skipping when running files from windows share over wireless network

[AbqSteve]

All,

I'm having some trouble with exaile running over the wireless network. I'm not sure where the post the question because I don't know whether to look at ubuntu or exaile.

What I'm seeing is intermittent skipping when exaile is playing mp3s. The mp3s it's playing are from shares on a windows XP home SP3 box. It's accessing them over the wireless connection. When the skips occur, there is a often a multi-second pause and then exaile continues the song as if it had been playing all along. For example, the song might stop at 2:30, have a 5 second pause, and then start playing at 2:35 as if nothing happened.

I've tried these things without it making any difference:
- updating everything on the linux box via aptitude
- updating everything recommended on the windows xp box via windowsupdate
- setting the priority of exaile to -15
- disabling all plugins in exaile

When I check the wireless signal strength via my conky bar graph, it's always at 50% or more.

When I run a mp3 that's on the local drive of the linux box, there is no skipping. I'm suspecting something about the file not being sufficiently buffered while it's trying to play but I don't know how address that.

The setup is:
- exaile 0.3.2.2
- ubuntu 11.10
- Linux zippy 3.0.0-14-generic #23-Ubuntu SMP Mon Nov 21 20:34:47 UTC 2011 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux

I'm accessing the windows shares using shortcuts made in nautilus.

[reacocard (reacocard)]

Does the same issue happen over a wired network? Is it worse on higher-bitrate files?

[AbqSteve (abqsteve)]

Thanks for the reply and great questions.

1) Does the same issue happen over a wired network?
I just ran for about an hour with wireless and an hour wired. Wireless had about 5 short skips, wired no skips. As a side note, during the test, I had moved the laptop so that it was about 4 feet away from my router and still had the skips.

2) Is it worse on higher-bitrate files?
I don't know yet. I need to try it.

[AbqSteve (abqsteve)]

Regarding 2), It appears that the the bit rate of the files does make a difference.

I ran for about a half hour with all 128kbps .mp3 files without a skip. I also ran for a half hour with all 320 kpbs .mp3 files and had about 4 short skips.

This was also with the laptop right next to the wireless router.

[AbqSteve (abqsteve)]

I updated my router firmware to see if that would help but, unfortunately, it did not. I'm still getting skipping.

[David Beswick (dlbeswick)]

Just a comment -- I got the same problem playing over a mounted samba share and wireless network, but I found that the same problem happened with any other media player: totem, sox "play", etc. I don't think it's an exaile-specific bug.

[Dustin Spicuzza (dustin-virtualroadside)]

Without further specifics, this seems like an error that wouldn't be specific to exaile. Closing as invalid.