# Slow IN-HOME Transfer Speeds after Update



## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

Ever since the Tivo app update my IN-HOME transfer speeds have been very slow! Did the new Tivo app change the way the downloading goes for the in-home streaming? It seems like I use to be able to transfer a movie in 20-30 minutes. Now it takes double that.

Anyone else notice their transfers IN-HOME slower?


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## lickwid (Oct 2, 2005)

Yes, since the last update, I believe, the time it takes to transfer a 30-minute TV show at Best quality takes about 35 minutes now. It used to take roughly 17 minutes.

The funny thing is when I go to download a show to my iPhone 5s, it shows 17 minutes, but once it starts, the timer jumps to 35 minutes. It was fine before the latest update that included OOH Streaming as an "Easter Egg".


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

Maybe the encoding quality level (bit rates) went up? Have you noticed the resulting file sizes being much bigger than they used to be?


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

No. Same file size.


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## bradleys (Oct 31, 2007)

Yeah, I noticed that last night as well.


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

Perhaps what TiVo did to support OOH streams/downloads is throttle the transfers to keep speeds < ~ 2.2 Mbps total. i.e. Maybe it's not adaptive streaming, but rather 3 fixed rate transfers according to quality you select, and it's the same transfer rates in or out of home. Lame if that is indeed the case...


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## lickwid (Oct 2, 2005)

The app is really weird. I'll have to test again when I get home or when I have time. For example, I am trying to download a 30 min. TV show. I choose Best Quality, which show 559MB. Once it starts downloading, it jumps down to 273MB and 9:30 minutes or so. Eventually, it'll jump to 573MB and 35 minutes or so.

This was over Verizon LTE.


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## Devx (Jun 1, 2006)

Just did an in home download test. Speed appears to be comparable to before the update. 30 min HD show, Best quality, took just under 12 min for 537MB or about 5.96 Mbps. Definitely higher than the 2.2 Mbps streaming rate Tivo claims for best OOH streaming.


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

Devx said:


> Just did an in home download test. Speed appears to be comparable to before the update. 30 min HD show, Best quality, took just under 12 min for 537MB or about 5.96 Mbps. Definitely higher than the 2.2 Mbps streaming rate Tivo claims for best OOH streaming.


 That's good to see.


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## lickwid (Oct 2, 2005)

Tested again at home and it's about the speeds Devx experienced. However, I still experience the same issue with the size of the file changing as it downloads. The initial size before download shows 559MB, then goes down to 273MB or so, then jumps up to 570MB. I don't know what causes this, or if it depends on speed.


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## bellbm (Dec 16, 2003)

I do a lot of in home streaming to my ipad (I Have the standalone stream), and ever since updating the ap, when I'm streaming, the show will stop every minute or so, pause for a second or two, and then start again.
NEVER had any problems like this before.
I hope they haven't throttled the transfer speeds. This is really annyoing!


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## NYHeel (Oct 7, 2003)

I've always found in home transfers to be about twice as long as the app initially estimates, but I haven't tried it since the new update. For a one hour show at lower quality (back when there was only 2), the app would always estimate 9 minutes but the transfer would actually take about 18-20 minutes. I've never been able to get the speeds that the app claims.

I'm on a 25/25 Fios internet plan and I actually get those speeds. My Tivo is hardwired and my wireless to my iPad is pretty solid, usually at least 20+ mbps based on speedtest.net.


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

I just transferred an hour long show (~1GB) and it took about 30 minutes. That works out to around 4.7Mbps. Pretty slow if you ask me. My iPad is connected to the router via Wireless-N (and is right next to the router). This definitely is slower than is used to be. 

When transferring via kmttg (which obviously isn't trans-coding real-time) the speed is just under 100Mbps.


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## Time_Lord (Jun 4, 2012)

I too see about 3 to 4Mb/s rate when transferring video's to an iPad (mini) over an 802.11g network (with excellent signal strength)

glad to hear I'm not alone in these lousy speeds

-TL


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## mr_smits (Dec 17, 2009)

moyekj said:


> Perhaps what TiVo did to support OOH streams/downloads is throttle the transfers to keep speeds < ~ 2.2 Mbps total. i.e. Maybe it's not adaptive streaming, but rather 3 fixed rate transfers according to quality you select, and it's the same transfer rates in or out of home. Lame if that is indeed the case...


That was my hunch as well. Hopefully it is just a crude placeholder until they figure out a better solution.


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

Time_Lord said:


> I too see about 3 to 4Mb/s rate when transferring video's to an iPad (mini) over an 802.11g network (with excellent signal strength)
> 
> glad to hear I'm not alone in these lousy speeds
> 
> -TL


I'm guessing you mean Mbps (MegaBits per second)... not MB/s (megabytes per sec). 3-4 MB/s would be a great improvement as I'm getting less than 1 MB/sec


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

I have an iPad Air arriving Friday so will be testing in home streaming and transfers over the weekend to see how it goes. For longest time I was waiting for Android support, but at this point who knows when that will happen anymore, and there will no doubt be early bugs to contend with if/when it does happen.


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## nbromber (Oct 25, 2013)

Download speeds are still painfully slow. Took over 30 minutes for 60 mins of video on the lowest quality. Roamio is hardwired to the router and I have Fios 150/65...

Hmmm...


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

nbromber said:


> Download speeds are still painfully slow. Took over 30 minutes for 60 mins of video on the lowest quality. Roamio is hardwired to the router and I have Fios 150/65...
> 
> Hmmm...


 In home or out of home transfer?

I suppose another possibility for slowing things down is perhaps to try and minimize heat generation during encoding. If TiVo slows down encoding it could help keep heat generation down. It would be interesting for someone with a standalone stream that hasn't gotten the software update yet to compare vs Roamio Stream.
That way we can also find out perhaps if the speed throttling is part of iOS app or the Stream firmware.


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## DeltaOne (Sep 29, 2013)

nbromber said:


> Download speeds are still painfully slow. Took over 30 minutes for 60 mins of video on the lowest quality. Roamio is hardwired to the router and I have Fios 150/65...


But what's the speed of your WiFi? b? g? n? ac?

How many devices were connected to the WiFi when you did the download? I don't have any ac experience yetbut each connected device on b/g/n slows down the network for everyone.


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## Time_Lord (Jun 4, 2012)

gbruyn said:


> I'm guessing you mean Mbps (MegaBits per second)... not MB/s (megabytes per sec). 3-4 MB/s would be a great improvement as I'm getting less than 1 MB/sec


isn't that what I said? Mb/s = Megabits per second
MB/s = Megabytes per second


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## Time_Lord (Jun 4, 2012)

nbromber said:


> Download speeds are still painfully slow. Took over 30 minutes for 60 mins of video on the lowest quality. Roamio is hardwired to the router and I have Fios 150/65...
> 
> Hmmm...


even 802.11b should give you a streaming speed of at least 6Mb/s certainly faster than what you are seeing.

By chance did you enable the WiFi on the TiVO at any point and then later move it to an ethernet connection?

-TL


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## lickwid (Oct 2, 2005)

nbromber said:


> Download speeds are still painfully slow. Took over 30 minutes for 60 mins of video on the lowest quality. Roamio is hardwired to the router and I have Fios 150/65...
> 
> Hmmm...


That seems way too slow. It takes me about 35 minutes to transfer an hour of video on the highest quality, which isn't terrible, but not great. I have my TiVo hardwired to my AC1750 router. I'm streaming to my iPhone 5s. Will test again with my iPad Air once I pick it up this weekend.


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

Time_Lord said:


> even 802.11b should give you a streaming speed of at least 6Mb/s certainly faster than what you are seeing.
> 
> By chance did you enable the WiFi on the TiVO at any point and then later move it to an ethernet connection?
> 
> -TL


Yes. I think I did have it hooked up to wifi initially... Why?


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## Time_Lord (Jun 4, 2012)

gbruyn said:


> Yes. I think I did have it hooked up to wifi initially... Why?


You need to "break" the WiFi configuration otherwise the TiVO goes back and forth between WiFi and Ethernet causing painfully slow speeds and possibly disconnects.

See these threads:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=510858
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=510785

Basically unplug your ethernet connection, go to the WiFi configuration screen and set some invalid SSID/password combination, then reconnect your ethernet. That should improve things for you.

-TL


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

Time_Lord said:


> You need to "break" the WiFi configuration otherwise the TiVO goes back and forth between WiFi and Ethernet causing painfully slow speeds and possibly disconnects.
> 
> See these threads:
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=510858
> ...


On second thought I was thinking about MoCa and not wireless. I double checked my router to see if the Tivo was trying to connect via wireless and it wasn't. So I don't think that is the problem.

The issue is with the software update. Maybe they limited the speed of the built in stream for heat issues --- like the previous posted said. Nothing else explains why it was fine and then it slowed down after the updated Tivo firmware and update Tivo app software.


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

P.S. Tivo just updated the iOS app and cited "Bug Fixes"... so maybe it'll be better? I'm away so I can't test it right now.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

FYI I still have my standalone Stream so I ran a test. I transferred the same show to the same iPad using the Best quality, which listed 577MB for both devices. (I know the Stream doesn't have the new software because it only offered 2 qualities and the Roamio had 3)

Anyway the Roamio took 13 minutes and the standalone Stream only took 10. So it seems that the Roamio is a bit slower. Although I never ran this test before the update, so it could be that the Roamio has always been a bit slower. (i.e. maybe they underclock the chip a little to reduce heat in the Roamio case)

However now that I have numbers I'll run the test again once the standalone Stream gets the OOH update and see if it slows down to match the Roamio or not.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

Just got the OOH update on my standalone Stream so I reran the test and sure enough the exact same file now takes 13 minutes through the standalone Stream too. So it's definitely the software on the stream itself causing the slow down.


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

Dan203 said:


> Just got the OOH update on my standalone Stream so I reran the test and sure enough the exact same file now takes 13 minutes through the standalone Stream too. So it's definitely the software on the stream itself causing the slow down.


 OK, thanks for confirming. I wonder if it is related to OOH streaming at all or if it was done intentionally to reduce power consumption and thus heat? I seem to recall some Stream related heat issues in the past (both standalone and integrated into Roamio).


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

The standalone stream has the fan running almost all the time, maybe the reduced the clock a little to reduce heat.


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

You all are probably right about the heat thing. But I hope not. I'd like the speed to increase back to where it was.. Or even get faster. Maybe it's just a bug that showed up due to the OOH streaming feature. We will see.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

Based on my test it's only taking an extra 3 minutes per half hour of video, so that only adds about 12 minutes to a 2 hour movie not double like you suggested in your original post. Not great, but not really a deal breaker either. It's still capable of transferring shows at about 2.5x real time meaning it should only take about 47 minutes to transfer a movie. That's still significantly faster then transferring to a PC, transcoding, and then syncing via iTunes.


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## jdmass (Dec 1, 2002)

I'm also experiencing very slow downloads now. Previously I was able to down load an hour show at best quality in about 20 minutes. Now a show at Medium quality takes over 30 minutes. 

I sure hope that they fix this.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

Hmmm... that doesn't line up with my testing at all. I was only seeing a marginal difference pre-post update. (i.e. 10 minutes for a 30 minute show at Best, vs 13 minutes)

Although the show I was testing was SD, I wonder if HD makes a difference? I'll have to test that.


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## jdmass (Dec 1, 2002)

Just to confirm, the shows that I've been attempting to download are all HD.

Also, I've tried an iPad Air and iPhone 5s - both very slow, so I don't think its a mobile device issue. I've also reset my Tivo network config and rebooted the Tivo. Tivo is connected via MOCA to a FIOS router. I have also switched wifi routers (turned off FIOS wifi and enabled WIFI on a Linksys router) to see if that made any difference. 

So far everything points to the software change on the Tivo


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## sneagle (Jun 12, 2002)

Looking for an update...any solutions?

I transferred a 30 min show out of the house last night. Took about 30 minutes.
Now, in my house, it is taking about 25 minutes to transfer a 30 minute show. 
Setting is Medium...about 300MB.

I have all the Roamios wired. 
My iPad is an iPad Air. I am using Apple Airport Express as a wireless access point. On my iPhone, it says "Connection: Excellent:

This is frustrating to me. It seems like it should be faster.
Using this calculator...speeds should be much faster


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## gbruyn (Mar 20, 2012)

I have heard anything either. My guess is that this slow speed might be here to stay. Maybe the posted to said it was a heat issue is correct. They did update the Tivo iOS app yesterday for "Stability Issues" but I doubt that helped with the speed. I'm HOPING it helped with the constant stopping/pausing of downloading shows outside the home.


.... Guess it's all a work in progress


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

gbruyn said:


> I'm HOPING it helped with the constant stopping/pausing of downloading shows outside the home.


 Yes the update did fix the "every 5 minute pausing" issue for OOH downloads.


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## sneagle (Jun 12, 2002)

BTW, it is seems that the app and the iPad have to be on for downloading to occur. There is no background downloading at all. Other apps, like Downcast, will download for a bit in the background before stopping.

Why can't TiVo do this?

Downloading means I can't do anything else with my iPad for the 30 min to an hour it takes ONE show


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

There is an Apple imposed limit for background downloading of 10 minutes which isn't very useful. Although in iOS7 there is a way to download for longer if the user allows it. So maybe a future update will include background downloading.


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

Dan203 said:


> There is an Apple imposed limit for background downloading of 10 minutes which isn't very useful. Although in iOS7 there is a way to download for longer if the user allows it. So maybe a future update will include background downloading.


 Certainly an option we should be lobbying for.


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