[SOLVED] Why is video on network drive struggling to play via blu ray player?

Oct 16, 2019
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Hi - apologies if this has been asked before or elsewhere but I am at my wits end with this.

Several MKV video files on my network connected 4Tb Seagate external HD are stuttering and "buffering" when playing back via my LG Blu Ray player also connected to the same home network via ethernet. Nothing is connected wirelessly. Exact same file copied to my network connected PC plays without stuttering or "buffering" via same network connected LG Blu Ray player!?? It is a gigabyte network with gigabyte switches - 4Tb Seagate HD and LG Blu Ray player connected to same network via same router. It's almost as if retrieving the video file from Seagate HD causes it to "buffer" as if it were live streaming yet from PC HD it plays uninterrupted. I never used to have this issue but it has become increasingly common as time as gone on. At first I thought it was a possible codec issue with the LG Blu Ray player but after much re-encoding and trying various audio and video formats it doesn't appear to be a codec related issue. Smaller video files, i.e. below 720p resolution, don't seem to suffer the same "buffering" issue but the larger HD and UHD files seem to struggle more when played from the Seagate HD but are fine when played from my PC HD. How can I test if my 4Tb Seagate external network drive is okay or if it is starting to fail? Is there a defrag equivalent for a network drive?
 
Solution
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if i were you i would contact Seagate support and tell them this. maybe they have test tools or can get you a new drive. sounds like your seagate may have issues if it used to work find and now doesn't
Oct 16, 2019
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Seagate 4Tb network drive is only connected to the router via ethernet cable - only USB connection is another standalone portable external HD that is connected to the Seagate drive but it isn't in use. I have tried watching the video on the LG Blu Ray with and without the USB drive connected, it makes no difference. For some reason larger (higher resolution) video files on Seagate start "buffering" when played through the LG Blu Ray player but the exact same file plays perfectly from my PC HD. Everything is connected on a gigabit network, Cat5e cable, gigabit switch, gigabit router etc. It is driving me nuts because it makes no sense at all. If there was a problem with the actual video file then it would do the same thing irrespective of where it was located (i.e. Seagate or PC). If it was a network cabling issue then it would do the same thing as LG Blu Ray player is connected to the same network via the same switch as the PC and Seagate - and I have tried swapping ports on both the router and the switch - no difference.
 
Which seagate hard drive do you have exactly?? I take it, it's not a real NAS?

This seagate and WD drives can have very slow ARM chips in them, and when I tried a couple(looking for travel hard drive), they max'd out at like 2-3MB/s over samba or FTP network connection. They only gave good performance with USB.

Check the file transfer speed with your PC. Try to copy a file from the drive to your computer and see what the average speed is. At 2-3MB/s, you'll see problems trying to play video.
 
Oct 16, 2019
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It is a Seagate Central 4Tb wireless drive that is connected to my router by ethernet cable and every device I access it with is also via an ethernet connection on the same network. I have no idea what constitutes a real NAS but it works the same way. Seagate Central 4Tb External Drive

And it used to play similar sized and resolution video files just fine but all of a sudden it is struggling. I tried copying a 1.1Gb video file from Seagate to my PC and it copied at around 59.8 MB/s - shouldn't be an issue, right?

Seagate drive is only 47% full, so it isn't that either.
 
That NAS is fast enough, I'd say the problem is on your LG blu-ray side. Perhaps the blu ray player had an update that uses more cpu resources. You need to buy a better client device.

You also need to get MakeMKV and a compatible blu-ray drive which can allow you to rip discs. I ripped my entire collection to my NAS, including 4k UHD blu rays. I then transcode them down to a more reasonable file size. Takes some work, but well worth it to just click on your movies on a whim.
 
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you can buy software to decrypt the bluray as well and rip and format the video any way you want with free Handbrake. my favorite ripper is DVD Fab BD ripper. Then I use Handbrake to make either mkv or mp4 videos.
 
Oct 16, 2019
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That NAS is fast enough, I'd say the problem is on your LG blu-ray side. Perhaps the blu ray player had an update that uses more cpu resources. You need to buy a better client device.

You also need to get MakeMKV and a compatible blu-ray drive which can allow you to rip discs. I ripped my entire collection to my NAS, including 4k UHD blu rays. I then transcode them down to a more reasonable file size. Takes some work, but well worth it to just click on your movies on a whim.

I also thought it must be the LG blu-ray player but the exact same video file that stutters when accessed on the Seagate drive via the LG blu-ray player plays perfectly when accessed from my PC by the exact same LG blu-ray player - no "buffering" or stuttering at all. Basically instead of selecting the Seagate drive as the source from the LG blu-ray player I select my PC and it then plays perfectly. How can it be the LG blu-ray player?
 
Oct 16, 2019
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you can buy software to decrypt the bluray as well and rip and format the video any way you want with free Handbrake. my favorite ripper is DVD Fab BD ripper. Then I use Handbrake to make either mkv or mp4 videos.

I have used Handbrake to re-encode some of the larger files and it has worked sometimes but not all the time and the strain Handbrake puts on my CPU during the re-encoding process is a bit worrying. My CPU sits at almost 100% usage and the temperature goes up significantly. It's okay if you just do a single video file but if you want to do multiple files then the CPU running at max for an extended period is far from ideal. And besides it doesn't appear to always solve the problem. I reserve the re-encoding procedure for those H.265 format files that my LG blu-ray player is unable to read - I then re-encode them to H.264 format and they used to play flawlessly but now they stutter and "buffer" when played from the Seagate drive. Same re-encoded files play perfectly on same LG blu-ray player from my PC drive??

Very frustrating as it is rendering my 4Tb Seagate drive virtually useless as a storage device for my video content and anything I want to watch via my LG blu-ray player requires me copying the video file to my PC drive so it plays without issue. Kind of makes you wonder what the point of the Seagate drive actually is if you cannot play any HD quality material from it. And the really frustrating part is it used to work flawlessly no matter what video file I accessed and played. Nothing has changed on my set-up either, same devices connected to the same network yet HD video files always struggle now!??
 
The seagate should offer either SMB or FTP, try using those.

Are you also using DLNA on your PC??

I suspect either the seagate or LG are trying to transcode, perhaps not fully, but rather transcode the video container to stream it.

Either way, get a real client device that's capable of playing H.265 to save you that trouble, but also can play without transcoding. I use an Apple TV 4 with an app called Infuse. It works very well reading files from SMB and decoding is done on the client device.

You can use KODI to do the same thing on nearly all other devices like Xbox, nvidia shield or other android devices. Not Roku. I just don't like the KODI UI.

The Nice thing about the Nvidia shield is that you can use PLEX as both a client and a server. It has a nice UI with good search and categorization as a client, but also has the ability to transcode video and serve it up to yourself remotely, or to your friends and family remotely or in your home. This makes it justify the hefty price tag.
 
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if i were you i would contact Seagate support and tell them this. maybe they have test tools or can get you a new drive. sounds like your seagate may have issues if it used to work find and now doesn't
 
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Solution
Oct 16, 2019
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The LG player accesses the video file from whatever source location I select - be it Seagate or my PC's hard drive - the EXACT same video file copied from Seagate to my PC's drive plays flawlessly on the same LG player that is what doesn't make any sense. Why is Seagate and/or the LG trying to transcode the video container but doesn't try to tdo the same thing for the exact copy housed on my PC's drive? It makes no sense at all. I have tried using my Android TV box (through Kodi and through VLC) via the same network (nothing wireless) to access the video files located on the Seagate drive and it is also a bit hit and miss with respect to this apparent "buffering" issue. Sometimes it is fine but more often than not lately it is also struggling. Seems to me the common denominator is the Seagate drive yet all tests yield the drive is fine and it doesn't appear to have any problems.
 
Oct 16, 2019
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if i were you i would contact Seagate support and tell them this. maybe they have test tools or can get you a new drive. sounds like your seagate may have issues if it used to work find and now doesn't

Yeah that may be the only option but naturally the 2-year warranty is no longer applicable!
 
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yes, i understand all that, see if SeaTools will work on your drive and test it with all the rigorous tests they have. install SeaTools on pc and beat the snot out of the NAS with it if you can. see if it reports any issues.

 
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