Echo Freeze Ups, Inconsistent Network Bandwidth

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jchoving

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Echo Freeze Ups, Inconsistent Network Bandwidth

#1

Post by jchoving » Fri Jun 24, 2016 6:19 pm

I've been experiencing very random freeze ups and slowness with watching live TV. Not sure what the issue is because this has been happening ever since I installed this setup a year ago, only now it seems to have got gradually worse. Nothing has changed in my network either. Live TV will start to get pixelated/blocky/choppy/slow (although sound is fine) and "network issue" pops up in corner....sometimes the issue goes away, but most of the time it completely freezes up and I have to reboot the Ceton. Once the Ceton comes back up, the issues either immediately occur again or eventually come back after 10 minutes or 2 hours, completely random. I have WMC running on a Dell laptop running Win 7 64-bit, and that is its sole purpose in life...not doing anything else but streaming to extenders. Driver is updated to latest version on NIC. Firmware is up to date on all Ceton Echos. Firmware is up to date on Procurve switch. In theory, I have a very nice setup and I shouldn't be having these issues.

Comcast cable card installed in HD Home Run Prime
HD Home Run ----> HP Procurve 1810-24G (24 port Gigabit switch)
Dell Latitude E6320 with 8GB RAM, 240GB SSD, onboard Intel 85279LM Gigabit Ethernet
Echo# 1: Procurve 1810-24G Gigabit Switch ----> TP-Link TL-SG108E (8-port Gig) ----> Echo
Echo# 2: Procurve ----> Echo
Echo# 3: Procurve ----> Echo

I have these issues on all Echos, even the ones directly connected to the Procurve. I have tried turning jumbo frames on and off (either all on or all off) on the Procurve and laptop and that didn't work. Flow control is enabled on both.

Another weird thing is that when I run the network tuner on an Echo, the bandwidth is all the way high and then after 20-30 sec, drops down to levels well below HD, but then it spikes right back up to full. Not sure what that's all about, but I suspect there is some setting I haven't tried on either my Procurve or my laptop's NIC. Anyone have any ideas?

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Crash2009

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#2

Post by Crash2009 » Sun Jun 26, 2016 5:46 pm

jchoving wrote:
Comcast cable card installed in HD Home Run Prime
HD Home Run ----> HP Procurve 1810-24G (24 port Gigabit switch)
Dell Latitude E6320 with 8GB RAM, 240GB SSD, onboard Intel 85279LM Gigabit Ethernet
Echo# 1: Procurve 1810-24G Gigabit Switch ----> TP-Link TL-SG108E (8-port Gig) ----> Echo
Echo# 2: Procurve ----> Echo
Echo# 3: Procurve ----> Echo
What is the E6320 cabled to?

All your TV Toys need to be cabled to the same switch.

mldenison

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#3

Post by mldenison » Sun Jun 26, 2016 6:37 pm

I had similar problems. After a couple of weeks, I found my HTPC (built-in Intel NIC) would start out at 1GBS but quickly go to 100MBS. I had a flaky cable running to the switch. Amy issues I had with my HTPC and Ceton products were network related.

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Crash2009

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#4

Post by Crash2009 » Sun Jun 26, 2016 7:32 pm

mldenison wrote:I had similar problems. After a couple of weeks, I found my HTPC (built-in Intel NIC) would start out at 1GBS but quickly go to 100MBS. I had a flaky cable running to the switch. Amy issues I had with my HTPC and Ceton products were network related.
Yes, that is likely the best place to start. Then move on to the NIC

jchoving

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#5

Post by jchoving » Mon Jun 27, 2016 2:13 am

E6320 is directly connected to the Procurve switch. Not likely to be any flaky cables because any other streaming service like Netflix works perfectly without hiccups. NIC on laptop stays a constant 1Gb speed. Doesn't drop down.

I attached a photo of the network tuner graph result in case anyone was wondering.
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Crash2009

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#6

Post by Crash2009 » Mon Jun 27, 2016 12:59 pm

Use the Procurve to mirror the Laptop port. Capture the data of the mirrored port with Wireshark. Wireshark will reveal the reason for the drops in the graph you just posted.

I am not familiar with the Web Interface of the Procurve. On my switch, Counter Summary counts the Received Errors, and Interface Statistics displays the Details of the Received Errors on a specific port.
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STC

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#7

Post by STC » Mon Jun 27, 2016 3:24 pm

Use an unmanaged switch between HTPC and extenders to test.
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Crash2009

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#8

Post by Crash2009 » Mon Jun 27, 2016 6:34 pm

Your Anti-Virus can also cause the drops you see in the graph.

Others have had to make adjustments to "Norton" to prevent the stall/drop.

Personally I dropped AVG all together and went with MSE to eliminate that exact problem.

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Crash2009

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#9

Post by Crash2009 » Tue Jun 28, 2016 12:14 pm

One other suggestion.... for intermittently drops Ethernet, and YES, I am aware this Changelog specifies HDHR-4

Part 1

Firmware Changelog

Release 20150826:
•Fix problem causing guide to stop working for some customers.
•Auto-detect HD channels during channel detection to improve favoring recording HD channels (requires channel scan to update).
•Support disabling channels from the device Channel Lineup webpage.
•Return DeviceAuth in discovery response.
•Improvements to diagnostic logging.
•CC models: Improve channel-to-guide matching when a tuning resolver is present (requires channel scan to update).
•HDHR4 models: Fix problem where Ethernet link may intermittently drop.
•HDHR4 models: Fix AGC problem causing poor reception in some environments.

http://www.silicondust.com/support/down ... changelog/

Part 2

another note re: HDHR, I have read about a few complications that have arisen with WMC as a result of using the HDHR/DVR version of the driver.

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Crash2009

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#10

Post by Crash2009 » Tue Jun 28, 2016 1:28 pm

Intermittent Signal Loss could show as drops in the graph. BUT would also show when running WMC on the Laptop. Not sure if you said Laptop/WMC runs fine.

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#11

Post by Sammy2 » Wed Jul 06, 2016 5:38 pm

Crash2009 wrote:
jchoving wrote:
Comcast cable card installed in HD Home Run Prime
HD Home Run ----> HP Procurve 1810-24G (24 port Gigabit switch)
Dell Latitude E6320 with 8GB RAM, 240GB SSD, onboard Intel 85279LM Gigabit Ethernet
Echo# 1: Procurve 1810-24G Gigabit Switch ----> TP-Link TL-SG108E (8-port Gig) ----> Echo
Echo# 2: Procurve ----> Echo
Echo# 3: Procurve ----> Echo
What is the E6320 cabled to?

All your TV Toys need to be cabled to the same switch.
Not sure what you mean here. I have two switches between my HTPC and my Primes and because I re-provisioned old Cat5 telephone in my home the ethernet to my echo extenders is "daisy chained" and goes through anywhere from 4 to 6 switches as I have a switch in each room, the garage, the office and the Family Room where the HTPC resides. Everything works fine but I do have to give the echos a kick in the pants every so but not too often! Last time though, I had to reboot my HTPC and power cycle every echo (I have five extenders en total) to get everything all hooked back up. I think I may have had an issue with my router that caused this but haven't looked in the router log to see. If it happens again I'll research some more.

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Crash2009

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#12

Post by Crash2009 » Wed Jul 06, 2016 11:19 pm

We've been doing it this way for years Sammy. Extenders, Network tuners, and htpc all on the same switch. once the boot they get the IP from the router. then they don't go through the router no more they just yak and Yak to each other. Routers are busy enough, plus if they are busy, and they don't have time to figure out where your packet is supposed to go, they toss it in the trash and the htpc has to resend.

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Crash2009

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#13

Post by Crash2009 » Thu Jul 07, 2016 12:33 am

STC made me do it. Spent the whole summer digging a trench to the garage found in holes with a sledgehammer cutting a bunch of stuff with a Sawzall then spend all winter patching up the mess I made.

Don't regret it one bit.

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#14

Post by STC » Thu Jul 07, 2016 3:23 am

You lost me at STC ;)

I missed the ops original comment about having an SD tuner. For the test that also should run off the unmanaged switch. Keep all TV traffic off the main switched network.
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Crash2009

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#15

Post by Crash2009 » Thu Jul 07, 2016 6:19 am

Sammy2 wrote:
Crash2009 wrote:
jchoving wrote:
Comcast cable card installed in HD Home Run Prime
HD Home Run ----> HP Procurve 1810-24G (24 port Gigabit switch)
Dell Latitude E6320 with 8GB RAM, 240GB SSD, onboard Intel 85279LM Gigabit Ethernet
Echo# 1: Procurve 1810-24G Gigabit Switch ----> TP-Link TL-SG108E (8-port Gig) ----> Echo
Echo# 2: Procurve ----> Echo
Echo# 3: Procurve ----> Echo
What is the E6320 cabled to?

All your TV Toys need to be cabled to the same switch.
I asked about the E6320 to eliminate the possibility of a Wifi HTPC.

I was commenting on the part highlighted in blue. Sounded like you never heard of that. I was about to redo my network in 2012 everything to the same switch was one of the first suggestions given to me.

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#16

Post by Sammy2 » Fri Jul 08, 2016 3:31 pm

Okay. In my set up wireless clients are off the Asus RT-AC68U router but the wired clients all go through daisy chained switches connected to the switch in the office which is directly connected to that router. Almost all my traffic is media related with the Emby Server, HTPC, Echos and two Primes in addition to 2 ethernet Rokus (eventually through other switches) connected to that switch. There are two Rokus that are only wireless and a couple of Chromecasts connected to the WiFi as well that work just fine. I have only the "main" switch in the office and a Brother Printer connected to my router for a very long time and everything works just swimmingly. All my switches are unmanaged. I have four Trendnet 8 port Gig Switches and two Netgear 8 port Gig Switches in this daisy chain and they work great. I can attest to the high quality at low price of Trendnet gear! I even have a Trendnet 5Ghz Media Bridge zip-tied to the back of my 50" on the patio so I can connect one of my echos to that TV. I use a Harmony 900 here with the RF blaster on the back of the TV too. This works great! When looking for network gear I look for Trendnet first but that Asus Router is an awesome piece of equipment. The F/W on it is a modification of DD-WRT and is very flexible while being easy to use.

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