Netflix Streamers.....

I'm catching up on Breaking Bad right now and I keep having this issue where the show just all of a sudden goes from High Def to Standard Def. Sometimes I can stop the episode and start it again and it will be back in high def, but sometimes that doesn't work.

Anybody with the same issue?

I have it all the time. It has to do with downstream buffering. If your signal gets throttled for whatever reason midstream, it will cut back on the def quality to get you the content without a break in programming. It detects that the program is about to run out of buffed in amount- and it jams SD content in. Kinda annoying.

Wow, how strange. I just watch episode 47 and 48. No issue with either through my Roku. When I say just finished, I mean I am right now looking in at the TV and it is asking me to hit play to see episode 49.

In reply to JohnRW1621:

I just got done with episode 50 starting 51 right now.

mndsm wrote: I have it all the time. It has to do with downstream buffering. If your signal gets throttled for whatever reason midstream, it will cut back on the def quality to get you the content without a break in programming. It detects that the program is about to run out of buffed in amount- and it jams SD content in. Kinda annoying.

Ahh, that was the explanation I was looking for.

I have nothing to add except I just finished watch Breaking Bad from start to the last episode they have on Netflix the end of last week.

mndsm is exactly right as to what is going on.

In reply to rebelgtp:

I started from the beginning last Tuesday and I literally finished it 10 minutes ago.

I get that problem when I'm at the edge of my wifi range.

I never have that problem anywhere on my property, nor in the neighbor's house...

Uber geek and uber fast internet connection for the win.

Sometimes I have that issue when multiple people are using the Internet. I think my old as dirt router I having problems keepin up.

Would running a direct line to the router vs. using WiFi help this? Right now, I don't have a TV, so I'm just watching on my laptop, but eventually I plan to get a flat screen and will be hanging it on the wall, so running a cat 5 cable wouldn't be a big deal.

I've had my Roku1 since 2009, and lament the "Loading..." screen regularly. A few weeks ago it was so bad for a few days I couldn't watch it. One night I tried to watch a 22 minute episode of a TV show and got the screen 4 times in the first 2 minutes of the episode.

Called the AT&T guy that came out to fix all the half-ass crap the first guy did, he ran some checks and said everything looked normal. Shortly after that it went back to normal. I can never be sure it's the internet traffic, AT&T, Roku service, Netflix service...

Ian F wrote: Would running a direct line to the router vs. using WiFi help this? Right now, I don't have a TV, so I'm just watching on my laptop, but eventually I plan to get a flat screen and will be hanging it on the wall, so running a cat 5 cable wouldn't be a big deal.

I have a Samsung Blu-Ray with Smart TV and its good, but I think it's the device Lagging not the Internet. I also think sometimes Netflix sucks with loading the streaming content. I have Cat5 going right from the modem to the Blu-Ray, since they sit next to each other and the Blu-Ray doesn't have WiFi built in.

You must have a net provider that cuts bandwidth down when it gets high? What you're describing used to happen to us when we were dating the devil/using Comcast. Doesn't happen anymore.

Streaming directly to the device COULD mitigate it a little, but in a lot of cases, it has to do more with your ISP and netflix than anything. Netflix will get all hemmed up (and especially with popular shows, like Breaking Bad) and start dropping content quality. I never have this problem with E36 M3ty horror movies lol. The other side is again, your ISP. Think of it like a GIANT router with a dedicated limit to signal. If you only take 5 cuts of that signal, it works out well. BUT- if you have say 20 cuts on a signal only designed for say..... 15... people are gonna get horseE36 M3 signal. Before I had a private line run to my apt, we were on community based, and while free- I ran into throttling issues on a nearly hourly basis. This didn't matter if I had a router, plugged in, wifi, no difference.

Derick Freese wrote: I never have that problem anywhere on my property, nor in the neighbor's house... Uber geek and uber fast internet connection for the win.

I hate you.

We've got Uverse and the range on the router really sucks. It won't go 30 feet into the master bedroom, for example. I've tried adding a Lynksys range extender and the Uverse equipment just won't work with it. Plus I'm only geek through MS DOS so I get pretty flustered with anything that isn't a phone modem.

I've found LTE on my iPhone 5 is faster than our Wifi a lot of the time. Grrr.

Basil Exposition wrote:

Derick Freese wrote: I never have that problem anywhere on my property, nor in the neighbor's house... Uber geek and uber fast internet connection for the win.

I hate you. We've got Uverse and the range on the router really sucks. It won't go 30 feet into the master bedroom, for example. I've tried adding a Lynksys range extender and the Uverse equipment just won't work with it. Plus I'm only geek through MS DOS so I get pretty flustered with anything that isn't a phone modem. I've found LTE on my iPhone 5 is faster than our Wifi a lot of the time. Grrr.

I've done the same thing- I've speed tested my Centurylink and my phone next to each other at the same time. Tmobile usually wins.... and I'm paying for 12 down from Centurylink.