Can't connect (listing files) anymore

I make a new thread because I've not found anything with these symptoms in other threads, including the "disconnects after 30 minutes" one. My symptoms are different.

I've been a happy user of Serviio for several years. In the last 1-2 years for reasons I better not talk about, I stopped using Serviio, to the point that I didn't reinstall it on my last Windows reinstall this march. This september I got a new computer, Win10 new and shiny, and after discovering my TV was working well after all, decided to reinstall and use Serviio again.

I connect my Philips BDP5500 blu-ray player to a ZTE router with ethernet cable, nothing complex. It has always worked, although the first time years ago I had a problem which was solved through this forum. I installed Serviio 2.1 without problems, shared a couple of folders, turned on the player and connected without problem, in fact the router and player configuration were the same and I didn't need to change anything. I don't use transcoding or anything, only video files as they are. It worked right away.

That was like a week ago. First day was fine, but following days I noticed that after using Serviio, and then making a pause or watching a physical disc movie, I couldn't reconnect to Serviio again. The symptom was not that there was no server, but that trying to connect it made my player unresponsive. I had to physically unplug the player to turn it off. No amount of resetting of computer, Serviio service, Serviio server, router and/or player in any order or combination would change that problem. The player would see the network, would try to connect to the server and stall without solution.

The curious thing was that next day I would be able to connect again, and use the player with my computer files for a while, before having again the problem described above. Once I got stuttering while watching a video, and I was wondering what could be. Resetting the player brought back the problem of not being able to connect. But next day I would be able to reconnect and use the player with Serviio for, once again, a while.

Last night I got that stuttering again, approximately after 90 minutes since connecting to Serviio, followed with the described problem trying to reconnect. And I started to think that it was a time-based problem, around 2 hours. It could be 90 minutes, it could be more, but can't know anymore. Since yesterday, I can't connect anymore. The problem is not that I get a "device disconnected" problem, nor "server disconnected". The problem happens when the device tries to retrieve the files from the server. I got to this conclusion because I was toying with the console and the device, and if I stop the server while the device is unresponsive, the device returns to the list of servers saying there is none. When I restart the server, it almost instantly appears in the device as available server, but connecting to it makes the device enter into "list" mode and stall again. Stopping the service makes the device say "server disconnected, check your blah blah blah". And I can go with that as long as I want, but once again, no amount of resetting of all parts of the connection will solve the problem.

Now I'm desperate because unlike other days, today it doesn't reconnect at the next day. I've read other threads, and tried stuff in my router. E.g. I tried connecting IPTV for that lan port - immediately the device couldn't find any server. I don't even find the multicast function. I checked the DHCP server and the IP lease time is 72 hours. I checked and rechecked every configuration in router, Serviio and device, reconnecting each alone trying to find a way to reconnect. Nothing works. I'm really desperate, and can't understand what's going on.

Any ideas, please? Thanks in advance.

[atc98092]

Hi! Let's see if we can get some detail here.

You mention connecting the BD player to your router. Is the BD player what you are using for your DLNA playback? I know that BD players seem to be getting worse about their support for DLNA.

The symptoms might be pointing to a networking issue. Personally, I don't like using the firewall router as my main network switch. Even though my DSL modem has four Gigabit ports, I just run a single cable to a 16 port Lynksys switch, and feed all my devices from that switch, including a couple of cascaded switched down-line. This removes any possibility of the router having issues sharing between network ports. we actually had another user about 6 months ago that had connectivity issues, and using a standalone switch resolved his problem.

I am assuming your Windows computer is also connected to Ethernet, and not using a WiFi network. Are your media files located on a hard drive on your Serviio computer, or on a network share somewhere? Just another detail needed.

It might help to see a copy of your Serviio log. It's located at C:\Program Files\Serviio\log. Note that as the log grows, it is capped at 5 MB and a new log is started, with the old log getting renamed with a sequential number from the last one.

I've not "solved" the issue, but found a workaround.

The only thing I didn't try about resetting and reconfiguring that I didn't try was reinstalling Serviio. And indeed it works. I reinstalled it and I was able to reconnect instantly. It worked for a few days and once again it wasn't able to connect on the "listing files" part. So the BD sees the serves, connects to it, but stalls at retrieving which files are available. So I don't think it's a network problem, but a configuration problem from Serviio. Maybe exclusive to my setup, dunno. I expect that the thing works for a few days without problems until it fails again, then I'll have to reinstall and reconfigure again...

Yes I use the BD for DLNA playback, and it's the same I've been using since I first started with Serviio years ago. Yes I plug the BD to the router, and IMHO there shouldn't be any difference than using a switch or anything else. Everything goes through ethernet and if it works once, I don't understand why it fails at the tenth time. Yes the files are in the Serviio computer, so I think it's about the simplest hardware and network setup you can do with Serviio (I can't connect the BD directly to the computer without disconnecting the router).

The only change I've made this time is installing Serviio out of "C:\Program Files" to see if it's a permission problem, which would mean a Windows config problem and not from Serviio. Next time the thing fails I'll paste relevant bits of the log file, and examine it myself to see if there's any clue there. I don't exclude the possibility of it being a network problem due to my everlasting inability to understand network stuff. I can tinker with Windows or Linux all you want, but put me a router config in front and I panic.

Thanks for your help.

Again after 5 days, same problem. The leasing time of the DCHP is 72 hours and I don't see any config in my router related to 5 days. Also the device was turned on during reinstallation and connection and listing worked instantly once installation finished, which reinforces my belief that this is not a network issue, or at least, not only network-related. Before reinstalling, I examined the log but it doesn't tell things like "device X requested connection" or "device X requested files" and such. Only stuff when starting or stopping the server and about adding files to library. So the log is useless for my problem. I think I'm doomed to reinstall and reconfigure Serviio every five days from now on.

[atc98092]

Well, no one else has to reinstall every few days, so there's something else going on. And my guess is it's some setting in Windows. My Serviio computers run 24/7, often without a reboot for months. Never have a connectivity issue.

Are you using a static IP address on your Serviio computer? If not, that's the first thing I'd try. I have my router set to begin assigning IP addresses at .20, and since the router itself is using .1, I can use .2-.19 for static assignments. I have one server on .2 and another on .5 as static addresses. You might also go into the Windows Device Manager and open the properties for your network card and see if it has a setting that allows Windows to turn it off for power management. If it does, turn that off so the NIC remains enabled at all times. If any of your media drives are connected via USB, do the same thing for them so the USB connection isn't powered off.