[solved] trouble streaming 1080p video

[Dougy]

up until recently my collection has only been a maximum of 720p.  I've just bought a 1080p projector so have been collecting some 1080p movies with decent bit rate, averaging about 10Mbps.  I 'm having issues with the video stuttering.  I am using media browser with Win 7, I have set media players settings to the max of 60 sec network buffer but I still have trouble. 

 

I am running unraid on an Atom which I think is the limiting factor.  File transfer vary from 30mb/s down to 10mb/s. 

 

I am doubting that there would be anything in my syslog that would be useful but I can provide it if required.  Are there any changes with SMB or maybe I could use NFS?  I would really like to get this working without having to change hardware.....

[GFOviedo]

There might be other factors other than CPU.  What media player are you using? Or are you using a HTPC?

[Dougy]

im running win 7 and using mce that makes use of windows media player.  The client has nvidia 6600gt video card and intel E6600 cpu.  It is more then capable of playing the files.

 

I have mediocre speeds ever since building the server but it hasn't been a deal breaking issue until now......

 

I'm currently debating throwing a 3tb drive in the htpc for 1080p movies and just using the uraid box for 720p and lower stuff.......  but really hoping I can resolve this

[S80_UK]

I really doubt that the fact that you are using an Atom CPU is the issue if you are just streaming.  If there is any transcoding needed then an Atom will not be up to the task.  I have happily used Atoms while sharing large video files and have had transfer speeds at hundreds of megabits per second, more than enough for blu-ray rips and the like.

[maxinc]

I would firstly copy one of the 1080p from the unraid server to the HTPC and play it locally. In the process I would evaluate the transfer speed for the file transfer as well as if the file plays correctly on the HTPC. You may be surprised with the capabilities of the HTPC software.

 

Is your HTPC connected via WiFi, as this would explain poor streaming performance for 1080p. A 10Mbit/s movie needs about 1.2MB/s sustained transfer speed which shouldn't be a problem given the reported transfer speed of 10-30MB/s. These speed should comfortably allow full Bluray streams of 54Mbit/s over a LAN connection but a WiFi could struggle under certain conditions.

[Dougy]

thanks for the replies, I am starting to wonder if the htpc is up to the task....  I will copy across some files this afternoon and try again

[Johnm]

I have several atom PC's (literally like 10) on my network. all of them can stream DVD ISO's just fine over wire.

most are D510's or D525's but even my older 330 and N270 (single core)  can keep up.

All of my desktop atoms can even playback/decode just fine because of the videocard or decoderchip I have added.

 

A few things i have seen with some older atom boards (zotac boards are notorious for this) with 4 SATA ports. They are really only 2 ports with a port multiplier. Thus killing read/write speed when accessing multiple drives.

 

I would suggest you try XBMC on your HTPC and see if that solves your issue.

[da1000]

Should be no prob with the unraid server side of things as i stream my blurays fine (full 1080p with HD audio and subs) i am using a gig network and xbmc as the media player, also have a raspberry pi running a xbmc build (xbian) and that plays 1080p fine too as long as its not trying to decode dts audio then it stutters lol fine if it passes dts through to amp or with AC3 streams so im guessing if the pi can play them your atom should be able to

[Dougy]

I have on of the supermicro Atom boards that I imported from the states.  I have always found that my transfer speeds were lower then others report with more powerful equipment and I have seen similar jerks when watching 720p tv shows when sickbeard decides to transfer a file to the server (this I think was solved with the 60sec network buffer setting).  These are the reasons I initially thought the problem was with unraid....

 

I am in the process of transferring a 1080p file to a local HD now.  I will report back shortly

[Dougy]

OK, still getting jerkiness after using the skip function (but not as bad as from network) but don't seem to be getting any other random jerkiness as before.

 

What would be the bottleneck causing the jerkiness on the local HD after skipping forward?  it is a WD750GB Black... SATA I from memory

[Influencer]

How much ram does your htpc have? It sounds like your buffering sucks, if physical memory is low the buffer will go to virtual memory which is very slow compared to physical.

[maxinc]

What was the average speed during file transfer? As suggested, xbmc is probably the best media player companion for unRaid so it's worth a try to narrow down the issue which at this point could be a combination of network performance, hw and sw capabilities.

 

If you are running other services on the unraid such as sab or sickbeard, I would expect performance drop to occur especially if simultaneous read/write operations occur on the same disc even with a more powerful CPU. My new unRaid based on a microserver 1.3Ghz CPU is working miracles and streaming 1080p to several clients simultaneously so I know the CPU alone is hardly a limiting factor with unraid.

[S80_UK]

Should be no prob with the unraid server side of things as i stream my blurays fine (full 1080p with HD audio and subs) i am using a gig network and xbmc as the media player, also have a raspberry pi running a xbmc build (xbian) and that plays 1080p fine too as long as its not trying to decode dts audio then it stutters lol fine if it passes dts through to amp or with AC3 streams so im guessing if the pi can play them your atom should be able to

Your guess is incorrect.  The Raspberry Pi includes h.264 hardware acceleration for video in the Broadcom chip.  You can only use an Atom CPU for HD playback if it also has hardware support, such as the Nvidia Ion graphics hardware.

 

It's not clear what hardware the OP is using for playback, but the original question was regarding the hardware on the server side (where an Atom cpu would not be a problem).

 

[lionelhutz]

I can't say what the issue is, but it's funny how many people are responding that the Atom can playback just fine when you're using the Atom on the server side and not the HTPC side.

 

The Atom should be capable of playback though. You could try NFS if you're on a new beta where it works. You could also double check your networking setup to ensure it's good.

[Dougy]

I was just pointing out why I initially suspected the atom could be a factor, not that I still did.

 

The problem is now solved thanks to all your help. 

 

I install CoreAVC.  no difference so I borrowed a newer video card from a friend that supports CUDA.  In media player fast action scenes barely hit 30% cpu usage, down from the 100% it had been sitting on.  Problem was media centre seems to ignore the codecs and didn't improve....

 

I had not used xbmc in the past as no PVR was a deal breaker.  I saw that it had become available but figured it would be in it's infancy and was put off by the need for a separate backend software as I really want it to be a seamless as media centre....

 

I took the plunge and installed it last night....  wow.....  it is pretty cool.  I'm getting too old and don't like change.... while I'm not looking forward to having to relearn everything,  first impressions are f'ing awesome.  The configuration options are great but not sure if the WAF is going to be so good...

anyway, I still need to configure the live TV but video is playing perfectly now.  The action scenes from Transformers - Dark side of the moon look absolutely amazing in hi def on a 100" screen.

[Johnm]

~golf clap~..

 

Good deal.

so when are you inviting us over for movie night? (jk)

[Dougy]

 

just thought I would follow up in case anyone else in the same situation works of what I said earlier.....

 

While XBMC did look fantastic, I was unable to get live TV working properly...  with some backends it would start to work on some channels but was not consistent. Some channels had horrible interlacing issues too...  I'm not sure if Australia may not be as well supported by the community based offering?

 

In the end I decided that MediaBrowser with Media was a better solution as the live and guide works faultlessly. I ended up finding a way to make media centre use coreAVC but was still unhappy with overall performance.

 

I purchased the following:

 

  1   Kingston HyperX KHX1600C9D3B1K2/8GX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 $49.00

  1   Gigabyte GA-B75M-D3H Motherboard $75.00

  1   Intel Core i3 3220T $145.00

 

I also purchased

 

1   Gigabyte GeForce GT 610 Silent $42.00

 

I carried over:

1. Auzentech Prelude audio card

2. an early model DVICO Dual digital tuner card PCI that plugs into a USB2 port for the second tuner

 

 

While the board I purchased has two pci slots, I am unable to use the Geforce GT 610 due to it covering one of the pci slots.........

 

I decided to give it a shot using the I3's built in video and have been extremely happy with the performance.  I still intend to plug in the video card at a latter date.

 

I don't have any issues with the Auzentech Prelude under WIN7x64 for media as the last driver update seems to be a lot more stable.  I would however like to look at replacing the tuner card with a PCIe one.  It works great, the only issue is the second usb tuner can be a bit flakey which can result in scheduled recordings failing.... especially if I try putting the computer to sleep. 

 

What dual PCIe dual digital tuner would people recommend for use with media centre?