I am on an ethernet connection using cat6 cable, using Verizon Fios with speed test at 20mbps.

Everything else is coming in incredibly well with no reloads. I can watch a complete movie, DVD quality, or TV show in HD quality with Amazon on demand with no problems.

dbcom wrote:

vmps, it's very possible that I may be haring off some crazy ideas, but what other option do i have other than to sit on my @$$ and cry foul? Roku isn't helping, they haven't made a peep on this thread since last week? And it's what, May 3rd already? For the record, everything I've done thus far with the debugging has helped me get a much more reliable stream/connection with mlb.tv.

I did have one buffering/freeze tonight on the KC/CHW game, but managed to restart the stream again after exiting and going back in. So, the problem hasn't been completely resolved, but life is better. I'm hoping Roku can resolve the rest, quick.

Note that a bunch of other people have posted that things are better for them without having screwed with the debug settings...

I watched the Rockies/Padres I guess about half of it. No buffering and video was excellent.


mark

philsoft wrote:

1. I have dealt with what are essentially the exact same complaints from a host of other users in the past year or so, and since the problems you folks are seeing are not universal (some have problems and others don't) THAT tells me that the problem is not in the DVP Firmware. That leaves MLB, DNS, ISP, and the Home Network pretty much.

If this true, then I would assume that:

1) Roku is done with any further tweaking on their part, although I don't understand why they have yet to state this. Apparently MLB users aren't worthy of their attention.
2) MLB needs to resolve all these problems. If so, then based on their track record of the previous 6 years it will never happen.
3) All problems lie with the end users router settings.

First of all the majority of users don't feel comfortable tinkering with their router settings.

Secondly this is a hard sell when one's present router settings allow him to view streaming from many other web sites without any problems whatsoever. To suggest that I change my settings to allow one stream to work properly while possibly disrupting dozens of other sites doesn't cut it.
So I assume you are saying that there is a magic setting that will allow everything to flow harmoniously. Actually I have already tried different DNS settings with no success, but I'm willing to try anything so any additional advice on router setup would be appreciated.

chriscom wrote:

philsoft wrote:

The reason why some people are having excellent results, and some people are having mixed results and some are having poor results, is most likely for the same reasons that we see a lot of new Roku users, having the same types of problems. The problems are usually either related to DNS settings in the router, proximity to the router(in wireless setups), or problems in the users network. Doing a search within the forum, specifying your issues in the search criteria will probably help some of those who are experiencing problems.

I don't want to pick a fight with philsoft, but if I may state the obvious, customers of consumer electronics should not have to worry about DNS settings--that kind of down in the weeds stuff is for geek-obsessives who have, say, Linux running on one of their boxes. And many (if not most, which is very possible) of the users have perfectly strong networks) and are hard-wired (I am, yet I get the constant reloads, window-panes, endless retrieving etc). the key is this: if you have strong reliable feeds from every other service (as I do, for everything from Netflix to Revision3 to hacked YouTube feeds) then it's not your network or DNS settings--it's a Roku/MLB failure that they collectively are obligated to resolve.

Thank you...If I have to stand on my hand and whistle Dixie in order to see a game...then the service is unacceptable.

Good morning everyone.

Been watching archives of yesterday's games for over 4 hours this morning and not one rebuffer or freeze. Picture on all games I have checked was very good-excellent.

On a side note, a neighbor popped in last night and remarked how good the picture looked and he was convinced it was in hd. Thought I would toss that in as an opinion from a non-critical viewer. In fact he did not believe that it was coming in over the internet (he had never heard of Roku) and show I showed and explained a little to him.

Halfway thru last nights Angel-Red Sox game (Angels feed) now and the picture is excellent. As I stated before, not one rebuffer all morning (about 5:30 am here now).

Only issue that I experienced was on the Met-Red game (Mets feed), a slight static sound in the sound that would appear intermittently. When changed to another game the static sound would disappear but reappear when back to Met game. Not a major issue but throwing it out there.

IMO, if the Roku can perform for 3 straight days the way it has performed yesterday and this morning then I think it is ready for full release. Nothing in life is perfect but the past 24 hours have been enjoyable and frustration free (mostly) while watching baseball with the Roku device.

Still on build 388 for reference and my wireless signal (go to Home-Settings-Network) shows as excellent.

Nothing live till 4 today, but plenty of archives to catch up on (have stayed away from the sports sections online all night).


Peace

brett

IMO, if the Roku can perform for 3 straight days the way it has performed yesterday and this morning then I think it is ready for full release. Nothing in life is perfect but the past 24 hours have been enjoyable and frustration free (mostly) while watching baseball with the Roku device.

Last night my picture quality was very good too, but I would still get reloading on occasion.
Weekdays seem to be much better than weekends. For me archived games do better than live one's, however I would think that most people prefer to watch live. That said I have to believe that increased user volume adversely affects the stream. Boxee on my PC is more stable than Roku so unless things change it will be Roku during low volume hours and Boxee during peak times.

dbcom wrote:

chriscom wrote:

this bitrate stuff is interesting but, no offense, irrelevant for many of us. I and others have a hardwired system and have all the problems everyone has spoken about. and if I force-lowered the bitrate any lower, the poor image would be utterly unwatchable. I'd be better off depicting the action in crayons.

chriscom, to that i would say, try it and see what the bitrate is. What is the bitrate of your network (not what your PC says, but what Roku says in the debugging)? Just curious. Jump into debug mode, activate debugging and then hop into a game to see the bitrate of your network. I've been at roughly 2.7 all night and have only had 1 freeze. Like night and day compared to the weekend for me.

hi dbcom--did all that many, many pages ago, right around the time mystery man MarknRoku said the numbers Roku debugging reported were irrelevant. but fwiw, i get the 1.5mb stream reported for MLB like everyone else, much higher network stream availability, and according to other speed tests anywhere from 11 to 14 mb download speeds.

Last night, 5/3, I was unable to load a single feed from any game. The best I got was on the Retrieving screen, and the blue bar at the bottom reached to about a half inch from the end (for lack of a better term). Not one single feed. The day before, Sunday, it worked sporadically. Saturday, if I recall, it was mostly fine with one or two glitches along the way with rebuffering.

I had to reboot my Roku 7 or 8 times, I attempted the debugging mode as seen in previous posts, but I'm not techy enough to understand what the flower I'm doing in there.

Here's the simple: when I activate MLB.tv on the Roku, I should be able to load the game I want without any issues the first time. Given that it is an internet stream, I am easily able to excuse any lack of video quality in return for a game that runs smoothly from inning 1 to inning 9. I should not have to mess with my router's settings, or operate a debugging mode in Roku...those are beyond most consumer's comprehensions. For those that are operating in this manner, I believe you are overthinking the situation.

Last year I had no problems with mlb.tv on my roku. This year, I've been able to watch 2 games. That's it. Every other game I have tried either gets stuck on a reloading loop or never even loads. I've used debugging mode and my network is plenty strong (never below 5 bitrate), I have no problems with any other type of streaming, and yet I can almost never even get the game to load. Almost every time, last night included, the loading bar just gets stuck halfway and never loads. No matter how much I unplug the roku or anything else, no game.

I don't know what happened from last season to this, but the ENTIRE reason I chose mlb.tv over extra innings was so I could use the stupid roku for which I had already shelled out money. And yet, here we are, a full month into the season, and I still can't sit down and watch baseball when I want.

It seems incomprehensible that roku could try and claim that this issue is either on mlb or worse, the fault of our home networks. Everything else works fine. It worked fine for me last season. mlb.tv on my computer works fine (to the degree that my old computer can handle the worst quality feed). And yet, so many people are coming on here to try and figure out what the heck is going on. Do something!!

Been watching Monday's Col-SD archive game (SD feed) and after 5 innings the picture is just great.

All features, pause, rew, ff, jump to inning are working well, no issues.

Peace

brett

vmps wrote:

dbcom wrote:

vmps, it's very possible that I may be haring off some crazy ideas, but what other option do i have other than to sit on my @$$ and cry foul? Roku isn't helping, they haven't made a peep on this thread since last week? And it's what, May 3rd already? For the record, everything I've done thus far with the debugging has helped me get a much more reliable stream/connection with mlb.tv.

I did have one buffering/freeze tonight on the KC/CHW game, but managed to restart the stream again after exiting and going back in. So, the problem hasn't been completely resolved, but life is better. I'm hoping Roku can resolve the rest, quick.

Note that a bunch of other people have posted that things are better for them without having screwed with the debug settings...

Are you then also able to view games smoothly as so many others are? What is your situation? Still freezing/buffering on you? All I can say is that it has been very helpful to me in gauging my bitrate and troubleshooting my signal/connection.

There is NO mystery to debugging mode. If you can execute a combo on an XBOX360 or PS3 or press 3 buttons a total of 8 times, you can enter the debug option screen. There's nothing fancy about debugging and you don't have to be a whiz to do it. All you need to do is enable it, so you can see what bitrate you're getting when you supposedly hit those snags. It doesn't fix anything, but it does give you more information.

Chris73 wrote:

Last night, 5/3, I was unable to load a single feed from any game. The best I got was on the Retrieving screen, and the blue bar at the bottom reached to about a half inch from the end (for lack of a better term). Not one single feed. The day before, Sunday, it worked sporadically. Saturday, if I recall, it was mostly fine with one or two glitches along the way with rebuffering.

I had to reboot my Roku 7 or 8 times, I attempted the debugging mode as seen in previous posts, but I'm not techy enough to understand what the flower I'm doing in there.

Here's the simple: when I activate MLB.tv on the Roku, I should be able to load the game I want without any issues the first time. Given that it is an internet stream, I am easily able to excuse any lack of video quality in return for a game that runs smoothly from inning 1 to inning 9. I should not have to mess with my router's settings, or operate a debugging mode in Roku...those are beyond most consumer's comprehensions. For those that are operating in this manner, I believe you are overthinking the situation.

Chris73, it may be that your signal strength is weak. What is your network signal strength (if you're on wireless)?

Goto HOME > Settings > Network

Rather than reply individually, I'll just try to do it all in one post. It sounds like what people are NOW saying is "I shouldn't have to do complicated things to make this work".

My first computer was a Commodore VIC20. To make it do anything you had to manually type in, (at minimum), hundreds of lines of spaghetti code. This was BASIC programming, and the argument could have been made that I shouldn't have to program a computer in order to use it. But the technology was in it's infancy, and that was just "how it was". Today, practically everyone has a computer in their home, and they have become MUCH easier to use.

IPTV or "Internet Television" is also in it's infancy, and for as young as it is, it is pretty easy to use. There are hurdles, and DNS settings and Home Network settings are just a couple of those hurdles. If you want to just "flip a switch" or "turn a knob" then you will want to wait a couple years or more until this tech is fully mature, before diving in. If however, you are excited to use this new tech, then you need to expect some growing pains, and expect to have to deal with them.

It is quite obvious that because the problems are not Universal, that the issues people are having can almost certainly be attributed to one of the following:
DNS settings
Your ISP (I am not fully convinced that some ISP's may not be throttling)
Your Home Network
Or MLB themselves

If you do not want to accept or deal with these issues, then it is probably too early in the life cycle of this technology for you to enjoy it.

DaBronx wrote:

On a side note, a neighbor popped in last night and remarked how good the picture looked and he was convinced it was in hd. Thought I would toss that in as an opinion from a non-critical viewer. In fact he did not believe that it was coming in over the internet (he had never heard of Roku) and show I showed and explained a little to him.

If this is true, then I am confused. I have tried my Roku on 2 different lan (hard wired) connections (6mbps and 18 mbps). I don't usaully have any buffering issues, but there is no way that I would confuse the Roku feed for the Directv Extra Inning HD feed. While fairly clear and sharp, the movements have a digital look to them that is painfully obvious, I would think to everyone. That being said, assuming that the software and hardware is the same in our units, I can't understand how your picture could be confused with a hd cable feed. I am not saying that you are lying, I just wonder what is causing your feed to output smoothly enough to be confused for a cable hd, while mine continue to exhibit a ton of digital blurring.