Home NAS issue

[Frazzle]

Currently have an old Zyxel NSA320 NAS that I store all our photos and home videos on. I have this connected to an EE Brightbox Router and also the TV which is a Samsung Smart TV 8000 series which is around 7 years old. Any videos I try to play always buffer. I have tried putting a small switch in and connecting the TV and NAS to that but it's the same.

 

What is causing the buffering? Is it the NAS or the TV?

Thinking of replacing the NAS with a Synology 218j but wondered if that would make any difference.

[ZeroHour]

What app are you using on the tv? I take it when you copy files to the NAS its fast?

[Frazzle]

Yes copying is fine. The NAS appears as a source on the tv so not sure what you mean by app?

[ZeroHour]

Ahh so its probably DNLA playback. I think Windows Media play and possibly VLC support DNLA so you could try playing back on pc and see if that happens there. The issue with a lot of tv's is that they only support limited formats and even the ones they do support can have issues with the limited hardware on the tv (processor wise)

[Frazzle]

So buying a new NAS is not the answer?

[ZeroHour]

I dont think it will necessarily help, what format and res is a video in that buffers?

[Frazzle]

The videos are in MTS format and full HD. Transferred directly from the Sony camera they were filmed on.

[ZeroHour]

The videos are in MTS format and full HD. Transferred directly from the Sony camera they were filmed on.

 

Since you are hard wired I suspect the tv just cant process the full 1080 video properly given you have no transfer speed issues with a pc. Playback on the pc is fine for those videos?

[Frazzle]

On my laptop the videos stream fine wirelessly.

[Frazzle]

So it's a new TV I need ? [emoji2]

[Norphy]

Either that or something like Plex which can transcode the videos into a format the TV can cope with. Or an STB like an Amazon FireTV.

[Frazzle]

Either that or something like Plex which can transcode the videos into a format the TV can cope with. Or an STB like an Amazon FireTV.

Explain where Plex would sit please? Installed on NAS?

[ZeroHour]

Best to have it on your PC linked via UNC as most Nas boxes really can't handle transcoding as it can be quite intense. Plex also has a dnla mode you can enable to try that. Universal media server is another option but it needs java.

[Frazzle]

So no real way of having the NAS play HD videos directly to the tv without buffering?

[SpuffMonkey]

So no real way of having the NAS play HD videos directly to the tv without buffering?

 

I'd try transcoding an example file to something the TV can play natively and see what happens

[Frazzle]

So I looked at loading Plex onto the NAS but as the NAS is quite old Plex doesn't support it anymore and older versions are no longer available on their site.

 

I have decided to upgrade the NAS to a Synology Box. I can get a Synology DS218+ with 2x1TB Iron Wolf drives for £406 (have some vouchers usable on Amazon) so cash wise will cost me less than that.

 

Supposedly the DS218+ can transcode on the fly so this should help with playing video on different devices.

 

Any thoughts on the DS218+?

[ZeroHour]

I would consider a HP Microserver Gen8/9 possibly as its pretty good as a plex device as well as letting you tinker with home networks if you want. I am not sure on the price now but the Gen 8 is a few years old and you can upgrade the ram and processor in the base one (I have).

[mavhc]

Or just copy the files to your pc, re-encode them into a format your tv can play natively, and copy them back

[Frazzle]

Well I decided to purchase a Synology DS218+ with 2 x 1TB Iron Wolf drives.

Arrives today so will see how I get on with that.