Samsung SmartTV. Playback interrupts and lags

[WingDog 16]

Hello!

yesterday I tried to watch a movie at Samsung SmartTV and got multiple lags and interrupts during playback.

it was Direct Play mode  @SamES

To eliminate the problem with Wi-Fi, I later watched this and other films on the same TV via DLNA and there were no problems.

server logs are attached.

What should I do to debug this?

 

 

logs.zip

[SamES 1057]

If you're having lags or issues and it's DirectPlay, it can only be network or server, but most likely network.

If you are using WiFi, make sure you are on a 5GHz channel and don't have interference from other neighbours.  Try restarting your router as well.

While DLNA is also using WiFi, it's traffic volume will be lower and different to the web client. For example, DLNA is not reporting back the playback progress, while the actual client is.

 

[WingDog 16]

5 hours ago, SamES said:

If you're having lags or issues and it's DirectPlay, it can only be network or server, but most likely network.

yep, it looks like this, but I have other TV's  that never have the same issues. so it might be the only one TV issue.

5 hours ago, SamES said:

make sure you are on a 5GHz

already done. but the required 11mbps are provided in abundance by 802.11G, not ever N,AC,AX and over high-speed-low-latency.

Unfortunately I don't know how to debug Tizen and don't have an ability to install there something like iPerf at least.

maybe you can assist me to dig into this case?

5 hours ago, SamES said:

While DLNA is also using WiFi, it's traffic volume will be lower and different to the web client. For example, DLNA is not reporting back the playback progress, while the actual client is.

you are talking about so minor and insignificant traffic volume. is it a several MB in Sum for several hours of playback? keep-alive and progress should be literally 1KB each, let's assume that it is transmitted 4 times per minute, which makes 240 per hour. even if you really have to transmit 1MB of data (LOTR every 15 seconds?) per iteration that volume can't affect anything. 

it's very hard to sniff wifi traffic at the end-user home router so I can't prove this thing, but you can.

is there a debug log in TV client?

Edited July 5, 2025 by WingDog

[SamES 1057]

So are you using 2.4Ghz band? You need to consider more than it being just an 11Mbps file

[WingDog 16]

1 minute ago, SamES said:

So are you using 2.4Ghz band?

no, I don't. I use 5Ghz band.

[SamES 1057]

If all the other TV's are also on Wi-fi, but only this one has problems, then maybe it has bad signal strength.  Has this always been an issue, or did it start recently?

[WingDog 16]

1 minute ago, SamES said:

then maybe it has bad signal strength.

yep, maybe, but maybe not. this TV is the nearest to the router and doesn't have anything around that can interference wifi signal.

2 minutes ago, SamES said:

Has this always been an issue, or did it start recently?

it's time to time issue.  Sometimes I can watch The Hobbit without any problems, and sometimes I can't watch The Bing Bang Theory

[WingDog 16]

I am currently experimenting with pre-rebooting the TV and it seems that there is a dependency - after rebooting, in most cases, I can watch any movie in any quality. I assume there are problems with the Garbage Collector or something similar, but I am not sure.

[WingDog 16]

HI @SamES!

any updates or thoughts?

[AndreiP 33]

Imho: if all other devices do not have any problems with the same movies, it should be definitely the problem in that Samsung TV. Maybe it's older and the Emby app doesn't work properly? Or the WiFi in TV doesn't handle as it should? Etc... 

Btw, according to your screenshot you are watching a movie with a 11 mbps bitrate: it's very high. I suggest you to use a lower bitrate and just to test on the same tv. I mean find the same movie but with a lover bitrate. Personally, I always try to not exceed 5 mbps to avoid transcoding and lags. 

Edited July 26, 2025 by AndreiP

[Luke 42077]

Right, does it happen with lower bitrate content?

[SamES 1057]

11Mbps shouldn't be an issue, even on an old TV, as long as you are using ethernet or 5GHz wifi, not 2.4GHz.

If you are on 5GHz wifi and believe you have a good connection, and are testing DirectPlay, can you please try a different WiFi channel. Try channel 48.

How many audio and subtitle tracks does the file have?

[WingDog 16]

15 hours ago, AndreiP said:

11 mbps bitrate: it's very high.

good joke!

 

14 hours ago, Luke said:

Right, does it happen with lower bitrate content?

should I review a thousand of Movies? this is time-to-time issue.

I'm asking don't take a wild guess and win, but debug.
 

12 hours ago, SamES said:

can you please try a different WiFi channel. Try channel 48.

Ok, I'll try. I've got Ekahau AI Pro and made a site survey and UDP stress-test - I have very good Wi-Fi.

but I can't test the TV.

12 hours ago, SamES said:

How many audio and subtitle tracks does the file have?

 brilliant question!! 7 audio tracks and 12 subtitle. this is my mistake - I usually remove all audio tracks except one or two and all subtitiles.

 

[AndreiP 33]

 

Quote

 

11 mbps bitrate: it's very high. 

good joke!

 

It's not a joke. Like I wrote previously I had some issues when I stream I high bitrate movies. It could be your case also. High bitrate need a very good and stable network. 

Quote

this is time-to-time issue

The problem should be with the internet connection if sometimes it works and sometimes not. If I understand well, it arrives with different movies, so it confirm the network issues in my opinion.

Edited July 27, 2025 by AndreiP

[Luke 42077]

19 minutes ago, AndreiP said:

 

It's not a joke. Like I wrote previously I had some issues when I stream I high bitrate movies. It could be your case also. High bitrate need a very good and stable network. 

The problem should be with the internet connection if sometimes it works and sometimes not. If I understand well, it arrives with different movies, so it confirm the network issues in my opinion.

It could also be the Samsung video player having difficulty with certain files.

[WingDog 16]

2 hours ago, AndreiP said:

It could be your case also.

Yes, it could be my case and it could be not my case and so on.

2 hours ago, AndreiP said:

High bitrate need a very good and stable network. 

Like I wrote previously I tested my wireless network. a laptop just behind the TV is able to perform an iperf's UDP flow up to 300mbps (up and down) with 1-2% loss.

this is a very-quality indicator. in addition i should say that I have regular exchanges of significant volumes of traffic between devices on the network - all the same movies we are talking about and there are no problems or delays anywhere. you need to understand that 11mbps is only one megabyte per second - this is the capacity of 20 years old network.

Be that as it may, I ask for help in debugging time and time again.

2 hours ago, AndreiP said:

The problem should be with the internet connection if sometimes it works and sometimes not. If I understand well, it arrives with different movies, so it confirm the network issues in my opinion.

it confirm nothing - different movies, different codecs, different play-mode (direct play or transcode) - too much variables.

2 hours ago, Luke said:

It could also be the Samsung video player having difficulty with certain files.

it could be.

but all the answers have to be found in the logs.

Edited July 27, 2025 by WingDog

[SamES 1057]

Maybe try the 'reset the Network' option on the TV.  It's possible that the TV is having issues with your current WiFi channel, but if this file is working fine on all your other devices, then maybe there is a problem with your TV,  When you are testing DirectPlay, if the file is within the TV's specs then it is really only a network problem.

If it is just this file, then there may be an issue with the way that it was encoded which might not be working well for the TV.

[AndreiP 33]

To summarize the problem you're having: some movies that play very well and others don't, but they're not the same, and it only happens on one TV. So, the problem isn't with these movies (format, codecs, etc.), but with the TV itself or the TV's connection to the network. It could be also only the TV that have an issue with the connexion even if your lan works fine. 

That's why I insisted on the network while Luke assuming a problem with the TV which is also very likely.
Let's see if the logs will help. 

Edited July 27, 2025 by AndreiP

[WingDog 16]

8 hours ago, SamES said:

Maybe try the 'reset the Network' option on the TV.

TV restart is faster and more effetive.

8 hours ago, SamES said:

It's possible that the TV is having issues with your current WiFi channel, but if this file is working fine on all your other devices, then maybe there is a problem with your TV,  When you are testing DirectPlay, if the file is within the TV's specs then it is really only a network problem.

If it is just this file, then there may be an issue with the way that it was encoded which might not be working well for the TV.

we can try to guess more and more.

can you help me with debug?

5 hours ago, AndreiP said:

That's why I insisted on the network while Luke assuming a problem with the TV which is also very likely.
Let's see if the logs will help. 

yep. logs will help.

need somebody who knows what to search for.

[SamES 1057]

You mean TV reset, not restart - yes, go ahead.

We're not guessing, it's your network or your media or your TV.  You need to work out which one it is by trial and error.

There is nothing to debug.  If it's DirectPlay then it's all up to the TV.  Emby just passes the original source file to the TV's internal player.  Aside from the server log (with debug enabled) there is nothing else logged.

[WingDog 16]

7 hours ago, SamES said:

If it's DirectPlay then it's all up to the TV.

does DLNA works the same as DirectPlay?

[brothom 177]

1 hour ago, WingDog said:

does DLNA works the same as DirectPlay?

Basically yes, but it depends if the program you're using to view the files over DLNA has it's own codec support or uses a different buffer size / technique.

But in essence yes; in both cases a media stream is presented to "a media player" which then tries to play this stream directly (except when the program can transcode on the fly, but that's a different story).

---

Funnily enough I also experienced some playback issues yesterday evening on my Samsung Smart TV when my server didn't seem to have connectivity issues, the TV just took forever to buffer even without seeking (00:00 timestamp). 

I couldn't figure out the cause so just rebooted the server and that seemed to do the trick, for some reason because nothing had really changed.

Edited July 28, 2025 by brothom

[WingDog 16]

3 hours ago, brothom said:

Basically yes, but it depends if the program you're using to view the files over DLNA has it's own codec support or uses a different buffer size / technique.

if so, then why does it depend for DLNA application but not for Emby? early POW was nothing depends on application it's all about the HW.

 

[WingDog 16]

3 hours ago, brothom said:

But in essence yes; in both cases a media stream is presented to "a media player" which then tries to play this stream directly (except when the program can transcode on the fly, but that's a different story).

built-in DLNA player never lags at only this Samsung TV.

need to explain better. at any moment when Emby begin to lag or interrupt the playback I can switch to internal DLNA and continue to watch content. It's not quite comfortable (that's why an Emby/Plex/Jollifish and so on are exists) but it works. 

should I check my HW again and again?

Edited July 28, 2025 by WingDog

[SamES 1057]

53 minutes ago, WingDog said:

if so, then why does it depend for DLNA application but not for Emby? early POW was nothing depends on application it's all about the HW.

 

It's similar, but not exactly the same as DLNA.

Is it all files, or just this one that has the issue?