[ThisIsMyOnlyName]

OK, something doesn't add up somehow. I am having problems streaming video and if I had a choice I would switch from wifi to wireless in a heartbeat. I've got a 100 foot ethernet cable I'm about ready to string from the garage (where my router lives) to the TV despite local protests (spouse). I am not going to be able to get a wired connection to that TV any other way. Isn't this the kind of situation wifi was meant for?

But sitting right next to my Kodi box, connected to the same wifi network is a Roku, which never seems to have any problems streaming anything anytime over wifi. And the content isn't even local! At the times when streaming seems to be working for me with Kodi, its always stuff local to my network. Internet content still gives me endless buffering loops. What lets Roku get away with it? I don't think they have a significantly different wifi adapter - they're selling at around $100, presumably for a profit. What are they doing right? Why can't we get have such useable wifi connections with Kodi?

[Ned Scott]

There's a near endless number of possibilities going on here. One that there are huge performance differences for wifi, even of the same type (b, g, n, ac, etc) due to hardware factors, hardware quality, the software in the OS of the box, the protocol of the video file (http, smb, nfs, etc), and probably a lot more that I'm forgetting. I've seen many devices advertise 802.11 AC, but that perform worse than some 802.11 N devices. I've even seen something as simple as a box being a few inches away from the TV as having a major impact on the wifi signal.

The other is that Roku video services likely have very reliable video servers on very robust network connections, and are not using the same servers as whatever service is giving you buffering issues. It doesn't matter how good your internet is if the server on the other side of the internet is slow or busy or whatever. The fact that you are not having buffering over wifi with local network content seems to indicate something like that.