WDTV Live - 5MB/sec fast enough to stream?

[gigahertz20]

Continuation of this thread from the networking subforum:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2230985

Basically there is two WDTV Live units that I want to network together, one downstairs and one upstairs. The downstairs one has two USB 2.0 external hard drives attached to it. I want to be able to use the upstairs one to access those hard drives and stream.

To see if powerline networking would even work in this house I went to Best Buy and bought their only 200Mbps kit which was the Netgear XAVB2101 (includes 2) they had available in the store. Since I need 3 units I can't setup what I want to see if it works. I thought maybe I could connect both WDTV Live units directly using the powerline adapters without having to plug a powerline adapter into the router since I don't need them to have internet access, but apparently that doesn't work.

Anyways, just to test the transfer rates. I plugged 1 powerline adapter into the router and connected the downstairs WDTV Live using the other adapter. I transferred a 1GB media file at 5MB/sec from the unit to a wired computer. Is that speed fast enough to stream 4-15GB 720P/1080P h264 mkv's without any problems between the 2 units?

I guess I should try playing back a movie from the WDTV Live using a wired network computer to access one of the hard drives attached to it, if that works then I would think the other WDTV Live should be able to stream from it as well.

 

[velillen]

Really depends mor eon the bitrates than anything i would think.

I just checked from my server playing back a 1080p @ ~10k MBps and was seeing ~1-3mbps on average with some spikes closer to 4 and 5. Now if i play back a rip off a bluray disc i was seeing ~4mbps averages with plenty of spikes above 5. So you'd have stuttering/problems with those. A 720p was streaming at ~.5-1mbps as well.

Least that was a quick and dirty test by me but seems like any lower bitrate movie should playback ok. Just wouldnt want the bitrates to get to high on the 1080p side.

 

[gigahertz20]

Really depends mor eon the bitrates than anything i would think.

I just checked from my server playing back a 1080p @ ~10k MBps and was seeing ~1-3mbps on average with some spikes closer to 4 and 5. Now if i play back a rip off a bluray disc i was seeing ~4mbps averages with plenty of spikes above 5. So you'd have stuttering/problems with those. A 720p was streaming at ~.5-1mbps as well.

Least that was a quick and dirty test by me but seems like any lower bitrate movie should playback ok. Just wouldnt want the bitrates to get to high on the 1080p side.

Just to clarify, MBps is megabytes/sec and mbps is megabits/sec. I think you got them mixed up. Anyways, I think the transfer rate I saw of around 5 MBps/sec (or 40 mbps/sec) should work decently for the most part. Maybe I should try out the 500Mbps powerline adapters to see if they work faster in this house.

 

[Howard]

I've run some 1080p videos through PS3 Media Server that peaked at 150 Mbps, but usually I hit 75-110 Mbps peak.

 

[Lotheron]

I've run some 1080p videos through PS3 Media Server that peaked at 150 Mbps, but usually I hit 75-110 Mbps peak.

Perhaps when it's buffering, but not sustained. Video, even bluray, isn't that high of a bitrate to necessitate that kind of transfer rate. Bluray peaks at 54megabits for Data Transfer and 48 megabits for Audio/Video data rates.

To answer the original question, if we're talking 5megabits, that's pretty slow for LAN network speeds and probably will not be enough for 1080p HD video, but should be for most 720p video, unless the bitrate is pretty high for some unknown reason. Now if you're talking about 5 Megabytes/s that's plenty for any resolution HD video and even most Bluray.

(wrote out megabits/megabytes to clear up any confusion).

 

[gigahertz20]

Perhaps when it's buffering, but not sustained. Video, even bluray, isn't that high of a bitrate to necessitate that kind of transfer rate. Bluray peaks at 54megabits for Data Transfer and 48 megabits for Audio/Video data rates.

To answer the original question, if we're talking 5megabits, that's pretty slow for LAN network speeds and probably will not be enough for 1080p HD video, but should be for most 720p video, unless the bitrate is pretty high for some unknown reason. Now if you're talking about 5 Megabytes/s that's plenty for any resolution HD video and even most Bluray.

(wrote out megabits/megabytes to clear up any confusion).

Yeah, I was talking about Megabytes/sec which is why I used MB not mb.

 

[velillen]

My bad on the units Theres a reason i shouldnt post till im a full cup of coffee into the morning

 

[Howard]

Perhaps when it's buffering, but not sustained. Video, even bluray, isn't that high of a bitrate to necessitate that kind of transfer rate. Bluray peaks at 54megabits for Data Transfer and 48 megabits for Audio/Video data rates.

To answer the original question, if we're talking 5megabits, that's pretty slow for LAN network speeds and probably will not be enough for 1080p HD video, but should be for most 720p video, unless the bitrate is pretty high for some unknown reason. Now if you're talking about 5 Megabytes/s that's plenty for any resolution HD video and even most Bluray.

(wrote out megabits/megabytes to clear up any confusion).

All I can say is that my wireless connection wasn't good enough to maintain smooth playback.

 

[vshah]

All I can say is that my wireless connection wasn't good enough to maintain smooth playback.

your wireless probably wasn't pushing more 20-30mbps