Like many of you've I've been frustrated by the TiVo apps inability to consistently stream shows from my TiVo. However, I've taken the time to experiment more and I believe I understand the pattern behind the failures. I'm posting here to see if others see a similar pattern.
First, let me explain my setup:
Obviously since I have a Roamio OTA I'm limited to recording OTA television, and as you'd expect most of what I record are primetime programs on the big 4 networks (ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox)
After spending some time on the problem what I noticed was that certain shows seemed to more consistently stream properly. After playing around more, I noticed it was the ABC and Fox shows that typically would stream properly. I thought about this, and realized that ABC and Fox broadcast in 720p, and CBS and NBC broadcast in 1080i http://ift.tt/1Q2nroI so there could be a pattern in place.
To prove this, I power cycled my TiVo Stream, and streamed only ABC and Fox programs. 100% of all the ABC and Fox programs I have (all 720p) streamed properly (and I have quite a few). However after another power cycle, 100% of all of the CBS and NBC programs I had failed streaming in various ways, typically with errors in the TiVo apps on both iOS and Android. On iOS the typical error was the "low bandwidth" error, on Android, a "Please check your network and try again" error.
I finally decided to watch carefully what happens at the TiVo Stream's status page at http://ip_addr:49152/sysinfo while playing a show from one of the 1080i networks (replace ip_addr with the IP address of your TiVo Stream) I noticed while trying with the 1080i programs, some of the 1080i programs would cause the Tivo Stream device to crash and reboot. After trying to stream some of the 1080i programs I have, the status page of the Stream would actually say that the device went from "Streaming State: Ready" to "Streaming State: Offline" and shortly thereafter would stop responding to pings over the network. The device appears to be rebooting, and after 2-3 minutes comes back up and works again (of course any attempts to stream while the device is down fail). I believe this explains the behavior some of you observe, that after some time streaming works again. It might take longer if you repeatedly try to stream 1080i shows of course because you might be making your Stream reboot repeatedly. Not all 1080i shows would necessarily crash the device in my tests, but all 1080i shows failed to stream.
I'm not sure if the same thing happens on Roamio devices where the Stream hardware is built in as I can't test this directly, but if you can, try to do so. It's certainly more difficult to reboot the Stream hardware separately if you have a Roamio where the Stream is built in though.
Since I can consistently reproduce this and it's very clearly associated with one type of program over another, I think I have enough to go to TiVo with. However, I would strongly appreciate it if anyone else could reproduce my experience.
One further update: My Moto X seems slightly more tolerant that my iPhone, one 1080i show plays on it that the iPhone can't play. However I still believe there's something fundamentally wrong with the Stream software on the 1080i programs.
First, let me explain my setup:
- Tivo Roamio OTA on 20.4.7a
- Tivo Stream device on 20.4.6a stream software
- iOS 3.5.3 app on iPhone 6 and iPad Mini 2
- Android 3.0.0 app on Moto X (2014)
Obviously since I have a Roamio OTA I'm limited to recording OTA television, and as you'd expect most of what I record are primetime programs on the big 4 networks (ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox)
After spending some time on the problem what I noticed was that certain shows seemed to more consistently stream properly. After playing around more, I noticed it was the ABC and Fox shows that typically would stream properly. I thought about this, and realized that ABC and Fox broadcast in 720p, and CBS and NBC broadcast in 1080i http://ift.tt/1Q2nroI so there could be a pattern in place.
To prove this, I power cycled my TiVo Stream, and streamed only ABC and Fox programs. 100% of all the ABC and Fox programs I have (all 720p) streamed properly (and I have quite a few). However after another power cycle, 100% of all of the CBS and NBC programs I had failed streaming in various ways, typically with errors in the TiVo apps on both iOS and Android. On iOS the typical error was the "low bandwidth" error, on Android, a "Please check your network and try again" error.
I finally decided to watch carefully what happens at the TiVo Stream's status page at http://ip_addr:49152/sysinfo while playing a show from one of the 1080i networks (replace ip_addr with the IP address of your TiVo Stream) I noticed while trying with the 1080i programs, some of the 1080i programs would cause the Tivo Stream device to crash and reboot. After trying to stream some of the 1080i programs I have, the status page of the Stream would actually say that the device went from "Streaming State: Ready" to "Streaming State: Offline" and shortly thereafter would stop responding to pings over the network. The device appears to be rebooting, and after 2-3 minutes comes back up and works again (of course any attempts to stream while the device is down fail). I believe this explains the behavior some of you observe, that after some time streaming works again. It might take longer if you repeatedly try to stream 1080i shows of course because you might be making your Stream reboot repeatedly. Not all 1080i shows would necessarily crash the device in my tests, but all 1080i shows failed to stream.
I'm not sure if the same thing happens on Roamio devices where the Stream hardware is built in as I can't test this directly, but if you can, try to do so. It's certainly more difficult to reboot the Stream hardware separately if you have a Roamio where the Stream is built in though.
Since I can consistently reproduce this and it's very clearly associated with one type of program over another, I think I have enough to go to TiVo with. However, I would strongly appreciate it if anyone else could reproduce my experience.
One further update: My Moto X seems slightly more tolerant that my iPhone, one 1080i show plays on it that the iPhone can't play. However I still believe there's something fundamentally wrong with the Stream software on the 1080i programs.
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