Wi-Fi & connectivity

[andyross]

Just because it has a USB port does not mean it will support external Ethernet adapters. It needs to have the driver support for them, and most devices are not like a full computer that have built-in or can download drivers.

[fluke]

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@andyross wrote:

Just because it has a USB port does not mean it will support external Ethernet adapters. It needs to have the driver support for them, and most devices are not like a full computer that have built-in or can download drivers.

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True.  However, check out this:

Roku knowledge base article on using USB to ethernet adapter 

It seems some of the Linux drivers for USB based ethernet adapters are making it into Roku OS.

We don't need all adapters to be supported, just at least some that can easily be found available for purchase.  Possibly Roku could even provide their own branded USB-C to Ethernet adapter.

If later we start craving IEEE 802.3bz Nbase-T (2.5 Gbps) or MGbase-T (5 Gbps), we just upgrade the adapter.  Anyone that doesn't need/want 1000Base-T, Nbase-T or MGbase-T will not have to pay for it as part of the initial unit itself.

I have some other ideas of how Roku could further expand their players through USB adapter offerings but that might go beyond the scope of the OP.  USB-C provides plenty of bandwidth for some interesting possibilities.

[spikul]

Comcast is going to push more down the line quickly.  That is why they are beginning to strongly suggest to everyone who wants to bring their own purchased modem upgrade to the 3.1 standard.  Granted most are OK for now, but not in the to distant future. 

The increased requirements as I understand it is the focus on gaming.  Content transmission is going to explode and Comcast with Xfinity wants the customer base and higher fees. 

Families have more and more technological devices.  I transfer very large files that can take 8+ hours now.  With the new 3.1 DOSIS that time to transmit will be cut drastically. 

If it is a single person and one device, what you have works for you.  Try transferring files both wired and wireless.  Our test here showed dramatic speed differences.  There is also less human exposure when wired. 

Research studies are listed here.  Also check out www.pubmed.gov

https://www.defendershield.com/10-facts-health-dangers-wifi

1. WiFi Can Cause Insomnia
2. WiFi Can Affect Childhood Development
3. WiFi Can Compromise Child Health
4. WiFi Can Impair Cellular Growth
5. WiFi Can Impair Brain Functioning
6. WiFi Can Reduce Male Fertility
7. WiFi Can Reduce Female Fertility
8. WiFi Can Cause Cancer
9. WiFi Can Promote Cardiac Stress

[fluke]

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@spikul wrote:

Comcast is going to push more down the line quickly.  That is why they are beginning to strongly suggest to everyone who wants to bring their own purchased modem upgrade to the 3.1 standard.  Granted most are OK for now, but not in the to distant future. 

The increased requirements as I understand it is the focus on gaming.  Content transmission is going to explode and Comcast with Xfinity wants the customer base and higher fees. 

Families have more and more technological devices.  I transfer very large files that can take 8+ hours now.  With the new 3.1 DOSIS that time to transmit will be cut drastically. 

If it is a single person and one device, what you have works for you.  Try transferring files both wired and wireless.  Our test here showed dramatic speed differences. 

The idea Comcast is going to be the one to push H.265 streams to exceed 100 Mbps sounds a little silly.

It is true that Comcast is going to push DOCSIS 3.1 which will allow for faster bursts in speed.  Comcast charges more money based on customers being able to have those faster bursts in speed.  But Comcast also discourages customers being able to actually take advantage of that speed by charging overage fees starting at 1.2TB of data.  After Comcast will gladly add an additional $10 for every 50GB (4%) more.

Is 1.2 TB a lot?  Not really.

If you keep a 4 Megabit per second (Mbps) stream going for an entire month then would be downloading 500 kilobytes per second (KBps) which turns into 30 Megabytes per minutes which turns into 1.8 Gigabytes per hour which turns into 43 Gigabytes per day which comes to 1.3 TB of data per month.  Comcast OVERAGE FEES for the next Xfinity bill for streaming at only 4 Mbps!

If Comcast successfully promoted over 100 Mbps H.265 streams, here is how the math works out:

100 Megabits per second comes to 12.5 Megabytes per second which turns into 750 Megabytes per minutes which turns into 45 Gigabytes per hour and in 27 hours you are right back to Xfinity grade OVERAGE FEES!  So once you switch to 100+ Mbps streaming services make sure you only binge watch a *single* 22 episode season of 1 hour episodes and maybe two feature length movies per month.  If you watch a third feature length movie you will exceed the Comcast/Xfinity 27 hours quota to get his with those overage charges.

Most people in this thread aren't trying to claim streaming services will exceed 100 Mbps any time soon.  Rather they would prefer to be able to use things such as Roku Media Player and Plex to stream from their home NAS/computer at a speeds exceeding 100 Mbps.  This is a fair request but at the same time limit which commodity components are used.

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@spikul wrote:
There is also less human exposure when wired. 

Research studies are listed here.  Also check out www.pubmed.gov

https://www.defendershield.com/10-facts-health-dangers-wifi

1. WiFi Can Cause Insomnia
2. WiFi Can Affect Childhood Development
3. WiFi Can Compromise Child Health
4. WiFi Can Impair Cellular Growth
5. WiFi Can Impair Brain Functioning
6. WiFi Can Reduce Male Fertility
7. WiFi Can Reduce Female Fertility
8. WiFi Can Cause Cancer
9. WiFi Can Promote Cardiac Stress

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*sigh*  Ok.  WiFi as used by Roku operates at two frequencies of 2.4 Ghz and 5 Ghz.  

So, why don't we go together through the list of studies about the 10 "facts" involving "wifi"

Claim one: Wifi can cause insomnia

Study linked to: "Two types of radiation fields were used; 900 MHz unmodulated wave and 900 MHz modulated at 8 and 16 Hz waves"

Conclusion on claim one NOT backed by a study involving *Wifi* as 900 MHz is not wifi.

Claim two: WiFi Can Affect Childhood Development

Study linked to: "In this study, a simulation model was designed for the exposure of pregnant rats to pulsed GSM-like RFR (9.4 GHz)"

Conclusion on claim two NOT backed by a study involving *Wifi* as 9.4 GHz is not wifi.

Claim three: WiFi Can Compromise Child Health

Study linked to says nothing specific to wifi, it only talks about cellular phones.

Ok, I have done three of the facts about "wifi" and have yet to see any studies that have anything to do with actual wifi frequencies and wifi transmission levels.  The "facts" website makes no attempt to use the term wifi in a way that is consistent with reality which is kind of a key part of stating facts.  I doubt anything you linked to have anything to do with Roku.

There is some legitimate health concerns with how people structure their lives around electronics.  But the misrepresentation of studies on an agenda against wifi is just pure noise.  Presenting things as "facts" this way just drowns out people with actual facts that are really backed by studies consistent with their concerns.  Please reconsider linking to website that misrepresent studies as being "facts" when the reality is the text of the study is unrelated to the claim.

As a side note, the movie Maximum Overdrive (1986) is available for rent on Prime Video, Vudu, AppleTV and Redbox (which can all be accessed via Roku connected via ethernet or wifi).  You may want to check it out as I think you might like it.

[wb6vpm]

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@fluke wrote:

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@andyross wrote:

Just because it has a USB port does not mean it will support external Ethernet adapters. It needs to have the driver support for them, and most devices are not like a full computer that have built-in or can download drivers.

---

True.  However, check out this:

Roku knowledge base article on using USB to ethernet adapter 

It seems some of the Linux drivers for USB based ethernet adapters are making it into Roku OS.

We don't need all adapters to be supported, just at least some that can easily be found available for purchase.  Possibly Roku could even provide their own branded USB-C to Ethernet adapter.

If later we start craving IEEE 802.3bz Nbase-T (2.5 Gbps) or MGbase-T (5 Gbps), we just upgrade the adapter.  Anyone that doesn't need/want 1000Base-T, Nbase-T or MGbase-T will not have to pay for it as part of the initial unit itself.

I have some other ideas of how Roku could further expand their players through USB adapter offerings but that might go beyond the scope of the OP.  USB-C provides plenty of bandwidth for some interesting possibilities.

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While it's a start, it really isn't though, if you look at the post, you'll see that they specifically call out that gigabit ethernet adapters will not work.

[wb6vpm]

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@fluke wrote:

The idea Comcast is going to be the one to push H.265 streams to exceed 100 Mbps sounds a little silly.

It is true that Comcast is going to push DOCSIS 3.1 which will allow for faster bursts in speed.  Comcast charges more money based on customers being able to have those faster bursts in speed.  But Comcast also discourages customers being able to actually take advantage of that speed by charging overage fees starting at 1.2TB of data.  After Comcast will gladly add an additional $10 for every 50GB (4%) more.

Is 1.2 TB a lot?  Not really.

If you keep a 4 Megabit per second (Mbps) stream going for an entire month then would be downloading 500 kilobytes per second (KBps) which turns into 30 Megabytes per minutes which turns into 1.8 Gigabytes per hour which turns into 43 Gigabytes per day which comes to 1.3 TB of data per month.  Comcast OVERAGE FEES for the next Xfinity bill for streaming at only 4 Mbps!

If Comcast successfully promoted over 100 Mbps H.265 streams, here is how the math works out:

100 Megabits per second comes to 12.5 Megabytes per second which turns into 750 Megabytes per minutes which turns into 45 Gigabytes per hour and in 27 hours you are right back to Xfinity grade OVERAGE FEES!  So once you switch to 100+ Mbps streaming services make sure you only binge watch a *single* 22 episode season of 1 hour episodes and maybe two feature length movies per month.  If you watch a third feature length movie you will exceed the Comcast/Xfinity 27 hours quota to get his with those overage charges.

Assuming that you are referring to Comcast provided streaming services, and not 3rd party services such as Netflix or Hulu (barring some agreement with the service providers to allow it to not count), it would presumably be like most provider provided services, where that usage isn't counted against their billable usage totals.

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@fluke wrote:

Most people in this thread aren't trying to claim streaming services will exceed 100 Mbps any time soon.  Rather they would prefer to be able to use things such as Roku Media Player and Plex to stream from their home NAS/computer at a speeds exceeding 100 Mbps.  This is a fair request but at the same time limit which commodity components are used.

This is exactly what I was trying to say!

[spikul]

I am tired of seeing a circular arrow going round and round incircles loading pages. I even added a memory card so that the apps would not have to load every time an app was selected.

Roku needs to upgrade it's equipment.  If the issues is not the fact that they don't accommodate 1 GB transmission, then the units need to operate at a much faster rate. 

The bottleneck during streaming needs to be removed.  Streaming stops periodically to wait for loading.  This is on a device which is directly connected to the cable modem, so they can't blame wireless.

Any ideas?

[andyross]

If you have buffering issues, then it is not a Roku problem. 100Mbit is more than enough, as noted many times. I have an Ultra and an older Roku4. I never have buffering problems. Some channels tend to be sluggish, even on the Ultra, but that is an issue with the developers programming and the service's servers.

Just what model Roku do you have? 

[zipman]

I am having timing out issues. While watching tv, I get a three to five second delay then it resumes. This happens intermittently while watching, very annoying.... I bought ultra just to have a wired connection.... sucks!

[andyross]

If you are streaming from the Internet, then something else is going on. Internet streaming maxes out at about 25Mbit for 4K. If your speed is at least 50 or more, you should have no problems. Otherwise, it's probably an internal problem with your network. Exactly how is your Roku connected? Is it direct to a router or gateway? Is the cable a decent Cat5e or better? Is it round or flat? How long? Is it multiple services, or just one in particular?