Netflix quality HORRID after update

Bormimern wrote:

Just want to restate (as others have) that this isn't just a problem with ATV.

You may be seeing different Netflix issues across multiple devices (plenty of people are) - but as has been repeatedly said in this thread since November there is definitely an Apple TV issue where people can stream Netflix without issues from other devices on the same Network or even use AirPlay to the Apple TV without issues.

It started early November - was fixed for many mid-December (myself included) but continues for many more.

If you see Netflix playback issues on multiple devices you have a different issue which could be any of your local Network, ISP or Netflix - but its not the issue being discussed in this thread.

Just adding my 2 cents...

I ran a couple of test this morning...

Using a desktop PC and chrome I got a HD stream 1280×720, just after this on my apple TV 2 got an SD stream 640x480 and setup my xbox one as well and it got a HD stream 1280×720 as well

Rasied an issue with netflix just to raise visibility...

Bormimern wrote:

Just want to restate (as others have) that this isn't just a problem with ATV. I have the exact same problem with two different Roku devices. I renewed my long dead Netflix account to start streaming in November. Streaming quality was terrible from the start so I cancelled it again. My internet speed is blazing fast and Amazon streaming is consistently high quality/HD. Netflix is consistently terrible, pixalated, unwatchable. The problem is with Netflix.

I agree with you Bormimern. While (as Vandergraff says) this thread started out with many thinking the Apple TV is at fault, all 76 pages have led many of us to the conclusion that is not the cause, but the problem lies with Netflix streaming distribution issues.

The following news article shows what is at play. Netflix (and other streamers) lost an appeals court ruling on net neutrality that will support better business deals for the ISP's. It shows the conflicts going on. See:

Netflix Stock Dives After Net Neutrality Ruling

at:

http://tinyurl.com/mh89vba

An excerpt from this is:

"The ruling could open the door for providers like Verizon and Time Warner [and Comcast] to charge bandwidth-heavy websites more to deliver their content to users. If this happens, businesses that serve video — services like YouTube, Hulu and Amazon Prime — would be hit hardest. And Netflix is by far the largest in terms of bandwidth, accounting for nearly a third of downstream Internet traffic in North America."

To me, this further clarifies that what's been going on is that Netflix and the ISP's have been jockeying back and forth as they work out new business arrangements for a reluctant Netflix to pay more to distribute their new higher bandwidth streaming. We've seen the results of that with poor streaming performance, which has improved in some areas (such as mine) as the business deals were worked out.

This court ruling, a loss for Netflix, means Netflix will now be forced to pay more to get the coverage they desire. IMO this has never had anything to do with Apple TV deficiencies, but has been a business issue from the start, as the ISP's have asserted their right to be compensated for Netflix's huge increased load on their systems.

I certainly understand others may have different opinions, but believe this sheds some light on the situation.

I prefer this argument...

ISPs are growing bigger thanks to providers like Netflix. Most of the ISPs need to rely on OTT services so they can charge customers more (aka the FIOS Quantum service) or Cable companies "channel-bonding" in DOCSIS layers. If Netflix is 30% of usage and is the Golden Goose, why cut it's belly to find more eggs. Keep it healthy. If the customer behind the ISPs has a bad experience with Netflix and cancels their service, both the ISP and customers lose. The ISPs themselves are pushing IP TV and SDV, because there infrastructure is showing its age and see Netflix as a threat. For example, Apple TV now carries ESPN3 (WatchESPN).

Why are these so called ISPs (VZ, Comcast, TWC) in content delivery and connectivity both, while Netflix is doing only content delivery? Such ISPs have a conflict of interest. VZ bought RedBox to compete with Netflix.

"The only reason I'm paying for $100 broadband is so I get access to those bandwidth-heavy applications," says Rich Greenfield, a media analyst with BTIG. "The scales are balanced: if the ISPs damage Netflix, that will hurt the ISPs themselves."

He adds: "It's like putting a gun to your own head. Nothing stops the ISPs from hurting Netflix, but why don't you blow your own brains out? It's illogical."

What will the ISPs do when 4K streaming goes live on Netflix v2.0+?

jimpal wrote:

IMO this has never had anything to do with Apple TV deficiencies, but has been a business issue from the start, as the ISP's have asserted their right to be compensated for Netflix's huge increased load on their systems.

I can assure you what I and many other saw November/December was an Apple TV issue with other devices on the same network having no issues. It seems the Apple TV issue continues for some. The correlation on whether the Apple TV sees the issue is dependant on what CDN it connects to (hint your ISP doesn't decide this).

Now there are certainly many other Netflix streaming issues that people are seeing that are independent of the Apple TV issues - and here increased load, network bottlenecks and business issues definitely come into play - but let's not confuse a very specific Apple TV issue with the general issues.

We'll have to see how the court decision yesterday plays out for Netflix - for now it is all speculation - but it is also irrelevant to any issues people were seeing before yesterday. Prior to the court's decision the ISPs had to abide by the FCC's Net Neutrality rules.

That said I am very disappointed by the courts decision that the FCC cannot enforce these rules. It opens the way for all sort of shenanigans by the ISPs

Loner T wrote:

"The only reason I'm paying for $100 broadband is so I get access to those bandwidth-heavy applications," says Rich Greenfield, a media analyst with BTIG. "The scales are balanced: if the ISPs damage Netflix, that will hurt the ISPs themselves."

He adds: "It's like putting a gun to your own head. Nothing stops the ISPs from hurting Netflix, but why don't you blow your own brains out? It's illogical."

These are exactly my sentiments. If I can't get good quality Netflix I will cancel Netflix - but if I can't get good performance on bandwidth-heavy applications such as Netflix I will also scale back my broadband service and guess what I pay my ISP a lot more each month then Netflix.

It is also for this reason I am hopeful this will work out OK (although I still wish the court decision had gone the other way).

The ISPs need the bandwidth-heavy applications to sell their highly profitable high-speed internet services......

Vandergraff wrote:

I can assure you what I and many other saw November/December was an Apple TV issue with other devices on the same network having no issues.

Sadly jimpal is not concerned with preponderence of evidence since it's not a personal problem. Those of us with continuing exactly contradictory experience know what we're seeing.

Vandergraff wrote:

That said I am very disappointed by the courts decision that the FCC cannot enforce these rules. It opens the way for all sort of shenanigans by the ISPs

I don't believe that's the current informed consensus. See Stuart Benjamin among others.

Vandergraff wrote:

I can assure you what I and many other saw November/December was an Apple TV issue with other devices on the same network having no issues. It seems the Apple TV issue continues for some. The correlation on whether the Apple TV sees the issue is dependant on what CDN it connects to (hint your ISP doesn't decide this).

Vandergraff, you've contributed a great deal to of helpful info to this forum, and I thank you for it. I especially appreciate your willingness to express an opinion rather than just blasting others. But, I still disagree with this part. And that's OK; all of us readers can take away what we feel is right.

If this really is an ATV issue, then why after these months hasn't Apple released a software update? As much fun as it is to criticize Apple, and while they may take a while to fix things sometimes when needed, they never take this long if they see a serious deficiency in their gear. In this case there is nothing for Apple to fix. The fix resides with Netflix.

Of course the ISP doesn't decide the CDN's, but they do provide the pipeline from the CDN's used by Netflix. If their pipeline isn't big enough there will be problems like we have all seen. When Netflix compensates them for a bigger pipeline (as a result of this new court ruling), Netflix will perform better everywhere as it was before the Super HD rollout.

Both Netflix and the ISP's have incentive for Netflix to perform well. The court ruling can lead to a realignment of their mutual business plans, probably with somewhat more expense for Netflix, and all will return to normal everywhere. It's just business (as the article I posted above shows).

jimpal wrote:

If this really is an ATV issue, then why after these months hasn't Apple released a software update?

How do we know they (Apple or Netflix) didn't? We have no visibility if the Apple TV apps are updated. Around the mid-december 'fix' many noticed that the Netflix app seemed to take longer to load - possibly indicating an update.

I am not blaming Apple (or Netflix) - I don't know what actually caused the issue.

What I do know with absolute certainty was that I saw an Apple TV specific Netflix Streaming issue from around 9 November to 17 December - it was very well documented by myself and others in this thread - and unfortunately still seems to be an issue for some.

Your circumstances may be different - but please don't discount the very clear fact based analysis done by some in this thread on an Apple TV specific issue.

bodosom wrote:

I don't believe that's the current informed consensus. See Stuart Benjamin among others.

Interesting - it seems we need to find out more about what the actual court decision was rather than the (hysterical) media reaction.

That said I don't know if Stuart Benjamin's view represents the informed consensus.

I disagree with SB...

This looks like the Gibraltar-Spain dispute (like many others) waiting to happen. VZ can tell Netflix (Cogent) - I do not have pipes wide enough for you, I am still allowing traffic at 2kbps though.

Meanwhile, as to net neutrality: the transparency rules can go into effect. The FCC can issue an NPRM proposing the no-blocking rules that the D.C. Circuit indicated would stand on stronger footing and that the general counsel said the Commission wants. That is, it looks like the no-blocking rules that Commission seems to want would have a good chance of being permitted in light of yesterday’s ruling. As to the nondiscrimination rules (which only applied to wireline Internet access), and insofar as the Commission wanted greater confidence on no-blocking rules, the Commission would have two options (in addition to abandoning them, of course): most obviously, the Commission could classify broadband Internet access as common carriage under Title II and have all the authority it wanted (and then some). Alternatively, the Commission could craft more flexible standards, akin to the“commercially reasonable” standard it adopted with respect to data roaming that the D.C. Circuit (again with Judge Tatel writing) found not to be common carriage regulations a year ago in Cellco Partnership v. FCC, and then enforce those standards via agency adjudications.

"Commercially reasonable" is yet again a very wide and subjective interpreration between two parties. Sooner or later arbitration will become necessary.

Vandergraff wrote:

jimpal wrote:

If this really is an ATV issue, then why after these months hasn't Apple released a software update?

How do we know they (Apple or Netflix) didn't? We have no visibility if the Apple TV apps are updated. Around the mid-december 'fix' many noticed that the Netflix app seemed to take longer to load - possibly indicating an update. . .

Continue to appreciate your thoughtful comments, but don't understand this one. If Apple "snuck in" some Apple TV updates without saying so, why would they only update some Apple TV's (like mine here in Minneapolis) and not all of them? Some people still have inferior performance while others are fine. Wouldn't a hidden software update affect them all?

Really the only variable here is the Netflix distribution system, relying on various CDN's and ISP's (and their business arrangements with them) in different parts of the country. It's the only rational explanation for the variation from excellent performance some places and inferior performance in others.

jimpal wrote:

Really the only variable here is the Netflix distribution system, relying on various CDN's and ISP's (and their business arrangements with them) in different parts of the country.

You keep saying this but when it's pointed out that when really the only variable is the client the ATV (client) performs poorly you have no answer. Why is that?

jimpal wrote:

It's the only rational explanation for the variation from excellent performance some places and inferior performance in others.

We provide contradictory facts but you still keep saying this Everyone else that makes this assertion stops when given evidence it's wrong. Do simply refuse to believe us or are you trolling for some vested interest?

bodosom wrote:

jimpal wrote:

Really the only variable here is the Netflix distribution system, relying on various CDN's and ISP's (and their business arrangements with them) in different parts of the country.

You keep saying this but when it's pointed out that when really the only variable is the client the ATV (client) performs poorly you have no answer. Why is that?

Hasn't it been stated by several on this forum that different devices in the same home would connect to different CDNs? I'm pretty sure that was the case with me when I was still subscribed. It seems like that would be an additional variable. That was when it was still an ATV-only problem for me. Then the problem became device-agnostic in my home, affecting everything equally. That's when I quit. It's comical to watch reports on different forums where people list all of their Netflix devices and the various quality streams they get and they all vary anywhere from the worst SD to SuperHD and alternate on different days. It's a huge mess for anyone who just wants something to work with some consistency.

bodosom wrote:

jimpal wrote:

Really the only variable here is the Netflix distribution system, relying on various CDN's and ISP's (and their business arrangements with them) in different parts of the country.

You keep saying this but when it's pointed out that when really the only variable is the client the ATV (client) performs poorly you have no answer. Why is that?

jimpal wrote:

It's the only rational explanation for the variation from excellent performance some places and inferior performance in others.

We provide contradictory facts but you still keep saying this Everyone else that makes this assertion stops when given evidence it's wrong. Do simply refuse to believe us or are you trolling for some vested interest?

You keep harping on this but I think it only fits your personal situation. Or most yours.

My streaming problems have been consistent since about 11/11 EXCEPT when Netflix started streaming my ATV off of the Limelight CDN and my ATV problems completely went away.

If I recall right, your situation, and certainly others, has been static since 11/11ish. You get better results on other devices and unacceptable on ATV.

I think my experience rules out the ATV client being at fault and neither your experience nor mine rules out this being a CDN side streaming problem. The anecdotal data points pretty strongly in that direction.

I regret if I've misstated the facts in your situation but I think you'll have to agree that my (and others) single variable change (Netflix decided to stream from Limelight to my ATV) eliminates this being a client side software problem.