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Author Topic: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?  (Read 12667 times)

superboyac

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In past years, I've tried this and never gotten it to work.

I have a folder of video files that I would like to be able to share with other computers.  Now I don't have a network setup up, but I do have a wireless router.  Currently, I have  linksys wireless G router, but I also have this spare Linksys wireless-N router that I've been planning on using instead (I've been too lazy to do the swap and redo all my settings).

The problems I've run into in the past is that the network connection whenever I set it up is always so sketchy.  Sometimes i can't find the computer, sometimes I can't find the file.  Sometimes I find the file, but the connection comes and goes, or it's too slow and the file doesn't play properly.  Sometimes every click on the shared drive takes forever to process.  I've just never had good success doing this.

So I guess the question here is twofold:

--Help me set up a decent network using the wireless router.  The only thing I know of is the Windows simple-sharing thing.  if there is something better, or some nice software that makes it easier, let me know.

--Next, what is the best way to stream the movies?  Is the wireless bandwidth capable of handling a movie?


Thanks!

Shades

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #1 on: May 03, 2009, 07:19 PM »
The (wireless) bandwidth capacity from both your routers should be sufficient for streaming.

Having said this, high(er) quality streams require also (a lot) more bandwidth. My own experience with wireless networking is that the speed varies a lot. Having a Linksys wifi router and ditto card in my PC, I was expecting a better troughput than I have. 54Mbit/sec is the max. bandwidth, but there is a lot interference that I gladly went back to connecting a cable!

Video streaming in a LAN is possible with the VLC media player software. One system will act as server and on this machine it is not possible to see the video. Any other PC in the LAN network can use VLC to access the stream. As far as I know, there is a wizard helping you through the necessary steps in version 0.9.5 and higher.

Turn off as much bandwidth gobbeling applications (messengers, browsers, skype etc.) as possible when using this option.

Found the following link on a webmaster forum for an open source full fledged media (flash) server solution: http://osflash.org/red5, maybe that would be something to try.
In any case, I would first make a solution like this work on a network that uses cable to connect computers and only after it is working there to start fiddling with wireless network PC's.

lanux128

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #2 on: May 03, 2009, 10:03 PM »
i was trying to do the same some time back but due to my location there is no conclusive solution.

Streaming movie into living room

mnemonic

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #3 on: May 04, 2009, 10:33 AM »
My setup is a Windows Home Server box (although I was fine when I used my laptop and TVersity) linked by cable to the free router from my ISP - a rebadged Netgear DG834GT (when I was using the laptop with TVersity, this was a wireless connection to the router).  I then have an XBox 360 connected via cable to the same router.

A couple of things:

1. Is the router uPNP compatible?
2. Definitely try TVersity and leave Windows Media Player sharing on the host machine alone (my Xbox didn't pick it up half the time).  You should be able to see the TVersity stream from Windows Media Player on the receiving computer.

When I was connecting wirelessly, I rarely had problems with bandwidth.  The only problems were when the laptop had something CPU-intensive running on it and TVersity was trying to transcode at the same time.

phillfri

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #4 on: May 06, 2009, 09:37 AM »
Hmmm. I ran into a similar wireless issue in Windows XP a couple years ago. Wireless connection was intermittent. You don't notice so much if you're web browsing, but it can cause issues when streaming. Try turning off Windows wireless zero configuration. Google it. Its out there.

3of0

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #5 on: May 06, 2009, 12:13 PM »
Recently I've been looking into software and solutions to have media streamed to my computers.  I have a large number of video, music, and picture files that I would like accessible.  This may be different in what you're looking for if you're trying to stream a DVD for instance (but can be fixed by making a video file out of it, of which all I know is that it's possible).

I've found that XBMC has been my front end of choice.  It connects to anything that you have (well, not my TV tuner yet, but I think it's close), and plays anything you have, regardless of your OS, the protocols you need, codecs, etc...  Ok, for Windows it's a snap, but and for Linux it's very easy and there are fairly easy instructions to get it working.  It has a very clean interface as well.  I've been very impressed with it.  Some downfalls I've seen, it is looking like it needs some moderate hardware to run smoothly.  I've been running it on my EeePC netbook, and I've noticed freeze for 1-3 seconds at a time when changing and selecting options, or loading a music or video file.  For a netbook, I'm very happy with it as I'm normally waiting that amount of time anyway for it to respond.  It works Wonderfully on my desktop PC as well.

XBMC has just released version 9.04 today, and I'm excited to try it out.  Their Beta 1 version was very stable and I was very happy with it.  I'd highly recommend it to anyone, or at least give it a try, if they want to stream their media from any where to their PC.

Terflip

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #6 on: May 06, 2009, 01:41 PM »
 ;) Thank you rwremsik, for the heads up.

I have downloaded XBMC 9.04 and have not as yet installed the application, but with your happy review I am very excited to give this a try.  I'll try to let you know my thoughts after I give it a test run.  :D

Thanks again

Terflip

superboyac

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #7 on: May 06, 2009, 01:56 PM »
Is there a way to use your preferred video player (I use Zoom Player), but to ensure that the data is streamed properly?  In other words, how do we solve this problem of intermittent transmission or whatever it is that would cause playing video files to not work right?

zacharyliu

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Re: How to setup wireless streaming movies through house?
« Reply #8 on: May 06, 2009, 02:42 PM »
I'm pretty sure that your network should work out-of-the-box, or maybe after following its Quick Start Guide. (of course, you threw that out as soon as you opened the box, right?  ;)) Windows has the Network Setup Wizard, which I've never used, but should work.

You should stream (and play on the other end) the video using VLC. There might be better ones, but that's the one I know about and works for me.

Using the wireless-N router would be a good idea, since you could then stream at a higher bitrate more reliably.