In my experience the Apple TV is not a good streaming device

Forums › Apple iOS and devices › In my experience the Apple TV is not a good streaming device

1 | 2 | 3

226 posts

Master Geek

#1209804 7-Jan-2015 11:25

Mark: You are bodging things together to get access to Netflix, but because it's not working it's the fault of the AppleTV ? :-)

Personally I'm not an Apple person anymore (got all 3 AppleTVs here in cupboards), but if you keep the whole Apple ecosystem then they run great, barely had an issue streaming from iTunes or from Apple for videos when I used them.

But using unblockus and an ATV should work just fine (got bunch of friends doing it with no issues), are you doing everything via Wifi ? Possibly poor signal (your Sony laptop will have much better antennas).

How am I bodging things together? All I'm trying to do is stream Netflix by plugging the device in according to accepted practice. I'm not blaming Apple TV for anything, merely trying to get it to work. I'll say it again, "In my experience Apple TV is not a good streaming device". I'm not anti-Apple, we have iphones and ipads in our house too.

I'm doing nothing via wifi, all is connected by ethernet.

All I want to know is why can I stream on the laptop and not the ATV?

Life is a daring adventure or nothing at all...

jonathan18

7413 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

#1209805 7-Jan-2015 11:26

Mark:
Personally I'm not an Apple person anymore (got all 3 AppleTVs here in cupboards)...

At the risk of thread hijacking - are you interested in selling one of these? My sister's looking for a s/h 3rd gen ATV. If so, what would you want for it (incl. shipping to Chch)? (or would you rather I PM you this query?) Thanks...

russelo

328 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1209814 7-Jan-2015 11:36

Netflix streaming on Apple TV 2 works first time every time. Never seen buffering for a long time now.
Have been like this for 2 years.

Vodafone unlimited naked, Unotelly set on router(TPLink on Gargoyle), Apple TV connected to Onkyo AVR to Panasonic Plasma TV, Apple TV wired connection to network switch. Using Logitech Harmony remote.

Dairyxox

1594 posts

Uber Geek

#1209819 7-Jan-2015 11:42

bluedisk: Ok, so I have been very patient with my Apple TV over the last nine months. Its connected to the Vodafone VDSL modem...

(SNIP).. This is probably the issue. Exactly what model modem is it? I've got friends with the vodafone modem and they have these kinds of issues with network printing etc. Any products can be funny about their routing network environment, but Apples stuff seems a little more sensitive than most.

bluedisk

226 posts

Master Geek

#1209823 7-Jan-2015 11:48

Dairyxox:
bluedisk: Ok, so I have been very patient with my Apple TV over the last nine months. Its connected to the Vodafone VDSL modem...
(SNIP).. This is probably the issue. Exactly what model modem is it? I've got friends with the vodafone modem and they have these kinds of issues with network printing etc. Any products can be funny about their routing network environment, but Apples stuff seems a little more sensitive than most.

Its an Asus DSLN66u modem.

Life is a daring adventure or nothing at all...

Mattmannz

471 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1209840 7-Jan-2015 11:56

I have had a look at Bluedisks setup and there are no issues with his router, cabling, DNS configuration etc. Multiple routers have been tried along with wired and wireless. Everything is setup correctly and running the latest versions of software/firmware

My own personal experience is that combinations of Apple TV, DNS provider and Vodafone DSL can be a problem.

Matt.

bluedisk

226 posts

Master Geek

#1210039 7-Jan-2015 17:18

Mattmannz: I have had a look at Bluedisks setup and there are no issues with his router, cabling, DNS configuration etc. Multiple routers have been tried along with wired and wireless. Everything is setup correctly and running the latest versions of software/firmware

My own personal experience is that combinations of Apple TV, DNS provider and Vodafone DSL can be a problem.

Matt.

Thanks Matt, maybe I should have titled the thread "In my experience the combination of Apple TV, Vodafone VDSL and Unblock US for video streaming is terrible".

While your observations are relevant to me, I'm no clearer as to why this would be? Except for the vague knowledge that one brand of technology doesn't play well with certain others.

The even more puzzling thing is that for a few weeks before Xmas, I had no trouble streaming Netflix through the Apple TV, it worked first time everytime, with no changes anywhere on my system. Then it went bad again with no warning.

As I'm still trying to understand this, I'm hoping that someone may have a theory as to why my Apple TV is not streaming as it does for others. Does it not have a wide enough latitude to cope with Vodafone VDSL?
Somebody mentioned that Unblock-US was sub-par, but I didn't get any reply to my question asking why that would be? Why would it work occasionally sometimes, but not others?

I'm not banging on about this for any other reason, except to understand the issues I'm having. Then I will move on and replace it with something that works more reliably.

Life is a daring adventure or nothing at all...

Sharesies

Trade NZ and US shares and funds with Sharesies (affiliate link).

code15

198 posts

Master Geek

#1210041 7-Jan-2015 17:24

I use a 3rd gen Apple TV + UnoTelly DNS (via the Apple TV DNS not the router) and it works fine on Spark.

Navigating the Apple TV with the remote is terrible, but fine if you use the Remote App on an iOS device.

Roku and Chromecast force you to deal with things at a router level, Apple TV is ok for now.

Jordan2004

24 posts

Geek

#1210124 7-Jan-2015 19:01

I also have Asus DSL N66u and use a Apple TV with Unotelly.

It might be the fact that your IP is dynamic in which case Unotelly has thing where you can use Dynamic IP.

You have to configure the DDNS in the router and put that DDNS into Unotelly.

Now it works everytime.... Previously it would only work if I manually updated the IP address in Unotelly.

I hope this helps.

Mattmannz

471 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1210129 7-Jan-2015 19:27

Why don't you give unotelly a try? Only cost you a few bucks for a month.

bluedisk

226 posts

Master Geek

#1210206 7-Jan-2015 22:15

Mattmannz: Why don't you give unotelly a try? Only cost you a few bucks for a month.

Yes I think I will try this next, thanks Matt

Life is a daring adventure or nothing at all...

enfield

203 posts

Master Geek

#1210210 7-Jan-2015 22:22

working fine for us, been using it for over a year now.

steve98

1395 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1210358 8-Jan-2015 09:28

bluedisk:
Mattmannz: Why don't you give unotelly a try? Only cost you a few bucks for a month.

Yes I think I will try this next, thanks Matt

You said earlier you have entered the DNS server directly into the ATV rather than in the router.

The ATV only lets you enter one DNS server address, rather than a primary and a secondary. Is it possible the one you entered is a bit flaky and in other devices where you have both a primary and secondary entered it fails over to the secondary more than you realise?

Maybe try entering your secondary DNS server into the ATV settings and see if that resolves it. If not, pick an entirely different Unblock-us DNS address server intended for a different country and see if that solves it. I have experienced issues with Unblock-us DNS myself in the past and ended up switching to Unotelly.

Otherwise could you try setting the DNS in your router and then just pointing your ATV DNS to the router DNS, just to see if that performs differently?

trig42

5816 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

#1210366 8-Jan-2015 09:43

After saying yesterday in this thread that mine is fine, I went to watch Netflix last night, and menu loading was very slow, and cover art etc was not populating properly (some would, others wouldn't). A power cycle on the AppleTV sorted it and it was fine after that, but after saying yesterday that mine had been fine, it went and made a liar out of me :/

JoeTurksta

61 posts

Master Geek

#1210383 8-Jan-2015 10:01

I got one for Christmas from the wife and it's great.

I'm on UFB with My Republic using a Zyxel VMG-8324 router. I signed up for a US Itunes account so I can utilise all the features if I wish, and also signed up for Netflix. So far it's awesome, I've had no issues. If you're on VDSL then I'd recommend that you change ISP's to any of the ISP's within the Call Plus group (Orcon, Slingshot, Call Plus) which have "Global Mode" so you're not needing a VPN Service. Given the supposed "Traffic Shaping" on Unlimited Plans within Vodafone and Spark's networks, I would expect them to be figuring out the IP Addresses of VPN services and restricting the traffic through them, especially with users trying to pull down HD content via. Netflix/Hulu

I can fully recommend My Republic if you're within a current UFB zone.

1 | 2 | 3