Stuttering - maybe a solution

[mikeinnj]

Ok,

The stutter at times was driving me nuts. Tried all sorts of stuff... including other servers. Yesterday, I started sniffing the connection while streaming (using Mediatomb as I was also playing around with various TCP options).

At regular intervals, the stream would stop while the trace showed multiple dup-acks and retransmissions from the server. At first I suspected the wifi router, however was able to disprove that by using a different client.

Looking deeper into the sniffer traces, it seemed that each hiccup was preceded by a brief http exchange with playstation.net. When I "signed out," the problem resolved. I haven't repeated this, so it *could* have been coincidence, however the trace strongly suggests that the PS3 cannot deal with multitasking while streaming.

I'm wondering whether others who have the issue are, "signed in" and whether those who have no stutter issues are "signed out."

[LongbowFoSho]

I'm signed in the entire time, but only recently have I been able to stream HD stuff wirelessly.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4632

[mikeinnj]

You mentioned that you're still seeing stuttering - that you rewind or pause to clear. Does that go away if you sign out?

Again, from looking at the network, the stutter seems to be a wholly an issue of the PS3 falling behind.

Also, what format is the stuff you're streaming? Various other posts here and on other forums suggest that the PS3 may stutter more with some formats than others. Divx being the least affected.

[mikeinnj]

Another thing to try: upnp=disabled.

I moved to a wired connection and the stutter got worse. After some time troubleshooting and looking at packet captures, I disabled upnp. That cleared up the stutter immediately and completely.

[3am kickoff]

I've got the same problem and it's driving me bonkers.

I used to get stuttering over a poor quality wireless connection but everything worked fine when I put in a wired connection. Since then I've had my PS3 replaced as part of a warranty repair but I don't recall whether the return of the stuttering co-incided with the arrival of the replacement PS3.

The PS3 is running 3.15
I'm using PS3 Media Server version v1.10.51

I've disabled uPNP and I'm not logged into the playstation network.

This sequence of duplicate ACKs is typical of what happens when a streaming a movie stutters... (192.168.1.3 is the PS3, 192.168.1.4 is the Media Server).
(I captured this using wireshark on the media server).

No. Time Source Destination Protocol Info
931 3.329700 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=868801 Win=64252 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939
932 3.329715 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=873145 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
933 3.329728 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=874593 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
934 3.330560 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP [TCP Window Update] 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=868801 Win=65535 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939 SLE=871697 SRE=873145
935 3.330991 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP [TCP Dup ACK 934#1] 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=868801 Win=65535 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939 SLE=871697 SRE=876041
936 3.331007 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=876041 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
937 3.331851 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP [TCP Dup ACK 934#2] 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=868801 Win=65535 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939 SLE=871697 SRE=877489
938 3.331867 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP [TCP Fast Retransmission] commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=868801 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
939 3.331881 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP [TCP Out-Of-Order] commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=870249 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1436 TSV=123939 TSER=46
940 3.331895 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP [TCP Out-Of-Order] commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=871685 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=12 TSV=123939 TSER=46
941 3.332945 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=871685 Win=64264 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939 SLE=871697 SRE=877489
942 3.333391 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=877489 Win=58460 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939
943 3.333405 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=877489 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
944 3.333420 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=878937 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
945 3.333432 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=880385 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
946 3.333439 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP [TCP Window Update] 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=877489 Win=65535 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939
947 3.334465 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=880385 Win=64252 Len=0 TSV=46 TSER=123939
948 3.334481 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [PSH, ACK] Seq=881833 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
949 3.334494 192.168.1.4 192.168.1.3 TCP commplex-link > 55530 [ACK] Seq=883281 Ack=1 Win=65316 Len=1448 TSV=123939 TSER=46
950 3.530119 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.4 TCP 55530 > commplex-link [ACK] Seq=1 Ack=884729 Win=65535 Len=0 TSV=48 TSER=123939


I'd been convinced it was my router causing the problem but I'll take peoples word for it that you get the same problem if you use a cross-over wire between the PS3 and the media server.

So for me the prime suspect is the PS3 itself but I can't see what else I can change. I'm pretty damned reluctant to upgrade to the new PS3 firmware because this used to work fine and I don't want to lose the ability to install linux.

Can anybody help here?

[3am kickoff]

and now it looks like I've fixed it by setting my media server and PS3 to connect to the network at 100Mbps half duplex.

I saw a remark on this thread (viewtopic.php?f=6&t=5030&p=28536&hilit=+stutter#p28536) about setting the network adapter to half duplex.

I remembered that when I first noticed the stuttering I also noticed a problem with my media server dropping it's network connection speed to 10Mbps so I'd forced the network adapter to connect at 100Mbps full duplex. And why not I thought?

That didn't fix the problem so I set the PS3 to force connect at 100Mbps as well. That seemed to improve things a bit, but not a lot.

Anyway, now things are working as well as ever. uPNP is enabled as well so that wasn't a factor for me.


It still seems a bit dodgy to me that you can set the PS3 to connect at 100Mbps full duplex but it can't seem to keep up.

[pier]

it can't keep up at 100Mbps??

I'm going to install a Gigabit network... will it be useless?

[Demaster]

I've been using this server for about 3 or 4 months, and until a day or two ago, I had stuttering. Some movies would play ok with a minimal amount of stuttering, but other movies would be terrible and unwatchable. I have a gig router connected to my gig port on my Win7 ultimate 64 w/4MB of ram. Should not be a problem. I was using wireless, and when I did connect a wire...things would improve, but still wasn't perfect. I then realized something in the ps3ms log. It reported that I connected to the PS3 at 7Mb/s. The Max bandwidth was set to unlimited (0). THIS WAS THE PROBLEM. I changed the bw to 7 to match my connection. No more stuttering at all. Since then I've cleaned up some things (annoying automatic media sharing by windows media player), and now the "traces" log reports my connection at 17Mb/s. I set the max bw to 15 now, and I have not seen one moment of choppiness/stuttering since then.

Let me know how things go for you, and good luck

Demaster

[FloydSummerOf68]

I've been using this server for about 3 or 4 months, and until a day or two ago, I had stuttering. Some movies would play ok with a minimal amount of stuttering, but other movies would be terrible and unwatchable. I have a gig router connected to my gig port on my Win7 ultimate 64 w/4MB of ram. Should not be a problem. I was using wireless, and when I did connect a wire...things would improve, but still wasn't perfect. I then realized something in the ps3ms log. It reported that I connected to the PS3 at 7Mb/s. The Max bandwidth was set to unlimited (0). THIS WAS THE PROBLEM. I changed the bw to 7 to match my connection. No more stuttering at all. Since then I've cleaned up some things (annoying automatic media sharing by windows media player), and now the "traces" log reports my connection at 17Mb/s. I set the max bw to 15 now, and I have not seen one moment of choppiness/stuttering since then.

Let me know how things go for you, and good luck

Demaster

I have been looking for about a week for answers and this solved my problem perfectly the first attempt.

I attempted messing with quality settings, bandwidth settings, etc....

It wasn't until I matched the bandwidth to what the "Traces" log reported the PS3 was connecting at (only 5mb/s) that I got stutterless viewing (only standard definition...HD still isn't working over wireless, but I don't expect it to with my current network; that will all be changing soon though).

[P3RCUL8OR]

within the trace log, how can i tell what bandwidth i'm connecting at? thanks.