Buffering during Live TV using Android TV app on Sony X850C

Support & Troubleshooting
#1

An FYI for the @TabloSupport @TabloTV development team.

I installed the Android TV app on my new Sony TV. The recordings play fine (and look beautiful on the 65" screen if from an HD signal), but watching Live TV has constant, intermittent buffering. I’ve disabled the “Fast Live TV” option so that’s not the problem. And I’ve ruled out most of the other problems:

  • Strong TV signal from a tower 7 miles away
  • Tried several different channels with the same problem
  • Tablo hardwired into AC1900 router
  • TV is streaming from Tablo on 5ghz wi-fi channel and all other streams (including 4K from Amazon and Netflix) coming over fine
  • Throughput is over 1 gbps on my internal network
  • Tablo is updated to latest firmware as of 11/29/15.

A few other possibilities that came to mind:

  • Buffering seems worse when I’m also recording another show during a Live TV stream. But I might be imagining that. Should it matter?

  • Does the “recording quality” affect the processing power when streaming Live TV? I thought there might have been less buffering when I dropped the quality from 1080p to 720p, but also not sure.

#2

I agree that buffering during live TV playback is more often present if you are recording other shows at the same time.

#3

Recording quality affects the bandwidth required for live TV and recordings. Does it look better at 720?

#4

I know it takes up more bandwidth on my home network, but I’m pretty sure this isn’t a network capacity problem. For instance, I can stream 1080p recordings without any buffering. When I’m on Live TV, there’s buffering at both 720p and 1080p, but I think there’s less at 720p, which is why I’m wondering if it’s a bottleneck on the Tablo processing side.

#5

@jshang01 - There shouldn’t be… I would maybe touch base with support so they can see what might be happening.

#6

Can you please try hard wiring your TV to your router? Just temporarily to test if it’s WiFi speed related.

#7

I’ll need to dig up a longer ethernet cable but will give that a try.

#8

Yeah it’s not a permanent fix but it will help troubleshoot.

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#9

I’m hard wired Gigabit throughout the house. Cisco commercial router and switches. I see the exact same problem with Roku and live television. The problem is worse with 1080i @ 10Mbps. I get maybe one buffering incident @ 720P @ 5Mbps. It seems like the guide is updating or something like that when the buffering incidents occur.

#10

This is Android TV though, which traditionally doesn’t have any much buffering at all.

#11

Good to know. Maybe my problem was extra noticeable b/c I had just installed the app and the Guide was updating. It seems better since yesterday’s update so maybe it’s a false alarm.

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#12