Video playback from NAS

asheenlevrai · January 18, 2021

Hi

I put some movies on a Synology DS214play and I'm watching them on a 4K monitor via an AppleTV 4K using either VLC or Synology DSvideo.

Since I get unexpected results, I decided to monitor the resources on the NAS during video playback. However, keep in mind that even in "real time" mode resources usage values are refreshed only every 30 seconds on DSM.

I get the following outcome:

- VLC (via SMB): playback OK, CPU usage below 5%, Network activity variable (high overall) but constant (low:s 15MBps, highs 350MBps)

- VLC (via uPnP): unwatchable (playback pauses most of the time and plays for a couple seconds every now and then), CPU usage low, Network activity intermittent (0 when playback is not working)

- DSvideo: playback OK, CPU usage high (30-60%), Network activity low (<1MBps) with short peaks at relatively low level (5-10 MBps)

RAM usage seems to be unaffected by video playback.

Can anyone help me understand what is going on?

And eventually fix video playback when accessing the files via uPnP?

Thank you very much in advance for your help

Best,

-a-

TechNurd · January 19, 2021

seeing that you posted on the network section, some detail on your network set up would be useful.

are you using wifi?
if ethernet, are you getting full speed or lower? lower could mean cable damage.
how are you getting your network stats? using task manager? if yes, try using resource monitor. task manager only shows some protocols and not everything. pretty sure that's why you're seeing low utilization on some of them

asheenlevrai · January 19, 2021

19 hours ago, TechNurd said:

seeing that you posted on the network section, some detail on your network set up would be useful.

are you using wifi?

if ethernet, are you getting full speed or lower? lower could mean cable damage.

how are you getting your network stats? using task manager? if yes, try using resource monitor. task manager only shows some protocols and not everything. pretty sure that's why you're seeing low utilization on some of them

Yeah sorry

- Ethernet only

- full speed (gigabit) everywhere

- via DSM ressource monitor (the OS of Synology)

Thanks a lot

Best,

-a-