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How do I troubleshoot skipping music?

209.131.236.185
Posted on December 29, 2016 at 08:03:53
mikecole
Audiophile

Posts: 29
Location: Florida
Joined: April 28, 2007
 I have a set up where I stream music from my media server to a Logitec Squeezebox and then to my DAC. This morning it started acting strange. It kept skipping parts of the music or replaying parts of the music. It sounds to me like the packets are being missed or re-sent. How in the world do I troubleshoot something like this? It could be the computer or the router or the squeezebox or maybe even the DAC. I thought I could rule out the DAC since it only plays what is fed into it. Could the network card in the computer be guilty? It seems like the router would not suddenly start doing something like that ... or? I am not sure what part the Squeezebox plays in this. If this were being done wirelessly, I would suspect that, but it is a wired connection everywhere. Can anybody help with a best guess of where the problem is most likely to occur?

 

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RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on December 29, 2016 at 09:37:19
AbeCollins
Audiophile

Posts: 46280
Location: USA
Joined: June 22, 2001
Contributor
  Since: February 2, 2002
 Since you give no details on your music server, router, network cabling, switches, etc., I'll guess:

Power DOWN everything. Wait a couple minutes. Then power UP everything. Seriously, give it a try. ;-)

Good luck.


 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on December 29, 2016 at 14:37:23
ahendler
Audiophile

Posts: 5151
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Joined: January 24, 2003
 Abe is correct. You will be basically rebooting everything. Usually works
Alan

 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on December 29, 2016 at 15:29:49
mlsstl
Audiophile

Posts: 1079
Location: Midwest
Joined: September 1, 2015
 Another vote for the full power-down, waiting a few minutes, the rebooting everything. The problem could have a variety of causes, ranging from a robot hacking attempt that has the network modem/router temporarily fritzed to other issues.

 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on December 29, 2016 at 15:57:46
JBen
Audiophile

Posts: 3082
Location: South FL
Joined: May 18, 2008
Contributor
  Since: July 26, 2010
 That's the basic rule with these things. Reboot, and "soft" reset (if allowed) when a reboot still falls short. Now, Mlsstl also adds a very good point.

Unlikely as it may be, malware may be involved. Therefore, I'd leave the rebooting of the PC for last. Then, if nothing has worked, before rebooting the PC, I'd try to remember where I hid the latest backup or recovery options. Some "silent" malware cannot finish installing until the PC is rebooted. If no backup is at hand for safety, I then go get an offline virus scanner program and ONLY reboot to it. Ask if details needed.

Of course, in the rare instances where I do have a very recent backup, I just reboot. Otherwise, when in doubt, I offline-scan before rebooting to the normal OS.

 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on December 29, 2016 at 20:00:30
pixelphoto
Audiophile

Posts: 655
Location: So. Cal.
Joined: December 15, 2009
 If you're on a Mac you could also us an app like Memory Clean or Dr. Cleaner to clean the memory without rebooting.

 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on December 29, 2016 at 20:37:15
AbeCollins
Audiophile

Posts: 46280
Location: USA
Joined: June 22, 2001
Contributor
  Since: February 2, 2002

Or you can use the purge and sync commands built into Mac OS X from the Terminal:

Memory Usage before executing the purge command:



Memory Usage after executing the purge command:



 

Well, when things gowrong with my Squeezeboxes..., posted on December 30, 2016 at 15:22:24
My name is Fred
Audiophile

Posts: 634
Location: Sunshine Coast
Joined: May 23, 2013
 ... and I have 3 Duets running round the house, I get LMS to scan the files. It sometimes works.
Then I return to factory settings and set it up again which only takes a few minutes.
Does it only happen playing from a hard drive or does it mess up internet radio as well?
If it is only the hard drive, it sounds as if the fault is upstream.
Sometimes the Squeezebox is as unpredictable as a Donald Trump speech. Sometimes as reassuring as a warm cosy... sorry. my mind went somewhere else entirely...

 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on December 30, 2016 at 20:30:52
mikecole
Audiophile

Posts: 29
Location: Florida
Joined: April 28, 2007
 I will try the rebooting of everything all at once. I have tried powering off and on separately and that did not work. I will also try actually unplugging everything for a minute. I am using a Windows PC with Win7 Ultimate for the media server. That is the only thing it is used for. I have a separate computer to do all my other stuff like work and surfing etc. I am using an iPad to control the music slection.

 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on January 2, 2017 at 11:48:06
mikecole
Audiophile

Posts: 29
Location: Florida
Joined: April 28, 2007
 That seemed to work, so I am just left with the usual dropouts. I just ordered some cat5 cable and will wire this up since the router is only about 20ft away. I suppose that will cure the dropouts and any other oddness.

 

RE: How do I troubleshoot skipping music?, posted on January 3, 2017 at 13:00:00
AbeCollins
Audiophile

Posts: 46280
Location: USA
Joined: June 22, 2001
Contributor
  Since: February 2, 2002
 In your first post you said, "If this were being done wirelessly, I would suspect that, but it is a wired connection everywhere."

But now you're ordering some cat5 cable so I'm not understanding your setup. Were you experiencing problems playing music over Wifi or were you in fact using a "wired connection everywhere"?

It puzzles me when people say they are experiencing dropouts unless they are using a very under-powered computer and/or running other tasks while playing music, playing over a marginal network, or have some other severe issues going on in their setup.

How old is your PC, what CPU does it have, how much memory does it have? What media types are you playing through your PC? Is it simple CD quality 16/44.1 resolution music files, or much larger files that require higher bandwidth? Is your computer 'memory starved'? Is it swapping to disk? What player software are you using?

We can hope that your new cat5 cable solves your problem but not knowing anything about your setup makes true troubleshooting practically impossible.



 

I'm with Abe, posted on January 3, 2017 at 13:06:43
E-Stat
Audiophile

Posts: 37580
Joined: May 12, 2000
Contributor
  Since: April 5, 2002
 perhaps it would help to provide a more thorough picture of your arrangement and specifics of your content. I used to get dropouts in the garage playing 96/24 content with a Touch streamer until I put an access point out there.

Unless your current ethernet cable is faulty, getting a new one won't likely do much. Also you should consider getting CAT7 today if you're in need of a new cable.

 

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