Streaming...

[-jk]

I've heard a lot of reports of people having trouble streaming, and lots without trouble.

I had no trouble. I use a 1st gen Apple TV thingie, with a wired connection to our modem/router, to a modest 30 Mb Comcast connection.

Other results? Can we find any trends?

-jk

[juise]

WatchESPN app on iPad and iPad/Chromecast... no issues pretty much ever. I essentially stream all my sports using Network apps (ESPN, Fox, DirecTv, NFL network, NFL Sunday ticket) and I find ESPN to be the most stable by some margin.

[Kedsy]

I've heard a lot of reports of people having trouble streaming, and lots without trouble.

I had no trouble. I use a 1st gen Apple TV thingie, with a wired connection to our modem/router, to a modest 30 Mb Comcast connection.

Other results? Can we find any trends?

-jk

I watched it on my Dell laptop, through my run-of-the-mill Comcast router and connection, with no trouble at all.

[-jk]

I watched it on my Dell laptop, through my run-of-the-mill Comcast router and connection, with no trouble at all.

Wifi or wired?

-jk

[unclsam1]

Watch on a Surface Pro 4 Wireless via Comcast. Only trouble is when some notification interrupts the video feed without disturbing the audio feed. Then you get audio of action before you see it on video. Have to exit the feed and go back in to get audio and video to synch.

[BandAlum83]

I watch on my laptop through xfinity high speed internet on wifi. I Connect my laptop to my widescreen with an hdmi cable. Great picture. At the beginning I do get a buffering delay a couple of times.

[DevilFalcon]

Amazon fire stick, 2nd gen, WatchESPN app wireless to a 100mb Spectrum connection.
I had a couple times where it kicked into low quality and once where I totally lost the stream.

[CameronBornAndBred]

I gave up on watching last night's game at home, it locked up constantly. Today, I watched the football game through DirecTV's app on my tablet at work, and worked fine for the whole game. I would have preferred last night worked better than today in hindsight.

(PS, cable feed at home and at work, same company, speed should be no different.)

[bbosbbos]

100 mb Spectrum connection in Cary, NC. Wired to PC. Completely lost the signal twice. Every 15-30 seconds the streaming froze for about 5 seconds. Very often the resolution became very poor during the game. :mad:

[LasVegas]

Apple TV 4th gen. WiFi with a netgear nighthawk R7000. Cox internet at 100 Mbps. Flawless all the time. I have no cable tv or satellite in my house. I stream 100% of what I watch. I never have issues.

Cox recently upped my speed to 100 Mbps from 50. I also had no issues when I was running with 50.

[-jk]

100 mb Spectrum connection in Cary, NC. Wired to PC. Completely lost the signal twice. Every 15-30 seconds the streaming froze for about 5 seconds. Very often the resolution became very poor during the game. :mad:

What vintage pc, and were you running anything else on your pc at the time?

-jk

[diablesseblu]

Apple TV, 3rd generation. Suddenlink 50 Mbps via WiFi. Older router (D-Link DIR 615) and modem (Arris CM820). Nary a blip -- flawless video using WatchESPN app (knocks on wood). :)

[Native]

I usually stream on an 4th-gen Apple TV, but sometimes I do simultaneous streams off of a single MacBook Pro.

I'm in NYC and usually get around 55-60 Mbps down with Verizon FiOS. No issues here.

[-jk]

I usually stream on an 4th-gen Apple TV, but sometimes I do simultaneous streams off of a single MacBook Pro.

I'm in NYC and usually get around 55-60 Mbps down with Verizon FiOS. No issues here.

wired or wifi?

And, everyone, if you're wifi: are you in a single-family-home neighborhood, or in a higher density arrangement (townhouse/apartment)? And are you competing with others in your home for that wifi? Wifi has so many variables; I know a family with several kids - each streaming on multiple devices at the same time...

-jk

[sagegrouse]

Streaming was better last night than for the earlier exhibition. I got a busy signal every few minutes that lasted between five and 30 seconds. Twice it said the connection was lost, so I rebooted Firefox (and once may have restarted my computer). I made sure I only had one window open on Firefox and almost no other applications running on my machine (except all the security and other junk I can't control).

I am watching on my small Dell laptop via my in-house cat 5 cable connected to an Edge router which connects to my line-of-sight ISP, who (I think) attaches to a Comcast trunk.

[LasVegas]

wired or wifi?

And, everyone, if you're wifi: are you in a single-family-home neighborhood, or in a higher density arrangement (townhouse/apartment)? And are you competing with others in your home for that wifi? Wifi has so many variables; I know a family with several kids - each streaming on multiple devices at the same time...

-jk

I’m in a subdivision basically with about 100 homes. While I was streaming the game, my wife was watching Netflix in 4K at the same time. No issues. My internet is always 100 Mbps. Any hour or day of the week. It’s constant. Doesn’t matter when I run a Speedtest. Which is very rare for a cable connection. So I can have a lot of streams going at once.

Seems to me that Apple devices have no issues.
My father streams the games on a 6 mbps wifi cable connection in rural Ohio. With an Apple TV 4th gen and sometimes 3rd gen. He never has issues and it comes in crystal clear.

[-jk]

Streaming was better last night than for the earlier exhibition. I got a busy signal every few minutes that lasted between five and 30 seconds. Twice it said the connection was lost, so I rebooted Firefox (and once may have restarted my computer). I made sure I only had one window open on Firefox and almost no other applications running on my machine (except all the security and other junk I can't control).

I am watching on my small Dell laptop via my in-house cat 5 cable connected to an Edge router which connects to my line-of-sight ISP, who (I think) attaches to a Comcast trunk.

Do you stream other live things often? If so, how do they perform?

One issue with live streaming is they can't compress anywhere near as much with live content as they can with pre-recorded content - why ads play better during games; a dip affects the live much more.

Another issue is pretty much all endpoints (i.e., your home) share the last mile (or three) with a lot of other homes. So evening streaming might be shakier than afternoon streaming. If you've used most hotel wifi, you'll understand - breakfast time and after dinner are often unusable for streaming...

-jk

[Native]

wired or wifi?

And, everyone, if you're wifi: are you in a single-family-home neighborhood, or in a higher density arrangement (townhouse/apartment)? And are you competing with others in your home for that wifi? Wifi has so many variables; I know a family with several kids - each streaming on multiple devices at the same time...

-jk

WiFi. I'm in downtown Manhattan in a 39-story apartment building, so about as dense as you can get in terms of population. I also have two roommates on our home network.

[DU82]

I was able to stream fairly well last night when I wanted to check replays. Fortunately, Cameron’s WiFi is much better than Wallace Wade.

[JNort]

ESPN3 with WIFI on a PS4 was crystal clear with no issues

[elvis14]

I streamed via Wifi to my FireStick. There were a handful of times where the video froze for a second or two. Not enough to worry about. I just ran a speedtest on my Macbook and got 87 Mbs down and 23 up. Spectrum in Raleigh.

[-jk]

I streamed via Wifi to my FireStick. There were a handful of times where the video froze for a second or two. Not enough to worry about. I just ran a speedtest on my Macbook and got 87 Mbs down and 23 up. Spectrum in Raleigh.

How crowded is your neighborhood and household?

-jk

[dalmatians98]

We have Verizon FIOS service and had intermittent trouble when streaming WatchESPN on laptops and tablets. Last Christmas I bought a Roku stick. Since then, knock wood, little or no trouble with WatchESPN.

[SilkyJ]

We have Verizon FIOS service and had intermittent trouble when streaming WatchESPN on laptops and tablets. Last Christmas I bought a Roku stick. Since then, knock wood, little or no trouble with WatchESPN.

Verizon FiOS in Philly at a house in the 'burbs
Elon: we did WiFi on a Macbook Pro, HDMI to TV. Was a bit choppy occassionally, froze half a dozen times through out and I had to reload the page. We were also watching the REPLAY around 9:30pm ET when I got into town.
Utah Valley: WiFi on Macbook pro. Same issues. Switched to a Dell, hardwired, and seems to be more stable.
(Speedtest is indicating 80mbps down, 25 up both wifi and wired...)


For the preseason games, I was on a Roku via Comcast with 100mbps down and it was choppy. WiFi connection in a large apartment building...

[SilkyJ]

Verizon FiOS in Philly at a house in the 'burbs
Elon: we did WiFi on a Macbook Pro, HDMI to TV. Was a bit choppy occassionally, froze half a dozen times through out and I had to reload the page. We were also watching the REPLAY around 9:30pm ET when I got into town.
Utah Valley: WiFi on Macbook pro. Same issues. Switched to a Dell, hardwired, and seems to be more stable.
(Speedtest is indicating 80mbps down, 25 up both wifi and wired...)


For the preseason games, I was on a Roku via Comcast with 100mbps down and it was choppy. WiFi connection in a large apartment building...

Update: No choppiness right now, but it does seem to freeze/buffer every 5-10 minutes.

[jwillfan]

I posted some in the chat but here's what I saw:

Setup-Spectrum 100mbps internet, AC wifi, getting 110mbps on fast.com to my cell phone connected to same router
Tried Xbox One ESPN app and it froze 2x, backed out and restarted stream. At 3rd freeze I went to Roku and installed the app and activated it, then had no real freezes. Screen rez went blurry a few times but always recovered, maybe twice went to a "restarting" screen for a second or 2 but recovered...until about 2.5 min to go. Totally froze, then I went back to the menu and tried to restart and got a message saying unauthenticated but no way to re-authenticate/activate. Went BACK to the Xbox and it asked me to activate with a code AGAIN, 3rd time in < 24 hrs. Now I know why I haven't cut the cord yet! Streaming stuff still not ready for prime time. I considered youtube tv but would need yet ANOTHER device, chromecast or the like - my remote systems and more importantly my wife would not tolerate.

[LasVegas]

I posted some in the chat but here's what I saw:

Setup-Spectrum 100mbps internet, AC wifi, getting 110mbps on fast.com to my cell phone connected to same router
Tried Xbox One ESPN app and it froze 2x, backed out and restarted stream. At 3rd freeze I went to Roku and installed the app and activated it, then had no real freezes. Screen rez went blurry a few times but always recovered, maybe twice went to a "restarting" screen for a second or 2 but recovered...until about 2.5 min to go. Totally froze, then I went back to the menu and tried to restart and got a message saying unauthenticated but no way to re-authenticate/activate. Went BACK to the Xbox and it asked me to activate with a code AGAIN, 3rd time in < 24 hrs. Now I know why I haven't cut the cord yet! Streaming stuff still not ready for prime time. I considered youtube tv but would need yet ANOTHER device, chromecast or the like - my remote systems and more importantly my wife would not tolerate.

I cut the cord 4 years ago and stream exclusively with an Apple TV. No issues at all. Zero. Nada. And I stream 700 gb a month.

[-jk]

For the first time this season, I had a couple blurry moments, and one pause (mid-air in a FT). Otherwise, fine.

-jk

[elvis14]

How crowded is your neighborhood and household?

-jk

Sorry, just saw this question. Logged into the router last week and took a look at the list of connected devices in my house. There were about a dozen. My kids, both of whom are teenagers, stream a lot of Netflix, they essentially don't watch TV.

The neighborhood is large but not dense. They have run a lot of fiber of late but I don't know of any of my neighbors who have put it to use. Outside of cost savings, I just don't have the need. Multiple Netflix streams running last night during the game (streaming on the ESPN app) and no issues. I will say that the picture quality of the games this weekend wasn't great.

[Ggallagher]

I streamed the ESPN3 signal via wifi to a kind of mid range five year old Dell laptop. The picture quality was good, and there were only two or three brief freezes during the game. The router in the house I've visiting this week is one of the Apple Airport devices..

[SilkyJ]

For the first time this season, I had a couple blurry moments, and one pause (mid-air in a FT). Otherwise, fine.

-jk


I usually stream on an 4th-gen Apple TV, but sometimes I do simultaneous streams off of a single MacBook Pro.

I'm in NYC and usually get around 55-60 Mbps down with Verizon FiOS. No issues here.


Apple TV, 3rd generation. Suddenlink 50 Mbps via WiFi. Older router (D-Link DIR 615) and modem (Arris CM820). Nary a blip -- flawless video using WatchESPN app (knocks on wood). :)


I've heard a lot of reports of people having trouble streaming, and lots without trouble.

I had no trouble. I use a 1st gen Apple TV thingie, with a wired connection to our modem/router, to a modest 30 Mb Comcast connection.

Other results? Can we find any trends?

-jk


Apple TV 4th gen. WiFi with a netgear nighthawk R7000. Cox internet at 100 Mbps. Flawless all the time. I have no cable tv or satellite in my house. I stream 100% of what I watch. I never have issues.

Cox recently upped my speed to 100 Mbps from 50. I also had no issues when I was running with 50.

Pretty interesting: everyone using an Apple TV had a flawless stream, except for jk's one issue. I'm a bit surprised that virtually every other config had at least someone with an issue (I had issues on a Mac, a PC, different browser, Roku at home AND across service providers).

To me this suggests the browsers we are using on our laptops/mobile devices are not as stable. I'm going to talk to my IT guy on Monday and ask his opinion on the most stable browsers for streaming and will A/B test browsers next time we have to stream.

[fidel]

Apple TV 4, wired, burbs. spectrum with plenty of download (50 gbps).

i have noticed that the espn app will give choppy response at times, while same stream on directv now will come in crystal clear.

I almost never have issues with hbo, netflix, etc. espn app almost every showing some level of downgraded video.

FWIW. Happy to have cut the cord.

[campered]

I've heard a lot of reports of people having trouble streaming, and lots without trouble.

I had no trouble. I use a 1st gen Apple TV thingie, with a wired connection to our modem/router, to a modest 30 Mb Comcast connection.

Other results? Can we find any trends?

-jkSaw the Utah valley beat down on my 65" Toshiba smart TV using Roku and the Watch/Espn app and very slow Frontier wireless internet. Had no problems but no HD quality.

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

Pretty interesting: everyone using an Apple TV had a flawless stream, except for jk's one issue. I'm a bit surprised that virtually every other config had at least someone with an issue (I had issues on a Mac, a PC, different browser, Roku at home AND across service providers).

To me this suggests the browsers we are using on our laptops/mobile devices are not as stable. I'm going to talk to my IT guy on Monday and ask his opinion on the most stable browsers for streaming and will A/B test browsers next time we have to stream.

I had no issues, streaming on my phone over suburban residential wifi, then pushing that signal to my Google Chromecast on my television. I guess I am an aberration.

[flyingdutchdevil]

WatchESPN app on iPhone and iPad. No issues ESPN has finally done something right.

[SilkyJ]

I had no issues, streaming on my phone over suburban residential wifi, then pushing that signal to my Google Chromecast on my television. I guess I am an aberration.

Not a total aberration. Others with similar configs had good experiences, but some didn't. It was just interesting that every Apple TV config seemed to be flawless. That's the only correlation I can find...nothing else seems to really line up.

[elvis14]

WatchESPN app on iPhone and iPad. No issues ESPN has finally done something right.

I wouldn't say they have done something right....I'd just say that they have done just 'OK'. When I stream Netflix or Amazon Prime video over the same setup the quality is so much better than ESPN. But at least our games were available.

[jwillfan]

Just saying - yes I have no issues using netflix, hbo go, amazon prime, etc - no matter if using my very old smart tv app, xbox, or roku. But as soon as I try live sports there is a difference. The difference is that with movies the algorithm can buffer ahead when there is good throughput but you can't buffer ahead something that hasn't happened yet. I may try pausing to be 2-3 minutes behind live next time to see if that helps. But with anything, various platforms implement algorithms differently so the Apple TV might be better engineered but there is likely a difference between the ESPN app on my Xbox vs Roku. I recall trying Sling TV on the Xbox over a year ago and it was Un-watchable. I got the roku during another trial of Sling in the spring and it's gotten waaay better.

[SilkyJ]

Just saying - yes I have no issues using netflix, hbo go, amazon prime, etc - no matter if using my very old smart tv app, xbox, or roku. But as soon as I try live sports there is a difference. The difference is that with movies the algorithm can buffer ahead when there is good throughput but you can't buffer ahead something that hasn't happened yet. I may try pausing to be 2-3 minutes behind live next time to see if that helps. But with anything, various platforms implement algorithms differently so the Apple TV might be better engineered but there is likely a difference between the ESPN app on my Xbox vs Roku. I recall trying Sling TV on the Xbox over a year ago and it was Un-watchable. I got the roku during another trial of Sling in the spring and it's gotten waaay better.

Fair when its live, but for the preseason games I was watching on replay and had some choppiness. Not as bad as live, but ESPN still isn't as good/stable as Netflix/Amazon--I'd bet a lot of money that those two companies are hiring more and better engineers and investing a lot more in their streaming infrastructure as they view themselves as tech companies, whereas ESPN is a media company at its core.