Sending but no receiving

Using the Church Webcasting System, YouTube, etc. Including cameras and mixers.
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lajackson
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Sending but no receiving

#1

Post by lajackson »

What is the proper procedure when everything appears to be streaming correctly to the servers, but no one can receive the return stream? At GSC suggestion, we deleted the first test and set up another but the problem remained.

Unfortunately, I also deleted the second event when it did not work so it would not just run unused for another hour, so GSC now says they have nothing to look at in the morning.

So, does headquarters have a way to look at the stream and see if it is properly being received?
And what do we do it we cannot get it back again?

I am going back up to the stake center tomorrow evening to repeat the process, but it would be nice to be able to actually troubleshoot it. This time I will leave the events in place so that someone can do an autopsy for us.

Finally, just for grins, were there problems with the South West US servers Thursday evening from 6 to 8 pm mountain daylight time?

*****

Now that I have written all of that, I see at the Portal that even though I deleted the events, they are still recorded in the Completed Events section of the site. Since the GSC cannot do it, is there someone else who can look at those two events for March 30 and let me know what may have been the problem? Thanks. I will PM my unit number to rannthal. [grin]
rannthal
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Re: Sending but no receiving

#2

Post by rannthal »

lajackson wrote:So, does headquarters have a way to look at the stream and see if it is properly being received?
Yes they can.
lajackson wrote:And what do we do it we cannot get it back again?
Once the event is over, the media server is removed, but the logs are stored for a time.
lajackson wrote:Finally, just for grins, were there problems with the South West US servers Thursday evening from 6 to 8 pm mountain daylight time?
I didn't see anything wrong. I ran a test event in that region this morning with no problems.


There are some steps that can be done to isolate where the problem lies. I'm going to write these on a different thread so all can view and have.
lajackson
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Re: Sending but no receiving

#3

Post by lajackson »

rannthal wrote:There are some steps that can be done to isolate where the problem lies. I'm going to write these on a different thread so all can view and have.
I just wanted to say thank you for your help via email in working through our specific problems, particularly in helping to understand the logs. I, for one, would never figure this out on my own. I have successfully run a broadcast before, but there are so many variables that even a full test still gives me pause.

Thank you for helping us through these challenges.
lajackson
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Re: Sending but no receiving

#4

Post by lajackson »

Because it appeared that both the download speed (which didn't really matter) and the uplink speed (which was critical) on our stake center Internet had deteriorated significantly, I asked the FM Group to contact our provider and ask them to refresh the line. The FM Group questioned the name of the provider I asked them to contact and verified the building we were discussing. That was my first clue.

Unbeknownst to us, the FM Group "upgraded" our stake center Internet service from a provider giving 20/4 service to a Church national contract provider giving 15/2. During testing for stake conference, I was seeing 12 Mbps down and 1.8 Mbps up, which was abysmal for the provider I thought we had, but actually was great for the real provider.

My mistake was that I was not paying attention to the upload speeds. They were barely sufficient for a 1.5 Mbps send and the glimmer of success we saw causing us to ask about other problems distracted us from the actual failures we were experiencing.

Knowing now that we had been "upgraded", I advised the FM Group that 2 Mbps up was insufficient to originate a reliable stake conference webcast, and that we needed the 4 Mbps back again. They have ordered the next higher tier of service on the national contract, 60 Mbps down and 5 Mbps up. I think we will be able to manage a stake conference broadcast with that.

Thank you to rannthal for helping me troubleshoot all of the equipment along the way (which is working fine), and also for (reluctantly) pointing out that it would be good to check with our ISP on their service, because signs pointed in the direction that the Internet might be the problem. He called it right. The new, "improved" upload speed was killing us.
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Mikerowaved
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Re: Sending but no receiving

#5

Post by Mikerowaved »

It's good to periodically visit speedtest.net when the building is empty to keep tabs on the ISP's claimed throughput. Especially in the weeks leading up to a webcast.

Rather than duplicating it all here, you can read some more of my remarks in this thread:
https://tech.lds.org/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 81#p169381
So we can better help you, please edit your Profile to include your general location.
lajackson
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Re: Sending but no receiving

#6

Post by lajackson »

Mikerowaved wrote:It's good to periodically visit speedtest.net when the building is empty to keep tabs on the ISP's claimed throughput. Especially in the weeks leading up to a webcast.
I totally agree. I simply forgot to look more closely at the upload speed test results.

This will sound funny to the well-connected, but download speeds over 10M are so glorious around here that it is easy to become euphoric, and then the lack of oxygen affects the brain in other matters. [grin]
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