BT Home Hub 5 and Airplay Fighting?

Hi cb999,

Thanks for using Apple Support Communities. This article has some troubleshooting steps you can take for performance issues with AirPlay:

iOS: Troubleshooting AirPlay and AirPlay Mirroring

http://support.apple.com/kb/ts4215

Troubleshooting performance issues with AirPlay or AirPlay Mirroring

If you are experiencing intermittent playback or significant network lag with AirPlay or AirPlay Mirroring, it could be due to a weak Wi-Fi connection, interference, or the distance between the Wi-Fi router and your iOS device, Apple TV or AirPort Express.

Try the following suggestions:

• Ensure that other devices are not trying to stream to the same Apple TV at the same time.
• Turn off Bluetooth on your iOS device by tapping Settings > Bluetooth.
• Ensure that your Wi-Fi router is set up with the recommended settings for the best performance.
• Certain external devices, such as microwave ovens and baby monitors, may interfere with a Wi-Fi network. Try moving or disabling these devices.
• If possible, try to locate your Wi-Fi router in the same room as your iOS device and Apple TV.
• If your wireless and wired networks are the same, try connecting your Apple TV to the router via Ethernet instead of Wi-Fi.
• If the Wi-Fi router has an external antenna, check to see that is it connected properly and in good condition.
• Use the Wi-Fi network troubleshooting guide to resolve interference and other issues.

Cheers,

- Ari

AIRPLAY solution shared by sleekitwan in various forums, eg Apple, BT:

Hi

First, before you lose interest - I have a solution that works so well to get BT Home Hub 3 working with 'Airplay' and Apple TV and my iPad 4, that I am so far unable to 'break' it. Please do try to break it yourself, and could you report back here or mark it with stars or whatever so I know what happened in someone else's setup?

I appreciate what you are going through, all I wanted to do was get 'Real Racing 3' running for me and the kidz on the TV that is attached to Apple TV box. Sometimes the Airplay icon appeared, sometimes not, it was chance - really frustrating.

The nub of it is this - you 'reserve' certain aspects of how the HH3 services the wifi network, so it directs data/communications via these 'reserved' ports specifically assigning them to the purpose you need - in this case, 'stuff' (technical eh?) going to the Apple TV so that Airplay works.

Apple forums somewhere list these publicised ports, and you go into HH3 management (tap in the IP address of the hub in 'safari' to get there, then put in your password for admin - it is 'admin' if you didn't change it already). In short, you use one of the games/applications that already are in the list for 'Port Forwarding', and I modified the name of a new one I made to make it like 'Airplay attempt using BT alarm' or something, because I 'copied' the BT safe alarm app details to start my custom one off. Lost yet?! Go into the HH3 manager, go to the A-Z I think it might be in 'advanced' and get 'Port Forwarding' up.

Ok, here's the things to set - if you peruse the apps/games they already list in HH3 for this sort of thing, you will see entries under 'TCP' or 'UDP' headings, and it's these sort of things we want to reserve. I only set the single specific addresses (it's just a number to you and me) that were listed on the Apple site as being to do with Airplay:

There are only 2 bits to set - you hit the button on screen in HH3 manager, to 'add entry', then select in the box marked 'protocol' that you want TCP or UDP according to the info I dug up from Apple site below - don't worry it is not complex to do you are just editing a couple of figures on a thing you don't use. Incidentally, I left the first two entries as they were (1024 was in there already) because I am just timid! So set it as below.

TCP 1024 -

UDP 1024 -

TCP 80 80

Any 123 123

TCP 443 443

Any 554 554

TCP 3689 3689

UDP 5353 5353

I took a pic of mine, for records, and this is what is in that pic. You have to enter the self-same number (eg 123 as above) no less than 4 times, this gives the results above.

On the bottom right, there is a button that says 'apply', so you hit that and it saves this new-fangled custom designed list of reserved ports/addresses for your 'Airplay BT alarm' or whatever you called it. THEN YOU MUST ASSIGN THIS CREATION OF YOURS TO A DEVICE - THE APPLE TV.

That's the basics of what I did - I have since restarted the BT HOMEHUB 3 several times, the Ipad 4 several times, the Apple TV has updated its software and has been restarted twice. STILL AIRPLAY WORKS.

So, I am reassuringly presented with the Airplay icon whenever I 'upswipe' on my ipad from the bottom of the screen - iOS 7.1 is on my ipad obviously, but that did not change the hit-and-miss of the Airplay icon until I made these mods to the HH3.

Over to you - try and break my solution please, and let me know if it works for you as well, or not. All I know is, Real Racing 3 can reliably be brought to bear on the Apple TV thing, and the Airplay icon is now never missing.

One more point - I think I also set the Apple TV IP address to be static - my ipad has had this situation for some time, along with the 'lease' set to a couple of weeks or something, so it does not try to select a different channel for wifi frequently? PLUS, I set something in the ipad I think, long ago (did not affect this issue as far as I can see), so that when the ipad 'wakes up' it does not decide to search for a better channel or IP address or something - that caused loads of glitches it seemed, then I found out my BT HH3 was on the end of dodgy phone cable not hi-quality shielded...but hey, that's a different bucket of bolts.

Good luck and let me know an outcome please, best to all.

You sir, are a legend.

THIS WORKS. Haven't broken it yet. Instant satisfaction—no need to restart the router or Apple TV once you've set up the port forwarding in the Home Hub 4 Infinity admin settings for the BT Alarm and Apple TV.

Very happy.🙂

This still works, and has solved all AirPlay inconsistency with my BT Home Hub 5. Nice one!

I have to say that lseekitwan's solution was beyond me, no slight on him for what appears to be a workaround. My problems have been a persistent and intermittent drop out of my Apple TV connection to my iTunes account. I explored many forums and tried various workarounds. The most successful was to disable the BT Home Hub 5's two alternating frequencies by giving each one a separate name. This proved more stable but I still got drop outs. The problem is, and now proven to be the BT Home Hub 5. I have now by-passed the HH5 by connecting an Airport Extreme connected to my HH% with the AE working in bridge mode. All works perfectly PLUS I get a more stable and strong wifi signal throughout my house.

I Had problems connecting my Naim Muso app on my IPad Air and my iPhone 5s using AirPlay to connect to my BT hub i lost connection frequently and could not reconnect through AirPlay to hub. I am relieved to say that Since I reset the BT hub using the BT app on my iPad air I have experienced no further problems at all connecting to my iPad Air or my iPhone 5s to my Naim Muso using AirPlay, the iPad and iPhone can be turned on and off and the trouble free connection returns. It has proved to be a permanent solution a very frustrating problem that I had for a long time since I purchased my Naim Muso I hope this information is of help to you and others that may have experienced the same problem.

christophernorthampton