WIFI booster

[charlyhors]

Hi all,

We're presently in a small park, about 30 residents, and it has that rare thing - wifi of adequate range to reach our unit and kinda adequate capacity to stream Netflix.  We generally get pretty good netflix streaming during the day (a bit watery on the colors), but that is when we're doing work and errands.  In the evening, the reception is pretty on and off and frustrating - frequent stops for buffering, etc.  Is there anything we can do on our end to help this - a signal booster, or whatever?

Oddly, I have also noticed that the park network can be quite slow on surfing the web, but still can stream movies.  Does Netflix have some sort of priority on bandwith that could cause that?

[TXiceman]

Park WiFi is not intended for streaming.  WE have found several with a note to not stream and be considerate of others on the network.  Streaming gobbles up bandwith.

Ken

[docj]

21 hours ago, charlyhors said:

Oddly, I have also noticed that the park network can be quite slow on surfing the web, but still can stream movies.  Does Netflix have some sort of priority on bandwith that could cause that?

No, neither Netflix nor any other content provider has a priority under current Net Neutrality rules.  All data must be treated the same.  Of course, this is likely to change, but that's the case at the moment.

Netflix utilizes software which enables it to accommodate significant changes in internet bandwidth and still provide an acceptable image.  If you are on a marginal internet connection and you look closely at the screen during the show you will notice changes in the video resolution.  This is how Netflix copes with varying internet speeds; it degrades your picture a bit to avoid having it pause while it rebuffers.