cynicaljoy Posted March 29, 2013 Share Posted March 29, 2013 I am constantly experiencing buffering when attempting to play videos from my unRAID server. The server has a 3.0 Ghz quad core and 8GB of RAM which I thought would be plenty being that my old setup was a single core with 2GB of ram and JBOD and that streamed content just fine. Yes, I _am_ using a cache drive. Quote Link to comment
Joe L. Posted March 29, 2013 Share Posted March 29, 2013 I am constantly experiencing buffering when attempting to play videos from my unRAID server. The server has a 3.0 Ghz quad core and 8GB of RAM which I thought would be plenty being that my old setup was a single core with 2GB of ram and JBOD and that streamed content just fine. Yes, I _am_ using a cache drive. The "cache" drive has absolutely NOTHING to do with playback of media from your array. It is involved in allowing "writes" to your array to occur faster then when written directly to the protected array. If you have issues with streaming media, you'll need to provide a lot more detail on your network configuration, add-on processes, and whatever else is going on on your server simultaneously. Simply having a 3Ghz quad-core processor is completely useless unless being utilized by a CPU intensive process. For most streaming, you are I/O bound by your PCI bus and network. Quote Link to comment
cynicaljoy Posted March 29, 2013 Author Share Posted March 29, 2013 Per your comment in another thread the CPU matters. That is why I called it out. Per other comments (not by you) adding the cache drive is what solved buffering issues for them. I am confident that my network configuration is not the issue as I am using wired gigabit router with cat6 cables. I am willing to do additional testing/provide more detail if you believe it to be necessary. I've disabled all plugins and am using the default go file to make sure nothing additional is going on. What additional information can I share in order to provide you with adequate details to assist? Thanks! Quote Link to comment
Joe L. Posted March 29, 2013 Share Posted March 29, 2013 Per your comment in another thread the CPU matters. That is why I called it out. Per other comments (not by you) adding the cache drive is what solved buffering issues for them. I am confident that my network configuration is not the issue as I am using wired gigabit router with cat6 cables. I am willing to do additional testing/provide more detail if you believe it to be necessary. I've disabled all plugins and am using the default go file to make sure nothing additional is going on. What additional information can I share in order to provide you with adequate details to assist? Thanks! What do ifconfig eth0 and ethtool eth0 show?? Did you crimp the ends on the cat6 cables yourself? If yes, what color-code did you use? What specific make/model router? How busy are your CPUs? Is a parity calc/sync in progress? (You can see the statistics in "htop" (if you installed it) or "top" (if using top, press "1" to toggle individual CPU stats) What are you using to play media? What type of media are you playing? Joe L. Quote Link to comment
cynicaljoy Posted March 29, 2013 Author Share Posted March 29, 2013 What do ifconfig eth0 root@Tower:~# ifconfig eth0 eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:1c:c0:60:92:e2 inet addr:192.168.23.134 Bcast:192.168.23.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:69198745 errors:0 dropped:476075 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:47236942 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:98347285550 (91.5 GiB) TX bytes:16430554304 (15.3 GiB) Interrupt:20 Memory:e4200000-e4220000 and ethtool eth0 Settings for eth0: Supported ports: [ TP ] Supported link modes: 10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 1000baseT/Full Supports auto-negotiation: Yes Advertised link modes: 10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 1000baseT/Full Advertised pause frame use: No Advertised auto-negotiation: Yes Speed: 1000Mb/s Duplex: Full Port: Twisted Pair PHYAD: 1 Transceiver: internal Auto-negotiation: on MDI-X: off Supports Wake-on: pumbg Wake-on: g Current message level: 0x00000007 (7) Link detected: ye show?? Did you crimp the ends on the cat6 cables yourself? No, purchased from Monoprice If yes, what color-code did you use? N/A What specific make/model router? Asus RT-N16 (w/Firmware: DD-WRT v24-sp2) How busy are your CPUs? Does the `top` output below give you enough detail? Is a parity calc/sync in progress? No (You can see the statistics in "htop" (if you installed it) or "top" (if using top, press "1" to toggle individual CPU stats) htop screenshot What are you using to play media? Apple TV w/XBMC What type of media are you playing? MKV 720p Joe L. All of this was captured while attempting to stream 720p content and experiencing buffering. Quote Link to comment
kizer Posted March 29, 2013 Share Posted March 29, 2013 Your machine has been up 3 days and look at all the dropped packets. RX packets:69198745 errors:0 dropped:476075 overruns:0 frame:0 Mine has been up 8days and look at my numbers RX packets:64219396 errors:0 dropped:1225 overruns:0 frame:0 Unless I'm nuts that seems a bit odd I can easily stream not transcode 5 720 streams without any buffering what so ever on my little AMD single core machine over my Gigabit network. With both have transfered close to the same amount of data, but your dropped packets is a lot higher. Quote Link to comment
cynicaljoy Posted March 29, 2013 Author Share Posted March 29, 2013 That does seem odd, would that have to do with my router or my NIC? I am using onboard NIC. Quote Link to comment
kizer Posted March 29, 2013 Share Posted March 29, 2013 What nic are you running and what build of unRAID are you running? I know there is/was some problems with people running certain builds of the Realtech onboard NIC on some of the RC5 releases. I have an older Realtec card and I don't appear to be suffering from it. Then I don't know for sure if the newer card simply do not work or if they are just buggy and drop data. Quote Link to comment
cynicaljoy Posted March 29, 2013 Author Share Posted March 29, 2013 UPDATE: Believe I have: Intel® 82566DC Gigabit Ethernet Controller Original Message Attempting to figure out which make it is from the Motherboard spec but for now here is what I have: *-core description: Motherboard product: DP35DP vendor: Intel Corporation physical id: 0 version: AAD81073-209 serial: USDP825002LZ slot: Base Board Chassis Location *-network description: Ethernet interface physical id: 19 bus info: pci@0000:00:19.0 logical name: eth0 version: 02 serial: 00:1c:c0:60:92:e2 size: 1GB/s capacity: 1GB/s width: 32 bits clock: 33MHz capabilities: pm msi bus_master cap_list ethernet physical tp 10bt 10bt-fd 100bt 100bt-fd 1000bt-fd autonegotiation configuration: autonegotiation=on broadcast=yes driver=e1000e driverversion=1.9.5-k duplex=full firmware=1.3-0 ip=192.168.23.134 latency=0 link=yes module=e1000e multicast=yes port=twisted pair speed=1GB/s Quote Link to comment
dgaschk Posted March 29, 2013 Share Posted March 29, 2013 Try a new cable, new port, etc... Quote Link to comment
cynicaljoy Posted March 29, 2013 Author Share Posted March 29, 2013 Thanks guys! Found the culprit, the switch. My configuration was Router + Switch now its just Router. But now I am thinking about getting a new switch and putting everything on it. What do people thing of TRENDnet TEG-S80G because currently the only thing in my media cabinet wired is my ATV (directly to router, in order to bypass crapped out switch). But I like having everything wired (within reason of course, no need to do that with laptops). Quote Link to comment
burtjr Posted March 30, 2013 Share Posted March 30, 2013 I have one, works great. Newegg has sales on those all the time if you are not in a hurry you could save anywhere from 5-10 USD. Quote Link to comment
kizer Posted March 30, 2013 Share Posted March 30, 2013 Yep I'm pretty sure I'm using that one at my house. Quote Link to comment
Joe L. Posted March 30, 2013 Share Posted March 30, 2013 Thanks guys! Found the culprit, the switch. My configuration was Router + Switch now its just Router. Glad you found the issue, especially since you started with saying Quote: "I am confident that my network configuration is not the issue as I am using wired gigabit router with cat6 cables." Right now, it is probably time go watch a few movies and enjoy your improved performance.... Joe L. Quote Link to comment
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