Re: Roku?
 

You might want to use the Comcast Speed Test instead of the OOKLA speed test. Recently I've had problems with the OOKLA speed test stop transmitting before it finishes. Also I suspect the Comcast Speed test uses servers on the front end of it's network so it doesn't have to traverse the internet to find the server (ping appears to be faster with the Comcast servers than with the servers that OOKLA uses).

http://speedtest.comcast.net/

Also to elaborate a little more about your cable modem, if you originally had a lower speed line with a rental cable modem from Comcast and later upgraded to a faster line, Comcast may have forgotten to upgrade your cable modem from DOCIS 2.0 to DOCSIS 3.0. If that happened, I'd demand refund for the period of time that you had the faster line because you couldn't get the service you paid for with a DOCSIS 2.0 cable modem. However if you own your current cable modem, then that's your fault and you probably can't get a refund (however, Comcast should have told you to upgrade your cable modem).

Also if you got your router from Comcast, it is likely a NETGEAR WNR100 which is a single band N-150 router which isn't that great. Although it is supposed to have a maximum throughput of 150 mbps, it real throughput is probably limited to about 50 mbps since a "g" type router has a specified throughput of 54 mbps but I've never got it to go more than about 16 mbps. The following are the throughputs of different types of routers.

802.11b - 11 Mbps (2.4GHz)
802.11a - 54 Mbps (5 GHz) (seldom implemented or used)
802.11g - 54 Mbps (2.4GHz)
802.11n - 600 Mbps (2.4GHz and 5 GHz) - 150Mbps typical for network adapters, 300Mbps, 450Mbps, and 600Mbps speeds when bonding channels with some routers
802.11ac - 1300 Mbps (5 GHz) - new standard that uses wider channels, QAM and spatial streams for higher throughput. It also supports various N speeds on both the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz band depending on the router.

"N" type "AC" type routers come in various maximum throughputs. Down the page on the following link will give a comparison between different "N" and "AC" type dual band NETGEAR routers.

http://www.amazon.com/NETGEAR-Wirele...dual+band+n600

Down the page on the following link breaks out how the throughput is allocated for different dual band NETGEAR "AC" type routers.

http://www.amazon.com/NETGEAR-Wirele.../dp/B008HO9DIG

The "AC" type routers are probably currently overkill unless you had a 100 mbps line speed and/or large usage for file sharing between computers.

Re: Roku?
 

try testmy.net it is not a usual flash based speed test and gives you a much more accurate idea of speeds over a longer period of time than the regular speedtest websites, as others have stated try and do this when there is very little to no traffic on your home network. If it is still slow then investigations need to begin as to where the bottleneck is.

Re: Roku?
 

It depends on what you are trying to determine. Since I'm interested in checking the cable line speed and not the internet, I need a powerful server with as few of hops as possible from the ISP, a server that can stream data at full speed with large packets, an OC connection that can handle many users at a time without slowing down, packets that are routed that same each time, and the test repeats the same each time the it is run.

The testmy.net web site doesn't seem to do that since it changes the size of the transfer from one time to the next and it appears to do other things since I get varying speeds but the other web sites remain at a constant speed. Therefore with that web site, I have no idea what it is doing.

Re: Roku?
 

I always use my Roku box. I also have AppleTV, PS4 and laptop that I could use for my Netflix/Amazon/Hulu etc but the Roku wins out due to its ability to search across all services.

Search for a particular actor/movie and you'll see where it's playing and the cheapest place to get it.

Re: Roku?
 

We bought WD TV Live boxes instead of Roku.

Roku may be better for internet streaming, depending on what you are watching.

But the WD boxes are better for streaming your own media files/downloads to TVs around the house.

I guess it depends on what you do most of. If you are a TV downloader ... the WD is an awesome device.

Re: Roku?
 

I have one of those too. All bases covered :D

Re: Roku?
 

It is a great bit of kit.

Serviio is a nice, free server too, which works well with so many devices.

Re: Roku?
 

Thnks for the dvice on the speed checks everyone.
Will tckle this over the next couple of dys, once I've worked out why the key for the first letter of the lphbet has suddenly stopped working....:frown:

ET - one got thru! There is hope!

Re: Roku?
 

I like the look of the WD boxes. However, the Roku is extremely good for streaming your own media around the house. It does require a bit more setup than the WD boxes but it is pretty elegant when you get it going and the user interface is nice.

Basically you run a Plex server off your main computer and tell it to crawl through your movies/TV directory. The server then trawls the web for metadata and artwork for your various video files. Then you install the plex channel on your Roku and you should then be able to stream all the movies TV etc to the box. It doesn't matter what format the files are in because the Plex server uses VLC player to transcode them for the Roku. Mostly this works although on occasion I have had to process certain files using handbrake (usually old ones using odd codecs). The quality is good as you'd expect and 1080p files stream with no problems.

The drawback of the Roku used to be the lack of a Youtube channel (you could still get it but via the Plex channel). Now the Roku has a Youtube channel of it's own, albeit only on the version 3.

Re: Roku?
 

Another vote for Plex. :)

Re: Roku?
 

So you couldn't use Serviio to do all that, as a DLNA server for the Roku to pick up?

Plex is good, but it's not a freebie is it?

Re: Roku?
 

I think you now have to pay a one off charge of $5 or something like that for installing the channel. However I think the channel was free when I installed it so i've never paid a cent for Plex.

Dunno enough about Serviio but i'll give it a look.

Re: Roku?
 

If you have Windows 8 or 8.1, it is full of problems finding the 5 GHz WI-FI connection. Over the last year with Windows 8, I had to connect to the 2.4 GHz connection and then the 5 GHz connection so that after Windows 8 awakes and tries to find a network connection, it would initially find the 2.4 GHz connection and then about 5-15 minutes later, it would find the 5 GHz connection and connect the WF-FI to that connection. However with the last update of Windows 8, the 5 GHz connection never shows up so my Windows 8 system is typically running the network between 3-8 slower than if the 5 GHz connection was found.

Also in San Jose, it appears that Comcast is using the same servers as the Ookla web site but restricts the server to the closest one to the Comcast head end and that one has recently gone bad (ping of about 30 millisecond) and can't seem to serve over 23 mbps on a good day. The Ookla web site by default also picks the same server but allows me to look for a better server in the area (San Jose, Palo Alto, or San Francisco) and there are several with pings in the 10-15 millisecond range and those can keep the download stream running at a minimum of 29 mbps.

My Vista laptop never has a problem finding the 5 GHz WF-FI connection and never has hangs on the Ookla web site those so problems appear to be Windows 8 related.

Windows 8 and IE10-11 are pig stys. Thousands of reports on different problems on the Microsoft Community have been coming in over the years for the network as well as other problems but it doesn't appear to phase Microsoft since they seldom fix the problems and generally introduce more problems as updates are released.

Therefore I'd recommend the Ookla web site and not the Comcast web site when trying to determine the speed of your connection.

http://www.speedtest.net/

Since you live in a house, I doubt that the 2.4 GHz band is giving you problems as long as you have a "N" type router but the problem is likely either your cable modem or Comcast is not serving your connection as the 50 mbps speed that you are paying for. Therefore it is important that you find a server on OoKla that can serve at least 50 mbps. I suspect that any of the servers that you can ping at between 10-12 milliseconds should be able to serve at 50 mbps or greater. If there is heavy usage in your area streaming data, your connection speed could possibly fall below 50 mbps but during relatively quiet times, you should see speeds of 50 mbps or possibly more.

Re: Roku?
 

Handy guide for the home user here...

http://howto.cnet.com/8301-11310_39-...i-vs-internet/

Re: Roku?
 

The following is a list of real life throughputs for the different WI-FI protocols.

802.11b - 2-3 Mbps downstream, up to 5-6 Mbps with some vendor-specific extensions.
802.11g - ~20 Mbps downstream
802.11n - 40-50 Mbps typical, varying greatly depending on configuration, whether it is mixed or N-only network, the number of bonded channels, etc. Specifying a channel, and using 40MHz channels can help achieve 70-80Mbps with some newer routers. Up to 100 Mbps achievable with more expensive commercial equipment with 8x8 arrays, gigabit ports, etc.
802.11ac - 70-100 Mbps

http://www.speedguide.net/faq_in_q.php?qid=374

It appears that even "N" type routers (especially the N-150 routers) may possibly not be able to keep up with lines speeds of 50 mbps or greater and an "AC" type router would be needed if your devices support the "AC" protocol. According to specifications, the N-150 routers are 3x faster than "g" type routers so they should be able to download at ~60 mbps and the N-300 routers are 6x faster and should download at ~120 mbps but that doesn't appear to be the real life case according to the above link. There is also N-600 and N-900 routers which can possibly go even faster but I wonder if older PC's that support the "N" type protocol support those speeds.