It's getting old, Dan.

It's good to hear that you guys are making progress on this front. However, it really gets tiresome blaming it on bad wireless connections when several of us in this thread had the problem with wired connections. And if it is a general networking problem then why don't my networked computers skip songs when playing them in WMP? It seems like it is pretty clear that the problem lies within the Soundbridge and how it handles any network "problems". I really wanted to give it a try again but since you can't guarantee that the problem is completely fixed my family won't allow one back in the house again and I will have to move on to something else.

Both mike and I have clearly acknowledged that there is likely still problems in our code that we can and will improve. I have someone working full time on this one issue.

However, based on the tech support questions we get and how they end up being resolved, I know for a fact that wiifi issues are the most common reason for "skipping". Perhaps just not in your case.

Count me as one of the peeps getting "buffering" in the middle of a track. Drives my husband absolutely nuts as he is generally practicing at the time...he's a bassist and it's maddening to be "into" a song and then have it stop on you...

flower - just happened again!!! Now it skipped to the next song...arrgh. so much for the theory I had that it might have something to do with the VPN on my laptop - I work from home and we use the same router for the Roku as for my laptop using our PC to access our cable internet connection to use VPN...but I shut my laptop down. Apparently that wasn't the problem

Yup - we have the latest 2.5 release downloaded - from the email that was sent out a few weeks ago (I think).

Chaps in the know.....
When running wirelessly, what's more important for smooth running.....quality or strength?
I've got a quality of 100% and strength of -76dBm (& software 2.5.171), yet still get tracks ending prematurely and jumping to the next or constant rebuffering.
It's a shame, it's such a cool piece of kit but just might end up in the bath if it carries on like this!
Cheers,
Wander.

Wander wrote:

When running wirelessly, what's more important for smooth running.....quality or strength?

IMO it's strength, and -76dBm is pretty low.
You should aim for around -60dBm at least.

I got mine higher by adding a high-gain antenna to my range extender and moving the Soundbridge around - it's amazing, moving it by an inch or so increased the signal strength from -74dBM to -58dBm

Thanks, will have a play.
The internet radio plays faultlessly. Wouldn't this keep stopping if it was the signal at fault?
Cheers,
Alex
ps forgive me for being slow but what's IMO?

Wander wrote:

The internet radio plays faultlessly. Wouldn't this keep stopping if it was the signal at fault?

Radio was fine on mine too, even with a low signal strength.

[IMO = in my opinion ]

I can confirm everything M@rk said.

The reason internet radio is "more reliable" than music streaming from your library is probably because many internet radio stations are lower bit rates than the music in your music library --- hence are more tolerant of poor signal. If you switch to a higher bit rate station, like “Radio Paradise”, you’ll stress your wifi connection more.

Anthony

I agree with others here that this isn't simply a signal issue (as well as the fellow partners in the house getting angry at the drops in iTunes playback). On the basis of the forums I moved my router down one floor, from second to main since Soundbridge is in the basement. I was previously getting dropped and buffered signals and was measuring about 19 for signal quality and about -75db for noise. Moving it down a flight increased my reported numbers to about 35 and -60db (or less).

Now the odd thing is that it had been on the second floor for over a year working fine with a linksys BEFW11S4 - which by the way isn't supposed to work with - until one day the router just...kaput. So I replaced it with a Linksys WRT54GC - the compact one with internal antenna (and I just bought an external antenna, btw so that will boost signal further) - then the problems started.

I noticed an odd thing today while looking on the net in the other room with my laptop which might provide a clue... I found **instantaneously** I could click on a link in a web page and the soundbridge would choke into buffering mode... ? I can't think of why this little amount of data on the airwaves ought to do that. The iTunes library is hard-wired to the router and the soundbridge and the laptop are wirelessly connected. I also noticed while playing with the laptops wireless card settings (moving from Ad-hoc to Access point I **completely** buggered the soundbridge - had to completely reset all its settings - What gives with **that**??

Now I'm wondering if there is some kind of weird network conflict, wirelessly, but I can't duplicate the event yet.

Has anyone resolved this problem of cutting tracks short? It is happening to me on every track played from the library. However, Internet radio plays all day without any issues. I am running the M1001 wirelessly.

Any help would be apprieciated as overall it's a great piece of kit but it's a little unreliable!!

Thanks

Hawkinsdamily: What server are you using, and is the server wired or wireless?

jtimleck wrote:

Now the odd thing is that it had been on the second floor for over a year working fine with a linksys BEFW11S4 - which by the way isn't supposed to work with - until one day the router just...kaput. So I replaced it with a Linksys WRT54GC - the compact one with internal antenna (and I just bought an external antenna, btw so that will boost signal further) - then the problems started.

I wonder if moving from a 802.11b to an 802.11g router made the difference. Is your laptop b or g? If it is g then it has changed it's wireless signals to match the new AP. Can you set the WRT54GC to B only mode to see if that resolves it?

I don't have any skipping problems, but my network is B only. (Though one of the notebooks is G capable.) I am using original Apple AirPorts for my APs.

I am using Windows Media Connect, a Belkin wireless router. Everything is working fine, except the problem detailed.

Well I backed off to scratch - reset everything

So here is my set up:

Running DSL modem (Westell, in bridge mode) to linksys Compact G router. Router now has all defaults (for now) except SSID broadcast. iTunes library is served, hardwired from my Apple (OSX 10.4.5) to router. Firewalls are off, no port forwarding for soundbridge in the Mac's network prefs or the router. Things seem to work. But there is one weird abberation - there is a noticeable lag (visually as data display delay) of the song (iTunes library) time remaining - up to 5 secs - and when adjusting the volume (you can see the volume change but it takes moment for the Soundbridge to change and then it "jumps" all the transmitted "notches" of volume. I played 320kbs files this morning as a test without any stuttering but this is also pretty bothersome behavior.

Does the soundbridge have to "read" something like a "volume increase input" through the router then I assume - but why the delay when there's no delay in processing the more complex audio (or are such signals given low processing priority?).

I also tried to work out the possible laptop signal conflict - all I got was more pain as the laptop started to behave like the soundbridge - suggesting it was maybe the router setup (hence the tear down and rebuild). However I think the issue is something inbetween - i.e. the set-up of the laptop's wireless card and DHCP for the network was causing problems with the soundbridge accessing the network (btw, signal is still very strong , >30 and "clean" <-58dB)

will post again later this evening with tests as I ramp on the security