Various FTP problems

[dabomy]

I’m currently using plain old FTP on a local network (using Ubuntu Linux with proftpd as the server). I have been having several problems off and on for a while now.

The first one is “An Infinitely loading” Loading screen (the screen will never disappear and the video will not start playing), sometimes “permanent” for some files, other times will show up now and then but disappear just as strangely.

The second and more common one is an odd time with the buffering/cache fill. Sometimes it works great, other times it stops to refill the buffer every 60 to 180 seconds. I’m also getting “glitches” in the video that I’m thinking may be related to the cache fill.

The biggest problem is, I can’t tell if it’s the server, firewall/router, proftpd, or WiiMC that is the source of these problems. FTP seems to be working just fine (and at full speed) when being accessed from other sources than WiiMC.

I apologize that I don’t have more “tangible” errors, but I will mess around a bit with the ftp settings and the network monitor to see if I get anywhere.

Am I the only one with these problems? Or is anyone else successfully using FTP with WiiMC?

[rodries]

All I can say is that I don’t recommend FTP for streaming. I think SMB is a better candidate.

[dabomy]

Switched over to Samba and it seems to be working a lot smoother! Excellent!

In case anyone else is using Ubuntu Linux and want to switch over to Samba, the tutorial I followed was very simple hassle free:
http://www.jonathanmoeller.com/screed/?p=1590

I’m still having a few issues with “infinitely loading” but now I know it’s the videos rather than the connection. I’ll create a separate thread for that once I have poked around with it a bit more.

[JaIL]

I am using my Wii with FTP function to stream video’s from my NAS at home (with 100 Mbits upload connection) at my girlfriends place. It works partially, but the main issues I have are the following.

– Not showing folders when logging onto the FTP. I have to go back and forth about 4 times, before the folders start showing up. Though my FTP server log shows the wii has requested the folder data and it is send succesfully, WiiMC does not always show the content.

– Not playing files. The Wii will ask to download the file, FTP responds by sending it, but the Wii will abort transfer immediately. This results in WiiMC crashing (endless load) and having to reboot the system. This happens in 3 out of 4 times when trying to play a video.

Though, when it’s streaming, it will keep streaming without the need of buffering until the end of the video. When it tries to load the next file, it will crash (endless load), because the connection is aborted.

In early versions of MplayerCE it worked flawlessly, but I messed it up by updating the cIOS versions and I don’t know wich versions I used before. WiiMC makes use of the IOS58 so nothing custom is loaded and I think the IOS is to blame for the poor FTP function.

If anyone encounterd this problem before I’d like to hear from it. Streaming over the internet is quite a usefull function for me, because I don’t want to download everything before being able to watch it.

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