday 3/16/12).
I’ll be interested in your experience with the powerline networking. I have a WD Livewire which works pretty well for streaming audio to a WD TV Live in my kitchen. Bear in mind that the 200Mbps is a theoretical maximum which will never be achieved in real setups. The quality of the house wiring and power strips can affect the speed. I’ve also read that the speed drops off with distance.
Going back to your problem streaming from the Hub to the SMP, did you try connecting by network share instead of by the Twonky media server?
yes, both resulted in the same freezing after a few minutes of playback. At first I wasn’t be to even discover the hub from my smp via network share…so I was only able to use townky, which I wasn’t to fond of using because the PC had to be on . But then magically the smp discovered the hub and I was able to access it with no pc, but the problem persisted.
I will add that changing from my all in one Verizon router to a separate standalone wireless N router " helped" but it only delayed the time from freeze ups. So, my last resort is to try these powerline adapters and see what happens, if not I’ll revert to just adding an external hdd. I have an old WD MY book II, 2TB external, but its pretty full and I didn’t wanna get rid of the stuff I have on it, but if I have to I’ll try to go half and half, and delete 1TB of data from it to make room for my 1TB of mkv movies.
I am also aware that the 200mbps is probably not gonna be achieved in the “real world” but it may still prove a lot better than wireless. This apartment bldg was built in 2011, brand new, so I’m hoping and “expecting” good quality wiring throughout. Tomorrow I should find out how it goes and I’ll post back my experience,
So, I got the logitech powerline adapters. The logitech software ( that you install on pc to monitor the network) is reporting on average 70-90mbps transfer speed on the “wired”( via wall socket) network. I am very impressed as I have so far succesfully sustained playback of a high bitrate 1080p mkv movie file being streamed from the Live Hub. It did start freezing again though at one point when I first tested it( and I was like " awwww mannn", but oddly hasn’t done so again for a while thankfully.
edit: NOPE…forget it, no more networking. I’m just gonna connect an external hdd to the SMP in my bedroom. I tested the powerline adapter and it suddently dropped mbps from 70-90, to 40-60mbps…don’t know why, not using any bandwidth elsewhere either I brought the 2nd adapter to the same room as the primary adapter and speeds went up to 185mbps. So definitely the distance is a factor. Oh well, guess “streaming” is not for me. Going old school with an external 1TB hdd.
edit 2: Bought an external hdd 1TB Seagate GoFlex and now the copy process from the Hub to the external hdd is excruciatingly slow ( 7.45mb/sec) which isn’t so bad but moving 700gb is going to take forever…
spoke to soon, so maybe I do need the n600? it looks like “I’m getting there” though. The playback lasted alot longer with the new router I can say, compared to my original setup which froze the movie in less than 1 or 2 minutes. The playback is sustained much longer now. So , I’m think better router still? go from the N300 which states up to 300mbps to the N600 which advertises up to 300 + 300Mbps…