Beta M3 Streaming Performance Testing

skoal74 · August 2011

I'm currently a WHS v1 user who'd like to migrate to WHS 2011. I primarily use my server for media streaming to my HT, so I want the pooled shares such as in v1. While I'm 95% happy with v1, I still get random streaming issues even with scheduled turning off/on of DE. As a result, I want to migrate to 2011 hoping the 64bit architecture plus SATA2 compatibility will fix the drive I/O issues I random get. So I'm curious how far along DrivePool has from streaming performance perspective?

Has anyone done any testing (e.g. streaming the various bitrate Birds videos). I primarily stream full BD rips with HD audio tracks, so need 55-60 mbit streaming performance at least. Preferably, I'd like it to be be higher to be able to accomodate more than one stream at a time to multiple players in the house.

Also, separate question, can folder duplication assignment be done at the sub-folder level within a share folder or is it limited to the share folder level as it is in WHS v1 (which is annoying)?

Shane · August 2011

Hi skoal, see http://forum.covecube.com/discussion/comment/419#Comment_419 and http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool#Performance

To summarise: currently (as of Beta M3) streaming performance is... tolerable, but far from optimal. YMMV. However, the DrivePool framework is structured to include a performance layer and that layer will be added in Beta M4.

Post a link here to the Birds videos and I'll post the results when we get our hands on M4 and work gives me a break (madness until early September).

Folder duplication is currently share-level only. I suspect folder-level duplication will be a feature to be considered after the first version is released. There's nothing inherently impossible about adding it, it's just a demand vs difficulty vs KISS consideration. (caveat: I'm not with CoveCube, I'm speculating)

WillCS · August 2011

In my experience streaming of BD rips with HD audio haven't gone that well, lots of buffering, that was with M2 and wireless N 5 GHz on wired of course it's much better, so I'd say hold off until M4.

lee1978 · August 2011

Hi,

I have no problems streaming BD rips to 5 Ac Ryan mini2 boxes at the same time i am running a 24Tb server full of media and the streaming works fine no problems at all. All the connection's are 1 gig lan running through a 10 port switch.

Lee

skoal74 · August 2011

Hi,
I have no problems streaming BD rips to 5 Ac Ryan mini2 boxes at the same time i am running a 24Tb server full of media and the streaming works fine no problems at all. All the connection's are 1 gig lan running through a 10 port switch. Lee

Thanks Lee....just to be clear, these are 5 full bd rips ripped as is with imgburn or makemkv or the like, without additional compression?

If so, then that seems pretty darn capable. I'm fully hardwired gigabit network too.

SDWolf · August 2011

DVD ISO rips perform beautifully.

BD ISO rips... not so much. Menus work just fine, but playback of the movie proper tends to skip and buffer quite a bit. I'm using the combination of Windows Media Center, TotalMedia Theater 5, My Movies, and Virtual CloneDrive.

lee1978 · August 2011

Hi,

All my rips are uncompressed and I have no problems streaming DVD/BD rips I do wonder if it met have something to do with how the data is stored for some people for instance I have 12 2tb hddrives 7200k spin so my data is spread out while some have 1 or 2 drives packed with data so for instance the 5 films you may choose to stream my be all on 1 drive while the 5 I choose are spread over 5 drives so there is no bottle neck so to speak just a wild thought.

As to how I format my films here goes lose the menus waste of time I just rip the the main film also I found some BD rips don't like been in iso format and as some of u say skip/stutter so for some rips you have to keep them in m2ts format which is the raw format for them this also helps as I found certain films are made up of 20 or more of small m2ts files and the ripping software is unable to join them smoothly for playback that's when you have to use a little free program called txmuxing I think I will check when I get to a computer to join the fills into 1 seemless movie . That's why I like the Acmini2 boxes they can play back just about any file format there is and there cheap at Ã‚Â£80 each I got mine from scan.co.uk

All I use for DVD/BD rips is dvdfab and txmuxing to join the m2ts files store all my data in the pool and i just access my films using the GUI interface of the acmini2

Hope it helps if you need anymore info let me know

Lee

Shane · August 2011

skoal74, Alex just mentioned else-thread that per-folder duplication will not be in 1.0 - http://forum.covecube.com/discussion/131/individual-folder-duplication

speedownsie · September 2011

Hi, All my rips are uncompressed and I have no problems streaming DVD/BD rips I do wonder if it met have something to do with how the data is stored for some people for instance I have 12 2tb hddrives 7200k spin so my data is spread out while some have 1 or 2 drives packed with data so for instance the 5 films you may choose to stream my be all on 1 drive while the 5 I choose are spread over 5 drives so there is no bottle neck so to speak just a wild thought. As to how I format my films here goes lose the menus waste of time I just rip the the main film also I found some BD rips don't like been in iso format and as some of u say skip/stutter so for some rips you have to keep them in m2ts format which is the raw format for them this also helps as I found certain films are made up of 20 or more of small m2ts files and the ripping software is unable to join them smoothly for playback that's when you have to use a little free program called txmuxing I think I will check when I get to a computer to join the fills into 1 seemless movie . That's why I like the Acmini2 boxes they can play back just about any file format there is and there cheap at Ã‚Â£80 each I got mine from scan.co.uk All I use for DVD/BD rips is dvdfab and txmuxing to join the m2ts files store all my data in the pool and i just access my films using the GUI interface of the acmini2 Hope it helps if you need anymore info let me know Lee

This is not the same as per the OP. Loading an actual BD iso rip across the lan and playing back with a PCH C200 is incredibly CPU and ram intensive.

This is why Kalediscape do exactly as you do and only concern themselves with the main m2ts file.

However, IMHO, it is much more user friendly to rip to BD ISO and playback that.

When streaming multiple BD ISOs across the lan, the first hurdle is physical disk I/O.

As a proper test, one would need to access the same iso from 4 different players simultaneously.

Once this is flawless then I'll be happy.

The main problem occurs when the manufacturers technical specifications start to mean nothing. e.g in the test above.

lee1978 · September 2011

Hi,

Ok I have just run a 30 min test

The new star trek film in a full BD iso rip 49gig total file size

Running on 5 acmini 2 boxs with 5 min intervals

The film runs fine without any stutter or pause

Infact the server is set to power save mode so that test is better than expected.

Hope this helps

Lee

speedownsie · September 2011

Thanks for the test.

I've heard of the AC Ryan products, but i've never needed to change from the Popcorn hour.

One thing i can say is DON'T BUY DUNE products.

Build construction, OS, firmware updates and NO customer support make them the worst company i've ever had dealings with. The cost of the products make you think you are getting high quality, but when things go wrong, there is no EU customer support, literally. For the same money buy a POPCORN HOUR. When things go wrong with their stuff there is a very large community on 'NMT forums' to help.

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