Total Newbie - Apologies in Advance

[simoncn]

(13-04-2014 16:12)gnomus Wrote:  Once again, thanks for your assistance. I am rural and my broadband connection is very poor, but I didn't think that would be relevant to the internal network (for want of a better phrase). I have the latest BT Homehub. I am using BT Homeplugs. I have a few kids with laptops, phones, tablets, etcetera, but they all connect wirelessly. Could that be messing things up?

With a dedicated wireless bridge, I need a second router. I connect my renderer and my NAS to this and I have this second router connect wirelessly to my main router for the odd time when my renderer/NAS needs to connect to the Internet - is that correct? I do actually have a second router (new still in its box).

The first step is isolate where the problem lies. There are two prime suspects:

1) The Homeplugs

The problem might be caused by the Homeplugs. If you have other devices as well as your NAS and renderer connected to your Homeplugs, the Homeplugs might be getting overloaded at certain times of day and causing audio streaming dropouts. If this is the problem, the solution is to use either an ethernet connection or a dedicated wireless bridge to connect your renderer (and/or NAS) to your router.

A wireless bridge is not the same as a router. It consists of a pair of devices that talk to each other wirelessly on a different channel from your main wireless network, setting up a chain like the following:

renderer --- bridge device 1 ........ bridge device 2 --- router

where the dashes represent wired Ethernet connections and the dots represent a wireless link.

In my case, I am using a pair of bridge devices to connect my renderer to the switch. My NAS is close to the switch, so I am connecting it to teh switch with an Ethernet cable.

To confirm whether that this is the problem, you could use Ethernet cables (which might need to be quite long) to connect your renderer, NAS and router and see whether this makes any difference.

2) The router

The router (Homehub) might be overloaded with traffic (internet/nroadband, local/wifi or both) at certain times of day. If this is the problem, the solution is to use a separate switch for the wired ethernet connection to your audio devices (NAS and renderer). This switch can be conected permanently to the router, so your NAS and renderer always have internet access. Because the streaming traffic between the NAS and the renderer is passing through the switch and not through the router, any overload that might be occurring in the router won't affect audio streaming performance.

The switch is used for wired ethernet connections only. If you are using a wireless router as a wired switch, you should disable the wireless side to avoid possible interference with your main wireless network. Alternatively, you could leave the wireless side enabled and use it to create a separate wireless network on a different channel with a different SSID (if you are confident with your ability to set this up).

There is no need for a wireless bridge with this setup. Your NAS and renderer would be connected via ethernet cables or Homeplugs into the wired connections of the new switch.

To confirm whether that this is the problem, you should be able to set up your second router as a switch and see whether this makes any difference.

Quote:I was, however, slightly concerned about noise from the NAS interfering with my enjoyment of the playback. I have a Synology DS213J. I don't know how noisy it is at the moment - every time I am sat next to it, I have my very noisy Blu-Ray drive going ten to the dozen burning discs!

I'm not sure why you are concerned about this. With either of the two setups suggested above, it is possible to have your renderer in a different room than your NAS.