Very odd experience, what is the make and model of the modem / router the Tablo is connected to? Is it the ISP provided combo modem + router? I have my ISP modem in bridge mode and I use my own standalone router and I haven’t lost pairing on my iPhone and iPad in over a year.
I use my own Linksys router. Curious why that might matter though.
Some ISPs and some ISP provided equipment limit the ability to setup the necessary port forwarding required for Tablo Connect. It’s just a “few” of them, but they are out there.
Wouldn’t that prevent access for initial setup, thus it never works, vs unreliable access?
No, if you’re doing the initial setup from your LAN, the router is not involved.
I understand the modem isn’t used within my LAN but I’d assume the router is used. I’m not a networking guy but isn’t the router needed for the devices to see and talk to each other unless the Tablo is somehow peer to peer?
BTW, I used my Andriod phone on the Tablo in my house Saturday (full sync). It dropped connection Monday and could not connect remotely.
I bet it was implied ISP modem/router or ISP modem + router as previously noted. As some setup have
ISP device > personal device - LAN
I have been using Tablo now for about a year. I must say the remote streaming could use some HUGE improvements. While being able to set your own streaming rate is helpful, it truly is a pain. Why do I have to do it in the first place? Every major streaming service works 10x better than Tablo. I can say that because at time the Tablo just sputters, if I pop onto Netflix or another major stream right then, the video is flawless. Same device, network, etc.
Note I also have a 500Mby bidirectional connection for my home internet. So thats not to blame. I have 5G phones and modems - again that should not be the cause. Same device. So whats left? Tablo video compression.
First off, not sure they bother to spend money on superior compression tech. Nor does Tablo adaptively determine stream rate - huge problem for me. All I know is all other streaming works nearly flawlessly on the same network and devices.
Tablo - whats you answer? Will you fix this???
Transcoding new data on the fly isn’t the same as having stale fixed data in a CDN. Just saying. And, believe it or not, Netflix has more compute resources than your Tablo does.
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I am sure that if a company wanted to build the “ultimate DVR”, and price wasn’t an issue, they could build it. But how much money would the average consumer pay?
For the price point, and simplicity of setup and operation, the Tablo is really hard to beat. Years ago, I built a 6-Tuner cable card based multimedia PC. I put around $2,000 into it, and purchase two XBox 360s for the TVs (plus one TV directly connected). It took hours of configuration, and a lot of tinkering to get it to the point that it worked really well.
For around $3,000 I had the ultimate DVR system. And guess what - I had complaints. 
The Tablo is $200 plus a hard drive.
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Agreed to responses. But the only complaint I have is with remote streaming. I’ve worked on this type of thing in the past (retired now) I am pretty sure there are better algorithms for transmission. That’s all. Not asking for ultimate anything, just a better functional piece.
I’d be happy with better buffering to prevent the stuttering.
The main reason for my tablo choice was remote streaming capability.
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I’ve used two Tablo LItes for four years. And for four years I’ve experienced the “no internet connection” problem discussed in this thread–and frequently. I’ve labored through reading this forum thread and a thread on “can’t stream from Tablo if internet is out”.
My conjecture is that the “Tablo server in the sky” is the common thread. When you sync your device (be it Smartphone/tablet/etc.) to a Tablo with the LAN in the household the final IP address for the Tablo in the household and in the “Tablo server in the sky” are the same. If anything happens to affect the Tablo address in the household you can no longer access the Tablo in the household with the device until you go through the “synching process” in the household again. So if you have any internet connection problem with the cable company—a temporary outage, a power pause in the household, a modem (or router) reboot, etc.–then the “new” IP address for the Tablo in the household “may” have changed. Therefore when you try to access the Tablo remotely the connection will be unsuccessful. You’ve got to go back to the household with the Tablo and re-synch the device(s). Are there fixes that you can implement for this? I’m not sure–perhaps a static IP for your cable modem. I find that when a reboot occurs on my router the devices normally wind up with the same “router-assigned” IP addresses. The static IP address for the modem could maintain the integrity between the Tablo in the house and the data in the “Tablo server in the sky”.
Although not a specific topic of this thread, if you lose your internet connection you can’t stream recorded programs on your Tablo even while at home. I suspect that even if you’re at your home and want to use your Tablo at home coordination with the “Tablo server in the sky” is required–and if your internet is out that coordination can’t occur so you can’t stream from your Tablo at home if your internet is out.
That’s a good theory as to why some people have the problem. I have only had an issue with my ip changing when
- My cable/ISP had a HUGE outage that made them do a lot of reconfiguration or
- I changed either my cable modem or router.
Power outages and reboot’s have not been an issue but that may be different for other people on other ISP’s. Recently a friend using a different ISP then me had his IP change because he replaced a his WiFi router. I directed him to use “MAC cloning” on his new router which restored his previous IP.
For the most reliable performance these things might help:
- Give your Tablo a static IP on your local network.
- Make sure the ports are forwarded if necessary.
- Attach your modem and router to a UPS(uninterruptible power supply).
- Set your router to clone the cable modems MAC address. (This will help if you replace the router later).
- Most routers include the capability to set up a VPN server. It doesn’t cost anything extra and it can be useful if you plan to be away from home for long periods. I use Dynamic DNS which is also free. It’s highly recommended when you set up a VPN. VPN could be used to restore remote connect if something happens or you can simply use the VPN to stream without remote connect.
That should leave your cable modem as the primary weak point but I don’t think consumers can easily change the MAC address on them. They also don’t need replaced as frequently as routers because they rarely need upgraded. It might be possible to convince you ISP to transfer the IP address to your new cable modem if you ask.
I believe you can usually stream your Tablo from the apps when the internet is down as long as you don’t let the Tablo reboot and your local network is working as normal. my.tablotv.com won’t work though because it’s a web app. I wrote usually because I had something strange happen once and I haven’t tried streaming without internet since then. My internet has been pretty stable since that time.
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