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[Qythyx]

Is there a way to increase how much is buffered when playing from a Library Server? I know there is the Buffering option under the Playback -> Wave Out Settings, but is this what that setting does?

The reason I'm looking for an option is because I'm streaming my music from a Library Server is WMA Lossless mode (~1Mbps), and I'm finding that most songs play the first few (5 to 10) seconds fine, then the skip for a second or 2, then they play the rest of the song through just fine. I'm looking for a way to fix this.

Thanks.

[John Gateley]

Yes, the buffering will affect library server content too.

But it may not fix the problem. If you don't have enough bandwidth, you will have gaps (either during a song or waiting to play the next song).

Try converting to a high quality lossy format...

j

[Qythyx]

Hmm, I definitely have the bandwidth and I very rarely have gaps in the middle of the song. The pattern is quite consistent:

1. first few second play fine
2. approx. 1 second pause
3. rest of the song plays fne

I'll try converting, but I'd prefer not to if possible.

[rpalmer68]

I have exprienced the same problem (and logged it in this forum previously).

I am playing back WMA lossless files and also don't want to go to a lossey format.

I'm currently running 11.1.95 and don't often get the problem with this version, but did with some of the earlier ones.

I must admit the problem seems to come and go with different versions, will try .99 this weekend and see if it returns or not.


Richard

[Alex B]

I don't see this happening with APE files on a standard 100 MB wired and switched LAN. In any case, if there has been some congestion on the server side it has only delayed the start a bit, but not interrupted playback after that.

What is your LAN connection? What are the server OS and HD configurations?

Have you increased the buffering in the MC options? (on the client)
(Options > Playback > Audio > Output Mode Settings > Buffering)

The OS level sound card driver may have additional buffering options, but I don't now if they can make any difference to this.

[Alex B]

Could you guys convert a bunch of WMA lossless files to Monkey's Audio and Wave and try if the used file format has any effect on this?

That would separate a possible file transfer issue from a possible file format issue.

[Qythyx]

I converted 15 tracks to APE and tried streaming them. I think the problem might have been somewhat reduced, but it did still occur. I would say that it was less consistent at the beginning of songs, but still did occur sometimes.

Although I know I do have enough bandwidth to stream the tracks over time, I suppose it is possible that network congestion causes problems over a shorter period of time. Is it possible for MC to tell me when this happens (logs, etc). It would be great if there were some statistics I could see for these streaming sessions that show buffer underruns, etc.

One other thing, sometimes when there is a delay in the song it just pauses for a few seconds and then continues. But sometimes it pauses for a while and then starts the next track. Even worse, sometimes it pauses for a very long time (multiple minutes) and then finally starts the next track. When this happens I can short-circuit the delay by just clicking the Next Track button.

[John Gateley]

Try turning on conversion for Library Server, to a lower bitrate format. It's just a test, it's not permanent.

Remember that wireless and wired bandrate numbers are not equivalent: wireless is not full duplex and all nodes share the same "wireless", while typical wired networks each node has it's own wire.

j

[Qythyx]

Sorry, I should have mentioned that. Yes, if I set it to a lower bitrate format then things are improved and I rarely (if ever) get the same type of dropouts.

I'm guessing that the issue is related to network congestion, but I just feel that there should be more/better buffering to get over that problem. Also, I still think a few things are odd:

1. I quite consistently get a drop out/pause about 5-10 seconds into a song when in WMA lossless format, after that the song usually plays the rest of the way through without issues.

2. Sometimes I get a pause in the middle of a song and MC takes multiple minutes to recover and proceed to the next song.

[kthomas]

I get the same choppy performance using WMA lossless over WiFi 11Mbps.   I haven't experimented much with settings, and I know I could upgrade my WiFi, etc.

What I found very interesting, however, was when a friend of mine told me how much he loved his new Squeezebox, I downloaded the server and the PC client.  I had the server find all the music on my server (1500+ CDs), and then I used the client to stream the files to my laptop.  Outside of the music search, the whole thing took less than 10 minutes to get set up, including downloading the software, and the streaming was flawless - no skips, no delays, no tweaking of settings.   Very impressive, and makes me wonder why it's as difficult as it is on MC.

[John Gateley]

Does the Squeezebox support WMA Lossless (I couldn't find anything that said it did). I'm guessing that the  server is converting your WMA lossless files to a less bit-intensive format like MP3.

To do a fair comparision, figure out what format is being used and use Library Server's convert on the fly option.

j

[John Gateley]

Nevermind that, I found that the squeezebox can support lossless WMA.

But are you sure you are comparing lossless WMA on both systems? I haven't seen any slowdown  like you describe.

j

[rpalmer68]

I'm running MC over a 802.11g wireless network with only my main PC running Media Server and the client PC on the network.  I have between 75-80% signal strength.

I get ther occasional 1sec pause when playing music, which is rather annoying, but I've just come to live with it and put it down to "networking issues" even though there are only the 2 pcs on the network.

What's more of an issue for me is that from time to time MC will pause for several (15 - 20) seconds and then just keep playing back the last few seconds (what's in the buffer I assume) over and over again.  The only way to stop it is to press <Stop> and then go into playing now and play the track again.  Once again I assume this is a networking issue, but during this time I can still access the network and browse directories from the client PC to the main PC, so I know the network is still operational.

I love MC and what it can do, but I certainly think there needs to be something done about how the buffering works so that these little annoyances can be overcome.  Is there any logging we can enable to try to help isolate what is causing the problem?  If not,  maybe some can be added so we can help solve this.

I too had a squeezebox and it never seemed to have the same problem, and it was on a 802.11b network.

The majority of my files are WMA lossless but I have had the problems with my 192K MP3s as well.

Cheers
Richard

[Qythyx]

One quick note regarding my issues...I'm not actually streaminy over a LAN, I'm streaming over the internet. I'm now starting suspect that the issue for me is that, due to network congestion between my work (client) and my home (server) at some times, the buffer just underruns. But, that still doesn't explain why I very often have a short pause after the first few second of a track, but then once that pause is over the rest of the track plays just fine.

Anyway, would it be possible to allow the buffer size it increase more than 5 second? It'd be interesting to see if that would help me.

Thanks.