Kodi Community Forum

So, there have been a few other threads on this topic:

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=55276

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=63998

Now, the topic is that I have a XBMC setup on my Revo 1600, and a Windows 7 machine sharing all my music, movies and tv shows. My Win7 machine is very beefy, and its sharing the media over my Wireless N network.

I originally had a XP machine doing all the sharing, over the same Wireless N network, and everything was running flawlessly, no buffering etc. But ever since I went to Win 7, my 720p and 1080p movies start to buffer every few seconds making them unwatchable.

I tried the few fixes in the previous threads such as rebooting the Win 7 machine, setting the network speed to 100mbs, etc.

The only thing I havent tried yet is, using a wired connection, for 2 reasons. On the XP machine, everything was fine on the wireless, and second, my beefy computer that shares everything is about 25 feet away (though its a pretty clear shot with NO interference between Card and Router).

I think that we should try and get this issue hammered out as a lot of people are going to be jumping on the Win 7 bandwagon!!


Thanks and hope to hear your ideas / fixes!!

Win 7 Machine:
AMD 6000 Dual Core
ATI Radeon 2900HD
4GB RAM
Wireless N Netgear USB Card

XBMC Machine:
Aspire Revo 1600

Netgear Wireless N Router

I recently attempted to use a Revo 3610 with Win7 on a wireless network and it was pretty rubbish. Maximum throughput was 1MB/sec (10BaseT anyone :-) and if anything was hitting the CPU, e.g. running XBMC, throughput fell to 400KB/sec. This was with the Atheros WLAN, I think some Revos have a different WLAN card.

I didn't chase the problem because I was at a friends house and I use a wired GHz LAN myself. However it does sound the sort of thing that would cause the buffering problems you describe. Annoyingly Win7 reported the wireless strength as "Excellent" so I don't know what the problem could be. Maybe it's just a useless WLAN card.

JR

jhsrennie Wrote:I recently attempted to use a Revo 3610 with Win7 on a wireless network and it was pretty rubbish. Maximum throughput was 1MB/sec (10BaseT anyone :-) and if anything was hitting the CPU, e.g. running XBMC, throughput fell to 400KB/sec. This was with the Atheros WLAN, I think some Revos have a different WLAN card.

I didn't chase the problem because I was at a friends house and I use a wired GHz LAN myself. However it does sound the sort of thing that would cause the buffering problems you describe. Annoyingly Win7 reported the wireless strength as "Excellent" so I don't know what the problem could be. Maybe it's just a useless WLAN card.

JR

Well, the XBMC is wired into my router, and my Win 7 is the one on the wireless USB adapter...

Now, on my lunch break I went home and plugged in my Win 7 machine via a 50ft ethernet cable, and ran the same movie i was having issues with last night, and lo and behold, it ran smoothly.

So, the issue is with the Windows 7 Wireless settings, because when I was on Windows XP (same machine, different OS) everything was running smoothly, so I have 3 options:

1. Run a long network cable through my apartment (ugly as fook)

2. Reinstall XP instead of Win 7

3. Try and change some settings in Win 7 to allow for better media streaming

Or I suppose option 4 is to try a different wireless card.

I haven't heard any reports that Windows 7 has problems with wireless networking, so I'd guess the problem is with your WLAN card. Obviously the drivers are different in XP and W7 so it could be the driver letting the side down.

I'd run the network cable. Yes, it can be intrusive, but with a bit of care the cable can usually be routed in a reasonably inconspicuous way. Mine runs along the bottom of the skirting board so it's mostly concealed by the edge of the carpet.

JR

Just to up this post. I'm having exactly same problem and same setup. I'm running XBMC on my Acer Revo windows 7 which is wired connected to the router. My media collection is in another PC running windows xp connected to network via usb wifi and everything is working fine, without buffering issues.

Now, after changing OS of media pc to windows 7, I have the same problem here, buffering all the time and movies are not watchable. Any solution? I think it's a sharing setup issue in windows 7, I could be missing something in setting up the file sharing to stream movies to the network.