Playing .ts files over wifi

[dlukic]

I expirienced problems when playing HD ".ts" files over my local 2.4GHz wifi network. After few seconds of playback, VLC pauses playback, than start buffering for another couple of seconds plays few more seconds, re-buffering again ...
Files I tried are H264, 5MBits, 1080i.
Wifi network I am talking about contains only two computers. One computer contains above .ts files in a shared folder and the other computer running VLC and access those files. VLC I am using is Twoflower 2.0.5 under Windows 7. However, I experienced the same problem with other VLC versions as well.
I tried to increase various network and file caching options but it did not solve the problem. It just increases buffering time and intervals of smooth playback. For example 20000 miliseconds network buffer increases buffering time to 40 seconds or so, then plays nice for about 23 seconds, then start buffering again for another 40 seconds... It is interseting that for 1 second of video from .ts file it is required more than one second for buffering. In addition to different buffering options, I tried some other tips from forum (with ffmpeg, hardware decoding on-off ...) but without success.

A few more interesting facts I dicovered and directly related to above problem:
1. The same files and computers performs nice in VLC if played over wired Ethernet connection.
2. Exactly the same content I have in above .ts files, if wrapped in container other than .ts (for example mp4) looks very good and plays smoothly in VLC over the same wifi network.
3. Above HD .ts files are played fine over the same wifi using GOM Player or Windows Media Player, for example.

Is there any explanation why VLC handles .ts files as described? Is there any chance to use different settings and fix it and have satisfactory results over wifi.
Danilo.

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

5 Mbits/s is much more multicast bandwidth than a typical WiFi access point provides.

[dlukic]

Thanks for fast reply.
I just tried 1 Mbits/s file and results are exactly the same.
In addition, it does not explain why 5 Mbits/s ".mp4" file is played in VLC fine over the same network. And why exactly the same 5 Mbits/s ".ts" file is played fine in Windows Media Player and Gom Media Player fine over the same network.
Looks much more that problem is related only to ".ts" files played in VLC, not to network itself.
Regards,
Danilo

[dlukic]

Finally colleague of mine find solution for problem above.
In order to perform smooth playback over Wi-Fi VLC needs to be started with following option:
--file-caching = 0
It may be done also through Preferences->All->Input/Codecs->File Caching (ms)

By default it is 300ms. Any other option for file caching results in very bad playback over Wi-Fi.

[GYU]

Thanks for the solution! I was trying everything, including changing the adapter settings in the device manager, changing clock synchronization in vlc, etc.. without success.

But --file-caching = 0 solved the problem for me too!

Thanks again!