Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

Discussions around receiving, originating, and holding Church broadcasts and conferences in meetinghouses including schedules, setup, equipment, and support.
russellhltn
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#11

Post by russellhltn »

You might want to assign a static IP to the device. I think the current firewalls are pretty good about assigning IPs for a reasonable period of time (a day) but the old ones would assign for an hour. Having an IP change on you wouldn't be fun. The IP you mentioned in your first post is in the middle of the DHCP pool.

If the unit is acting odd when cold like that, I'd start checking settings and looking at the video that's being fed to it. If the video is a little odd or not in agreement with the settings, I could see that driving the unit batty. From what I've heard, the video converter from SD to HDMI that was recommended at one time was pretty cheesy.

The Teradek is a $600-700 unit. I'm not sure of the model, but that brand tends to have 4 star ratings. It's not something ordered off of eBay or Alibaba. Getting things set up can be challenging, but it shouldn't be that bad.
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CalS201
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#12

Post by CalS201 »

mawhiteley wrote:
The vidiu goes brain dead a lot, nothing to do with internet bandwidth. It's on our LAN, plugged into the same switch as the computer trying to command/control it.
Did you add a switch to the network? Is it just a switch or a router/switch?
Are you connected through RJ45 in chapel overflow, RJ45 on wall in AV room, or RJ45 on front of EmTech AV Rack in AV room?

Have you tryed operating the VidiU on your home network (with DHCP addressing and correct subnet mask)?
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Mikerowaved
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#13

Post by Mikerowaved »

CalS201 wrote:Have you tryed operating the VidiU on your home network (with DHCP addressing and correct subnet mask)?
This was going to be my suggestion also. Try it either at home or another building. It would be good to rule out weird stuff going on with your stake center's LAN.
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russellhltn
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#14

Post by russellhltn »

Mikerowaved wrote:
CalS201 wrote:Have you tryed operating the VidiU on your home network (with DHCP addressing and correct subnet mask)?
This was going to be my suggestion also.
I agree. If nothing else, it makes it less of a hassle to mess with.
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lajackson
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#15

Post by lajackson »

mawhiteley wrote:However, our issue is we cannot get into the web interface to initially start or restart the broadcast. It takes 45 min. of rebooting to get into the interface. The vidiu goes brain dead a lot, nothing to do with internet bandwidth. It's on our LAN, plugged into the same switch as the computer trying to command/control it.
This is a little long and for what it's worth. I do not have a solution yet.

At our last stake conference, we were never able to connect to the VidiU interface. The only reason we were able to start webcasting the conference on time is because, after the last test a few days earlier, we went ahead and loaded the Sunday conference profile into the VidiU and selected it, so the VidiU was, in effect, ready to plug and play. The morning of the conference, we could never address the VidiU unit.

Because there was no interface, we were never able to see what the VidiU was encoding. The only check we had was that we have enough bandwidth at our stake center to bring down a return stream during the broadcast. We also put the receiving locations on alert to immediately notify us of any problem. If something had gone wrong, we would not have known until the end of the delay of about a minute and 10 seconds.

The only reason I let the conference webcast go that way is because of the confidence I have in the VidiU box. Even though I was effectively blind, I had had enough successful broadcasts that I trusted the box to work, even though we could not address it other than through the buttons on the front of the box, which is how we started and stopped the stream.

There is a way to enter the URL and stream codes into the box without the interface, but it is time-consuming and very painful.

The only change, to my knowledge, from the previous conference, is that the Cisco firewall was replaced with the Meraki firewall. That said, while I believe the meetinghouse network may be contributing to the problem, I am not ready to blame the problem completely on the firewall change.

Even before last stake conference, I have always had problems addressing the VidiU unit. Once it connects with the laptop, it usually stays connected. But until then, I have tried every browser on multiple laptops. It has become a little contest between my assistant and I to see who is able to make the connection first.

But while some VidiU boxes do flake and need to be replaced, I have confidence in the box itself. These identical boxes are used throughout the world in the broadcast industry. One national network has over a thousand of them feeding different broadcasts to member stations. Of note, however, I also know that that same network has a routine that reboots every VidiU on their network every night.

I have made a few feeble and unsuccessful attempts since our last stake conference to connect to and address the VidiU box. The FM Group is going to loan me another box to test and is prepared to have an extra box available for our next conference. Later this month and next if necessary, I will take the time to strip down the stake center network and see if something there is a part of the problem keeping us from connecting to the VidiU interface.

And if all else fails, I will have the first-time experience of loading the VidiU from the front panel. A lot of folks will share the pain with me if I wind up having do to that.
russellhltn
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#16

Post by russellhltn »

lajackson wrote:At our last stake conference, we were never able to connect to the VidiU interface.
I wonder if the DHCP changed the IP on you?

However, I think the main takeaway from your experience is that difficulty in connecting doesn't necessarily translate to a bad broadcast experience. We do need to be careful that we're not chasing a symptom that's not related to the real problem. (BTDT)
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lajackson
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#17

Post by lajackson »

russellhltn wrote:I wonder if the DHCP changed the IP on you?
The first step after the VidiU is turned on the morning of conference is to get the address from the face of the box. The next step is to use the laptop to locate the box on the network. Would the DHCP change the IP address in that short amount of time?

If the VidiU gets rebooted for some reason, the address needs to be retrieved again, of course, and it usually has changed. Would anything else cause it to change (other than a firewall reboot).

If the network changes the IP for some reason while the VidiU is running, will the VidiU know it and display the new IP address, or will it still display the old IP address. My guess is that the VidiU would stop working and need to be rebooted, starting the process all over again.
russellhltn
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#18

Post by russellhltn »

lajackson wrote:
russellhltn wrote:I wonder if the DHCP changed the IP on you?
The first step after the VidiU is turned on the morning of conference is to get the address from the face of the box. The next step is to use the laptop to locate the box on the network. Would the DHCP change the IP address in that short amount of time?
That would depend on how well the Vidiu updates the display. But I'd expect it to show the address.

All in all, I think I'd assign it a static address. The new firewalls allow for that.
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mawhiteley
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#19

Post by mawhiteley »

CalS201 wrote:Did you add a switch to the network? Is it just a switch or a router/switch?
Are you connected through RJ45 in chapel overflow, RJ45 on wall in AV room, or RJ45 on front of EmTech AV Rack in AV room?

Have you tryed operating the VidiU on your home network (with DHCP addressing and correct subnet mask)?
Thanks everyone for your suggestions and feedback. I have not done a good job separating the broadcast problems (rare) to the interface/connectivity problems (constant).

I picked up the Vidius and brought them home. I didn't have any trouble connecting to the web interface at home. While unlikely a factor, I don't allow ms windows in my home (we're a linux family). The computers at the stake center are all ms windows. Though I have tested with windows firewall and defender all disabled, no difference.

Given this home network test, it appears the brain dead behavior of the vidius is related to the network at the stake center. We have the IP address correct, 1) We pull it from the front panel interface, 2) I can ping it, 3) the Vidiu icon backdrop loads in the browser. However, after that, the "Loading" icon twirls indefinitely.

In our A/V closet, there is a single RJ45 jack. We have a 5-port netgear switch (pretty sure it's not a hub) the computer and vidiu are plugged into. The vidiu has never complained about not being "online". It checks for firmware updates every boot. Internet access must be working? While I do power cycle this box frequently during the troubleshooting, perhaps it should be replaced.

While at home, I took a number of mitigating steps:

1) Applied factory resets.
2) Turned off the vidiu WiFi router features.
3) Assigned static IPs tied to the MAC addresses for the stake center firewall (through the tm.lds.org website).
4) Assigned a password in the vidiu settings (while both our boxes have local connectivity issues, I'd say the one with the password works more often...maybe).
5) One box has the latest firmware update, and the other I have not let update (it's on 2.7.x something).

Thanks again!
mawhiteley
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Re: Ready to smash the Teradek Vidiu; alternatives?

#20

Post by mawhiteley »

russellhltn wrote:You might want to assign a static IP to the device. I think the current firewalls are pretty good about assigning IPs for a reasonable period of time (a day) but the old ones would assign for an hour. Having an IP change on you wouldn't be fun. The IP you mentioned in your first post is in the middle of the DHCP pool.

If the unit is acting odd when cold like that, I'd start checking settings and looking at the video that's being fed to it. If the video is a little odd or not in agreement with the settings, I could see that driving the unit batty. From what I've heard, the video converter from SD to HDMI that was recommended at one time was pretty cheesy.

The Teradek is a $600-700 unit. I'm not sure of the model, but that brand tends to have 4 star ratings. It's not something ordered off of eBay or Alibaba. Getting things set up can be challenging, but it shouldn't be that bad.
We have the Teradek converter from SD to HDMI. Before I was in the calling, at one conference, the audio quit working. While troubleshooting, I bypassed the audio from the Teradek converter right into the Teradek Vidiu analog in port. Guess I shouldn't have been so helpful because I'm "the guy" now. Anyway, that converter might be doing weird things. The broadcast does "look" normal when we do eventually get it working.

However, if a weird signal from the Teradek converter is causing the Vidiu to go unresponsive, that might explain why I can access the web interface at home, but not at the stake center. I'll try removing the HDMI connector from the Vidiu next time I run into this local connectivity problem.

Thanks for the tip.
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