YouTube Buffering

[fred]

Hi Folks
I have been suffering a bit from sporadic Youtube bufering via wifi connected devices over the last few days. I have also noticed when I connect devices to the 5Ghz band that on speedtest the speed seems a bit erratic. Could this be related? I have the latest stock firmware and no QOS enabled.

I am with Virginmedia's 100 meg service.

 

[srinivasvaradaraj]

Try an old fashioned reboot of both router and computer. This might allow the router to pickup a different band in case of interference from other 5GHz devices. Also, if you have a lot of devices connected to the router on the 5GHz band (more than 5). Try disabling the TX bursting in the professional tab for 5GHz.

Thanks.

 

[RMerlin]

Make sure you use your ISP's DNS. Using a third-party DNS like OpenDNS might cause you to be accessing a Youtube server that isn't as close to your ISP network-wise.

 

[fred]

Make sure you use your ISP's DNS. Using a third-party DNS like OpenDNS might cause you to be accessing a Youtube server that isn't as close to your ISP network-wise.

How do I know if I am using my ISP's DNS server? I thought it was all automatically configured when you set the router up?

 

[fred]

Try an old fashioned reboot of both router and computer. This might allow the router to pickup a different band in case of interference from other 5GHz devices. Also, if you have a lot of devices connected to the router on the 5GHz band (more than 5). Try disabling the TX bursting in the professional tab for 5GHz.

Thanks.

Hi
Can you explain what TX bursting is exactly?
Thanks
Fred

 

[RMerlin]

How do I know if I am using my ISP's DNS server? I thought it was all automatically configured when you set the router up?

If you didn't specifically change anything, then you are using your ISP's DNS.

 

[srinivasvaradaraj]

Apologies on the incorrect terminology but, I was referring to

Frame Burst
Frame burst allows packet bursting which will increase overall network speed though this is only recommended for approx 1-3 wireless clients, Anymore clients and there can be a negative result and throughput will be affected.

 

[fred]

Thanks for your help guys. Much appreciated

 

[shallo62]

Hi Fred.
You sure the problem is not with VirginMedia.
100 Mb/s service is no guarantee of a good service, i had it and had to leave.
At times i was getting less than 1 Mb/s, checkout VM 100 / 120 meg forum.
Just a thought.

 

[fred]

Hi shallo62.
I find that the speed of the virginmedia service is generally reaching 100 megs even on my nexus 10 which puzzles me about this buffering with YouTube. It doesn't happen all the time-its quite random really. Never happens on my desktop PC connected via Ethernet. However I will check out the forum you suggested.

 

[RMerlin]

If your issue is specific to Youtube, it could also be that the Youtube caching node on Virgin's network are being overloaded. This was a problem with my own ISP, and Google actually upgraded these caching servers last week if I recall.

 

[fred]

Hi Rmerlin
That was very useful information. I took a close look at the Virginmedia forums and i discovered alot more information regarding this buffering issue on Youtube. There are alot of people affected by this and the worrying thing is if they have indeed been upgrading things it appears to have been temporary as further reports are coming in of yet more buffering issues.

 

[RMerlin]

Hi Rmerlin
That was very useful information. I took a close look at the Virginmedia forums and i discovered alot more information regarding this buffering issue on Youtube. There are alot of people affected by this and the worrying thing is if they have indeed been upgrading things it appears to have been temporary as further reports are coming in of yet more buffering issues.

The upgrades I'm talking about were actually for my ISP. I have no idea what's the plan for Virginmedia's caching servers.

 

[fred]

Well it would appear that Virginmedia are doing some upgrades to resolve the buffering issues.

 

[fred]

Hi guys
Just to give you an update on my Youtube buffering issues. I had been in touch with my isp's support forum and one of the suggestions was to disconnect the N66u and return the Superhub back to router mode and monitor its behaviour. I did this yesterday afternoon and the buffering on Youtube only occurred once for a very short time. I tested this out on various tablet devices as well as my Sony Google TV and it never buffered once on that device.
Could there be something up with my N66U? Any suggestions are most welcome.

 

[RMerlin]

Hi guys
Just to give you an update on my Youtube buffering issues. I had been in touch with my isp's support forum and one of the suggestions was to disconnect the N66u and return the Superhub back to router mode and monitor its behaviour. I did this yesterday afternoon and the buffering on Youtube only occurred once for a very short time. I tested this out on various tablet devices as well as my Sony Google TV and it never buffered once on that device.
Could there be something up with my N66U? Any suggestions are most welcome.

Make sure they are both using the same DNS, otherwise you might end up on a different Youtube server.

QoS can also interfere with this if you had it enabled.

 

[fred]

Hi
How do I know if I am using multiple DNS servers? What would I be looking for in the router's settings?
I have QOS disabled.

 

[RMerlin]

Hi
How do I know if I am using multiple DNS servers? What would I be looking for in the router's settings?
I have QOS disabled.

Did you enter your own DNS on the router? If not, it means you will be using your ISP's servers, which is ideal. If however you entered your own DNS servers manually (for example the Google 8.8.8.8, OpenDNS's, etc...), remove them and leave the setting to Connect to ISP DNS automatically on the WAN page.

 

[fred]

Hi
I have never touched any of the DNS settings on the router. I let it do everything automatically when set it up.

 

[Bagman]

If this was a problem with your router, why would many other VM customers be seeing the same problems all over the country, including those just using the Superhub and all kinds of different routers? An easy test is to try running some Youtube videos during the quiet periods, such as first thing in the morning. I bet you it will work perfectly with the RT-N66U in place. Oh, and make sure you're using a cat 5e or cat 6 cable between the router and the Superhub.

The problem is Virgin Media. In many areas, they simply took on too many customers and overloaded the segments. IIRC, they don't even flag up area upgrades until they get to 90 percent capacity, whereas most cable ISPs start upgrade cycles at 60 percent. This is just too slow when you've also got to get permission from councils to site new cabs or dig up roads.

VM tried to deal with this with a new Content Delivery Network (giant caches), but these had the same problems as the old transparent caches ie, they get overloaded, and are even slower when a cache miss occurs. They also had to put in loads of emergency bandwidth at LINX over Christmas. It's worth noting that the likes of BT have three times the bandwidth at LINX than Virgin Media.

I've always had good service, because I'm on one of the newest bits of VM network, just a few hops from LINX, and even I suffered stuttering/buffering Youtube videos during peak hours. VM just don't have the bandwidth necessary.

The reason for all this became apparent with the recent announcement of VM's sale to Liberty Media. The suspicion is that in order to make VM look good prior to sale, they'd been loading up new customers onto already overloaded segments, but reducing expenditure (ie not fixing and upgrading the network more than the minimum) in order to make the company look more profitable.

If the Liberty Media take over does get approved, VM should get more investment (it's basically been run as an outsourced debt management vehicle until now). It can't be worse than the current shower that's in charge.