Netflix pausing/buffering issues

Help me understand this, please. I've read 50+ pages of comments in this forum and as a tech novice have missed what I think may have been embedded here all along.

Confession: I thought wireless was essentially wireless, although some might be more "powerful" than others with a larger coverage area. But you're saying that with your setup using a WiFi certified device providing the link between your ATV2 and Netflix content, you do not experience the pause/buffering issues being reported by others.

Have I finally broken the code, even if only a little bit? Thanks.

Good points Tango Mike. I heard about that system but no knowledge of practical use. I did find this one here on Amazon for $79: Netgear 85Mbps Powerline Network Adapter Kit - XETB1001. Worth a shot foe those in the market...

Just to update my personal situation, I am still experiencing issues. The most aggravating time is after 4PM PST roughly. I ran some speed tests and my download speed varies from 19+ to 8+ Mbps per OOKLO.COM's iPhone app running on my iPad. (COX Cable) The slower times are all over the place during the day but have a tendency to occur in the 6-9 AM range and 5-7PM range. Seems consistant with heavy usage periods of the population around me. I can stream to the iPAD or MBP no issues.Netflix on the ATV2 in the daytime is ok-for the most part. I get the audio/video interruptions but as you said they resolve in a few seconds, I just re wind and play what I missed. In the evenings they occur 3-4 times per minute, then go for a while then start occurring again.

In the meantime, I'm satisfied with the devise as a whole. The primary use is playing slideshows during photo session consultations, accessing images and playing iTunes. To be honest I did not even know that Netflix was available so its been a bonus. But I wish it would operate properly.

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Yes, that is what i'm saying. I have the device close to the base station and made sure there was nothing close by that could cause interference. I also researched and made sure I had a good connection speed.

The problems would come down to network setup and likely location/server issues.

Just for the record my device is 110" from my router/baststation.

It could be wifi interference or some form of throttling, look into it and see what you can find out.

The Apple TV supports both wired and wireless network connections. Which works better for you will be dependent upon your particular circumstances and environment. Nobody can promise you that any wireless device will function well in your own environment. While wireless devices work reliably in areas where homes are well separated, things tend to be more problematical in crowded urban environments. Where I live, I can pick up at least a dozen other networks, and there is also the potential for interference by many other consumer devices that radiate in this frequency range, including microwave ovens and cordless telephones. With that sort of congestion, I did not even bother to attempt wireless video streaming, which is the type of use that is most demanding of consistent, interference-free network communications.

There are two frequency bands used for wifi, 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. All "Wireless-G" (802.11g) routers are limited to the 2.4 GHz band. The 2.4 GHz band is the most prone to interference from nearby wireless networks, portable phones, and microwave ovens. Some, but not all, "Wireless N" (802.11n) routers can operate in the 5 GHz band. Some can use both bands simultaneously.

The most likely cause of slow performance when using wifi is a weak signal or interference. The easiest way to check if this is the problem is to hook your Apple TV up wired, at least on a temporary basis. If the problem goes away, it is probably due to a bad wifi connection.

Another possible cause of slow performance is routers that are malfunctioning, misconfigured, or that have security measures in place that mistake the Apple TV's traffic for somebody trying to break into your network.

Your connection can also be slow due to throttling by your ISP or because your cable connection has too much traffic on it.

Finally, it is possible that the rapid growth of the Apple TV platform has left Netflix's content delivery networks unprepared to meet the demand in some areas. It is likely that different Netflix devices interact with different servers, so you can't really conclude anything about the source of the probelem if another Netflix device works fine while Apple TV has problems

I was having this problem, Googled, and was led to this thread.

Got a new Apple TV this week, got it going, started streaming Netflix, and lo and behold it stops very frequently. Sometimes it's a stop for 30 seconds to a minute and it picks back up after, but more often it just stops for very, very long periods of time (been frozen for 15 minutes now 14 minutes into a "30 Rock" episode - it's not just waiting to buffer, there's something else wrong). Am using it wirelessly, Time Warner "Webstar" box to D-Link wireless router.

Checked my speed, get consistent 14 Mbps/40ms wired and 10 Mbps/50ms wireless. Like everyone else, I have a lot of other wireless devices (iPhone, laptops, etc.) that stream fine. I have them all turned off so they're not using my WiFi right now and the ATV is only like 5' from the base station. I read this thread last night, so tried unplugging the ATV overnight, plugging in power, then HDTV, then trying again. No effect. In a given half hour show it will stop for these 5+ minute spans multiple times, making it totally unusable for streaming, I guess it's back to the 360. I'll try wired once I obtain a spare cable. Lame. And this isn't "throttling," that wouldn't stop you for 15 minutes at a time. Making sure to tell my friends "don't be tempted to get one of these for Netflix streaming..."

Join the party. I sent out the exact complaint about a week ago and so far there have been 142 similar posts. So a lot of people have this problem. A friend of mine suggested using my iPad to stream Netlix (which doesn't have a problem of pausing, so throttling is not the problem)and using that to send the stream to the Apple TV over it's wireless connection (apparently the iPad offers that choice the minute it senses the Apple TV in the wi-fi network). I currently am hard-wired via a 20MPS cable connection. Has anyone tried this fix? I will and will post the result. Am waiting till about 7-8PM EST to see if it works.

mxyzpik: you could try getting some kind of wireless bridge, like a range entender. That's what I did and it definitely cut down significantly on this issues. Of course whether you want to spend extra money on something just to get it to work right is up to you.

My experience leads me to believe that the AppleTV's wifi antenna is just a whole lot more finicky than that of other devices. So any little flaw or issue in your wifi stream, such as interference or router issues gets magnified, whereas other devices don't miss a beat. Hopefully apple will issue a software update that improves things.

It isn't just a wi-fi issue. I use cable direct connection at 20MPS and the thing pauses every 2-6 minutes for 20-30 seconds. It's a flaw in Apple TV software or hardware, IMO

edsalvo: is there any router involved or is it directly plugged into your cable modem?

After all of the complaining I've been doing, last night my ATV worked surprisingly well for me, and I hadn't changed any settings. I watched the entire movie "Up" without a single pause or buffering problem. No idea why it works so well last night when every other time I've tried it I've had issues. I'm not sure if the buffering problem is related to which video I choose to watch or something that is different with my internet connection.... hmm...

Heh. I wrote up a post, hit "Post", and it got eaten because the Apple forums were down. Nice. OK, to try again...

My ATV is five feet from the wireless and is getting 5 bars, so I suspect an extender won't help.

I just finished watching a "30 Rock" episode and then went into the Network menu and tried to run a network test. It failed, "Can't connect to Apple." It worked last night. Then I go back and it can't connect to Netflix. I start up a stream on my PC (wired) and then iPhone (wireless) no problem. Sleep the Apple TV, bring it back, it connects again. Maybe it's leaking network connections.

Just to clarify what I meant earlier: the range entender should be hard wired to your apple TV for it to work. Here's my set up visually:

[Router] ))))))Wifi Signal))))))) [Range Extender] ---Ethernet Cable---- [Apple TV]

This set up avoids using Apple TV's wifi antenna which I think definitely contributes to the problem.

It's not perfect: I still have momentary losses of sound every now and then and very slights pauses, but they are very infrequent: once every 5 programs, instead of 3-4 times a program.

I'd say, if you're interested in trying this, only try it if you buy from a place with a good return policy. That way if it doesn't help, just return it.