Comments on: Netflix on Why Your Streaming Might Suck

By: Will

Will — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 16:20:06 +0000

I have regular problems streaming Netlix content on a Roku player. They include: regular total disconnects from my DSL service requiring a reboot by turning off the Roku, the router through which the player is connected by ethernet cable and the modem occuring once a month or so; and intermittent mild to severe buffering problems. The buffering problems are usually limited to one instance every 10 or so videos. But for a period of several days last month, they occurred multiple times (every few minutes) on every video I tried to watch. I suspect the problems are related because the buffering problem finally subsided after I did a reboot.

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 03:23:21 +0000

FIXED !!!

Choppy netflix silverlight playback?

I DISABLED the screen saver in win 7, now laptop plays entire movies without a hiccup!!!! That did it for me. Enjoy, Mike

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 02:42:54 +0000

I have many different devices that are netflix ready (PS3, Wii, Xbox 360, Sharp Blue-Ray DVD player, LED-LCD TV) I prefer to use my Xbox 360. However, i have my wireless router in another room but on the same floor as all these. I get a horrible connection by going wireless with the Xbox, even if i plug in a wireless adaptor (i have the new xbox 360 with wi-fi built in). So i went and bought a powerline ethernet adaptor so the signal will run through the powerlines in the house so i dont need to have a ethernet cable running through the whole house. And even then i still do not get a very good connection and my movies on netflix do not run very well. Could this be just the router? Should i upgrade the router to a more of a gaming/media router? I have the Linksys E2000, which i have read is not the best router for media streaming. Please help me out with this, it is very frustrating to not be able to watch netflix or play on Xbox live. Thanks.

By: JJ

JJ — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 06:11:48 +0000

I was using my new samsung laptop running vista for a while and had absolutely 0 problems with netflix streaming but once i started leaving that at the office and using my old toshiba satellite I started experiencing some issues. I think it’s just because this computer is about 3 years old and I think computer years are like dog years in terms of how quickly a machine becomes obsolete. I’m currently working on finding out what exactly i can do to make this laptop run with netflix. BUT WHAT’S REALLY WEIRD… movies are choppy but when i stream documentaries they run fine. and on top of that sometimes a movie will be running fine but if there’s an explosion or any kind of sudden movement it’ll start to chop up. does that make any sense? i’m going to try and update the drivers because i’m pretty sure that hasn’t been done in about 3 years maybe that’ll have an effect.

By: Steven Hamori

Steven Hamori — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 19:28:03 +0000

I'm having problems but I suspect it is related to QOS settings on my home network. I only mention it for other people who have problems; don't forget to check that too.

By: kelley

kelley — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 07:44:31 +0000

I use xbox 360 to stream netflix and I rarely have more than two bars of picture quality! We always have to stops in the middle of the movie and sometimes it takes thirty mins. just to load a movie. It sucks!

By: Mark

Mark — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:22:45 +0000

When I first got the player around X-Mass 2009 netflix was fast and movies downloaded fast and were typically in HD. There have been a few player updates with my LG Blu-Ray player and either due to those or on Netflix end movies take longer to load, and sometimes load at such a poor resolution that I hit stop and reload. I have had zero movies load at the HD setting in a very long time. I thought it was on my side, so I ran some speed test and I'm at 18MBps so that is not the problem. Either Netflix has slowed the service down, Comcast has slowed netflix streaming down, or the updates did something. I would think Netflix would look into this, and if ISP's are slowing down netflix streams I would think Netflix would work with them to keep those up. After all I hope to see all netflix go to streaming, getting a disc int he mail is old technology now...plus Netflix would save so much by not actually needing to deal with mailing, handling, and damaged disc.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 00:17:25 +0000

The Netflix watchnow service in Vista Media Center was outstanding. Then we were forced to update the netflix movie player to Silverlight. Ever since Silverlight, Horrible Tearing, Macroblocking, smearing and pixelation is the results. Netflix watchnow in media center has become utterly useless. Same happens with Windows 7 media center.

My network is not to blame, the same movie that plays poorly in Vista MCE plays perfectly (near DVD quality) on my XBOX 360. 360 does not use the silverlight player, unless I'm mistaken.

The XBOX 360 is connected to the same router, on the same network, etc. Its not my HTPC hardware either.

Microsoft either needs to admit that Silverlight is currently a failure or complete a solid software validation test plan against the silverlight player.

By: Lou

Lou — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 16:13:36 +0000

I've been experiencing the poor quality video also. Streaming video from Amazon HD is crystal clear for me. Streaming an SD video from Netflix is very pixelated and also has horizontal breakup. Not sure why the video is so bad, I'm guessing it's Silverlight compression/player? Or Netflix is locking down the bandwidth on their side, therefore limiting the quality no matter how good the user setup is. Just another disappointed customer. The DVD's in the mail are still great, streaming is a joke though.....

By: cyb1851

cyb1851 — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 22:31:18 +0000

Sparafucil, I can't get the Stream Manager on my Mac with your instructions. Any thoughts on how to get it?

By: Tom Reider

Tom Reider — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 23:44:44 +0000

Correction:

I called Netflix support and they said they made a business decision to ignore customers with slower internet connections.

By: sparafucil

sparafucil — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 10:09:21 +0000

Try this: 1. Start the movie and wait until it begins playing. 2. ctrl+shift+alt+S to open the Stream Manager dialog; must not be in full screen for it to appear. 3. Check the Manual Selection box, select a Buffering Rate (I use the max), click Apply, and close the dialog. 4. Drag the seek bar to the left and let go; the movie will rebuffer at the specified rate.

You have to repeat this process each time you start watching another movie/episode because the setting is not (cannot be?) saved. I had problems with the player just dropping frames for no apparent reason. After looking around for a solution, I tried the above; the player still drops a few frames now and again but the playback isn't nearly as choppy as before.

By: daved

daved — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 16:57:34 +0000

By: daved

daved — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 16:54:37 +0000

Just thought Id share this. I had been running a Windows Media Center 2005 machine for a long time, and even had the Silverlight player, but had ZERO streaming problems. By chance, someone gave me an extra desktop that I decided to use as a replacement to the MCE box, and I updated it to Windows 7. Guess what? Horrible streaming. My theory is that certain DirectX components embedded in Vista and Win7 are not playing well with the programming of the Netflix Silverlight player. By some good luck, none of the XP SPs or updates have included these flaky components, so even the newest player runs fine.
My advise to those with choppy video: either run a virtual copy of XP & stream from there, or stream off an existing XP box. Sadly, XP is yet again becoming my preference over the newer OS.
Why does MS do this? They have obviously messed up something in the Vista DirectX support but users are forced to ‘update their equipment’ when the exact same software technology worked in an earlier OS. I think MS is no longer testing to ensure wide support; they simply give it thumbs up after a few tests on select hardware.
As for me, I yanked out the Windows 7 machine, and went back to MCE for decent streaming. I’m just desperately hoping that some MS ‘update’ doesn’t modify a DirectX component and make XP/MCE video as screwy as Vista/Win7 video.

By: obo

obo — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 03:51:56 +0000

I've had the same experience as Brad.

It worked just fine until I had to switch to the Silverlight viewer.. and it's never worked well since.

Nothing wrong with my hardware. Nothing wrong with my network. Flash movies work just fine. Typical Microsoft evade and avoid and send the customer on a snipe hunt tactics.

JUNK THIS GARBAGE NETFLIX

By: Brad B.

Brad B. — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:43:20 +0000

I've had an x-box for a while, and for the most part, the video quality is top notch. Recently bought a PC running Windows 7 with an above average video card streaming netlix off the same network and I have to say that the picture is incredibly bad. I've swapped the ethernet cable from the xbox to the PC so the set-up is exactly the same, I've tried running netflix from the web-site as well as the Media Center (which has a cripplingly long load-time, by the way)... doesn't matter the picture quality on the pc is horrendous compared to your average Youtube video, let alone the quality on the xbox. I'd previously streamed Netflix to a laptop about a year or two ago and don't recall the picture being this terrible. Just makes you question the partner-ship that exists between Netflix and companies like Microsoft and Roku when the picture quality appears so degraded on hardware that most people already own.