Netflix quality HORRID after update

I disconnected my ATV weeks ago but now as a update I am even having streaming problems on my PS3 which use to be rock solid and my Roku 3. Last night was bad. I watched Fringe on the PS3 and it would only play at that worthless 240p junk. I restarted a few times and it played fine. Then watched Chuck which I restarted twice and it played great until 20 or so minutes and then it droped down twice to that 240p junk. The PS3 since early last year use to never drop quality. Bones on the Roku 3 then dropped down to that 240p junk during the show but ramped up within a minute and it was fine. After Once Upon a Time took about 6 reloads as it started out at that fuzzy 240p junk which actually makes me sick looking at it. It played fine through the entire program. I had enough for the night.

I don't care who is to blame we are paying for service so Netflix needs to step up and open up more CDN's instead of wasting money on Original programing and pushing Open Connect as the only solution.

As I say even with the ATV and other devices mornings and afternoons it ramps up within 30 seconds and plays fine. This is with TWC 15/1.

Great link. See proff that Open Connect ISP's performance is getting better every month while non Open Connect ISP's performance is getting worse every month. The way it is going for non Open Connect ISP's soon we won't be able to watch anything in the morning or afternoon either. This is pathetic. We are paying for a service do something about it.

I got ntop installed on my iMac with Mavericks...where exactly should I look to find out which CDN my Apple TV is using?

For others who might wanna play with it, goto ntop.org to get the software, and then I also had to get port from macports.org and install that to get ntop installed...kind of a PITA...

Loner T wrote:

This may also be of interest in this thread - http://tinyurl.com/mq9waa7

This is a link to the Netflix ISP monthly stats billboard. I prefer the list view myself but graph is "interactive".

Tony Ramirez wrote:

Great link. See proff that Open Connect ISP's performance is getting better every month while non Open Connect ISP's performance is getting worse every month.

Perhaps your looking at the wrong graph. E.g. Cox is consistently improving. The clear winner is Google which suggests that end to end speed matters more than anything else. What's more interesting is the October November decline. That must mean the ATV problem is effecting overall Netflix performance.

Edison517 wrote:

I got ntop installed on my iMac with Mavericks...where exactly should I look to find out which CDN my Apple TV is using?

Well first I managed to type ntop when I meant iftop. So if the snippet I pasted looks odd it's because it's not from ntop. Second: in a typical switched environment you need to be on the same "wire" which means running the monitor on your gateway or having a port mirroring switch.

Everyone following the thread should use Netflix's hidden diagnostic tool:

Here's how to check your Apple TV's Netflix bandwidth using a ...

This may have already been posted.

Edison517 wrote:

I got ntop installed on my iMac with Mavericks...where exactly should I look to find out which CDN my Apple TV is using?

For others who might wanna play with it, goto ntop.org to get the software, and then I also had to get port from macports.org and install that to get ntop installed...kind of a PITA...

Using the built-in nTop web server

IP -> Summary -> Traffic -> Pick a source host -> Contacts (or Active Sessions) should work.

Bodosom may also be able to help.

Cool, thanks. I found that before but my appletv is connecting to 224.0.0.251... I'm not sure which CDN that is

That is a multicast address, most likely from Bonjour. That isn't the CDN address you are looking for.

Edison517 wrote:

Cool, thanks. I found that before but my appletv is connecting to 224.0.0.251... I'm not sure which CDN that is

Count me in as another person suffering from this problem. I can get Super HD on my PS3, but a consistent 300-500 Kbps on our third-gen Apple TV, even an iPhone or iPad can get 3000 Kbps. We have 50 Mbps Time Warner Cable in Southern California.

I think I've tried all solutions offered in this thread, and nothing seems to work. iTunes, Hulu, etc., all work fine, great quality, no pixelation. I've given up and now use our PS3 for Netflix, I'm hoping this is resolved soon.

Ok, thanks for that. I got iftop to work on my Mac, but like you said, it's not helping me see which CDN my Apple TV is using. Since I only have my Airport Extreme, how would I be able to find out what CDN my ATV is running? I don't think I have a port mirror or anything like that 🙂

Edison517 wrote:

Since I only have my Airport Extreme, how would I be able to find out what CDN my ATV is running?

I don't think you can with the AE. I suspect the best approach is Internet sharing on your Mac but I haven't done it.

Should there be a separate thread on tools/how-to for monitoring/capturing ATV3/Netflix interaction? nTop just shows broadcast stuff, but nothing which is CDN-related. In promiscuous mode, any device on the same subnet should see traffic between ATV3 and Netflix, should it not?

Loner T wrote:

Should there be a separate thread on tools/how-to for monitoring/capturing ATV3/Netflix interaction? nTop just shows broadcast stuff, but nothing which is CDN-related. In promiscuous mode, any device on the same subnet should see traffic between ATV3 and Netflix, should it not?

I said Ntop but I mean IFtop. A properly functioning switched network (all but a handful) is point to point. So no, other devices can't see the traffic.

If you're not completely sure about being able to monitor your ATV traffic you probably can't although connection sharing (turning a Mac or Windows box into a gateway) may permit you to monitoring transiting traffic.

A bit of reading about layer 1, 2 and 3 network devices should provide the necessary background.