Great networking advice from .... gamers

I have Ubiquity UniFi / Network / Wi-Fi – Ubiquiti Inc.

You are missing the point. Unless the network is 10x over-provisioned it is considered "broken".

And yet:

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I guess this thread will go the way similar threads went in the past. First, without addressing the core of the concerns, an assault from members of the "People's Will" sect and then the devs will "gracefully" close the thread :wink:

You’ve discussed tools that test speed and the latency of a network connection.

Please share with the class the stats revealed by your own tests of your own WiFi connection.

We note you haven’t changed your posting style. And that it’s not WHAT you’re saying that’s necessarily problematic, or annoying, but rather HOW you’re saying it.

It is not relevant, you don’t need a multi gig switch to enjoy channels. Feel free to mark my post as the solution for your core concern

We .... :wink:

Hmmmm....., how am I saying it? Are you able to verbalize your "concerns" or do I have to guess? Maybe you have a hunch or a bias?

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You sound like you are trying to use this software in a non standard way that you wont divulge to anyone. I work for a software company. We design our software to fulfill a need. My customers sometimes try to push the envelope and use it for things it wasn't designed for. My answer to them is you are free to do so but don't expect us to support your custom configuration. We validate that it works in an approved configuration and beyond that, "good luck to you".

The channels software works great in a consumer household where you have normal consumer equipment. The developers designed it to be optimal for that environment. If you want to push the envelope and reverse proxy, bandwidth limit, inspect the packet stream then good luck to you. If you want community support, try submitting logs, explaining what you are trying to do, and generally being less snarky. Someone then may be able to try and help you even if you are "on your own" from a support perspective.

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Thanks for keeping it cool.

I think the problem was happening on Apple TVs while Android devices didn't seem to have a problem. The player behavior might be different. I tried playing from Pixel 4a in a place where the speed test was showing 20Mbps down and it played live TV stream at 13Mbps w/o issues. The good news is I am covered with at least 200Mbps in places where I care about so it should be a smooth sailing from now on.

@sdust
I love your threads. They never make sense. Always has some mild arguing and makes me happy. Please dont stop being you.

Now onto the OP about ethernet/wifi.


For 98% of people with a good quality wifi router and mild to little physical or radio interference. Wifi will work for 98% of stuff they do.

If you have any issues and you go to any tech forums and say "your app sucks because of XYZ" all people on tech forum will bash you and hate you. How dare you not go with superior ethernet. Therefore you are a moron. Only a idiot would use wifi. You must die!

So to avoid other people thinking you are a moron. Just use ethernet. Peer pressure is real. Now cave in.

If your going to use wifi. Get a good mesh system with ETHERNET backhaul. Again no ethernet backhaul works fine 98% of time. But the 2% of time it doesn't work. Will piss you off. So use ethernet backhaul. While your at it. Just run a ethernet cable to your streaming server/clients. Problem solved. And run ethernet to your bathroom. You need to be able to stream 4k on the throne.

Side question: Has anyone ever trief these ethernet over power things? Where it uses your homes power lines as ethernet. Ive never purchased one because I don't believe in them. Thoughts?

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Yes, they work, but they also destroyed my electrical switches and outlets with micro-arcing.
Direct wired ethernet and Moca for me.

We've answered all of this in other places, but to just do this all over again:

What does it mean to have Good Network Conditions

There are three aspects of a network connection that impact playback and recording with Channels:

  1. Throughput: the amount of data per second that can be transferred
  2. Latency: the amount of delay between a packet being sent and received
  3. Jitter: the variation in latency from one packet to the next

If Netflix Streaming doesn't have issues, why does Channels?

Some of the protocols that are used for streaming in Channels (from the HDHomeRun) are realtime only and have small buffers. This means that if the latency is too high or if there is jitter, it can cause data to be permanently lost before it is recorded (or seen).

Netflix streaming is non-live playback via HLS and DASH with large amounts of client-side buffering that can smooth over many latency and jitter issues.

Why is the experience of using the Channels DVR improved by having a better network connection?

When playing back recordings on the local network, the Channels DVR serves the raw recording to the client over HTTP and relies on the client to decode, parse and seek through the raw file. Seeking in an MPEG-TS container is a process that requires reading large amounts of data to find the exact location in the file to start reading. It involves doing binary searches at file offsets and reading contents until it finds the right place to pick up. It can be 10's megabytes that need to be read to find the right place to seek.

A Fast Ethernet (100BASE-TX) connection can transfer about 12MB in a second, a Gigabit Ethernet (1000BASE-TX) connection can transfer about 125MB in a second. This is going to cause the seeking to be much quicker (like skipping through commercials or just scrubbing across the timeline) the faster connection you have.

Can things work on WiFi? Sure. Will you sometimes have strange problems? Quite likely.

Our goal has always been to work in as many scenarios as we can, and we continue to improve all aspects of the product as we find ways we can improve situations, wireless connections will always introduce a spooky level of uncertainty that many times creates issues that are hard to identify and even harder to fix.

If having a high speed network connection is not possible on your local network, one solution is to get a beefier DVR and set your At Home Streaming Quality to 8mbps. Tuning to channels and starting to watch recordings will be a second or so slower as the transcoder spins up, but it will work around network issues.

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Thanks for finally providing details, and not an unsolvable riddle.

You're probably at the very edge of usability, with those tested speeds (on wifi, anyway). What source are you using? Transcoding the content, either from the DVR or other source, would absolutely help here.

You forgot about the arp spoofing - ARP spoofing - Wikipedia
Your mom will still get you.

Answered in a different thread.

(Emphasis mine.) And that ping and jitter... :grimacing:

Could you elaborate? Wonder what are your guidelines in this matter. :wink:

You should be aiming to halve those ping/jitter numbers, if not better. Do they significantly improve from a non-backhauled AP (i.e. the AP hopefully ethernet connected, eventually, to your DVR server)?

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I find the concerns about the milisecond jitter on a local network amusing. After all remote viewing, where jitter and latency are much higher, is also an option.

And I find your snarky false assumptions and selective attention (when clear answers have already been provided) to be annoying. Is this the best usage of our time?

Yes, thanks to transcoding.