What am I doing wrong?
Discussion
So I keep all my films in MP4 format on a Seagate 5TB Personal Cloud NAS drive, connected to my router via network cable.
I then can access all films from any device connected to the wifi around the house.
I was streaming from here to a Google Chromecast connected to my amp, which in turn, supplies all my donwstairs TV`s.
I was having trouble with it dropping out, and assumed it may be the wifi dropping.
Following a little research, I upgraded the fibre broadband connection and in turn received a new/better router (SKY).
I also at the same time, purchased some high speed powerline adapters and also a Google Chromecast Ultra.
So now we have more stable wifi and effectively a hard wired connection directly to the GC Ultra.
I set all this up before Christmas and watched a couple of films with no issues at all. Hallelujah!
Or not, as we attempted to watch a film yesterday (first one since) and it spent the entire film dropping out (suddenly appearing as the GC Ultra home screen). Upon which I have to re-open the Seagate app on my phone, re-cast and then re-start the film.
As you can imagine, it`s not much fun and takes the edge of relaxing with a film
I`ve tried it both from my phone (IOS) and my missus (Android), same issues with both.
Anyone got any ideas, before I throw the lot out of the window!
I then can access all films from any device connected to the wifi around the house.
I was streaming from here to a Google Chromecast connected to my amp, which in turn, supplies all my donwstairs TV`s.
I was having trouble with it dropping out, and assumed it may be the wifi dropping.
Following a little research, I upgraded the fibre broadband connection and in turn received a new/better router (SKY).
I also at the same time, purchased some high speed powerline adapters and also a Google Chromecast Ultra.
So now we have more stable wifi and effectively a hard wired connection directly to the GC Ultra.
I set all this up before Christmas and watched a couple of films with no issues at all. Hallelujah!
Or not, as we attempted to watch a film yesterday (first one since) and it spent the entire film dropping out (suddenly appearing as the GC Ultra home screen). Upon which I have to re-open the Seagate app on my phone, re-cast and then re-start the film.
As you can imagine, it`s not much fun and takes the edge of relaxing with a film
I`ve tried it both from my phone (IOS) and my missus (Android), same issues with both.
Anyone got any ideas, before I throw the lot out of the window!
I'm willing to bet your "high speed" power line adapters are to blame. They are rarely high speed in practice.
What file sizes are you streaming? I watch 4k hdr files, around 15gb each, and they won't stream smooth over powerline adapters, and they don't like WiFi much either, though it works, with a launch delay. I use cables .
What file sizes are you streaming? I watch 4k hdr files, around 15gb each, and they won't stream smooth over powerline adapters, and they don't like WiFi much either, though it works, with a launch delay. I use cables .
As above
To test it is simple, take a few devices into the room that has the router in and wire them up directly with Ethernet to test. If they don’t have Ethernet sockets buy a single high speed access point and test them.
If it all works fine then you have identified the power s
te as the issue. In my experience you get about 5% or less of the claimed throughput, firstly the lines are noisy, secondly the protocol is inefficient as it has to use loads of error checking and redundancy, thirdly once I had more than a few they seemed to crash every few days and need full reset. The only answer to get it working perfectly was to spend 4 days tuning cat 6e round the house, take up floorboards, run it through loft, eaves, round the outside of the house etc. Then in every single room install an access point and call it ‘lounge’ ‘kitchen’ etc. That way you can manually connect your WiFi device to the right ap. if each and every ap has a dedicated line to the switch as mine does, troubleshooting is ridiculously easy on the rare occasion something stops working.
To test it is simple, take a few devices into the room that has the router in and wire them up directly with Ethernet to test. If they don’t have Ethernet sockets buy a single high speed access point and test them.
If it all works fine then you have identified the power s
te as the issue. In my experience you get about 5% or less of the claimed throughput, firstly the lines are noisy, secondly the protocol is inefficient as it has to use loads of error checking and redundancy, thirdly once I had more than a few they seemed to crash every few days and need full reset. The only answer to get it working perfectly was to spend 4 days tuning cat 6e round the house, take up floorboards, run it through loft, eaves, round the outside of the house etc. Then in every single room install an access point and call it ‘lounge’ ‘kitchen’ etc. That way you can manually connect your WiFi device to the right ap. if each and every ap has a dedicated line to the switch as mine does, troubleshooting is ridiculously easy on the rare occasion something stops working. Thanks for the replies chaps, I’ll try hard wiring it and see what happens. It’s in the same room but across a large void which isn’t easy to hide a cable round.
I know what you’re saying, but it streams to everything else fine, phones, iPads, laptops etc no dropping out at all.
Also the previous chromecast was only connected via WiFi and had the same dropping out issue.
I’ll run a temporary cable this evening and give it another try
I know what you’re saying, but it streams to everything else fine, phones, iPads, laptops etc no dropping out at all.
Also the previous chromecast was only connected via WiFi and had the same dropping out issue.
I’ll run a temporary cable this evening and give it another try
Well interestingly I found we had a fire stick, so fired that up and tried that instead and all works perfectly!
Having now searched the internet for this specific fault with Chromecasts, it transpires that there’s lots of people suffering the same issues with no word of a fix from Google!
I think I’ll stick with the fire stick for a week or so and if all good I’m going to return the Chromecast Ultra as not fit for purpose. Pointless having a 70 quid item that doesn’t do the one job it’s supposed to!
Having now searched the internet for this specific fault with Chromecasts, it transpires that there’s lots of people suffering the same issues with no word of a fix from Google!
I think I’ll stick with the fire stick for a week or so and if all good I’m going to return the Chromecast Ultra as not fit for purpose. Pointless having a 70 quid item that doesn’t do the one job it’s supposed to!
RogerDodger said:
I'm willing to bet your "high speed" power line adapters are to blame. They are rarely high speed in practice.
What file sizes are you streaming? I watch 4k hdr files, around 15gb each, and they won't stream smooth over powerline adapters, and they don't like WiFi much either, though it works, with a launch delay. I use cables .
Not always the case.What file sizes are you streaming? I watch 4k hdr files, around 15gb each, and they won't stream smooth over powerline adapters, and they don't like WiFi much either, though it works, with a launch delay. I use cables .
I've a QNAP NAS that I have some 4k (12-25GB) movies on. I was suffering similar issues as the OP streaming these to my TV via powerline adaptors. The 4K movies would just randomly drop out or seem to reach some kind of limit and play no further.
Struggled to find anything specific online to explain why.
Eventually found another 'app' on the NAS to set up a slightly newer media server - all sorted. So now I have two DNLA media servers available from the NAS, one specifically for 4K streaming. This one has no issues amd plays full 4K HDR over powerline adaptors seamlessly.
The older media server which I used to use for movies pre-4K qualtiy/size is no longer needed and I'll deactivate it on the NAS when i can be bothered.
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