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Problems with random freeze-ups with Unslung NSLU2 + MP-101

Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:56 pm
by alanrab
I recently loaded TwonkyMedia 4.4 onto my new, unslung NSLU2. I'm using up to four Netgear MP-101s as clients, all connected to a wired, fast ethernet home network. The NSLU2 is running uNSLUng 6.8 beta firmware and the TV software is running on the hard disk drive, not the internal memory of the NSLU2.

I've been experiencing random freeze-ups on the clients whether running one or all four clients at a time. Interestingly, I had been running TwonkyMusic 4.1 on my Windows Vista PC, plugged in to the same network and router - will all four clients playing flawlessly, and no freeze-ups EVER. I presume that flawless performance would persist on my Vista PC server even using TwonkyMedia 4.4.

I've set the IP address of the server to a static address and have added the address of each client on the client/security page. I even replaced the Cat 5 patch cable to make sure that wasn't the problem.

Any suggestions on what more to do to stop the freeze-ups?

Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 2:33 pm
by sansp00
Ok, here we go ...
Are your drive partitioned natively ?
Did you setup more swap ?
What else do you run on the slug ?
Did you look at /var/log/messages to see if something looked fishy ?
When the freezing occurs, can you still log into the slug ?
And finally, could you monitor the activity of you slug via top when streaming/freezing ?

My best bet is that you lack memory ...
But I'll wait for answers before :)
Patrick S.

Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 11:20 pm
by alanrab
First off, Patrick, I appreciate your willingness to help me. Please be patient, for while my English is pretty good (I'm from Wyoming, but know English anyway), NSLU2's and the world of Linux are brand new to me!

To respond to your questions,

1.I don't know whether I partitioned the drive natively, so I'll explain what I've done:

The drive used to be formatted as a Window NTFS drive with 2 partitions, but, I formatted that drive while connected to the slug to EXT3. I also installed uNSLUng 6.8 beta firmware on the new NSLU2, and, I think I have the term right - uNLSUng to my hard drive. I know that there's a Twonkyvision folder on an "admin 1" folder on my EXT3 drive. There's also a "disk 1" folder on the EXT3 drive, which contains my music files, and an "hdd_2_1_1" folder on the drive which appears to be unaccessible. Hope that explains the first question.

2. I don't know what you mean by "set up more swap." How would I do that? From the Twonky web config page, or via telnet. If the latter, I'd need specific instructions please.

3. I run no additional programs on the slug, but have put some backup files in the disk 1 folder. By the way, I followed a website's instructions and doubled the clock speed of the slug to 266 mHZ, thinking that might cure the lockups. It didn't, but the thing seems to run much faster!

4. Not sure how to access /var/log/messages for fishiness. I just tried that via telnet and I get a "permission denied" message.

5. When freezing occurs, yes, I can still log into the slug. I can access files on the slug, and the unit itself does not seem to freeze up. Just the music streaming, and that VARIES among my 4 MP-101s! No one client consistently freezes and they typically will freeze consecutively, one after the other, but the timing of those events varies.

6. Not sure how to monitor the activity of the slug "via top" when streaming or freezing.

When you think there is a lack of memory, do you mean in the slug? I assume it has the standard amount of internal memory, but that by placing the Twonky files on the HDD during installation of Twonky, that any resident memory problems are a NON issue.

Thanks for your help Patrick.

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 12:26 am
by sansp00
alanrab wrote:First off, Patrick, I appreciate your willingness to help me. Please be patient, for while my English is pretty good (I'm from Wyoming, but know English anyway), NSLU2's and the world of Linux are brand new to me!

No problem, welcome to the 'club' :)

To respond to your questions,

1.I don't know whether I partitioned the drive natively, so I'll explain what I've done:

The drive used to be formatted as a Window NTFS drive with 2 partitions, but, I formatted that drive while connected to the slug to EXT3. I also installed uNSLUng 6.8 beta firmware on the new NSLU2, and, I think I have the term right - uNLSUng to my hard drive. I know that there's a Twonkyvision folder on an "admin 1" folder on my EXT3 drive. There's also a "disk 1" folder on the EXT3 drive, which contains my music files, and an "hdd_2_1_1" folder on the drive which appears to be unaccessible. Hope that explains the first question.

Ok, I think I grasp a bit here ...
What I think is your situation is that only one of your NTFS partition got 'formatted' to ext3, thus the presence of hdd_2_1_1.
Is your HDD plugged in port 1 or 2 ? Because only port 1 recognize's NTFS drives, and I am not sure it will read it since it's a 2nd partition.

2. I don't know what you mean by "set up more swap." How would I do that?

From the Twonky web config page, or via telnet. If the latter, I'd need specific instructions please.

Ok, probably have the basic setup ... swap space is hdd space used by the OS for memory. If the actual memory is full it will place some unused chunk of it to disk and vice versa. When running Twonky, swap space is crucial from my own experience. Also, deactivate the scanning from Twonky, it will help.
how to ...
http://www.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/HowTo/A ... lSwapSpace

3. I run no additional programs on the slug, but have put some backup files in the disk 1 folder. By the way, I followed a website's instructions and doubled the clock speed of the slug to 266 mHZ, thinking that might cure the lockups. It didn't, but the thing seems to run much faster!


4. Not sure how to access /var/log/messages for fishiness. I just tried that via telnet and I get a "permission denied" message.

You need to open a browser on the IP of your slug and click on the manage telnet and enable it (for each use)
I would suggest installing ssh, which is more robust and stays always on.
how to ...
http://www.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/HowTo/U ... moteAccess


5. When freezing occurs, yes, I can still log into the slug. I can access files on the slug, and the unit itself does not seem to freeze up. Just the music streaming, and that VARIES among my 4 MP-101s! No one client consistently freezes and they typically will freeze consecutively, one after
the other, but the timing of those events varies.

This bothers me a bit, did you try to browse Twonky with another UPnP client to see if your client was not the culprit ?
Do you see freezing with no client access at all ?


6. Not sure how to monitor the activity of the slug "via top" when streaming or freezing.

When you install ssh, log in to your slug, and do
ipkg install busybox
This will install basic tools to your slug
than type "top"
It will give you a view of the process running on your slug.

When you think there is a lack of memory, do you mean in the slug? I assume it has the standard amount of internal memory, but that by placing the Twonky files on the HDD during installation of Twonky, that any resident memory problems are a NON issue.

Running from disk won't change a thing since the program when running reside in the memory, adding swap like previously said will help ...

Thanks for your help Patrick.
Hope this helps a bit ...
Will take it from there :)
Patrick S.

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 1:28 am
by alanrab
Woah! Feels like I've already gotten in over my head.

1. As far as EXT3 partitions, I take it from your response that I may have an extra partition, but even though the drive is attached to USB Port 1, it really doesn't matter that I do have that extra partition (I think I have plenty of drive space left).

2. I tried to create the swapfile thing and got some responses that stopped me in my tracks.

4. Then I tried installing ssh and got responses predicted in the weblink. But then got messed up trying to install Putty for Windows.

The link you sent me on creating a swapfile suggests the following:

>>For Unslung firmware users the prefered method is to create an Unslung Script using a Unix style text editor such as vi and save this script to the /unslung folder with name rc.local, a similar method to that mentioned above.

#!/bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1
return 1

Then make the script executable.

chmod +x /unslung/rc.local <<

I couldn't even successfully install and use Putty when I tried it on my PC, so going to a text editor such as vi puts me in an uncomfortable place even though it seems the above would create the needed swapfile(?). Not sure what to do next on this swapfile thing.

5. As far as trying another UPnP client, I don't have one, unless Windows Media Player 11 for Vista is one of those. But, I don't think my Netgear MP-101 clients are the culprit as you suggest I check, since, as I mentioned in the original post, all 4 of my MP-101 clients ran flawlessly on my Twonky server run from a Vista PC.

6. I think I successfully installed top using telnet, at least a lot of activity scrolled by on the telnet screen. But when I typed top, telnet came back and said no such file or directory.

Can you hang in there with me? Better yet, there's a beverage of your choice in it for you if you happen to pass through Wyoming this week...

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 1:15 pm
by sansp00
If your new to Linux, I guess I may sound like Im speaking chinese or something ;)
Been down that path couple of years back, so I feel your pain ...
Hang in there I'll try to go a it from a noob stand point.
alanrab wrote:Woah! Feels like I've already gotten in over my head.

1. As far as EXT3 partitions, I take it from your response that I may have an extra partition, but even though the drive is attached to USB Port 1, it really doesn't matter that I do have that extra partition (I think I have plenty of drive space left).

This may not be a big issue, but you are not taking advantage of the HDD fully.


2. I tried to create the swapfile thing and got some responses that stopped me in my tracks.

We'll take a shot at this later


4. Then I tried installing ssh and got responses predicted in the weblink. But then got messed up trying to install Putty for Windows.

We'll take a shot at this later


The link you sent me on creating a swapfile suggests the following:

>>For Unslung firmware users the prefered method is to create an Unslung Script using a Unix style text editor such as vi and save this script to the /unslung folder with name rc.local, a similar method to that mentioned above.

#!/bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1
return 1

Then make the script executable.

chmod +x /unslung/rc.local <<

I couldn't even successfully install and use Putty when I tried it on my PC, so going to a text editor such as vi puts me in an uncomfortable place even though it seems the above would create the needed swapfile(?). Not sure what to do next on this swapfile thing.

We'll take a shot at this later


5. As far as trying another UPnP client, I don't have one, unless Windows Media Player 11 for Vista is one of those. But, I don't think my Netgear MP-101 clients are the culprit as you suggest I check, since, as I mentioned in the original post, all 4 of my MP-101 clients ran flawlessly on my Twonky server run from a Vista PC.


You can download this 15 days trial plug in for media player which add UPnP ...
http://www.on2share.com/UPnP/

6. I think I successfully installed top using telnet, at least a lot of activity scrolled by on the telnet screen. But when I typed top, telnet came back and said no such file or directory.



We'll take a shot at this later


Can you hang in there with me? Better yet, there's a beverage of your choice in it for you if you happen to pass through Wyoming this week...

Now we will do things from the ground up ...
First, you got to get ssh running on you box ...
This is the installer for putty ... http://the.earth.li/~sgtatham/putty/lat ... taller.exe
then run it and put the ip of your slug in the host box and select the ssh protocol and click open. If ssh is running properly, you should be asked about your user and password. You should login as root with your root password (same as telnet)

If it's not the case, either ssh is not installed properly or you have the wrong ip. Try to reinstall ssh via telnet.

Once you get this up and running, give me back a shout, we will work from there on ...

Patrick S.

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 6:14 pm
by alanrab
Okay, I reinstalled putty and was able to get to the login screen, entered the root and my password. Guess that means I did correctly install SSH.

I'm there.

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 8:40 pm
by sansp00
Great !
Were getting there :)
Once logged in to your slug, type the following commands:
ipkg update
then
ipkg upgrade
then
ipkg install -force-overwrite busybox

This will install the busybox package which is are the foundation tools used on a unix/linux box.

You could also do:
ipkg install bash

and use the bash shell just by typing "bash" at the prompt. You will get a friendlier (if we could say that for linux) shell to mess with ;)
Shout back afterwards ...
Patrick S.

Posted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 11:27 pm
by alanrab
I performed the ipkg update successfully.

When I tried the ipkg upgrade, I received the following message:

"ERROR: The following packages conflict with findutils: busybox-links"

When I did ipkg install -force-overwrite busy box, I received this message:

"Package busybox (1.4.0-1) installed in root is up to date. Nothing to be done."

I assume I'm okay there.

Insalled bash with no apparent problems.

By the way, I left home for part of the day with just one of my MP-101 clients running Twonky. My family reported this evening that it froze for several hours, then on its own, played music for about an hour, then froze again. Weird.

Shouting back at you...

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 12:16 am
by sansp00
Ok,
Now you got the fun stuff on your slug, lets do something with it :twisted:

Could you retry to setup a swapfile following the instructions previously mentionned (via ssh of course ;) ).

afterwards, do the command 'free'

Once you got the swap file setup, just reboot your slug (just for precautions)
log in on slug and redo the free command ...

Post both output here.
You could also post the value of the command 'df -k'
it indicates your mounts on the slug.

BTW, if you log into the Twonky web admin, what value do you have for the rescan (in minutes) ? It should be set to 0 ...

Patrick S.

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:25 am
by alanrab
When I follow the swapfile instructions, using putty, I entered the command


dd if=/dev/zero of=/mnt/swapfile1 bs=1024 count=256k
mkswap -c /mnt/swapfile1

per the website instuctions. Even though there seems to be a line break after 256k and mkswap, I entered it all in one line. I got the following response:

BusyBox v1.5.0 (2007-03-27 21:40:36 PST) multi-call binary

Usage: dd [if=FILE] [of=FILE] [bs=N] [count=N] [skip=N]
[seek=N]

Copy a file with converting and formatting

Options:
if=FILE Read from FILE instead of stdin
of=FILE Write to FILE instead of stdout
bs=N Read and write N bytes at a time
count=N Copy only N input blocks
skip=N Skip N input blocks
seek=N Skip N output blocks

Numbers may be suffixed by c (x1), w (x2), b (x512), kD (x1000), k (x1024),
MD (x1000000), M (x1048576), GD (x1000000000) or G (x1073741824)

Then I entered the second command as follows:

# swapon /mnt/swapfile1

And got the following response:

swapon: can't stat '/mnt/swapfile1': No such file or directory

Sooo, what now?

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:34 am
by sansp00
When you do the dd command, it takes a while to process. It actually creates a specific file for the OS to use as swap.
Just do the dd line and wait until you get the prompt back ... then move on, they are on 2 lines, not one.

dd if=/dev/zero of=/mnt/swapfile1 bs=1024 count=256k
(wait a bit, go get a drink and take a sip ;) )
Got the prompt back, yeah ! do this and the remaining steps.
mkswap -c /mnt/swapfile1

Your close, don`t despair !
Patrick S.

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:48 am
by alanrab
OK, here's what just happened:

# dd if=/dev/zero of=/mnt/swapfile1 bs=1024 count=256k
262144+0 records in
262144+0 records out

# mkswap -c/mnt/swapfile1
mkswap: error: Nowhere to set up swap on?
BusyBox v0.60.4 (2004.09.28-10:24+0000) multi-call binary

Usage: mkswap [-c] [-v0|-v1] device [block-count]

# swapon /mnt/swapfile1
swapon: /mnt/swapfile1: Invalid argument
#
# dd if=/dev/zero of=/mnt/swapfile1 bs=1024 count=256k

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:51 am
by alanrab
By the way, when I now type in the free command, I get:


# free
total used free shared buffers
Mem: 30524 29832 692 0 1620
Swap: 120480 11368 109112
Total: 151004 41200 109804
#

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:55 am
by sansp00
You need a space in between the -c and /mnt/swapfile1
like this ...
mkswap -c /mnt/swapfile1
move on to the other commands, they were fine.

Almost there ...
Patrick S.

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 2:07 am
by alanrab
Here's what I now get:

# mkswap -c /mnt/swapfile1
Setting up swapspace version 1, size = 268431360 bytes
# swapon /mnt/swapfile1
# free
total used free shared buffers
" Mem: 30524 29736 788 0 4964
Swap: 382616 4088 378528
Total: 413140 33824 379316


Now.... do I follow the additional guidance in the how to link such as:

Since you probably do not want to execute the swapon command every time the slug starts up you can create your own startup script. Create a new startup file (e.g. S100addswap) in /opt/etc/init.d with the following content:

#!/bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1

You then need to make the script executable.

chmod +x /opt/etc/init.d/S100addswap

For Unslung firmware users the prefered method is to create an Unslung Script using a Unix style text editor such as vi and save this script to the /unslung folder with name rc.local, a similar method to that mentioned above.

#!/bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1
return 1

Then make the script executable.

chmod +x /unslung/rc.local "

I'm not sure how to "create a new startup file (e.g. S100addswap) in /opt/etc/init.d"

Or do I drop to the instructions for unslung firmware users such as myself. It gets int "vi" which seems to require a bit much.

OR... do I just reboot the slug and type "free" again? Sorry, but not sure where to go next. Sure appreciate the help!

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 12:49 pm
by sansp00
alanrab wrote:Here's what I now get:

# mkswap -c /mnt/swapfile1
Setting up swapspace version 1, size = 268431360 bytes
# swapon /mnt/swapfile1
# free
total used free shared buffers
" Mem: 30524 29736 788 0 4964
Swap: 382616 4088 378528
Total: 413140 33824 379316

Excellent, your in business now !

Now.... do I follow the additional guidance in the how to link such as:

Since you probably do not want to execute the swapon command every time the slug starts up you can create your own startup script. Create a new startup file (e.g. S100addswap) in /opt/etc/init.d with the following content:

#!/bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1

You then need to make the script executable.

chmod +x /opt/etc/init.d/S100addswap

For Unslung firmware users the prefered method is to create an Unslung Script using a Unix style text editor such as vi and save this script to the /unslung folder with name rc.local, a similar method to that mentioned above.

#!/bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1
return 1

Then make the script executable.

chmod +x /unslung/rc.local "

I'm not sure how to "create a new startup file (e.g. S100addswap) in /opt/etc/init.d"

Or do I drop to the instructions for unslung firmware users such as myself. It gets int "vi" which seems to require a bit much.

Ok, just create the /unslung/rc.local script and make it executable, the other part is for other distros with the slug (openslug and so on)
As for vi here is a link to help
http://jedi.ks.uiuc.edu/~johns/links/comp/viguide.html
basically, type 'vi /unslung/rc.local'
type 'i', this is to insert text
type in the script

#!/bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1
return 1

press the esc key and then type ':w' this writes the file
then type ':q', this quits
do the chmod command and it should be ok.

OR... do I just reboot the slug and type "free" again? Sorry, but not sure where to go next. Sure appreciate the help!
If you reboot, login and type free, you should get the same numbers as you posted. If not, you have a problem with your script.

Now, you *should* be ok with Twonky, tell me how it goes ...
Patrick S.

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 6:01 pm
by alanrab
Here's what I get with the vi command line:

# vi /unslung/rc.local

~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
~
- /unslung/rc.local 1/1 100%

The cursor winds up atop one of those many '~' after I hit the enter key.

Then when I type 'i' I get no further response. This is after looking at the vi link to try to help. Feels like I keep hitting these little impediments! Am I still almost there???

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 6:20 pm
by alanrab
But wait! I may be wrong, but I realized that without the proper script, when I rebooted the slug, I may have lost all that swapon stuff.

So, I reentered the original commands then retried the script with vi. Still got the series of ~ s, but I nevertheless tried the i command and the rest of your latest instructions. The results of the free command are now as follows, AFTER a reboot of the slug:


# free
total used free shared buffers
Mem: 30524 29824 700 0 7780
Swap: 382616 2868 379748
Total: 413140 32692 380448
#

I see that these numbers are not identical to my previous post, BUT are they close enough to show I was successful in installing the script?

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 6:31 pm
by sansp00
The ~ are normal, they mean that there is no content ... when you type the 'i', you fall in insert mode which permits you to write text. once done, pressing the esc key takes you out of insert mode, the ":" brings you a sort of command editor to which you indicate to write (:w) and quit (:q).

If you do the following command 'cat /unslung/rc.local', you should get the content of the script you just

if it's empty, this means you messed up doing the vi :)
This means that the swap setting will be lost at each reboot.
If you see your script, than reboot the slug and you should be in business, well, I hope 8)
Patrick S.

Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 10:58 pm
by alanrab
Good news and bad news. Here's what I get with the command you suggested:

# cat /unslung/rc.local
#!bin/sh
swapon /mnt/swapfile1
return 1
#

So, it looks like I wrote the script to the disk okay.

The bad news is, I left just one MP-101 client running around 1:00 local time today, checked it at 5:00 pm and it was FROZEN solid :cry:

I had already set the rescan to zero on the TW config web page.

Sooo, with all these cool tools now, can we diagnose the patient?

Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 1:27 am
by sansp00
Ok, lets see
You can go under the Misc. menu and select all log level ...
Then click on view log file
Browse it around the time freezing and look for something 'fishy' ...
Post it here, we'll see afterwards
Patrick S.

Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 2:07 am
by alanrab
Okay. It didn't take too long to log during a freeze-up event. See around 20:01:37:882. Looks "fishy" to me and I don't know what I'm doing!

20:00:35:832 SSDP:### SSDP sending:
NOTIFY * HTTP/1.1
HOST: 239.255.255.250:1900
CACHE-CONTROL: max-age=1810
LOCATION: http://192.168.1.9:9000/DeviceDescription.xml
NT: urn:schemas-upnp-org:service:ConnectionManager:1
NTS: ssdp:alive
SERVER: Linux/2.x.x, UPnP/1.0, TwonkyVision UPnP SDK/1.0
USN: uuid:7076436f-6e65-1063-8074-0014bf65d5fa::urn:schemas-upnp-org:service:ConnectionManager:1


20:01:00:031 SYSTEM:get_interface_addresses 127.0.0.1
20:01:00:032 SYSTEM:get_interface_addresses 192.168.1.9
20:01:30:037 SYSTEM:get_interface_addresses 127.0.0.1
20:01:30:038 SYSTEM:get_interface_addresses 192.168.1.9
20:01:37:882 [ERROR]HTTP:Cannot receive header
20:01:37:882 HTTP:received no header in HTTP_send_receive, propably client closed socket!
20:01:38:623 HTTP:POST /ContentDirectory/Control HTTP/1.1
Host: 192.168.1.9
CONTENT-LENGTH: 486
Content-Type: text/xml;charset="utf-8"
SOAPACTION: "urn:schemas-upnp-org:service:ContentDirectory:1#Browse"


20:01:38:624 HTTP:<s>
<s>
<u u="urn:schemas-upnp-org:service:ContentDirectory:1">
<ObjectID>32$322</ObjectID>
<BrowseFlag>BrowseDirectChildren</BrowseFlag>
<Filter>res, class, duration, upnp:artist, upnp:album, upnp:genre</Filter>
<StartingIndex>1860</StartingIndex>
<RequestedCount>1</RequestedCount>
<SortCriteria></u>
</s>
</s>

20:01:38:626 HTTP:HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: text/xml; charset="utf-8"
Content-Length: 1177
Date: Wed, 08 Aug 2007 02:01:38 GMT
Accept-Ranges: bytes
Connection: keep-alive
EXT:
Server: Linux/2.x.x, UPnP/1.0, TwonkyVision UPnP SDK/1.0

Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 10:51 am
by sansp00
Yup, spot on ...
Looks like the connection dropped in between your streamer and you slug.

Is your slug on dhcp or static address ? What kind of router do you use ? And finally, are your device on dhcp or static address ? Does your router have a predefined ip table (mac to ip for dhcp) ?

Log in on the slug and do 'more /var/log/messages', press the space key to scroll and try to find if something else occurred on the slug near the time of your issue. Just want to make sure that there is no other related events.

This may be a bit harder to figure out or fix, but I'll try to help as much as I can ...
Patrick S.

Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 12:50 pm
by alanrab
Looks like the connection dropped in between your streamer and you slug.

Is your slug on dhcp or static address ?

When I first installed the slug, I kept it at the default IP setting of 192.168.1.77. I was getting the freeze-ups, so, I later set it to DHCP. This also suddenly allowed me to stream Shoutcast on Internet Radio. I'm sure it has to do with DNS and Gateway settings, since they were automatically filled in on the TM configuration page. All this made no change in freeze-ups.


What kind of router do you use ?

I'm using a 4-port Netgear wired router. I also am using a Netgear wireless router as an access point only, connected from a LAN port on the wired router to a LAN port on the wireless router. One of the 4 MP-101s is connected via cat 5 cable to this wireless router. Remember, with this same exact router configuration, I was getting flawless performance with TM on my Vista PC.

And finally, are your device on dhcp or static address ?

I've tried setting the MP-101s with both DHCP and fixed IP addresses, no difference in stability.

Does your router have a predefined ip table (mac to ip for dhcp) ?

Yes, both the wired and wireless routers have such a table. I've played with seting fixed IP addresses that match fixed addresses I set on the clients. Not sure about the MAC stuff.

Log in on the slug and do 'more /var/log/messages', press the space key to scroll and try to find if something else occurred on the slug near the time of your issue. Just want to make sure that there is no other related events.

This is all I get:

# more /var/log/messages
more: No such file or directory

Does that mean anything to you?

This may be a bit harder to figure out or fix, but I'll try to help as much as I can ...
Patrick S.

You've been extremely helpful Patrick! I hope others are benefitting from this 'conversation!'

Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 4:54 pm
by sansp00
I have netgears too at home, a WGR614 v6 router with a couple of switches 2 GS605 ports and 1 GS608 ports.

I have static addresses for all my streaming devices (2 Roku M1001, 1 Roku R1000 and a Roku HD1000), my NAS (2 NSLU2), laptop and desktop. I would suggest to do the same and avoid ip collisions and DHCP mix up. I had both occur with the netgear stuff before I moved to static.
If you could add the mapping for the ip directly to the mac address of each devices, it would even be better.

Netgear have a bad rep with some routers which are not fully stable.

Also, stay in the same subnet, in your case, it's 192.168.1.* I think.
Another thing is to disable the WINS from your slug.

Just glad I can help a bit, and mostly hope we get to the bottom of this one ...
Patrick S.

Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 6:33 pm
by alanrab
>>I have netgears too at home, a WGR614 v6 router with a couple of switches 2 GS605 ports and 1 GS608 ports.

I have static addresses for all my streaming devices (2 Roku M1001, 1 Roku R1000 and a Roku HD1000), my NAS (2 NSLU2), laptop and desktop. I would suggest to do the same and avoid ip collisions and DHCP mix up. I had both occur with the netgear stuff before I moved to static.
If you could add the mapping for the ip directly to the mac address of each devices, it would even be better. <<

I have the RP614 v 2. Just so I don't mistake you, in addition to doing static IP addresses for all my computers and clients, as well as the slug, are you suggesting I disable the DHCP on that router itself? (I don't think you are.)

Also, need I assign mapping of the MP-101 that is wired to the wireless access point by using the mapping on that wireless ap's webconfig page, or just handle that via the web config page of the wired router? (Hope I'm making sense here)

Thanks.

Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 7:02 pm
by sansp00
I have the RP614 v 2. Just so I don't mistake you, in addition to doing static IP addresses for all my computers and clients, as well as the slug, are you suggesting I disable the DHCP on that router itself? (I don't think you are.)
No, it's better to leave it on, just in case you add stuff down the road. But what you have right now *should* have static addresses.

Also, need I assign mapping of the MP-101 that is wired to the wireless access point by using the mapping on that wireless ap's webconfig page, or just handle that via the web config page of the wired router? (Hope I'm making sense here)
I am not familiar with wireless access points ... But I think it does not actually assign any ip, it is done by the router. So you should only add them to the router.

Patrick S.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 1:46 am
by alanrab
Make all the IP and MAC assignments on the wired router, then left all four clients running TM.

Came back after a couple of hours and 3 of 4 were frozen. :evil:

Yesterday, I had tried, as you suggested the following command:

# more /var/log/messages
more: No such file or directory

Does that response mean anything to you?

Not sure what's left. Looking at the TM logs, go the same errors as reported yesterday.

Would the top command tell you anything?

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 2:29 am
by sansp00
hey ...
instead of more, try 'cat' like
cat /var/log/messages

Im running out of ideas here ...
I know that the connection in between your slug and streamer gets broken, but can't figure out why ... Wish I had one of those to test it here :twisted:

Patrick S.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 2:38 am
by sansp00
Just read in another thread on the forum that the problem may be due to the Twonky version ... Could you install version 4.1 on your slug. From what I have read, it's the last to behave properly.
You can get it via this url:
http://www.twonkyvision.de/Download/4.1 ... -nslu2.zip

Other s have reported making it work, but without any Wifi ....
Anyway, I know it's older, but if it works, it's better than nothing :) The issue could be than reported to Twonky for investigation.
Patrick s.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 2:59 am
by alanrab
Patrick:

I'm gonna try one more thing before installing 4.1 TwonkyMedia on the slug:

I hadn't mentioned that 3 of my 4 clients are attached to the router via a D-Link 8-port switch. The switch is wired to one of the 4 ports on the Netgear wired router. (The 4th client is wired to the Netgear wireless router which I'm using only as a wireless access point as explained previously.) The wireless "router" is attached by cat 5 cable to one of the Netgear wired router ports.

I've always assumed that the switch provides enough bandwidth for running all 4 clients at a time, since that worked well when I ran the clients with the same network setup and my Vista PC running Twonkymusic 4.1.

For an overnight test, I've disconnected the switch and am running one client plugged in directly to one of the wired router ports. This will test whether there is, for some reason, a bandwidth issue introduced by the slug. If it's a bandwidth issue, I wonder if purchasing an 8-port router would solve the issue...

Also, FYI, when I first installed the slug, I tried TwonkyMUSIC 4.1 for the NSLU2 (not T-media). It froze the clients, but that was before all the changes you suggested I make. If tomorrow reveals poor overnight test results, I'll try installing TwonkyMEDIA 4.1 on the slug.

Thanks again.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 12:53 pm
by sansp00
After reading some more on your client, there is a RTP option in Twonky for your client, try to change it (either from 0 to 1 or vice versa).

Patrick S.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 1:05 pm
by alanrab
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll try that though, I've tried it before, unsuccessfully.

My bandwidth check still resulted in my client freezing. This morning, I installed TwonkyMedia 4.1 on the slug. It froze too.

I'm thinking I'm out of options and may just abandon the slug as a Twonky server, resorting to running my main PC 24/7 as the music server. :(

It wasn't for lack of trying though and thanks again for your persistent help.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 2:51 pm
by sansp00
The worst thing with this is that it does not seem to be the slug, but more the Twonky + MP-101 combo that is misbehaving. I've read many threads with the MP-101 having problems with Twonky or the the MP-101 itself.

My setup never had any issue of this kind :?

Sorry for not being able to solve this :(
Patrick S.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 6:50 pm
by alanrab
To me, it seems it's a delicate 'dance' being performed by the slug, the Twonky server software and the clients.

By virtue of the fact that my 4 MP-101 lients work well dishing out music served by the Twonky server running on my Vista PC, I suspect that the NSLU/Linux version of TwonkyMedia has problems interacting with the slug and the MP-101s.

The slug works fine on my network when just moving files. It's the streaming of music that seems to cause hiccups between the slug, Twonky and the MP-101 clients. The Windows version of Twonky and the MP-101s dance in synch.

Maybe the folks at Twonky would care to weigh in?

Thanks again Patrick.

- Alan

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:27 pm
by techfixer
alanrab

I wouldn't give up on running TwonkyMedia on the NSLU2, I was recently getting the same problems as you streaming music to my XBOX360. The music would play fine and then cut out for no reason, all checks on the NSLU2 indicated that it was working fine.

I eventually tracked the problem down to a networking issue. I had my NSLU2 connected via cable to a Linksys PSUS4 4-port switch and printserver, which was then connected via cable to my Belkin router. The XBOX360 was connected to the router via WIFI (Wireless G). At first I thought the cause was a poor WIFI signal but eventually tracked it down to the PSUS4. So I connected the NSLU2 directly to the router and the problems went away.

In my experience of tryinig various home/small office networking products (routers/switches/game adapters etc) they all have their problems and can be buggy and tempramental. I would suggest testing again with the simplest possible network architecture. Try connecting the NSLU2 and your MP-101 directly to the same switch/router and remove all other devices from the network.

Since I fixed my problem, I have been running TwonkyMedia 4.4 on my NSLU2 streaming music and video to my XBOX 360 without any problems at all. And, if you thought the NSLU2 wasn't up to the task, I can stream a HD (720p) WMV to my XBOX360 without any drop-outs - so I'm sure it can manage a few MP3s.

Unfortunately, I don't have an MP-101, so I can't say for certain that this combination will work but your symptoms were exactly like mine and the info from the logs you supplied to sansp00 do suggest a network problem.

Posted: Thu Aug 09, 2007 11:25 pm
by alanrab
Hey techfixer - thanks for the suggestions!

So far, I had tried connecting the NSLU2 and just one MP-101 directly to my router, but other stuff was connected to the router too - one router port to my PC, one to my wireless router (in turn acting as a wireless access point and not as an individual router) and the remaining fee port to my 10-port switch.

So, I'll now try disconnecting all but the NSLU2 and one MP-101 to the router and report back on stability. Just curious... if this fixes the stability issue, what would you suggest - buying an 8-port router to replace my 4-port router? Also, why would my PC-Vista based Twonky server run the MP-101s perfectly with the same home network setup?

Posted: Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:23 am
by alanrab
Okay the verdict is in (already).

I disconnected all from my Netgear 4-port PR614v2 wired router, except for the NSLU2 running TwonkyMedia 4.1 and one MP-101 client. I even disconnected the WAN connection to the modem.

The system froze within 25 minutes. :cry:

What else can be left as a solution?

Freezes exactly like that...

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2007 2:39 am
by as2651
I installed trial version 4.4 to NSLU2 (unslung, 133MHz, ITunes Server, OpenSSH, that's it). It periodically freezes entire NSLU2 unit. I can ping, but can't SSH, nor Telnet, nothing. Only power disconnect/connect "helps", for some time.
I don't think it's a streaming problem. Sometimes, I'm not even streaming via Twonky, just listening audio files stored on NSLU2-connected USB HDD.
This might be a problem with concurrent I/O to the files...

Final Resolution to my original posting

Posted: Sat Sep 22, 2007 2:16 pm
by alanrab
I went to the source - the Twonkyvision team - to see if they could come up with a resolution to the freezing-track issue. By the way, when a track would freeze up, I could still access files on my NSLU2, so I knew it was not the Linksys that was the problem. I told them that the majority of my 5,000 tracks were WMA files.

So, here's what the Twonky folks found per their email to me:

>>the problem is that the NSLU2 (or any Linux system) can only stream MP3 stable to the MP101. WMA causes the problem here. The details are that RTP does not work for WMA - and therefore HTTP streaming is used for WMA. But on HTTP the MP101 has problems with Linux TCP-IP stack implementation.

Sorry - but this can not be solved
The TwonkyVision Team<<

I've tested 20 MP3 files and my NSLU2/Netgear MP-101 setup is playing flawlessly. So, now I'm faced with whether I want to bother with converting my library from WMA to MP3. I tried a few, free converters found online, but they seem to strip all track info, except for the track title.

But at least I know why this issue has arisen!

Posted: Sat Sep 22, 2007 7:51 pm
by wideasleep1
MediaMonkey hasn't been stripping out my tag info from WMA to MP3. Give it a go!

Posted: Tue Oct 02, 2007 7:22 am
by Sjoske
I experience similar network problems, however I'm using a regular Suse 10.2 Linux PC as server. Network freezes appear every now and then when twonkymedia is running. They disappear when I shutdown twonky. From the PC itself I notice no network problems (while working on the console), but ssh/ping/... to this PC (from other machines) freeze with irregular intervals and periods.

I was suspecting the ethernet driver (forcedeth) in the linux kernel, but I was able to reproduce the problem running the 4.4 twonky server on another linux machine with skge driver.

So I think it is caused by the way twonky uses the network interface.

PC1: ASUS M2NPV-VM motherboard
PC2: ASUS A8V
Both Athlon 64bit, running 64-bit OS Suse 10.2

My upnp clients: Philips Streamium MX6000i and SMC EZ-Stream.

Network: using a 3COM 8-port switch and a Siemens SX551 router.

-- Sjoske

Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 10:02 am
by Sjoske
Sjoske wrote: So I think it is caused by the way twonky uses the network interface.

Network: using a 3COM 8-port switch and a Siemens SX551 router.
Problems seem to be caused the SX551 "KPN Experia Box".
When I disconnect the modem all network hickups are gone.
I used wireshark to analyze traffic from the modem, and the only traffic I see are IGMP multicast request to 224.0.0.1.
Is it possible that the problems are caused by IGMP?
KPN does not support the possibility to disable IGMP, so I cannot verify this.

-- Sjoske