Channel 9 Forums - Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

alco933 — Wed, 18 May 2011 00:34:26 GMT

I checked my bandwidth with a speed test and its fine so the problem is with the channel9 subdomain. The videos are dreadfully slow and buffer continually. I would rather not waste time on a site like this.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

sokhaty — Fri, 27 May 2011 02:05:18 GMT

Yeah, the same experience is here. Constant buffering, skipping and stuttering.Has been happening for a month or so now with approx 1/2 of the new videos posted during this period.

CDN or whatever, could you guys fix it? I'm on Win7 + IE9 + SL4. East cost, Verizon FiOS link 25/15Mbps.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

dentaku — Sun, 29 May 2011 11:53:49 GMT

Yup, I've been just streaming the .WMV instead of the smoothstream lately because of all the buffering.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

Chrono — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 15:15:13 GMT

I've experienced the same within the last few days.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

sokhaty — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 02:15:50 GMT

Tried to watch Scott Guthrie video, buffering starts after about 4 minutes into the show. There are seem to be some issues with the smooth streaming servers or CDN servers or both.

There is an excerpt from the IE9 network capture (hope someone from MS could look at it and figure out what is causing it):

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

StevenB337 — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 04:04:48 GMT

http://channel9.msdn.com/events/mix/mix11/FRM03

Having the same problem with smooth streaming, and I don't think it is me. I've butilt my own players, and have used it without incident. I'm also downloading the High-Quality WMV at about 16mbps, so it's also not my ISP. What's wrong with ch9's smooth streaming services? Any way we can send debugging information back to help?

Smooth streaming that isn't smooth makes me ...What a poor way to showcase an amazing technology.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

dentaku — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 01:40:54 GMT

21 hours ago, StevenB337 wrote
Smooth streaming that isn't smooth makes me ...What a poor way to showcase an amazing technology.

YUP

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

sokhaty — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 17:14:09 GMT

What a wonderful rainy day here in NE, have some in-door time to spare. Unfortunately, Ch9 smooth streaming servers do not reply at all (IE9 network capture below). None of the vidoes on the front page would stream.

The funny part is that requests don't even time out. As the result silverlight player hangs and doesn't respond to any buttont clicks. That's one lousy end-user experience...

URL Method Result Type Received Taken Initiator Wait‎‎ Start‎‎ Request‎‎ Response‎‎ Cache read‎‎ Gap‎‎
http://m.webtrends.com/dcs1wotjh10000w0irc493s0e_6x1g/dcs.gif?&dcsdat=1307898083959&dcssip=media.ch9.ms&dcsuri=/ch9/7971/9a4f50e1-8455-4184-a5e8-9efe00297971/CloudCoverEp47QueuesAndTopics_ch9.wmv&dcsref=http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Cloud+Cover/Cloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&WT.co_f=96.252.45.128-2415068864.30095791&WT.vtid=96.252.45.128-2415068864.30095791&WT.vtvs=1307897768840&WT.tz=-4&WT.bh=13&WT.ul=en-us&WT.cd=24&WT.sr=1920x1080&WT.jo=Yes&WT.ti=Link%3AClick%20To%20Play&WT.js=Yes&WT.jv=1.3&WT.ct=lan&WT.hp=0&WT.bs=1587x127&WT.fv=10.0&WT.slv=3.9&WT.le=windows-1252&WT.tv=8.6.2&WT.dl=1&WT.ssl=0&WT.es=channel9.msdn.com%2FShows%2FCloud%2BCover%2FCloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&WT.z_bdb=1&WT.entryid=Entry%3AWebView%3A9a4f50e184554184a5e89efe00297971&WT.sli=Installed&WT.vt_f_tlh=1307898077&WT.nv=video&wtEvtSrc=channel9.msdn.com%2FShows%2FCloud%2BCover%2FCloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&wtDrillDir=%2Fshows%2F%3B%2Fshows%2Fcloud%2Bcover%2F&wtNavigation=video&WT.dep=wtEvtSrc%3BwtDrillDir%3BwtNavigation">http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Cloud+Cover/Cloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&WT.co_f=96.252.45.128-2415068864.30095791&WT.vtid=96.252.45.128-2415068864.30095791&WT.vtvs=1307897768840&WT.tz=-4&WT.bh=13&WT.ul=en-us&WT.cd=24&WT.sr=1920x1080&WT.jo=Yes&WT.ti=Link%3AClick%20To%20Play&WT.js=Yes&WT.jv=1.3&WT.ct=lan&WT.hp=0&WT.bs=1587x127&WT.fv=10.0&WT.slv=3.9&WT.le=windows-1252&WT.tv=8.6.2&WT.dl=1&WT.ssl=0&WT.es=channel9.msdn.com%2FShows%2FCloud%2BCover%2FCloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&WT.z_bdb=1&WT.entryid=Entry%3AWebView%3A9a4f50e184554184a5e89efe00297971&WT.sli=Installed&WT.vt_f_tlh=1307898077&WT.nv=video&wtEvtSrc=channel9.msdn.com%2FShows%2FCloud%2BCover%2FCloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&wtDrillDir=%2Fshows%2F%3B%2Fshows%2Fcloud%2Bcover%2F&wtNavigation=video&WT.dep=wtEvtSrc%3BwtDrillDir%3BwtNavigation">http://m.webtrends.com/dcs1wotjh10000w0irc493s0e_6x1g/dcs.gif?&dcsdat=1307898083959&dcssip=media.ch9.ms&dcsuri=/ch9/7971/9a4f50e1-8455-4184-a5e8-9efe00297971/CloudCoverEp47QueuesAndTopics_ch9.wmv&dcsref=http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Cloud+Cover/Cloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&WT.co_f=96.252.45.128-2415068864.30095791&WT.vtid=96.252.45.128-2415068864.30095791&WT.vtvs=1307897768840&WT.tz=-4&WT.bh=13&WT.ul=en-us&WT.cd=24&WT.sr=1920x1080&WT.jo=Yes&WT.ti=Link%3AClick%20To%20Play&WT.js=Yes&WT.jv=1.3&WT.ct=lan&WT.hp=0&WT.bs=1587x127&WT.fv=10.0&WT.slv=3.9&WT.le=windows-1252&WT.tv=8.6.2&WT.dl=1&WT.ssl=0&WT.es=channel9.msdn.com%2FShows%2FCloud%2BCover%2FCloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&WT.z_bdb=1&WT.entryid=Entry%3AWebView%3A9a4f50e184554184a5e89efe00297971&WT.sli=Installed&WT.vt_f_tlh=1307898077&WT.nv=video&wtEvtSrc=channel9.msdn.com%2FShows%2FCloud%2BCover%2FCloud-Cover-Episode-47-Queues-and-Topics-in-the-Windows-Azure-AppFabric-Service-Bus&wtDrillDir=%2Fshows%2F%3B%2Fshows%2Fcloud%2Bcover%2F&wtNavigation=video&WT.dep=wtEvtSrc%3BwtDrillDir%3BwtNavigation GET 200 image/gif 1.44 KB 31 ms  6255 0 31 0 0 858
/scripts/Channel9.xap?v=1.5 GET 304 application/x-silverlight-app 223 B < 1 ms  6318 0 0 0 0 826
http://smooth.ch9.ms/clientaccesspolicy.xml GET 304 text/xml 272 B < 1 ms  7144 0 0 0 0 0
http://smooth.ch9.ms/ch9/7971/9a4f50e1-8455-4184-a5e8-9efe00297971/CloudCoverEp47QueuesAndTopics.ism/manifest (Pending...) (Pending...) (Pending...) (Pending...) (Pending...) (Pending...) 7144 32 0 0 0 -32

I wonder if anyone from MS is actually interested in fixing all this mess or at least figuring out what is going on. I'd gladly help by runnung some diagnostics or sending logs somewhere. Just tell me what diag and what logs and where to send them.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

dentaku — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 02:24:16 GMT

How long has this going on for anyway? I've got a 20Mbps connection so I can stream the .WMV in the meantime (it looks better anyway) but it's gotta be annoying for people with slow connections.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

Duncan Mackenzie — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 18:06:42 GMT

Ok folks, so I think we might make some headway here. The issue is that we decided to use a CTP service to do smooth streaming out of Azure blob storage. This is not a support Azure CDN offering at this time, but they are letting us use some early prototype servers to do this. Sadly what that means, although all of our initial testing went well, is that when a server dies, the correct procedures to detect that and get it removed from rotation are not in place. For the normal production CDN services, this would not be an issue.

This is not the CDN team's fault, it is a CTP after all, but more our fault (specifically my fault as I made this decision) for deciding to dogfood this service in production. An issue was just discovered today that may improve the situation once it is resolved. I'll post here when it has been fixed and we will also look at alternatives to streaming through this not-yet-ready CDN service.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

sokhaty — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 03:11:11 GMT

@Duncanma: Things are looking much better now. For a few days now no buffering and smooth streaming looks smooth again. I'll keep my fingers crossed (though it never really helps )

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

Duncan Mackenzie — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 06:13:30 GMT

@sokhaty:great to hear, hopefully others are experiencing improvements as well

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

dentaku — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 15:26:28 GMT

Yup, I watched the last TWOC9 in the Silverlight viewer and it seems to work well again.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

Sid Price — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 23:37:14 GMT

I am still getting constant buffering on preyty much any video. Any idea when this service will be stable?

Sid.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

Sid Price — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 13:59:20 GMT

An update on my streaming issues:

I have been working with my ISP to try and localize the issue. He noticed that they could stream the videos at their facility with no issues. However when I tried the results were just aweful. The conclusion was that maybe there were some settings on my IP stack that were not optimum for streaming from the channel 9 sites. The solution was that they had me set up to use a proxy at their facility for web access. This fixed the issue, or at least gave me a workaround that allows me to access the site videos.

It is worthy of note that the channel 9 site is the ONLY place I have had issues streaming from so while we have a workaround I really believe there are stil issues with the site servers themselves.

Maybe my experince will help others having problems,

Sid.

Site Feedback - Videos continually buffer

Sid Price — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 13:59:25 GMT

An update on my streaming issues:

It is worthy of note that the channel 9 site is the ONLY place I have had issues streaming from so while we have a workaround I really believe there are stil issues with the site servers themselves.

Maybe my experince will help others having problems,

Sid.