Room mates killing the bandwidth with Netflix and Torrents...

[slugg]

I have a Linksys WRT120N router. Piece of crap. It has "QoS", but all I can do is prioritize the clients, not actually set hard limits. The problem is mainly Netflix; it's just hogging up all the bandwidth and I'm lagging horribly in games and web surfing is stupid slow.

Is there anything I can do? The Netflix appliance is a Sony blu-ray player, if that matters. It's connecting via wifi...

 

[JoeMcJoe]

Install a different firmware on to the router, setup QoS correctly. It isn't just an enable QoS, you have to learn how it works first.

 

[imagoon]

Have you talked to him? This is a "person issue" not a "tech issue" really. QoS is only going to be of limited usefulness since the lag is caused by all the inbound data. Bittorrent is pretty brutal if left set to unlimited.

 

[dawks]

Normally streaming Netflix only uses a few Mbit/sec.. Unless you only have >2Mbit (down) internet (DSL) its probably not Netflix 'killing' your bandwidth. Also Netflix will 'back off' and lower the quality if its competing with other downloads..
Typically its uploading that really slows things down, significantly. I'd be looking at that first. Buffer bloat.

And yea, this is a 'people' problem. Not so much a tech issue.

 

[JackMDS]

Why One Gaming is more important than another person's capacity to see movies on Netflix, or anything else the allegedly disturbs the Gaming?

 

[Eug]

Well, gaming generally won't disturb Netflix, because gaming generally uses very little data in comparison.

 

[slugg]

It may not be a bandwidth issue... I wonder if this router is just too slow/not able to keep up with the NAT? I mean... gaming uses hardly any bandwidth, for the most part. There's no way Netflix is using all 20 mbit/s that my connection gives me. Should I buy a better router? The reviews for mine are absolute crap. It was free...

 

[VirtualLarry]

Should I buy a better router? The reviews for mine are absolute crap. It was free...

Sounds like you answered your own question.

 

[Binky]

Sounds like your problem isn't netflix, it's torrents. Does your roomate have upload and download speed limits set at something reasonable? Have him/her turn them down until you find a reasonable compromise. Maxing the upload bandwidth can quickly make gaming impossible.

Also, who's name is on the cable/DSL/internet line? If its yours, you might just find an RIAA lawsuit on your hands if your genius roomate (who doesnt seem to understand or respect speed limits) gets caught.

 

[slugg]

I spoke to my room mates and have blocked the torrent ports. We tried did some experiments; there's definitely some packet loss while someone is watching Netflix. The bandwidth is fine, but we're experiencing packet loss. What this equates to is pages randomly not responding (but click the link again or refresh the page and all is fine) and unplayable lag in games.

So the experiments... I went on campus in my lab where we get a solid 150+ mbps of bandwidth to the internet (theoretically 1000, but I can't find a remote site with equal bandwidth). I ran Netflix on my computer, as well as Tribes: Ascend, all while pinging Google.com on loop. Zero packet loss. If I do that here, Netflix seems to be the only thing that keeps running. I'm sure there's packet loss, but their buffering algorithms seem to compensate for it.

New router?

 

[Binky]

Blocking torrent ports isn't always as effective as you might think. I haven't found a reliable method to block torrents.

Speed limits on whatever torrent program he's using MUST be used.

 

[slugg]

Well, I just bought a DD-WRT capable router from someone on this forum. Super cheap price and DD-WRT is nice to have anyway. Hopefully QoS will fix the issue.

 

[billyb0b]

QoS will fix the issue if implemented correctly. DD-WRT and Tomato both offer a lot of customization. It will take some time and research in setting it up correctly if you are unfamiliar with it, but there's plenty on info online to help u get through it.

 

[mango123]

I actually dealt with this situation recently as I have a somehwat differenct situation with my home network.

I have a cable conn 30mpbs down and 2 up, with 14 users on it.
Everyones got a phone, a lot people try to watch netflix, and all sorts of shit goes on on my network, pandora, P2P, you name it it goes on.

I got to the point where I couldnt watch anything hidef because of constant buffering.

I got frustrated, read up, and bought an e3000, flashed it to DDWRT.

(I said I have a different situation and this it it... I am the "manager" at a "sober house" and the network is available for the residents to do "job search" and "productive shit" but we all know how the mice play when the cat is... well... in the other room.)

I thought that I would be able to limit bandwidth by MAC address, and it turns out that short of learning how to script for these linux open source software routers with IPTABLE scripts, it's kind of sketchy (read: takes a lot of learning.)

Heres what I did to TOTALLY CAP AND RESTRICT EVERYONE IN THE HOUSE.
(except for my host machines and the other managers host machines.)
It works very well, please use this with discretion however as you will be in pretty much complete control.

1. QoS on any router does not actually limit bandwidth, it only changes that way the router buffers and prioritizes frames/packets that are flying back and forth. SO, in other words, even if you are set to HIGH pri. and they are set to LOW, and they are streaming 10mb down with netflix, you are going to have hell trying to get some good response out of it.

Here is how I setup QoS on DD WRT with my e3000.

Flash your router, go into QoS page after it is setup.

Put everyones MAC ADDRESS into the QOS table including yours.
Set everyone elses priority to "BULK" and yours to "EXEMPT"
Scroll to top of page and check QoS and use either HFTC or HT? i forget that third letter. (these are 2 dif types of QoS)

VERY IMPORTANT__**** Now you have to set a DOWN and UP limit. This is a hard limit for ANYONE that is on the QoS table that is not Exempt.

I set mine for 1.25 mbps down and 600k up for everyone.
(myself and the manager are exempt.)
VOILA-
Everyone on the network is CAPPED at 1.25 down and you and the other exempts should be downloading at full speed, AND your packets will have priority over theirs.

Good luck with your throughput limiting adventures.

Oh, and by the way, those routers do suck. n150n or whatever it is you have.

I recommend the e3000 cisco/linksys (50$ refurb) if you want DUAL RADIO,
or the RT-16 ASUS i believe it is if you want a N single radio.

 

[mango123]

Normally streaming Netflix only uses a few Mbit/sec.. Unless you only have >2Mbit (down) internet (DSL) its probably not Netflix 'killing' your bandwidth. Also Netflix will 'back off' and lower the quality if its competing with other downloads..
Typically its uploading that really slows things down, significantly. I'd be looking at that first. Buffer bloat.

And yea, this is a 'people' problem. Not so much a tech issue.

Hmm, this isn't the case on my machines. With the network silent and at under 10k sec up and down, I start a netflix "HD" movie and netflix starts streaming in bursts of almost 13mbps down at a time. And the problem with these highdef streams like netflix is they download in bursts, which CAN in fact tie up network resources. I have seen it myself and netflix will of course stream as hard and fast as it can, and depending on your machine (pc, ps3, bluray player) and how it deals with streaming qualities, it may not dumb down the quality to make way for other network resources.
The network sees these packets as being high priority as well, as it is streaming data that is time sync sensitive, so alot of times these can take precedence over all over traffic making you wait. It's quite stupid that netflix on my HDTV doesnt just do a solid medium bandwidth stream. It downloads in chunks.

Just my 2 cents. :whiste:

Time warner cable estimates that netflix in wisconsin accounts for over 30% of ALL the consumer class downstream bandwidth.

 

[mango123]

It may not be a bandwidth issue... I wonder if this router is just too slow/not able to keep up with the NAT? I mean... gaming uses hardly any bandwidth, for the most part. There's no way Netflix is using all 20 mbit/s that my connection gives me. Should I buy a better router? The reviews for mine are absolute crap. It was free...

3 people streaming blu ray quality streams on a 10-20mbps down network WILL run into stuttering and buffering issues.

Hidef = somewhere between 6/7 - 15 mbps download speed.

 

[slugg]

Mango, your posts are appreciated. I expect the new router next week; we'll see how it goes. I'll do exactly as you said, except up the limit to 5 mbps (should be enough for Netflix at HD quality, DVD quality at a minimum). I'll read up on QoS with DD-WRT and try out some of the available tweaks. Hopefully some kind of combination will work for me.

If paying more monthly and upping the bandwidth is necessary, then so be it. But it's literally double the price; cable companies are jerks.

 

[wirednuts]

do you have a docsis 3 modem as well? docsis 2 is fine for 1 user but two heavy users can cause problems

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Well, gaming generally won't disturb Netflix, because gaming generally uses very little data in comparison.

Yeah, but my roommate watching Netflix will bump my ping from the low 100s to the mid-200s.

 

[edlight1]

It's 2015 now, but I have something for this 2012 thread. You can control Netflix's bandwidth usage. You can hover over the HD icon while something is playing and uncheck allow HD. You can alt-shift on the movie and choose Stream Manager; this can disengage itself on pauses, though. You can go into your account and limit your bandwidth in 2 stages. It could still buffer like mad at the start of a movie, though. I watch the bandwidth using the old free Bandwidth Monitor, or you can use Windows Task Manager.

 

[kevnich2]

It's 2015 now, but I have something for this 2012 thread. You can control Netflix's bandwidth usage. You can hover over the HD icon while something is playing and uncheck allow HD. You can alt-shift on the movie and choose Stream Manager; this can disengage itself on pauses, though. You can go into your account and limit your bandwidth in 2 stages. It could still buffer like mad at the start of a movie, though. I watch the bandwidth using the old free Bandwidth Monitor, or you can use Windows Task Manager.

Holy cow - why did you bring back such an old thread?? I was reading through this like, wow that's an old router then looked at the date on this - 3 years ago?