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I've upgraded to Gotham, and live games work, but, the past two times I've gone to watch I've experienced buffering issues so severe they make the streams unwatchable. Downgrading the quality even to the lowest level only very slightly lessens the buffering. I know that buffering has nothing to do with the plug-in, and from reading it seems like there's widespread familiarity with buffering.
Last night I experienced it for the first time with GCL via the website. Stutter (which I'd never seen before), and, very obvious and frequent downgrading (then upgrading) of the quality of the stream when "Best" was selected, which I've also not experienced before.
Today, for the first time ever, I am seeing buffering issues while watching Condensed games.
So from where I'm sitting it really feels like bandwidth allocation or load balancing or whatever coming OUT of the NHL servers is getting worse, which, as much as I'd like to rail against them, I doubt is actually the case. Maybe it's bad right now because of an upgrade in progress. Hey, a guy can hope.
I do have a high level of confidence it isn't my network where the choking is happening.
So I guess my questions are:
1) are others (recently) experiencing buffering issues on the order I am (10 seconds of video runs, buffering begins, buffering to 100% can take minutes, another 10 seconds plays...repeat)?
2) has anyone found a solution for watching live games away from the GCL website that isn't plagued by buffering issues, and if so, which solution is that?
3) a question for Carb0: since it's only recently that I've seen the GCL website actually change stream quality on the fly, and have never seen the Addon do it, I'm wondering if the Addon is continuously checking for the best available stream or if it only makes that choice once and then sticks with that choice.
Lately watching GCL reminds me of playing golf. Most of the time it sux0rs so bad I wonder why I do it at all, but then there are occasional flashes of perfect that remind me how good it can be. When this add on is receiving a smooth 4500kbs stream it's the next best thing to being there.
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Carb0
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It's normal that when buffering gets really bad that you can watch 10 seconds until it buffers again because the stream is segmented into 10 second long videos that are put back together by XBMC. If it takes longer than 10 seconds to download one segment, XBMC can't play the stream continously and buffers.
The website usually doesn't suffer from buffering issues because it uses a different protocol (HDS instead of HLS) and likely different servers. The official Gamecenter apps are only marginally better than this addon because they rely on the same streams as the addon.
XBMC can't change the stream quality on the fly. The addon will support quality changes on the fly without code changes when XBMC will support it in future.
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Hello Carb0,
If I use PC browser to watch NHL GameCenter Live for any live Montreal match, there is an extra French/Français feed beside the Home/Away feeds. Is it possible to add another button/feed Français on live game to play French channel feed for Montreal games?
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Carb0
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Can you watch the streams in one of the official Gamecenter apps?
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Hy everybody!
Watching live games with a Beta release of Gotham is working just great.
However I do have problems watching an archived or condensed game. Every now and then the Stream buffers for a few seconds (sound chopping and picture freezing) before kicking me back out to the list of games.
As the live games and other addons are running smooth I asume, that there is a problem with the 10-second-files which the addon gets from the NHL Gamecenter. As said, it does not happen everytime, but it sure does happen more often lately.
Anyone else is having the same problem or has a solution?
Any help appreciated.
Greetings from Austria
Fenki
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Carb0
Senior Member
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You probably experienced a little more buffering lately because more people had time to watch NHL games during the holidays. There is nothing you can do about the buffering. You just have to make sure that there is no bandwidth problem on your end.
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the problem is definitely not the bandwith... it may very well be that due to more people watching it was buffering more, but why does it kick me out of the game and back to the menu?
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Carb0
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I'm not sure. I think XBMC stops the playback if it can't download the next 10-second video segment. You should see the reason in the log.
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janice
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hey guys im really sorry for this stupid ? but how do i post a log file for you guys to look at. i have it i just don't want to copy paste it in a post. for some reason none of the google links are opening on the wiki
thanks
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I run xbmcbuntu 12.2
I have no issues with live games
but I can't play condensed/archive/classic ones
when I click on it, it 'works for a bit", stops and does nothing
Similar to what was happening with live streams at the beginning until that was fixed up
but, still have it with other formats
something I need to do to get other formats to work ?
