[Problems streaming: can't watch internet video for more than 6sec]

Having major problems with streaming issues. I cannot watch internet video for more than 6 secs at a time and it has proved impossible for me to watch movies. I have tested my internet speed and it is 16.5kbps, I have tried to use Mozilla with DivX, I've cleaned my registry, I've toyed around with my internet video browser adefault settings but nothing has rectified the situation. I have a toshiba equium laptop, working off windows vista, with AOL as my ISP. Does anyone out there know what I can do to resolve this issue?

 

Is "16.5kbps" a typo? Do you have broadband or dial-up. Has this just started happening or has it alway been this way?

Many things come into play here like the amount of RAM on your system, video RAM, and Internet connection to name a few. If you are buffering every six seconds it is likely your Internet speed it that is not a typo.

A little more information about your system would be helpful.

Mitch

 

Yeah sorry that was a mistake. I tested my download speed again and it gave a reading of 0.13Mb. I have AOL broadband with a netgear wireless router and the test said the average AOL download speed should be 2.58Mb.

 

Download speed of 0.13mb (which is about 128kps) is quite slow for streaming video. If you were running at over 2mb/s there would be very little buffering. You never said how much RAM you have installed so I'll assume 1gb or less which also would allow for more buffering because you have background programs, processes, and the streaming video competing for RAM.

Some things you can do to resolve this (as I see it) are:

1. Try the streaming video by directly connecting to your outgoing internet (not the wireless) and see if you have the same issue.

2. Increase you internet speed through your ISP

3. Increase RAM (or at least disable some programs running in the background).

It's likely your wireless connection my be the culprit and there may be some adjustment you can make to the router (but that is beyond my capabilities).

Post back and let me know what happens after you try the direct connect.

Mitch

 

Hi Mitch,

Thank-you for taking time to send me some advice. So far I have taken the following steps to try and resolve the streaming issue:

Reconfigured the wireless router
Rebuilt the AOL adaptors
Restored AOL
Deleted cookies and temporary files
Cleaned the registry
Set the internet explorer back to manufacturers recommendations
Deleted incompatible peer2peer software eg Limewire, from my system
Downloaded the latest versions of Java and Adobe Flash Player
Activated applets for Java scripting

But its all been to no avail. I cant even watch videos on You tube... its giving me an error message that either I dont have Java or the latest version of flash player- both of which I have. At the moment I cant get my hands on my leads to connect directly as you suggested. Been decorating and had to put boxes in storage. Will try this option when I get my stuff back and see if indeed it is the wireless router that is responsible. Really fed up with the whole thing now. I have limited computer knowledge and its been pretty diff to get through the steps I have already taken but hey Im learning new things all the time. Thanks again for your input and I will get back to you Re the direct connect.

Im not a happy lil Vegemite!

 

Reply when you can. I am a big believer in "learn by doing ".