A reminder when enountering a problem while streaming...

[AudioDoctor]

The problem may be your network and not the software you're using to stream. I come with this example. I have been streaming music most of the day, and for most of the day the streaming went fine. Then the interruptions started. I went to my Desk where HQP Desktop is running and opened Activity Monitor to see if I could find the culprit. I saw nothing that looked like it could be to blame but the skipping continued. Every time HQP went to get the next song, 10 seconds before the current one ended, and when starting a Hi-Res file. This got me thinking, so I went and did an internet speed test. What that told me is that for some reason my Comcast modem was restricting me to ~90Mbs instead of the Gig speed I am paying for. A reboot of the Comcast modem later and everything is back to normal.

[mav52]

Its amazing what a reboot of your router and cable modem has on your speeds.

[AudioDoctor]

40 minutes ago, mav52 said:

Its amazing what a reboot of your router and cable modem has on your speeds.

 

I would be lying if I said there isn't a part of me that thinks Comcast does this on purpose hoping I wont notice...

[DuckToller]

16 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

The problem may be your network and not the software you're using to stream. I come with this example. I have been streaming music most of the day, and for most of the day the streaming went fine. Then the interruptions started. I went to my Desk where HQP Desktop is running and opened Activity Monitor to see if I could find the culprit. I saw nothing that looked like it could be to blame but the skipping continued. Every time HQP went to get the next song, 10 seconds before the current one ended, and when starting a Hi-Res file. This got me thinking, so I went and did an internet speed test. What that told me is that for some reason my Comcast modem was restricting me to ~90Mbs instead of the Gig speed I am paying for. A reboot of the Comcast modem later and everything is back to normal.

Serious questions, does your provider a continouus speed close to the proposed bandwith, if you have a Gigabit contract ?
Here in France, I could be happy if I have up to 500mbp/s (up/down) on a 2Gig label fiber connection - I must assume that the  attached bandwith is just throretcial in an shared ewnvironment ...

[botrytis]

Well, in the USA, the bandwidth of the connection is MAX speed, not what people actually get. It also depends, if a person has a cable modem, depends on who many people are on you WAN your house is connected to, It will also vary based on number of people and number of devices.

 

We have a Gigabit connection (download speed only) but ours is... We NEVER get what they say we should have.

 

[AudioDoctor]

1 hour ago, DuckToller said:

Serious questions, does your provider a continouus speed close to the proposed bandwith, if you have a Gigabit contract ?
Here in France, I could be happy if I have up to 500mbp/s (up/down) on a 2Gig label fiber connection - I must assume that the  attached bandwith is just throretcial in an shared ewnvironment ...

 

I normally get the max theoretical available speed of a gigabit connection, which is right around 940Mbps. You'll never reach a perfect 1 gig due to the network overhead.

 

 

 

[AudioDoctor]

1 hour ago, botrytis said:

Well, in the USA, the bandwidth of the connection is MAX speed, not what people actually get. It also depends, if a person has a cable modem, depends on who many people are on you WAN your house is connected to, It will also vary based on number of people and number of devices.

 

We have a Gigabit connection (download speed only) but ours is... We NEVER get what they say we should have.

 

 

I don't see the problem here, your down speeds look fine.

[DuckToller]

I never get close to the bandwith announced by the provider's app (2Gbit/s - 554mbit/s), 
when using cloudflare speed test from any comp in the network it is usually around 300 down/ 250 up and with VPN 220 down/ 160 up (that is for testing) That's pretty much the same if I connect a laptop to the modem directly.
I have actually noted only once more tha 100 mbit/s download speed in real life.

[AudioDoctor]

29 minutes ago, DuckToller said:

I never get close to the bandwith announced by the provider's app (2Gbit/s - 554mbit/s), 
when using cloudflare speed test from any comp in the network it is usually around 300 down/ 250 up and with VPN 220 down/ 160 up (that is for testing) That's pretty much the same if I connect a laptop to the modem directly.
I have actually noted only once more tha 100 mbit/s download speed in real life.

 

I rarely do speed tests unless I suspect I am not getting the speed I pay for. Usually, I am proven right at those times.

I just did a CloudFlare speed test and these were the results.

when surfing around the web and downloading files I also rarely top out at or slightly above 100Mbps actual download speed, but I do see it on occasion. Even while streaming from Qobuz on occasion. I have HQP set to "freewheel" which makes it grab the file in it's entirety as fast as it can.

[botrytis]

I normally look at Ping Trace because there is more going on than just a PC - MODEM - The information Computer (on the internet). It doesn't work that way...

 

Just pinged 2 different website addresses and this is what I get. One is 10X longer response and it can be due to how many servers/Routers there are between.

 

 

 

 

If you use a VPN expect your speed to be 25-50% less speed, also.

 

[Jud]

2 hours ago, DuckToller said:

Serious questions, does your provider a continouus speed close to the proposed bandwith, if you have a Gigabit contract ?
Here in France, I could be happy if I have up to 500mbp/s (up/down) on a 2Gig label fiber connection - I must assume that the  attached bandwith is just throretcial in an shared ewnvironment ...

I get higher speed than Comcast/Xfinity advertises over the "wired" (optical Ethernet) parts of my home network (1.2 gbps advertised, about 1.6-1.7 actual), and reasonably close to the theoretical maximum of my iPhone 14 Pro over WiFi (I get 750-770mbps, and I think the theoretical max is in the 850+ range).

 

It's a nice result of upgrading my network after my old routers started acting up. This seems to happen as newer firmware that is supposed to be backward compatible is installed on older devices.

[botrytis]

28 minutes ago, Jud said:

I get higher speed than Comcast/Xfinity advertises over the "wired" (optical Ethernet) parts of my home network (1.2 gbps advertised, about 1.6-1.7 actual), and reasonably close to the theoretical maximum of my iPhone 14 Pro over WiFi (I get 750-770mbps, and I think the theoretical max is in the 850+ range).

 

It's a nice result of upgrading my network after my old routers started acting up. This seems to happen as newer firmware that is supposed to be backward compatible is installed on older devices.

 

I miss my local ISP when I was living in Iowa. I had fiber optic to the home, We had 1 GB up and down and it ran closer to 1.2 GB up and down. The ISP said 1 GB would be the minimum speed. It was cheaper and more reliable than Comcast.

[cjf]

11 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

I would be lying if I said there isn't a part of me that thinks Comcast does this on purpose hoping I wont notice...

Comcast is the Devil! I've got a 150mb line from them that can no longer stream anything above 24/96 from QoBuzzzz.

 

And, apparently, there is no breaking thru the purposeful human "Firewall" that would otherwise be known as Comcast 1st Line Support. Any questions outside of the script in front of them and they self reboot and start all the same questions over again 😐

[AudioDoctor]

18 minutes ago, cjf said:

Comcast is the Devil! I've got a 150mb line from them that can no longer stream anything above 24/96 from QoBuzzzz.

 

And, apparently, there is no breaking thru the purposeful human "Firewall" that would otherwise be known as Comcast 1st Line Support. Any questions outside of the script in front of them and they self reboot and start all the same questions over again 😐

 

I feel your pain. I became super excited when I received word Century Link fiber was ready in my neighborhood. I signed up, set the install date, paid my fine, etc... The day comes and a tech calls me up to tell me he has no idea why they scheduled the install when there is no fiber in my area to connect me to...

 

edit: God forbid you have a 3rd party router connected to your modem, Comcast immediately blames it and stops providing any help.

[Jud]

11 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

God forbid you have a 3rd party router connected to your modem, Comcast immediately blames it and stops providing any help.

Supposedly I get $10 a month off my bill for providing my own modem. Have to say (fingers crossed) that Comcast/Xfinity customer service has been decent to me so far. Now the bar for that is as low as it can go, because I have both their internet and mobile phone service, and they could not possibly be worse than AT&T or Verizon mobile phone customer service, both of which seem to do everything jn their power to actively piss you off.

[AudioDoctor]

1 hour ago, Jud said:

Supposedly I get $10 a month off my bill for providing my own modem. Have to say (fingers crossed) that Comcast/Xfinity customer service has been decent to me so far. Now the bar for that is as low as it can go, because I have both their internet and mobile phone service, and they could not possibly be worse than AT&T or Verizon mobile phone customer service, both of which seem to do everything jn their power to actively piss you off.

 

I have had AT&T for ever and not once have I had a problem with their customer service... Way back in the day of the first ever iPhone I had a weird problem with a certain phone number and auto disconnecting at 11pm on the dot, every night. They escalated and worked with us on that till it was solved. Pre-pandemic I would have said the same thing about Comcast however I think Comcsat took advantage of the pandemic by gutting their CS department even more and since then they have been awful.

[Jud]

34 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

I think Comcsat took advantage of the pandemic by gutting their CS department even more and since then they have been awful.

 

I agree customer service has not been as good since the pandemic.

 

AT&T: Every time I made a change I asked in advance about the price including fees. Then they'd hit me up for a huge hidden fee and when I complained, acted as if I should have known about it. Often they'd wind up waiving the fee (grudgingly) after a week of calls to 4 or 5 different people and infinite hold times.

 

I also had DirecTV, which AT&T bought. For the last year of my service (out of 20 or more I was with them), I called every couple of months and asked whether I could move from the satellite to the much less expensive and more reliable streaming service. They simply flat out refused every time. I called to cancel finally, and the reaction was sure, fine. Then as soon as I cancelled, they began an incessant stream of spam calls and emails that lasted almost two years, trying to get me to purchase the streaming service they'd refused to let me have while I was still their customer.

[AudioDoctor]

7 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

I agree customer service has not been as good since the pandemic.

 

AT&T: Every time I made a change I asked in advance about the price including fees. Then they'd hit me up for a huge hidden fee and when I complained, acted as if I should have known about it. Often they'd wind up waiving the fee (grudgingly) after a week of calls to 4 or 5 different people and infinite hold times.

 

I also had DirecTV, which AT&T bought. For the last year of my service (out of 20 or more I was with them), I called every couple of months and asked whether I could move from the satellite to the much less expensive and more reliable streaming service. They simply flat out refused every time. I called to cancel finally, and the reaction was sure, fine. Then as soon as I cancelled, they began an incessant stream of spam calls and emails that lasted almost two years, trying to get me to purchase the streaming service they'd refused to let me have while I was still their customer.

 

You want a Comcast secret? https://www.reddit.com/r/xfinity/

 

This seems to be the place to get support. I have had them fix my problem and give me the promotion price after my promotion expired.

[botrytis]

2 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

I have had AT&T for ever and not once have I had a problem with their customer service... Way back in the day of the first ever iPhone I had a weird problem with a certain phone number and auto disconnecting at 11pm on the dot, every night. They escalated and worked with us on that till it was solved. Pre-pandemic I would have said the same thing about Comcast however I think Comcsat took advantage of the pandemic by gutting their CS department even more and since then they have been awful.

 

I am my parents IT support, and they have ATT. They are the worst as far as support I have ever seen. My dad got a virus through email and I got rid of it. Next time he checked his email, which was erased and the attachment was also, his computer still got infected again. It turns out there was a virus in their email server (it had a email address tagged to it - a free YAHOO account - which is run by ATT) that hit a certain number of people and my dad was one. I had to prove to ATT that they are the problem not my dad - Proving a NEGATIVE?

 

 

[AudioDoctor]

3 hours ago, botrytis said:

 

I am my parents IT support, and they have ATT. They are the worst as far as support I have ever seen. My dad got a virus through email and I got rid of it. Next time he checked his email, which was erased and the attachment was also, his computer still got infected again. It turns out there was a virus in their email server (it had a email address tagged to it - a free YAHOO account - which is run by ATT) that hit a certain number of people and my dad was one. I had to prove to ATT that they are the problem not my dad - Proving a NEGATIVE?

 

 

 

Cross my fingers, so far so good. I have only had them for cell service since the first iPhone came out.