Moved Movies to Server, now HD stutters

Omegas

Omegas

[H]F Junkie
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Jan 19, 2007
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Having a little stutter problem.

I moved my movies from the HTPC in my sig to my new server, also in sig, and now when watching HD movies, either rips or iso's, it plays fine at the begginning but starts to stutter about half an hour into the movie. I didn't have this problem before while they were saved on the HTPC and when I copy a movie back over to the HTPC, it plays stutter free. I remember seeing someone else with this problem but can't seem to find the thread, so was hoping someone else remembers what the problem turned out to be or maybe where I should start looking.

My networks is setup as follows, Cable modem -> Linksys WRT54g running DD-WRT -> Trendnet TEG-S80g(gigswitch) -> Server/HTPC/Other Comps(all gigs)

HTPC is Vista Ulti 32bit running MyMovies in Media Center with ISO's being played on PwrDVD 7.3.

I've monitored my HPTC's system and the only changes that occur with the stuttering is the network bandwidth. It stays nice and steady ~8mbs and then spikes, dropping out to ~2mbs when the stuttering begins. I'm pretty sure this is a network setting somewhere and an easy fix but just can't remember what/where. Any help would be much appreciated.

Oh, BTW, any SD movies play just fine.
 
You might want to look up "Auto Tuning" and "Remote Differential Compression" as settings in Vista to tweak/try turning off.

Go to Start > Control Panel > Programs > Uninstall a program > Turn Windows Features on or off.
 
I have that switch and i believe it may be blocking UPNP over my network, maybe due to its broadcast storm control feature. Not sure but maybe that is interfering with your streaming as well. You may want to test if the switch is contributing to the problem.
 
thx for the input, will try that tomorrow after work.
 
Actually, I took a look at my switch and it is actually the TEG-S80TXE, which does have the broadcast storm control, yours however doesn't. Still one thing to consider but seems less likely that it would be causing the problem without that feature.
 
Can't help much but I do run a similar setup. I use a gigabit network (Netgear switch) with a WHS box and an HTPC running Vista 32bit Ultimate/PowerDVD 7.?. I have Bluray iso's on the WHS and have no problems playing them back on the HTPC by mounting them and using PowerDVD. I did upgrade both boxes with add-in Intel NICs but that only sped up the process of copying the ripped movies to the server initially. I have never had problems with the playback.
 
Just an update, I've tried turning off the Auto Tuning and Remote Differential Compression and while it did help, I'm still getting the occasional stutter. I've been watching the network traffic on both the server and HTPC and each time the stutter occurs the graph shows a very sharp drop from 4-5% (gig switch) to 0.5% and holds there till the stutter is over. Kinda stuck on this one so far but still fighting. Next I'll try swapping the ISO file to another computer and see how it likes that. Any input would be gladly accepted and tried.

Also, I've tried taking the switch outa the equation but still the same. Is there a packet size adjustment I can make or something?

Just throwing this out there, while moving the ISO from my Server to gaming computer, I'm hitting transfer rates of 35MB/s so far.
 
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I had the same problem as well and oddly enough it turned out to be the drive balancer service that was running. there was a fix for it somewhere but I cannot recall where i got it from. Try searching on wegotserved.com
 
If it is the drive balancer then go to wegotserved.co.uk forums and search demigrator.exe
 
I actually had a similar problem, but it was only when playing HD movies via DirectShow (like in media center) under Vista. I formatted the HTPC and re-installed (first Vista then 7), and the problem went away.

But yes.. on WHS, you should pause indexing or anything else that can cause erratic disk activity (like drive balancer as people mentioned). But, I'm having no problem streaming from my WHS over my network to my Win7 HTPC. Even when doing huge transfers, or multiple people in my house streaming HD movies, it never stutters.

Try updating the NIC drivers as well. Sometimes that can do the trick.
 
After swapping the ISO to another comp, my media center streamed it perfectly, not a single stutter. With the server now my main suspect, I checked up on wegotservered and searched demigrator.exe (thx SC385) and found peole complaining about the exact same thing. A couple of suggestions have been to swap disc's to 64k blocks and/or drop the priority on demigrator.exe to the lowest priority. Me being lazy, I've now set it's priority to lowest and started the ancient Indian war dance of computer happiness... Not looking forward to the 64k block thing. So far so good. I'm halfway through Wall-E and haven't her my kids yell "Fixit Daddy!" yet.


Spoke too soon, demigrator.exe kicked in and stutter central again...
 
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