Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

why is appleTV2 so rediculously slow with hd content

F

fadals

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 25, 2011
1
0
Hi, so yesterday I purchased an AppleTV for my dad because he was interested in the whole Netflix thing and im running it off my xbox so I figured AppleTV would be the greatest and cheapest way to go about bringing him the same movie streaming experience.

Apparently I was mistaken... Although the Netflix layout looks sweet, when it comes time to actually playing movies it is incredibly slow. The HD movies arent playing in HD and still require buffering while the movie is running. This is incredibly frustrating since I am used to playing Netflix in HD on my xbox literally within 10 seconds of hitting play, without a hiccup. Someone please tell me if ive missed on some miracle firmware update that solves this problem or something. I know it can't be our connection because of how great the performance is through the 360. BTW HD on youtube is rediculously slow as well, but at least its actual HD! Im in canada if that helps lol.

Hope you guys can help, thanks!
 
I do not think this is a consistent ATV2 problem. I have no problems with HD quality unless there is something hogging up bandwidth. For example, we have cable Internet service and many days around 4:30-6pm I notice a large drop in speeds when watching my Slingbox or ATV, etc. I've concluded that many people are getting home from work and hopping online all around the same time. Maybe that's a factor here. Maybe you just got a bad unit.
 
HD rentals usually start in a few seconds on my ATV2, in fact I just watched "Hanna" last night in HD, quick start and no rebuffering. Check to see if the ATV's software is up to date. Try power cycling the ATV2 and the router to see if it makes a difference.
 
What you are describing isn't normal.

You need to troubleshoot your system. If you are using wifi, there may be something interfering with the signal near the TV, so you may need to just try moving it away from some electronics that are generating radio waves or you may need to choose a different channel or frequency from the router, to avoid interference from other devices or your neighbors.

I'd try hardwiring the aTV2 to the router to eliminate wifi issues, as an easy way to see if playing with the wifi might help.
 
i would suspect you're using apple tv via a wifi connection as this would explain the problems you're having. If you are, then you need to consider switching to a wired connection, especially for HD content. If its not wwifi then my 2nd guess as others have stated would be a slow internet connection.
 
Also check the setup on the router and any possible bottleneck on your network. I use wifi N 5GHz to stream HD content to my ATV2 without any problem, but once I connect my MBA 2011 on this freq the connection is slower than 2.4GHz. My router is Linksys E4200 (stock --not flush to dd-wrt yet).
 
I'd also suspect a WiFi issue. I had to add a second router in my house to pump up the signal strength and ensure all my devices are happy throughout.

No problems at all with HD streaming on Apple TV.
 
I have to agree with others here, I'm on a relatively slow connection (6Mbit DSL) and we never have any problems watching HD movies and TV shows with Netflix. There may be like about 10 seconds of waiting when you hit play for it to start...presumably because it's buffering. But after that we watch it with no problems. This is also with our AppleTV on WiFi to our Airport Extreme.

Oh, once in a while if my son is trying to watch a lot of HD Youtube clips on his computer while we're watching it may degrade the quality. But honestly, this has only happened maybe 3 or 4 times in the past year.

So I have to suspect some sort of connection problem.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back