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my wifi is ok until i start playing games, every 2 minutes i have to alt tab to dc and reconect so it becomes stable again is there any solution i can buy other than an ethernet cable?
You should remove the two back speakers or the two right speakers to see if it's that they allocated what was it 44 and 48 Channel two separate areas or remove the subwoofer and then test I've seen stupid s*** like that
Goes back to a mantra I learned in my early networking career: wired when possible. Wireless may be better than in the past, but wired still beats it in everything but convenience. Also, kudos for corrections to past content, especially to sponsored videos.
@@anlealanleal3218 Many smart TVs an use a USB Ethernet adapter, allowing gigabit or greater hardwire networking. Worth a try if you want to hardwire your tv.
@@dylanevans5644 Sure, but it is ridiculous when you need to buy a tv and start playing around with appropriate USB adapters. And for sure it depends on tv os used.
Thanks for the follow-up Linus! I remember writing to you about possibilities time ago. There is something else to point out in this video. In your Wireshark view, you'll notice the 802.11 frames delivering the multicast traffic have an associated data rate with them of ~30Mbps, if I'm looking at the correct section of the video. Per the 802.11 standard, Multicast traffic must use the basic 802.11g (Wireless G, WiFi 3) data rates. This means 6, 9, 11, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48 and 54Mbps in the case of an 802.11ac radio. Sony also has the basic rates set to 6Mbps ( minimum for 802.11ac) so your beacons (for client link synchronization in this case) are sent out at a slower 6Mbps rather than at a higher basic rate. Sony is likely using Multicast to ensure the speakers are all synchronized and receiving ALL of the audio data for every speaker at the same time, then processing out their specific channel to play back. Likely also for latency, because Multicast is fire and forget. However, Multicast and Broadcast traffic as I pointed out previously, are massive drags on Wi-Fi as a technology. There are reasons why major Enterprise networks 1: Segment that traffic away from as many access points as possible when it must go over the wireless, and 2: Why Enterprise APs like your Ruckus support something called IGMPv3, where those Multicast packets are converted to Unicast packets, which the Wi-Fi radio can transmit AS FAST AS POSSIBLE (at full 802.11ac rates!) and get off the air as fast as possible, in the name of less airtime. I have personally seen entire corporate networks taken down by small amounts of multicast traffic, and this is why. Sony doesn't appear to be doing Unicast conversion because you're seeing Multicast frames rather than the client-to-client frames you see your Ruckus APs shooting out. The channel hopping you observed is another good thing to point out. This is Sony likely trying to avoid interference by spamming adjacent channels if that is a "while playing audio" capture, and yes that is yucky behavior. I've never seen Wi-Fi clients behave correctly when they're asked to channel hop on a dime. There is ALWAYS excessive latency. This could be why you're seeing excessive retries, and duplicated frames are counted as a retry. In my opinion, Sony should do the following. 1: Require the product to stick to a channel and never channel hop until rebooted or it is actually idle. 2: Switch the product to Unicast the audio frames over the air, and utilize 802.11 No Acknowledge/WMM for QoS/Latency on the Wi-Fi link, and re-design the software side of the speakers to account for a minuscule amount of latency. 3: When channel hopping, implement a LONG throttle.
I also kinda hoped he would do a base test and just try the speakers in an environment with no other devices in the area… but I guess that’s more of a labs thing
Reminds me of Panasonic's old style 2.4 GHz phones that used DSS (Digital Spread Spectrum) for channel hopping security. Killed Wi-Fi. Every. Single. Time. 😳🙄
@@bubbleboy821 tbh, wireshark and packet analyzing isn't complicated either. i used that stuff when i was 12, and to exploit networks not just look at the time stamps
@@MrPaxio TBF, back then a lot of network is basically open to exploit after you check wireshark for a bit intercept some useful frames, nowadays it is a bit harder.
Accountability is what makes the difference between an average content creator and an amazing content creator. You found what was wrong, pointed out the sponsored video you did, and let people know it turned out to be a load of bs. Don't think this could've been handled any better and it's what keeps me coming back to the LMG channels.
@Halibub nothing too bad, regarding accountability But we learned that he doesn't really watch videos. He gleams information from comments instead and making his workers summarize videos for him so he can form opinions. This made him missunderstand a video made about him regarding react content as being critically to him, when it was the opposite
@@jcfawerd Linus never assigned blame to his writer though, DarkViper was the one who came up with the idea that one of LTT's writers had a vendetta against him. Linus not watching the video and then bringing it up was a bit rude, sure, but he never criticized DarkViper or got mad at the video, he just used it as a segway for more discussion about reaction content.
It’s great to see troubleshooting done using WireShark. One thing to note is, the delta value between packets is calculated on the file that is loaded. WireShark does not change the delta when a filter is added. You need to export the file based on the filter and load the new file again. Hope it helps 😊
So since I’m a cybersecurity major now and just now starting to get into Wireshark, is this one of those scenarios when you would use a tool like NetWitness Investigator? Or am I completely off base?
There are 2 types of delta columns in Wireshark, "Delta time", which works as you have described, and "Delta time displayed", which calculates the delta of the displayed packets.
Something that would be good to know is what firmware the speakers are running. They did release a update 1.283 back in November that had some fixes like: Improves general performance, Improves Chromecast built-in connectivity, Improves stability of the wireless speaker connection.
Also, while I’m not a fan of Sony at all, they are not Apple. I don’t think it would be a massive issue for them to release a new firmware that either doesn’t channel hop, or filters channel hop based on a longer packet loss sample.
This. I had issues with my HT-A9 when I first got it, but over time it got better/stable. I no longer have dropouts. Heck, I lived in a crowded apartment complex at the time as well and was surprised by its performance and stability. As a precaution, I did have speaker prewire in my new house, so if the HT-A9 crap out on me or become unstable, I can just go back to my AVR.
This kind of problem could be fixed easily with a firmware update. It's a shame Linus didn't say if they had tried to contact Sony to see if they would provide a solution
massive props to admitting when you were wrong, and admitting especially when a sponsor was wrong. You remain one of the most reliable and honest tech youtubers today, despite being as big as you are.
I know these videos don't always get the most views, but I really do appreciate them :) They are far more educational while still being understandable to a slightly above average tech user. Thank you!
The lesson: If an actual Tech Guru (who has a literal army of tech guys, some secretly living in his house) can't get his home setups to work, what hope does the average user have?
@@FlyboyHelosim *in comparison to their other videos and I'd assume viewer retention could be low. I remember hearing on one of the wan shows that for these style videos their performance tends to be low. I just wanted to leave more than a like to let lmg know this content is always loved :)
Wow this seems like some actual good work, not just entertainment. Super bummed as I was really enthusiastic about these and wanted a future iteration for my future home. I really hope Sony responds to this or at least the AV tech tubers pick it up to to get a comment from Sony.
This video made me remember my days troubleshooting WILD networking problems with Wireshark. There's nothing more satisfying than coming back to the customer (or in this case the manufacturer) and basically saying "Hey, this is irrefutably exactly what's wrong" and there was absolutely nothing they could argue. Loved the video. It was really watcher friendly despite being such a technical topic.
I love how Linus (and team) is using the technology, finding issues, diagnosing the issues and telling everyone about them. Hopefully this will make Sony resolve the issues...
@@ilovefunnyamv2nd it was a sponsored video, and contract requirements aside TH-cam doesn't allow you to edit videos much and re-upload will just drive more traffic to it.
@@_framedlife The product is faulty. If it was a Sony sponsor, they messed up and should not receive that endorsement. If it was someone else sponsoring, they can get a free second video.
@@ilovefunnyamv2nd Not only did he specifically say he’s amending the already uploaded video IN THIS VIDEO, but he’s specifically spends the entire end of the video calling out how stupid this is and that he doesn’t want other people to have to deal with it. Watch the whole fucking video before you write a braindead comment. And yeah, who would’ve guessed a SPONSORED VIDEO would be an advertisement. Ffs
Sony stopped caring about the consumer in the mid-1980s. They will fix this in a later model and fight tooth and nail against declaring it a "design flaw" worthy of a recall.
I have to say I really enjoy these more technical videos and investigations of problems. I really think this is a good way to maybe bring more understanding to people about how certain things work. I like this kind of video because I am being entertained and an added bonus is that I am also learning new things! Looking forward to the Lab videos.
Their talents are really not used to potential while reviewing the newest bling bling tech; videos like this, fixing unexpected problems and showing how to do it for nerds is the gold of this channel. Watching the newest phone/gpu review one forgets they really know their stuff. Linus' home series is a hidden 'technology handyman' guide. Now I now how to troubleshoot wifi!
Technical breakdowns like this, while I don't always fully understand everything, I LOVE to watch, listen, and learn. These things are seriously interesting one way or another, and will also help me learn the thing that I don't understand. Keep these types of topics coming in top of the usual topics of "classic" LTT.
Sad thing that it is incorrect. @7:30 he complains that broadcast is bad, etc. Well, radio is always broadcast and goes to all listeners. Yes all wifi hits your laptop. You just put a tag on it to get discarded. Really doesn't matter if the tag is in the ethernet frame or the payload.
@@FreedomIsNotGoingToBeFree Modern WiFi has the ability to send signals directionally. Obviously there's always going to be spillover but you don't have to spam signals everywhere. Electromagnetic waves (which includes radio) are directional by nature. The higher the frequency the smaller the wavelength, the smaller the wavelength the more directional the waves become (a 10mm wave/photon is going to cover a 10mm line from it's emission source). Antennas send multiple copies of the same wave/photon in multiple directions (so multiple 10mm waves/photons can be sent in every direction carrying the same signal) but with modern tech these can be constrained to a much smaller area (10mm waves could be sent in a 30mm line). Note: I'm using 10mm just for convenience, I'm pretty sure most GHz radio signals are mm waves but don't know the exact conversions by heart. Sending the signals everywhere at once all of the time* instead of sending signals in the correct directions with some level of power constraints (don't need the living room right, rear speaker data in the neighbors backyard) creates a ton of unnecessary congestion (it is cheaper and easier to implement). The only reason I could see to do it this way (other than saving money on hardware and R&D) is to support a near infinite number of speakers but considering most people don't want or need more than one of each channel it's really not necessary. Other comments have suggested using unicast which may very well work with the hardware available (or at worst would add a small additional cost). If they used a newer WiFi standard (they're using WiFi 4 which is 802.11n) with Unicast they could use one directional antennae to get the data to each speaker in a short enough period of time to avoid noticeable latency. The speakers already have processors in them so sending some timing data to make sure each speaker is properly synchronized should be easy enough to do. *During setup and powerup it makes sense to send signals everywhere since the base unit doesn't yet know where the speakers are.
Sony can't advertise it as WiFi to users, as they will have unreasonable expectations on the features that the speakers will have. E.g. connecting to them from a laptop. Or believing they need a home network to set them up.
@@TilmanBaumann people will still expect to be able to connect the speaker to their home network like a sonos speaker which is what they are trying to avoid to keep latency low. At least, that is my assumption.
I get a little tingle every time you mention the labs team. They add a HUGE amount of value to the content coming out of the channel, but mostly channel 44 and 48 and sometimes both every millisecond or so.
Given your sponsor relationship with Sony, have you guys tried reaching out with your findings? Perhaps they could fix this with as little as a firmware update for the device? Or has that bridge been burnt?
Actually, now that it's mentioned, does Linus actually confirm the Sony speaker system is running the latest firmware? My one peeve with these esoteric devices is you then have to chase their patches from time to time.
Network Engineer here, the reason for the broadcast traffic is mainly to save bandwidth. Say you have 4 speakers on two channels. If you use unicast traffic, it’s 4 frames every cycle, each destined for the respective speakers. Now if you switch to broadcast, and all data for both channels can fit in a single frame, you’re suddenly sending only one frame each cycle. As you have more speakers, this saving only gets better. And since it’s WiFi, all traffic is always broadcast in the end anyway, it’s just that instead of the network interface filtering out unnecessary frames, the application running on the speaker has to do it itself. I’d imagine it’s not only a bandwidth thing, and more a latency issue, as streaming audio isn’t really constrained with bandwidth to begin with.
The funny thing is, I can remember looking at wireless audio solutions at least a decade ago, and deciding, then, that the technology just wasn't there. I'd have figured it would have been solved by now. At this point, I'll stick with wires for another decade.
9:55 @LinusTechTips ... I cannot thank you enough for the warning of extreme flashing. I used to suffer from epilepsy, and even though I never could be induced into a seizure due to flashing lights, I know what it's like to unknowingly have seizures occur out of nowhere. I thank you for the warning. 😊
Dude, I had a one year fight with my ISP because they were having a problem with one of their jumps on my route to any service that use the RTMP port like Twitch or TH-cam. I made a huge study and deep analysis about the problem and after one year and multiple calls with the level 3 support they finally addressed the problem.
@@funionsflagons7844 I monitored my and other people connections with pingplotter and wireshark for about 8 months and troubleshooting a bunch of things like cables, routers, other devices. Then i found some people who are huge network nerds helped me to understand everything and I wrote a document with my hypothesis on what could be the problem, pointing to the specific server location and I present it through the agency that regularizes internet usage in my country (kinda NTIA for US) and they fixed that knot on their network. I don't know if it was a configuration problem or a server error but they fixed it.
Sonos also causes a lot of problems with WiFi. Spent a long time diagnosing an issue at a clients home before we found out every single Sonos was creating its own hotspot, even when wired.
I would like your team to keep tracking this to real resolution. Aren't you building an EMI chamber? Put the base station and speakers inside and see if the channel hopping is there. As an EMI engineer, there are still a lot of questions I have about your room and proximity. What's the big magnetic coil in that sub putting out right next to the base? I personally have hardwired audio, and I agree that's the most reliable route, but the engineer in me doesn't think you've finished your analysis.
Even if it was the magnetic coil of the sub then that is something Sony should have addressed and not allowed the base station to even broadcast on them frequencies to start with then. Everything that he has done so far is testing the Sony themselves should have done and worked out before the product was released.
It’s a 5ghz signal. A subwoofer tops out at a few hundred Hz. And if it was the subwoofer it wouldn’t be an intermittent issue but happening every time the sub starts going. So that can’t be it
@@anonym3017 The sub amp could be class D, which would mean it would have a high switching frequency. But still, the sub amp shouldn't be putting out stuff in that range...
as a low voltage installer I always push for wire runs, wires suck but wifi is worse. I spend way more time messing with wifi the if I just would have just run wires. this is a great video series, love watching you go through all the problem and your unique solutions.
It's not as simple as wired is always better than wireless, but everything being wired is a good starting point and work from there to what would be convenient having wireless? For example wireless speakers are kind of stupid because you wont exactly move them around a whole lot, which *might* not be the case for headphones. I'll stick to having all of my audio equipment be wired but everything else is on the table if not having wires is more convenient.
@@vega272k8 I'm not familiar with that product but I think you misunderstood that product. If a product in any way "boosts" your WiFi, it HAS to USE your WiFi. You can't tie a rope to nothing and expect to pull anything with it. Same thing applied to the WiFi "booster". If you need to boost your WiFi, run a cable and plug in a business grade WiFi point like a Mikrotik or Ruckus. Avoid Ubiquiti and similar similar companies with poor software and poor client support.
Wired speakers are literally the definition of the type of tech you should advocate for, Linus. They are FULLY user repairable, FULLY user upgradable, and they need the exact number of wires run into them as WIRELESS. You could make an absolute ton of content on speakers and home audio, too.
@@c1ph3rpunk everyone is wrong sometimes, the difference with Linus and their team is that they admit when they are and correct previous information/videos. Don't see an issue with that at all!
you have to search for non-wifi based interference in channel 48 and 44 using an RF analyzer to see if other equipment (non-wifi) is the source of why the sony box is jumping channels.
Yup, very quick of them to just put all the blame on sony. Especially after doing zero steps (shown in the video) of diagnosing the true issue. Almost like they didn't learn anything from their last video.
It could also make a nice video about software-defined radio. Do you have any clue whether some SDR can receive as high as 5 GHz? Because I'm sure they won't want to spend 15,000 dollars for a spectrum analyzer (something like Keysight's N9322C).
Yep. Some devices might even be susceptible to noise on the power line (EG the sub!). So filtering the power, or running it off a Jackery as a test might give some incite.
if you look around your room, it seems like you have some sort of wall trim going up the corners and around the edge of the roof, along with skirting boadr on the floor. you could try hollowing those bits of trim out and using them to hide wires going around the room to speakers and other devices. might be a lot of work considering youve already finished the construction and rennovation steps of your house but if you dont want to see the wires it might be an easy way to hide them.
For some devices, such as mice, wireless actually has advantages over wired due to the distance a wired signal has to travel being longer than the distance a wireless signal has to, and both approaching the speed of light. However, for audio, this does not appear to be the case yet.
Its funny how he has followed a strict no battery policy and is willing to run wires for anything electric, but remains so resistant to using cables for audio.
And wired heating controllers that still connect to his network wirelessly so he's always taking moments out of his life to get them to pair together properly.
My HT A9s were giving me issues at my old apartment as well. Constant drop outs and I had to reset it all the time. I figured it was because my router was too close to the Sony receiver (but I couldn't really move it) plus I was in a very cramped area with wifi bulbs and kitchen microwave and two computers etc etc. Once I moved to my larger apartment, the wifi bulbs are gone but the router is in a closet so nothing is hardwired at my TV, yet I haven't had a single issue since moving. It's certainly weird.
Honestly, at this point it would be easier if Linus puts down the blinds during shoots instead of an editor needing to pixelate the background every time.
Presumably you guys have reached out to Sony, seems like they might be able to fix this with a software update? If so I'd love a follow up, I'm just surprised you didn't mention contacting them, because it'd be crazy not to in this scenario when they sponsored you to put this setup in your home.
For me Sony has been great with software updates for fixes and added features. Although it takes too long to receive them. My TV didn't come with VRR and since it was a last year's model I thought that the rumours of them adding it was never going to happen but sure enough they did it. And my Sony receiver while playing Dolby Atmos it made a horrible popping sound on the back right speaker when pressing pause or fast forward but they fixed that too.
@@Hopgop1 Having an in with the marketing department means very little for the actual engineering teams. Remember that Sony is a massive company with a ton of different consumer markets. LTT is but a small mouthpiece for all of Sony.
@@Beakerbite Sure, but if I was Sony North America’s marketing department, I’d be very worried about this very bad marketing. And the edit on the sponsored video they paid for.
Im a low voltage installer and do a lot of AV work, in my experience the best “wireless” surround experience is Sonos, a Sonos arc bar under the tv, a latest gen sub and either 2 Sonos One SLs or Sonos Fives as surround. Using the Truetone feature makes room correction super simple and it sounds fantastic for the trade off of not having to rip up drywall or use wire mold to run wired speakers
I've never been a fan of any speaker that relies on software to work, this just hits the nail on the head for me. I have a soundbar, and it is the worst audio solution I have ever spend money on, I cannot wait till I can afford to go back to having just speakers, subwoofer and an AV-Receiver again, really sad I didn't keep my old stuff :(
ive been experimenting with my AVR by using coaxial car speakers hooked up straight to the AVR. So far its been amazing for a tenth the price. I don't have the gear to confirm frequency response but they have a much wider band compared to home theater speakers and the coaxial car speakers also already have crossover built into them. But the downside seem to be one needs to be careful about impedance luckily my AVR handles 4 ohms at 100w. A second downside is no boujee mdf box included.
A good sound bar is better than any built in speaker solution. Keep your head up! Be like Buddha and "want what you have." (You'll get there. If you're stressing over speakers, you're doing pretty damn well yo!)
Really great work. Regarding the room correction in avrs: I switched recently from the Sony STR-DN1080 to the Marantz SR6015. In my 5.1.2 setup, the difference was remarkable. The imaging and low end got a massive upgrade in clarity and oomph, all else being equal. The Sony didn't do a bad job, but the multi spot audyseey room correction from Marantz/denon is a highly sophisticated piece of engineering.
I have to agree here. Having owned a number of Denon and Marantz AVRs over the years, their Audyssey room correction has never failed to impress me, especially on the higher end units.
Something that would be really useful is a long-term wifi router test, one that tests multiple routers over weeks or even months to see if they can sustain performance. I've experienced some routers which seem to slow down over time (days or weeks) but then suddenly get better after rebooting. I wonder if some resource within the router is leaking and causing this to happen.
from my experience a lot of routers have overheating issues, my asus RT-AX88U would run super hot. I took a wild shot and placed it on a laptop cooler to blow air right into the bottom intakes and now my router runs for several months without issues.
I honestly think this is why my TP Link Deco app has a setting that forces the routers to restart everyday at 2am because that restart clears the cache and now when I check the network optimization it always optimized because every day it's checking that the configuration is optimal!
Fluke and Ekahau software are professional grade tools the big players use. Common interference points include fluorescent bulbs/ballasts, janky wifi devices, stucco mesh, water piping, and microwaves
Mesh and pipes are only an issue if they're between the connecting devices, Linus put access points all around his house to mitigate these and other passive issues. Microwaves mostly put out 2.4GHz waves (some actually put out 900MHz but those are quite rare), most of his devices are using 5GHz or are far away from his microwave. His previous video looked for other sources of active interference like fluorescent lights and janky WiFi devices. He already knew the issue was active interference since it's intermittent (if it was passive it would be a constant issue unless the passive interference only affected certain channels and the devices weren't properly avoiding those which is highly unlikely).
"keyword optimized description (should be two lines long in the TH-cam text editor and include the product name) - Copy from Trello" Thanks for the detailed description!
Have they not said time and time again they are currently: Onboarding more staff, Rolling out new procedures, and Developing new software and documentation. Something will slip through the cracks from time to time.
I just love wireshark, as an IT it's one of the most useful tools I have learn in my career. Not only you can troubleshoot wifi, but you can also use it to figure out why your iscsi is having latency issues, why network transfers are slow and I could go on. It's probably too complex to go in deep on LTT but if you want to become a better sysadmin (or network engineer) well this should be in your toolbelt.
As a network professional of 25 year, the only questions during interviews is knowledge of HTTP, HTTPS, SSH, IP, IGMP, ICMP, Multicast, TCP and UDP and using Wireshark, we pull it up during interviews. All the other knowledge I can get into a candidates head with near free training from the vendors once they are on the job, but the candidate need to know this before learning what a NAT, PAT and Rule is to truly understand a modern more than one layer on the OSI model firewall. With a bit of free wireshark videos one can appear to be ready for Networking Jobs that are a hell of lot better than helpdesk.
As someone who doesn’t work in IT, these videos are the real reason I subscribe. I’ve seen enough LTT PC builds to last a lifetime. I much prefer these deep dives into problem solving. The home build, the new LMG location, the upcoming Labs facility, the LTT merchandise R&D, etc. Give me more of that any day.
This video is why i'm so excited about the future of your "Labs" project - skip the fluff, give us some details to better inform us about purchasing decisions. I liked your sponsored video of the sony speakers, but it's cool that you have revisited them (after a year?) and now thoroughly can't recommend. looking forward to DiRAC and Audessy shootouts. You should also add a custom room DSP with something like Mini DSP (or even QSC QSYS) + SMAART to cover all bases - should be interesting!
I'm so happy i watched this video, the part about using the wifi scanner app to figure out the interference was super helpful I managed to find a few channels no one was using and set my wifi router to channel 120 which avoided all the other 30AP in the area
I'm not entirely sure where the confusion about the protocol used stems from, in the spec sheet they pretty clearly denote that on the interfaces side, it can use WI-FI and Bluetooth for wireless comms - that "Wireless Audio Specification v4.0" is almost certainly just a higher level protocol.
Looking forward to that "best mainstream room correction" video. I'm in the market for a new AVR, and they all have their own version of mic+software room correction. It'll be nice to see a real head-to-head of that tech.
All of this is just making me realize I don't want a smart home, and I work for a major ISP so I understand how a lot of this works and it just doesn't seem worth the trouble
i hate going into sub’s smart homes and ask to troubleshoot those devices myself. just wire up everything to one single platform. some customers have like three different brands of smart home products and i’m just like why do you make my job difficult? lol
Smart home uses 450-900MHz transmissions. Mostly they send data when used, anything using 2,4GHz or 5GHz is evil. I remember when we track a rogue 2,4GHz network without SSID and MAC, that's was very intermittent only when my nephew drive his RCs.
Purchased the HT-A9's with the subwoofer. Linus' video was one of many vids that convinced me to do so. Overall pretty happy as I haven't experienced any problems like Linus. Hope SONY is able to address this or give us an explanation as to what's happening.
@@nisseost1 I could see that, but it sounds like he’s not really getting much help from Sony. I am assuming he’s tried to have them assist, but I know that assumptions are frequently wrong.
Same, his review was a major influence in my purchase of this unit. While I occasionally get drop offs on quality mode, it's been super solid on connection mode. I don't think I saw which mode he is running his system under. I can't tell the difference between the two settings but other audiophiles might.
I've been using metageek for years. Good stuff. Also, even a basic surround sound amp will come with a mic on a long cable. You set the mic in your listening position and run room correction, and it sets the room up for your speaker placement. It works well. Glad to see this - my latest p supports wifi speakers, so I've been thinking of setting up some back speakers in my living room. Good to know that that might be a bad idea.
He certainly knows how to do it that way, iirc it was even in James' upgrade video where the higher end AV amp had a fairly premium mic /tester included. I'm sure Linus' home theatre amp has one too.
"keyword optimized description (should be two lines long in the TH-cam text editor and include the product name) - Copy from Trello" my favourite description!
Linus's house makes me never want a smart house ever but who am I kidding, I'll never be able to afford a house anyway so I really have nothing to worry about.
Lol I have a smart home and have almost none of his issues lol. Also this issue is so dumb. Just wire the speakers to a receiver. No need for them to be wirleess
Agree with the other commenter i have a smart house with absolutely no issues, linus just really sucks at smart home stuff. Any techie worth their salt knows that anything using the same band will interfere. He literally knows and explains this as one of the reason he chose z wave over zigbee (as zigbee can possible interfere with 2.4ghz wifi) what this tells me is he didnt bother doing any research on the wireless audio (as with all his smart home stuff) and ended up like this.
@@TheRealGigaCat idk ask Linus why he decided to not put wires into STATIONARY speakers when he was designing this house and they were doing all the work to it.
@@Fine_i_set_the_handle agreed. Out of all the cool tech things Linus did to this house using wireless speakers is the most dumb and pointless since speakers rarely need to move lol
gotta love when the template stuff stays. "keyword optimized description (should be two lines long in the TH-cam text editor and include the product name) - Copy from Trello"
I can see why those making the Wi-Fi standards are trying to tap into more varied frequencies if Linus is having this much trouble even now. Maybe that curse of never fully closing up your PC before you run a test applies here as well.
Not really, the point of all the explanation in the video is to prove that this sony system which claims to be different from wifi is misbehaving. It's tripping face first into its own feces. There are no interference sources, it was just designed like shit and makes itself stutter because it randomly decided it wanted to change channels. No other wifi device in the house is doing anything like this.
@@Fuego065 Really there should be at least 4 non-overlapping channels due to 4 colour theorem. Have not worked out if operating in 3D space (like an apartment building) would require a 5th channel.
@@edc1569 well, technically internally it can, the fast fourier transform is the same. The issue is it is constrained not to pass on more to the computer. I would be breaking out the proper RF analysis gear with this and looking at things like the waterfall charts showing all the noise over time.
This!!! This explains a lot of my issues I had with an android tv box being so close to my router but having wifi drop outs so often. It is between my Sony soundbar and its wireless subwoofer, which could also have been wired being so close to each other, but no such option is offered by the hardware. It was driving me insane and I ended up buying a TP-link wifi extender just so I can connect the Android box via ethernet.
I had intended to purchase these, only thing that had prevented it was that they were almost entirely out of stock in my local market all of last year. Hopefully they can address the issues with a firmware update but yes, all of that said, the fact that the base control unit doesn't allow for a wired connection to the speakers is rather sad as they could have had wired and wireless built in without significantly impact to the B.O.M. per unit cost. I guess now back to the drawing board for another solution that offers the same benefits (ie. Extremely flexible speaker placement and sufficient digital smarts to not only do room correction but also account for far from ideal speaker placement, while also offering support for the modern standards such as Atmos) without the botched implementation.
Supporting both is non-trivial. The hardware needed to make a system like this work vs a wired one is very different and would require a completely different system architecture that would have to be baked into the way this system works.
I like the deeper dive content. In this case, could the dropped packets from the speakers themselves be the source of the frequency hopping? It doesn't look like it's happening often enough to be the source, but I could see a resend rate like that being interpreted by the software as a reason to try switching bands.
this is the best video u have made in a long time, you actualy understaind the problem rather than barf out some bull to make another video. u being humble and understanding the tech, is why i watch you.
Maybe a random question, but any reason the editors opt for mosaic blur instead of a Gaussian? I feel like the mosaic blur of any of Linuses windows is much more distracting (and eye-catching) than a Gaussian blur would be. Not a huge deal, just something I end up inevitably looking at more than Linus in these shots 😅
well... mosaic blocks more and is "easier", but I suppose they could have ran both? Mosaic first then Gaussian over the mosaic to "smooth" it. tho it might have been even better to white BG mask it?
@@musicalock privacy! It can be easy to identify a neighborhood by memory if someone is familiar and I’m sure it just gives Linus some peace of mind. We are unfortunately in a world where the reality of some improbable viewer finding the home of influencers and doing something nefarious is too high, so I don’t blame him at all given how high profile he has become. Just wish there was a little less visual distraction :-)
@@musicalockIt's so that it's harder to figure out his house's floor plan just by looking at videos, which could be a problem if anyone wanted to rob him.
That’s super sweet that MetaGeek was able to help out so much! The parent company Auvik Networks Inc. is based out of Waterloo. 100% would recommend reaching out to them for network management software. Especially now that you’re using multiple sites.
I have the same sound system and my friend has been complaining about wifi instability & dropouts since I hooked them up. He did have a suspicion that it might be the speakers that's interfering with our wifi network but I told him it's impossible. Now I believe him lol. Definitely getting the hardware & software that's needed to try this method. BTW, Keep up the good work, been watching your videos since I was 15 (2015) and I've learned so so much from it. Dropped out of school when I was 17 and started my career as an IT Technician since then. You've inspired me and made me what am I today. Thank you 😄😄😄
There's some kind of setting for this system to either prioritize sound quality or connection quality. In the last video, Linus had his set to "sound quality", and did not address that in this video. I'd be interested to see if changing that setting did anything for your friend.
Maybe having the Sony "router" right next to the Sub is not such a good idea, it has a large magnetic field and power supply. It is also at ground level in a cabinet with a large thick heavy object filled with metal coils probably blocking signal one whole side. I would try moving it up to the shelves and see how well it performs then.
@@kikihun9726 The Sony marketing reps are going for style, not function for the brochure. Plus I bet the cabinet that it is in is very well built out of thick plywood. I would not be surprised if the TV shelf was 1" plywood given the age of the house and that a tube TV probably sat there originally (from his house tour video). Open air shelving with glass probably would let the signal through very well.
@@mike123abc More likely sony used a single wifi chip for internal wifi and the speaker connectivity and now it has interferrence issue. This would explain the lots of resent datas.
The downside of the all wireless house is that it generates an insane amount of electro smog. I LAN wire everything possible in my house as a base principle, even using power line adapters to reduce electro smog as much as possible. Leaving the wireless only devices using wifi. Another solution is to use hidden Enterprise wifi SSID with a Radius server ( common on home NAS’s ) 5 minutes lifespan encrypted key, you will need to enlist the devices and install a certificate profile on the devices to connect, but the bright point is that you have the highest security available for your wifi and the enterprise enabled wifi router (you need to activate enterprise mode on it) will ignore any wifi client requests and by so not answer back, staying hidden and lowering a lot wifi traffic. Also make sure you don’t have a subnet storm due to excessive broadcast.
I think it would be interesting to see what is inside of that qos packet that it sends prior and after channel switch. The speaker might find some parameter not acceptable but it is not noticeable right now. You should definitely try to test it in your lab as others said here in comments
The QoS packet contains channel quality information. This information is what the broadcaster is using to choose between continuing the same channel or switching to another channel. But none of the objects in the house are moving, so I'm surprised that channel quality is varying. Maybe Linus should sit outside the room while capturing packets, just to be sure.
I know this is the least important thing in the video but thank you so freaking much for having that warning come on screen before you showed the flashing data, it's a small thing but it makes the experience so much better for me (and I assume people like me).
Linus this is a great video! I’m a heavy equipment mechanic for Cat and I love finding the true root cause of a failure! Keep up the good work and I’m super excited to see what all the lab team comes up with!
5:41 "That is our base unit that I hid on top of the other base unit. Get it hahaha that's a subwoofer... sorry, anywho" Linus apologizing for his dad joke is funnier than the joke. XD
Ahem, it says it's using 40MHz channel width which means the transmission uses BOTH channel 44 and 48. So it's not actually swapping, it's always using the "44+48" 40MHz channel (sigh, Wireshark!). Linus needs to check for traffic on channel 36 and 40 too, since those will *overlap* channel 44/48 if someone uses 80MHz or 160MHz channel width on channel 36. And in the brief glance we see of the ToNic spectrum view we see at 5:35 there appears to be at least 4 devices on channel 36 with 80MHz channel width which means they'll stomp over channel 44 and 48! So the solution might be as simple as "reduce channel width to 40MHz on everything" - reducing channel width and using consistent channel width both help with preventing "stomping" on nearby channels so it'd give him a double-whammy. That's no excuse for Sony's firmware deciding to set itself up for this... Other things: Sony is using terminology correctly with "Wireless Sound System 4.0", it's just Linus that is confused about what it means. Clearly it's a custom audio distribution system running ON TOP of Wifi, just as... every other such system these days (and what should be expected from what Sony said). It's probably using UDP packets to transport audio data via multicast. And no, broadcasting this doesn't waste bandwidth/spectrum, for this specific application sending individual audio streams to each speaker would use MORE spectrum/bandwidth than the broadcast approach. It does complicate the "lost packet" and the decoding on the satellites slightly but if they're mains powered that's may well be the right choice.
Thank you for commenting. I was blinking at the end of this video wondering how so many smart people missed this. Their brains were probably turning into mush after staring at millions of packets of data for hours, though, so I can understand that. Been there many times myself.
Finally someone that pick up this. *What is occuring is the one of the NIC system is not communicating on the channel-width/bond correctly. the Primary channel should be 40. Most likely the NIC driver or card is not capable of doing channel bonding. See this behaviour on warehouse RF scanners and cheap WiFi NIC cards. Resolution, change the sony WiFi to 20MHz, plenty of throughput, or upgrade the NIC cards
I'm so glad that this followup video was made. The last video blaming the zwave switches just didn't seem plausible to me. I was really hoping you would find some unexpected device that was causing strange interference but of course it turned out to just be a(probably) software bug on the Sony system. I have a stupid amount of smart home stuff and I always seem to have random performance problems with a few of them. This just makes me think that while interference might be some of it, most likely these cheap wifi iot devices just have bad wifi stacks that don't deal with networks with lots of devices well.
LTT is just a video production company that talks about tech. When it comes to actual networking and systems knowledge, they show a hobbyist level which is why they get themselves in to situations like these. They make great content but you have to take some of this with a grain of salt, especially when there are paid advertisers involved. Maybe they should test out the products a bit better before making a video about them. They may have removed the videos, but they still collected the ad revenue for them.
It was obvious from the first video seeing the waterfall plot completely saturated as soon as they pointed their directional antenna at the Sony shitbox. Saturating whole spectrum bands with gibberish can't be good.
@@jenda386 well it's not gibberish, it's streaming audio, so that part makes sense. The problem is its hopping channels for no apparent reason. What ever parameters the software uses to determine when it needs to change channels must be faulty. Maybe triggered by a generally busy wireless space due to lack of testing. One would hope that the problem would be solved through an update but it's possible the wireless stack wasn't even built by Sony(it's just regular wifi it turns out) so fixing it might be complicated.
@@BobSchmidt they are definitely hobbyists. I think that's the value of the channel though. If you aren't in those specific industries then you get to learn with them to an extent. People often find better value in that than hearing from someone who is so deep in the topic that they can't properly relate to a general audience. Mistakes will be made, and as long as they rectify them I don't really see an issue.
From what I remember , they aren't quite just 'cheap off the shelf' usb adapters, but ones that support promiscuous mode, which is pretty much needed for wireshark type of stuff. I don't really see much need for the Sony to be hopping or swapping bands, or not being able be told to stick on a user selected band. I'm all for some tech that would work in an auto mode that avoids congested bands, but when it's clearly not working as intended, then just let me go manual. Boo to Sony though for the misleading terms on the product, but they'll probably say their 'specification' relates to how the packets are fed via QoS, or something.
The only time I go with wireless is if it’s something portable or that needs to be moved around a lot. Otherwise, wires are the way to go. Sometimes though the convenience of wireless does have its upsides, like it’s a lot easier for me to connect my pc in my workshop to wifi rather than run a new Ethernet cable across the backyard and all that entails.
Props for going back and amending a sponsor video. Owning a mistake and helping others learn from it is a rare skill in the world atm where people stick with the wrong solution or mindset no matter what evidence is shown.
Well, already bought the Sony sound system because of LTT"s old video. After half year of use, I have not really notice any issues. But my house do not have nearly as many wireless devices as Linus' house.
Linus is a hell of an edge case, but this can impact people in cities living in apartments... ... then again if ya in an apartment you ain't got the money for this, and if you have money you'd be in an good mansion/ house out of the city...
@Linus Tech did you raise this issue with Sony? It would be interesting to hear what they have to say about it. And it may be something that is fixable with a firmware update. Now that this been _proven_ to use standard WiFi, if Sony actually cares about their customers, a wonderful option would be to have the settings user adjustable so you can tell it to use a fixed WiFi channel.
It's POSSIBLE to help some of this as @SGCSmith and @Morgan Hill have pointed out in the 1rst upper Great Dissecting of Sony's dropping the ball as usual. It took them WAY over 2-3 years to push the update for 4K TVs ! DAM !!
I think a simultaneous spectrum analyzer capture needs to occur in tandem with the Wi-Fi capture. There may be spurious RF sources that are not Wi-Fi related causing the Sony software to hunt for a more clear channel
This is a brilliant workout where the problem came from. As a consumer i would never been able to troubleshoot this problem. So thank you for this fantastic video
There are many receivers with room correction (dirac) also you should consider in ceiling speakers for the wife approval factor also a soundbar like the ambio from Sennheiser might fill your audio needs , you got a killer home cinema you can get by a mitigated experience in the living room also believe me being an audiophile for sometime I finally understand other people don’t care for sound quality as long is good enough they want something that works without intruding too much
Yes! I don't understand how Linus hasn't heard of Dirac Live. It is full state-of-the-art room correction, comes with many of the best new AVR options, and will blow the Sony system out of the water paired with any half-decent system. Plus the guys that made Dirac are super cool.
If you used Tonic to capture you could have missed a few frames since the adapter jumps from channel to channel, Metageek has another software called Eye P.A that let's you set static channels to capture. I would also try and move the main unit away from the subwoofer because you can experience some sideband interference. Use Chanalyzer again to see if that is the case. Also, 802.11n on such a new system. Yikes!
Since the Nakamichi Dragon 11.4.6 system is coming out soon, I'd love to see an in-depth review of their wireless implementation especially if you decide to make a Holy $h!t episode about it. Unlike any other soundbar, they have been given the AVR decoder for Dolby Atmos rather than the soundbar decoder, which means in theory they have MUCH better room correction than any other "soundbar" in history. I use that term loosely because of a) the price of the unit and b) because of how many speakers are actually in the thing: 11 bed level drivers, 6 up firing drivers, and two DUAL driver subwoofers. They've marketed it as a plug n play system like any other soundbar, but with the fidelity and modularity of a true AVR-based system. You can turn off each and every driver individually as well as play stereo music in true stereo mode to avoid the kind fake upscaling that messes with the original audio. They're also claiming 3000W of total RMS power as well as over a dozen independent amplifiers and all the speaker enclosures are automotive-grade steel, so whatever wireless system they're using must be very, VERY powerful. It could prove to be a very interesting analysis.
That 3000W is probably limited to European markets since most North American plugs max out at 1800W continuous. Nonetheless it sounds like an interesting product.
@@spdcrzy Ah, that makes more sense (and in hindsight is kind of obvious). I suppose the next question is what other power levels does it support. The thing about audio amplifiers (afaik, something could have changed) is that they always pull their maximum power regardless of volume settings. To combat this and keep power consumption more reasonable most systems actually switch between multiple amplifiers of different strengths depending on volume level (you can sometimes hear a delay when changing volumes across thresholds). If those amps are always pulling max power it would be a nightmare for the electric bill.
@@grn1 I don't know what classes the amps are yet, but considering just how many discrete amps they were able to pack into SUCH a small footprint (all things considered), I'm guessing they're quite efficient.
okay... Why the hell would anyone use wireless system for your home theater surround speakers? Especially someone like Linus who essentially custom built the house around his gadgets. First of all, you still need to power the speakers, so it doesn't save you anything. Just run the speaker wires in the walls and ceiling and power it directly with the the receiver's amps. Serves him right.
Okay here me out. I only say this because I’m a helicopter tech but this may have no correlation. His sub is right there and I’m wondering if that can produce a low enough frequency to affect the internals of the controller. This is sometimes a common issue on helicopters components that are worn out the shaking causes them to do weird intermittent faults and there is no way to know the component is failing until it had completely failed. but if it isn’t built for that kind of stress it could be causing unnecessary switching of wifi band some kind of failure somewhere in the box. Just an idea.
I own these speakers and also had audio dropouts. After seeing the last video, I moved every device that was on 5ghz to 2.4 and haven't had any issues since.
@@marcogenovesi8570 I've been saying for years that having "license free spectrum" without any stipulations on what can use it was a BS move. There's a lot of devices like this and they will almost all use channels 36-48, the most used WiFi channels, because they would never work on DFS channels where they have to switch if they detect radar and its cheaper to not be DFS certified. I was also able to completely block my Nintendo WiiU gamepad from working if I set my WiFi channel to 36 and completely hammered it with traffic. Anything latency sensitive needs to be on dedicated spectrum, not sharing with WiFi. Its why cordless phones in the EU/UK have their own dedicated frequency.
This could also explain why some people have had issues with the Samsung sound-bars with wireless rear speakers too. I'm guessing they're doing the same thing. (Makes me want to Wireshark my setup to see if this is the case). I haven't had dropouts, but I was also using higher channels on my WiFi)
Interestingly, I use a Vizio soundbar with wireless sub and surround at rear. Zero issues encountered and from a system around $300 purchased at my local Sam's Club!!!😳🙄
@@fookingsog well sure, though they've had quite a few issues around data gathering and selling. It's quite possible them speakers implement a good approach to wireless, since I've not actually heard about much problems regarding them, or they are used by people without a lot of other wifi devices, I dunno.
Loved this video. I learned about a ton of tools I could use some day! Thanks for having wireless speaker issues, Linus! You must really love your audience and making content!
Boost your productivity with the help of Grammarly and its tone suggestions! Sign up for an account and get 20% off Grammarly Premium: grammarly.com/LTT
Does Grammarly Premium come with free ice cream for Riley?
my wifi is ok until i start playing games, every 2 minutes i have to alt tab to dc and reconect so it becomes stable again is there any solution i can buy other than an ethernet cable?
You should remove the two back speakers or the two right speakers to see if it's that they allocated what was it 44 and 48 Channel two separate areas or remove the subwoofer and then test I've seen stupid s*** like that
Is Linus incompetent or just plain lazy? He didnt even try to solve the problem!
I feel so bad for you but know I know why my wifi does that and why my speakers sound like the the internet of the phone lines 😢
Next Video: "I give up... Why Wired Speakers are the Future of Sound"
Lmao yep
Love your older videos BTW. I liked when the writer did videos... it's killing me I can't remember his name
Epic channel crossover announced!!
@@TheNuclearGeek Fun fact, the headquarters of TodayIFoundOut are technically only about a 30 minute drive from Linus and co. ;-) -Daven
@@TodayIFoundOut that today I found out is based near LMG…
Goes back to a mantra I learned in my early networking career: wired when possible. Wireless may be better than in the past, but wired still beats it in everything but convenience.
Also, kudos for corrections to past content, especially to sponsored videos.
Btw, for today's smart tv sometimes it is not even possible. Manufacturers still uses old 100mbit port. But constantly updating wifi. That's sad.
@@anlealanleal3218
Many smart TVs an use a USB Ethernet adapter, allowing gigabit or greater hardwire networking. Worth a try if you want to hardwire your tv.
@@anlealanleal3218 just don't buy it if it has 10/100 then they will soon learn not to penny pinch.
@@dylanevans5644
Sure, but it is ridiculous when you need to buy a tv and start playing around with appropriate USB adapters. And for sure it depends on tv os used.
@@TheWebstaff I am afraid there is not so many of us to make it even visible by manufacturers.
Thanks for the follow-up Linus! I remember writing to you about possibilities time ago. There is something else to point out in this video. In your Wireshark view, you'll notice the 802.11 frames delivering the multicast traffic have an associated data rate with them of ~30Mbps, if I'm looking at the correct section of the video. Per the 802.11 standard, Multicast traffic must use the basic 802.11g (Wireless G, WiFi 3) data rates. This means 6, 9, 11, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48 and 54Mbps in the case of an 802.11ac radio. Sony also has the basic rates set to 6Mbps ( minimum for 802.11ac) so your beacons (for client link synchronization in this case) are sent out at a slower 6Mbps rather than at a higher basic rate.
Sony is likely using Multicast to ensure the speakers are all synchronized and receiving ALL of the audio data for every speaker at the same time, then processing out their specific channel to play back. Likely also for latency, because Multicast is fire and forget. However, Multicast and Broadcast traffic as I pointed out previously, are massive drags on Wi-Fi as a technology. There are reasons why major Enterprise networks 1: Segment that traffic away from as many access points as possible when it must go over the wireless, and 2: Why Enterprise APs like your Ruckus support something called IGMPv3, where those Multicast packets are converted to Unicast packets, which the Wi-Fi radio can transmit AS FAST AS POSSIBLE (at full 802.11ac rates!) and get off the air as fast as possible, in the name of less airtime. I have personally seen entire corporate networks taken down by small amounts of multicast traffic, and this is why. Sony doesn't appear to be doing Unicast conversion because you're seeing Multicast frames rather than the client-to-client frames you see your Ruckus APs shooting out.
The channel hopping you observed is another good thing to point out. This is Sony likely trying to avoid interference by spamming adjacent channels if that is a "while playing audio" capture, and yes that is yucky behavior. I've never seen Wi-Fi clients behave correctly when they're asked to channel hop on a dime. There is ALWAYS excessive latency. This could be why you're seeing excessive retries, and duplicated frames are counted as a retry.
In my opinion, Sony should do the following. 1: Require the product to stick to a channel and never channel hop until rebooted or it is actually idle. 2: Switch the product to Unicast the audio frames over the air, and utilize 802.11 No Acknowledge/WMM for QoS/Latency on the Wi-Fi link, and re-design the software side of the speakers to account for a minuscule amount of latency. 3: When channel hopping, implement a LONG throttle.
Thank you for your insight, I hope Linus reads it and goes on to further investigate the issue,
I also kinda hoped he would do a base test and just try the speakers in an environment with no other devices in the area… but I guess that’s more of a labs thing
Good info.
Reminds me of Panasonic's old style 2.4 GHz phones that used DSS (Digital Spread Spectrum) for channel hopping security. Killed Wi-Fi. Every. Single. Time. 😳🙄
Pro answer. This product is just garbage...
I'm really loving the more technical turn LTT is taking. I'm actually learning new stuff again rather than just being entertained. It's awesome
r u new? always been like that. slinus was never your average teaktoaker
@@MrPaxio Nah a lot of the videos are ez stuff
@@bubbleboy821 tbh, wireshark and packet analyzing isn't complicated either. i used that stuff when i was 12, and to exploit networks not just look at the time stamps
I feel like linus likes doing videos like this and it makes him more entertaining
@@MrPaxio TBF, back then a lot of network is basically open to exploit after you check wireshark for a bit intercept some useful frames, nowadays it is a bit harder.
Accountability is what makes the difference between an average content creator and an amazing content creator. You found what was wrong, pointed out the sponsored video you did, and let people know it turned out to be a load of bs. Don't think this could've been handled any better and it's what keeps me coming back to the LMG channels.
@Enchanted Goose what happened?
@Halibub nothing too bad, regarding accountability
But we learned that he doesn't really watch videos. He gleams information from comments instead and making his workers summarize videos for him so he can form opinions. This made him missunderstand a video made about him regarding react content as being critically to him, when it was the opposite
@@jcfawerd hatewatching is not healthy my friend
@@Random_dud31 i am stupid so who is 'he'?
@@jcfawerd Linus never assigned blame to his writer though, DarkViper was the one who came up with the idea that one of LTT's writers had a vendetta against him. Linus not watching the video and then bringing it up was a bit rude, sure, but he never criticized DarkViper or got mad at the video, he just used it as a segway for more discussion about reaction content.
It’s great to see troubleshooting done using WireShark. One thing to note is, the delta value between packets is calculated on the file that is loaded. WireShark does not change the delta when a filter is added. You need to export the file based on the filter and load the new file again.
Hope it helps 😊
So since I’m a cybersecurity major now and just now starting to get into Wireshark, is this one of those scenarios when you would use a tool like NetWitness Investigator? Or am I completely off base?
Seems like something that would benefit from a settings option or toggle, because that feels really obtuse.
I think there's a setting to calculate the delta based on previous displayed packet instead of previous captured packet.
There are 2 types of delta columns in Wireshark, "Delta time", which works as you have described, and "Delta time displayed", which calculates the delta of the displayed packets.
@@Californ1a That's wireshark for you.
Something that would be good to know is what firmware the speakers are running. They did release a update 1.283 back in November that had some fixes like: Improves general performance, Improves Chromecast built-in connectivity, Improves stability of the wireless speaker connection.
Also, while I’m not a fan of Sony at all, they are not Apple. I don’t think it would be a massive issue for them to release a new firmware that either doesn’t channel hop, or filters channel hop based on a longer packet loss sample.
This. I had issues with my HT-A9 when I first got it, but over time it got better/stable. I no longer have dropouts. Heck, I lived in a crowded apartment complex at the time as well and was surprised by its performance and stability. As a precaution, I did have speaker prewire in my new house, so if the HT-A9 crap out on me or become unstable, I can just go back to my AVR.
This kind of problem could be fixed easily with a firmware update. It's a shame Linus didn't say if they had tried to contact Sony to see if they would provide a solution
@@crisnmaryfam7344 That was about his Z-wave light switches.
@@crisnmaryfam7344 No, it was the switches. Remove false info plz
This is hands down one of the best videos you've made in quite a long time. More deep dives professionally explained please, this is your best yet
Imo, their best video was the one they uploaded last week titled "Windows Doesn't Suck ..."
Has a lot of useful tips for Windows power users
I thought the same thing, truly impressive geek content
massive props to admitting when you were wrong, and admitting especially when a sponsor was wrong. You remain one of the most reliable and honest tech youtubers today, despite being as big as you are.
Exactly, see how the dropped Anker
@@akf2000why did they drop anker
@@benbuthesbroke4774 their Eufy security /web cams (part of Anker) has massive security flaws, there's an LTT video on it
One of the only tech youtubers i truly trust to be honest 100% of the time.
I know these videos don't always get the most views, but I really do appreciate them :)
They are far more educational while still being understandable to a slightly above average tech user. Thank you!
I'd say almost 230k views in 3 hours is pretty good going.
Don’t get enough views? How is half a million to a million not enough? 😅😅
The lesson: If an actual Tech Guru (who has a literal army of tech guys, some secretly living in his house) can't get his home setups to work, what hope does the average user have?
@@Olibelus because most of their videos get over 1 mil….
@@FlyboyHelosim *in comparison to their other videos and I'd assume viewer retention could be low. I remember hearing on one of the wan shows that for these style videos their performance tends to be low. I just wanted to leave more than a like to let lmg know this content is always loved :)
Wow this seems like some actual good work, not just entertainment.
Super bummed as I was really enthusiastic about these and wanted a future iteration for my future home. I really hope Sony responds to this or at least the AV tech tubers pick it up to to get a comment from Sony.
I think this is loud enough for most people... def for sony...
seems like a software update should fix it.
@@A.Martin hopefully:( but seeing as they haven’t done anything since launch I’m not holding my breath unfortunately:(
This video made me remember my days troubleshooting WILD networking problems with Wireshark. There's nothing more satisfying than coming back to the customer (or in this case the manufacturer) and basically saying "Hey, this is irrefutably exactly what's wrong" and there was absolutely nothing they could argue.
Loved the video. It was really watcher friendly despite being such a technical topic.
I love how Linus (and team) is using the technology, finding issues, diagnosing the issues and telling everyone about them. Hopefully this will make Sony resolve the issues...
@@ilovefunnyamv2nd it was a sponsored video, and contract requirements aside TH-cam doesn't allow you to edit videos much and re-upload will just drive more traffic to it.
@@_framedlife The product is faulty. If it was a Sony sponsor, they messed up and should not receive that endorsement. If it was someone else sponsoring, they can get a free second video.
@@Rappoltt it’s a legal issue. Morally I’m sure they’d love to do that
@@ilovefunnyamv2nd Not only did he specifically say he’s amending the already uploaded video IN THIS VIDEO, but he’s specifically spends the entire end of the video calling out how stupid this is and that he doesn’t want other people to have to deal with it. Watch the whole fucking video before you write a braindead comment. And yeah, who would’ve guessed a SPONSORED VIDEO would be an advertisement. Ffs
Sony stopped caring about the consumer in the mid-1980s. They will fix this in a later model and fight tooth and nail against declaring it a "design flaw" worthy of a recall.
I have to say I really enjoy these more technical videos and investigations of problems. I really think this is a good way to maybe bring more understanding to people about how certain things work. I like this kind of video because I am being entertained and an added bonus is that I am also learning new things! Looking forward to the Lab videos.
Their talents are really not used to potential while reviewing the newest bling bling tech; videos like this, fixing unexpected problems and showing how to do it for nerds is the gold of this channel. Watching the newest phone/gpu review one forgets they really know their stuff. Linus' home series is a hidden 'technology handyman' guide. Now I now how to troubleshoot wifi!
Seeing a good troubleshooting process helps you understand how to do it even for something completely unrelated
are you a bot ¿
Look the number of views 😔
I approve what you say, but it seems that it's not a watch video :(
100% agree with this
Technical breakdowns like this, while I don't always fully understand everything, I LOVE to watch, listen, and learn. These things are seriously interesting one way or another, and will also help me learn the thing that I don't understand. Keep these types of topics coming in top of the usual topics of "classic" LTT.
Sad thing that it is incorrect. @7:30 he complains that broadcast is bad, etc.
Well, radio is always broadcast and goes to all listeners. Yes all wifi hits your laptop. You just put a tag on it to get discarded.
Really doesn't matter if the tag is in the ethernet frame or the payload.
@@FreedomIsNotGoingToBeFree Modern WiFi has the ability to send signals directionally. Obviously there's always going to be spillover but you don't have to spam signals everywhere. Electromagnetic waves (which includes radio) are directional by nature. The higher the frequency the smaller the wavelength, the smaller the wavelength the more directional the waves become (a 10mm wave/photon is going to cover a 10mm line from it's emission source). Antennas send multiple copies of the same wave/photon in multiple directions (so multiple 10mm waves/photons can be sent in every direction carrying the same signal) but with modern tech these can be constrained to a much smaller area (10mm waves could be sent in a 30mm line). Note: I'm using 10mm just for convenience, I'm pretty sure most GHz radio signals are mm waves but don't know the exact conversions by heart.
Sending the signals everywhere at once all of the time* instead of sending signals in the correct directions with some level of power constraints (don't need the living room right, rear speaker data in the neighbors backyard) creates a ton of unnecessary congestion (it is cheaper and easier to implement). The only reason I could see to do it this way (other than saving money on hardware and R&D) is to support a near infinite number of speakers but considering most people don't want or need more than one of each channel it's really not necessary. Other comments have suggested using unicast which may very well work with the hardware available (or at worst would add a small additional cost). If they used a newer WiFi standard (they're using WiFi 4 which is 802.11n) with Unicast they could use one directional antennae to get the data to each speaker in a short enough period of time to avoid noticeable latency. The speakers already have processors in them so sending some timing data to make sure each speaker is properly synchronized should be easy enough to do.
*During setup and powerup it makes sense to send signals everywhere since the base unit doesn't yet know where the speakers are.
Sony can't advertise it as WiFi to users, as they will have unreasonable expectations on the features that the speakers will have. E.g. connecting to them from a laptop. Or believing they need a home network to set them up.
They'd also need to pay the license fee for using the WiFi trademark on their product if they did so.
@@FatherlyFox you sure that they don’t pay a fee already, because they are using wifi4 as a standard in the product?
Just call it low level audio optimised WiFi or something of the like
@@TilmanBaumann people will still expect to be able to connect the speaker to their home network like a sonos speaker which is what they are trying to avoid to keep latency low. At least, that is my assumption.
@@TilmanBaumann or just say as it is *Wi* reless *Fi* quency
I get a little tingle every time you mention the labs team. They add a HUGE amount of value to the content coming out of the channel, but mostly channel 44 and 48 and sometimes both every millisecond or so.
Given your sponsor relationship with Sony, have you guys tried reaching out with your findings? Perhaps they could fix this with as little as a firmware update for the device? Or has that bridge been burnt?
I was wondering the same thing
Would love to see this happen. Don’t understand how they could release a product with this kind of fundamental issue
Sony fixing there shit? Can't remember that ever happened.
Looking for a compensation😂
Actually, now that it's mentioned, does Linus actually confirm the Sony speaker system is running the latest firmware? My one peeve with these esoteric devices is you then have to chase their patches from time to time.
Network Engineer here, the reason for the broadcast traffic is mainly to save bandwidth. Say you have 4 speakers on two channels. If you use unicast traffic, it’s 4 frames every cycle, each destined for the respective speakers. Now if you switch to broadcast, and all data for both channels can fit in a single frame, you’re suddenly sending only one frame each cycle. As you have more speakers, this saving only gets better. And since it’s WiFi, all traffic is always broadcast in the end anyway, it’s just that instead of the network interface filtering out unnecessary frames, the application running on the speaker has to do it itself. I’d imagine it’s not only a bandwidth thing, and more a latency issue, as streaming audio isn’t really constrained with bandwidth to begin with.
Honestly, I'm now certain that wired audio is the way to go, at least for the next few years.
Wired is the way to go, period.
I fixed that for you.
The funny thing is, I can remember looking at wireless audio solutions at least a decade ago, and deciding, then, that the technology just wasn't there. I'd have figured it would have been solved by now. At this point, I'll stick with wires for another decade.
wired will always be better.
always has been and always will be
Well... it's still good to have wireless headphones.
9:55 @LinusTechTips ... I cannot thank you enough for the warning of extreme flashing. I used to suffer from epilepsy, and even though I never could be induced into a seizure due to flashing lights, I know what it's like to unknowingly have seizures occur out of nowhere. I thank you for the warning. 😊
Dude, I had a one year fight with my ISP because they were having a problem with one of their jumps on my route to any service that use the RTMP port like Twitch or TH-cam.
I made a huge study and deep analysis about the problem and after one year and multiple calls with the level 3 support they finally addressed the problem.
my bro get educated cuz beef with his isp
@@fannyfanny9587 there's dozens of us
12:28 time on tv is 420 nice
when you say ‘they’ i assume you mean the ISP? if so, what was done and what did you provide to resolve the issue?
@@funionsflagons7844 I monitored my and other people connections with pingplotter and wireshark for about 8 months and troubleshooting a bunch of things like cables, routers, other devices. Then i found some people who are huge network nerds helped me to understand everything and I wrote a document with my hypothesis on what could be the problem, pointing to the specific server location and I present it through the agency that regularizes internet usage in my country (kinda NTIA for US) and they fixed that knot on their network.
I don't know if it was a configuration problem or a server error but they fixed it.
Am I supposed to be seeing this? I think I'm too early...
Think it’s been added to a playlist while still unlisted
YOUR SECRETS
TELL ME THEM
Wait 16h ago?
Yes
Lol 😂
Sonos also causes a lot of problems with WiFi. Spent a long time diagnosing an issue at a clients home before we found out every single Sonos was creating its own hotspot, even when wired.
I would like your team to keep tracking this to real resolution. Aren't you building an EMI chamber? Put the base station and speakers inside and see if the channel hopping is there. As an EMI engineer, there are still a lot of questions I have about your room and proximity. What's the big magnetic coil in that sub putting out right next to the base? I personally have hardwired audio, and I agree that's the most reliable route, but the engineer in me doesn't think you've finished your analysis.
pretty sure that room is still delayed due to the BS seller on that last update video of LTT lab
Even if it was the magnetic coil of the sub then that is something Sony should have addressed and not allowed the base station to even broadcast on them frequencies to start with then. Everything that he has done so far is testing the Sony themselves should have done and worked out before the product was released.
It’s a 5ghz signal.
A subwoofer tops out at a few hundred Hz. And if it was the subwoofer it wouldn’t be an intermittent issue but happening every time the sub starts going.
So that can’t be it
@@anonym3017 The sub amp could be class D, which would mean it would have a high switching frequency. But still, the sub amp shouldn't be putting out stuff in that range...
Interesting questions, emi is a really hardcore
as a low voltage installer I always push for wire runs, wires suck but wifi is worse. I spend way more time messing with wifi the if I just would have just run wires. this is a great video series, love watching you go through all the problem and your unique solutions.
what about sonos arc setup with surround sl's and sub 3.0 w/ sonos boost wifi adapter so your not riding on your wifi but the boost :D i like it
Not a network guy personally, but I’d eat my hat if any pro on that side wouldn’t say the same!
It's not as simple as wired is always better than wireless, but everything being wired is a good starting point and work from there to what would be convenient having wireless? For example wireless speakers are kind of stupid because you wont exactly move them around a whole lot, which *might* not be the case for headphones.
I'll stick to having all of my audio equipment be wired but everything else is on the table if not having wires is more convenient.
@@vega272k8 lol I was wondering why he didn't use sonos too.
@@vega272k8 I'm not familiar with that product but I think you misunderstood that product. If a product in any way "boosts" your WiFi, it HAS to USE your WiFi. You can't tie a rope to nothing and expect to pull anything with it. Same thing applied to the WiFi "booster".
If you need to boost your WiFi, run a cable and plug in a business grade WiFi point like a Mikrotik or Ruckus. Avoid Ubiquiti and similar similar companies with poor software and poor client support.
Wired speakers are literally the definition of the type of tech you should advocate for, Linus. They are FULLY user repairable, FULLY user upgradable, and they need the exact number of wires run into them as WIRELESS. You could make an absolute ton of content on speakers and home audio, too.
Precisely
Big props to you guys for updating the paid review, shows integrity.
@@RageQuitSon Stuff like that is exactly why Linus has been dumping buckets of money into the Labs project.
I would be highly skeptical of anything Linus is paid to promote.
@@stevestm1 because he’s wrong, a lot.
@@rustyt115 As somebody should about anything that is promoted. This is why it is important that you have to show that sth is paid for.
@@c1ph3rpunk everyone is wrong sometimes, the difference with Linus and their team is that they admit when they are and correct previous information/videos. Don't see an issue with that at all!
you have to search for non-wifi based interference in channel 48 and 44 using an RF analyzer to see if other equipment (non-wifi) is the source of why the sony box is jumping channels.
I was also thinking this. Pretty sure cheap adapters will not report incomplete frames, and not even sure wireshark would show them if they did.
Yup, very quick of them to just put all the blame on sony. Especially after doing zero steps (shown in the video) of diagnosing the true issue. Almost like they didn't learn anything from their last video.
It could also make a nice video about software-defined radio. Do you have any clue whether some SDR can receive as high as 5 GHz?
Because I'm sure they won't want to spend 15,000 dollars for a spectrum analyzer (something like Keysight's N9322C).
Indeed just looking at 802.11 frames is not going to show you the true picture.
Yep. Some devices might even be susceptible to noise on the power line (EG the sub!). So filtering the power, or running it off a Jackery as a test might give some incite.
if you look around your room, it seems like you have some sort of wall trim going up the corners and around the edge of the roof, along with skirting boadr on the floor. you could try hollowing those bits of trim out and using them to hide wires going around the room to speakers and other devices. might be a lot of work considering youve already finished the construction and rennovation steps of your house but if you dont want to see the wires it might be an easy way to hide them.
Who could have known that cabled speakers would have less problems than wireless crap?
Bro how 7hrs ago? 😂 just posted 6 minutes ago
@Ilya Radchishin The video was unlisted, but still in their Playlist
@@ilyaradd I think it has something to do with how they publish videos.
Hopefully this will give Linus some fodder to get yvonne to greenlight some wires
For some devices, such as mice, wireless actually has advantages over wired due to the distance a wired signal has to travel being longer than the distance a wireless signal has to, and both approaching the speed of light. However, for audio, this does not appear to be the case yet.
Its funny how he has followed a strict no battery policy and is willing to run wires for anything electric, but remains so resistant to using cables for audio.
He is purposely using this technology to test out the products and make videos like this.
@@ZNotFound Yup, he makes money from his house electronics perpetually having problems.
And wired heating controllers that still connect to his network wirelessly so he's always taking moments out of his life to get them to pair together properly.
And audio that is wired is easy to deal with.
Tbf it's also his wide
My HT A9s were giving me issues at my old apartment as well. Constant drop outs and I had to reset it all the time. I figured it was because my router was too close to the Sony receiver (but I couldn't really move it) plus I was in a very cramped area with wifi bulbs and kitchen microwave and two computers etc etc. Once I moved to my larger apartment, the wifi bulbs are gone but the router is in a closet so nothing is hardwired at my TV, yet I haven't had a single issue since moving. It's certainly weird.
Honestly, at this point it would be easier if Linus puts down the blinds during shoots instead of an editor needing to pixelate the background every time.
And would look much better
Natural light makes the shots look nicer though. But At least do the shots without 99% of the backround being windows and Linus moving on top xD
Also just don't shoot with the windows in the back, have his back to a wall with the natural light shining on his face.
They should animate memes behind the windows.
Or at least make this masking thing more neat.
Presumably you guys have reached out to Sony, seems like they might be able to fix this with a software update? If so I'd love a follow up, I'm just surprised you didn't mention contacting them, because it'd be crazy not to in this scenario when they sponsored you to put this setup in your home.
Sony, is sort of like Apple, but based in Japan, if you caught my drift.
@@AaronShenghao That makes sense, but I figured they'd have a contact there they could reach out to from the original sponsored video.
For me Sony has been great with software updates for fixes and added features. Although it takes too long to receive them. My TV didn't come with VRR and since it was a last year's model I thought that the rumours of them adding it was never going to happen but sure enough they did it. And my Sony receiver while playing Dolby Atmos it made a horrible popping sound on the back right speaker when pressing pause or fast forward but they fixed that too.
@@Hopgop1 Having an in with the marketing department means very little for the actual engineering teams. Remember that Sony is a massive company with a ton of different consumer markets. LTT is but a small mouthpiece for all of Sony.
@@Beakerbite Sure, but if I was Sony North America’s marketing department, I’d be very worried about this very bad marketing. And the edit on the sponsored video they paid for.
Im a low voltage installer and do a lot of AV work, in my experience the best “wireless” surround experience is Sonos, a Sonos arc bar under the tv, a latest gen sub and either 2 Sonos One SLs or Sonos Fives as surround. Using the Truetone feature makes room correction super simple and it sounds fantastic for the trade off of not having to rip up drywall or use wire mold to run wired speakers
I've never been a fan of any speaker that relies on software to work, this just hits the nail on the head for me. I have a soundbar, and it is the worst audio solution I have ever spend money on, I cannot wait till I can afford to go back to having just speakers, subwoofer and an AV-Receiver again, really sad I didn't keep my old stuff :(
Huh, you need drivers, and may want something to help with fidelity and umpf. Or do you mean if they need a app just to function?
ive been experimenting with my AVR by using coaxial car speakers hooked up straight to the AVR. So far its been amazing for a tenth the price. I don't have the gear to confirm frequency response but they have a much wider band compared to home theater speakers and the coaxial car speakers also already have crossover built into them. But the downside seem to be one needs to be careful about impedance luckily my AVR handles 4 ohms at 100w. A second downside is no boujee mdf box included.
A good sound bar is better than any built in speaker solution. Keep your head up! Be like Buddha and "want what you have." (You'll get there. If you're stressing over speakers, you're doing pretty damn well yo!)
@@BrotherWitch so true unfortunately if all you ever see are flowers, you will never know their beauty
Doesn't all speakers need software to work ? They have Firmware etc which is just software in a chip.
Really great work.
Regarding the room correction in avrs: I switched recently from the Sony STR-DN1080 to the Marantz SR6015. In my 5.1.2 setup, the difference was remarkable. The imaging and low end got a massive upgrade in clarity and oomph, all else being equal.
The Sony didn't do a bad job, but the multi spot audyseey room correction from Marantz/denon is a highly sophisticated piece of engineering.
I have to agree here. Having owned a number of Denon and Marantz AVRs over the years, their Audyssey room correction has never failed to impress me, especially on the higher end units.
That window should probably be more blurred.
Something that would be really useful is a long-term wifi router test, one that tests multiple routers over weeks or even months to see if they can sustain performance. I've experienced some routers which seem to slow down over time (days or weeks) but then suddenly get better after rebooting. I wonder if some resource within the router is leaking and causing this to happen.
from my experience a lot of routers have overheating issues, my asus RT-AX88U would run super hot. I took a wild shot and placed it on a laptop cooler to blow air right into the bottom intakes and now my router runs for several months without issues.
I honestly think this is why my TP Link Deco app has a setting that forces the routers to restart everyday at 2am because that restart clears the cache and now when I check the network optimization it always optimized because every day it's checking that the configuration is optimal!
This is some of the most interesting content you've put out in a while - great job solving the mystery Linus!
Fluke and Ekahau software are professional grade tools the big players use. Common interference points include fluorescent bulbs/ballasts, janky wifi devices, stucco mesh, water piping, and microwaves
Mesh and pipes are only an issue if they're between the connecting devices, Linus put access points all around his house to mitigate these and other passive issues. Microwaves mostly put out 2.4GHz waves (some actually put out 900MHz but those are quite rare), most of his devices are using 5GHz or are far away from his microwave. His previous video looked for other sources of active interference like fluorescent lights and janky WiFi devices. He already knew the issue was active interference since it's intermittent (if it was passive it would be a constant issue unless the passive interference only affected certain channels and the devices weren't properly avoiding those which is highly unlikely).
Someone must have forgotten that unlisted videos still show up in playlists
yea i think so
wdym?
@@cyberplayer5710 oh lmao
@@Illuminat-ve5ue his comment is older than the video has been made public
Lmaooooo that must have been so weird for u to find
What playlist was it on??
"keyword optimized description (should be two lines long in the TH-cam text editor and include the product name) - Copy from Trello"
Thanks for the detailed description!
Have they not said time and time again they are currently:
Onboarding more staff,
Rolling out new procedures, and
Developing new software and documentation. Something will slip through the cracks from time to time.
@@LiamNajor Of course. It's understandable. Still funny. And useful to point it out, in case someone in the team didn't notice.
I just love wireshark, as an IT it's one of the most useful tools I have learn in my career. Not only you can troubleshoot wifi, but you can also use it to figure out why your iscsi is having latency issues, why network transfers are slow and I could go on. It's probably too complex to go in deep on LTT but if you want to become a better sysadmin (or network engineer) well this should be in your toolbelt.
As a network professional of 25 year, the only questions during interviews is knowledge of HTTP, HTTPS, SSH, IP, IGMP, ICMP, Multicast, TCP and UDP and using Wireshark, we pull it up during interviews. All the other knowledge I can get into a candidates head with near free training from the vendors once they are on the job, but the candidate need to know this before learning what a NAT, PAT and Rule is to truly understand a modern more than one layer on the OSI model firewall. With a bit of free wireshark videos one can appear to be ready for Networking Jobs that are a hell of lot better than helpdesk.
As someone who works in IT, and even has a degree in networking, these types of videos are so interesting to me. Love it
As someone who doesn’t work in IT, these videos are the real reason I subscribe. I’ve seen enough LTT PC builds to last a lifetime. I much prefer these deep dives into problem solving. The home build, the new LMG location, the upcoming Labs facility, the LTT merchandise R&D, etc.
Give me more of that any day.
This video is why i'm so excited about the future of your "Labs" project - skip the fluff, give us some details to better inform us about purchasing decisions. I liked your sponsored video of the sony speakers, but it's cool that you have revisited them (after a year?) and now thoroughly can't recommend.
looking forward to DiRAC and Audessy shootouts. You should also add a custom room DSP with something like Mini DSP (or even QSC QSYS) + SMAART to cover all bases - should be interesting!
I'm so happy i watched this video, the part about using the wifi scanner app to figure out the interference was super helpful
I managed to find a few channels no one was using and set my wifi router to channel 120 which avoided all the other 30AP in the area
I'm not entirely sure where the confusion about the protocol used stems from, in the spec sheet they pretty clearly denote that on the interfaces side, it can use WI-FI and Bluetooth for wireless comms - that "Wireless Audio Specification v4.0" is almost certainly just a higher level protocol.
exactly
Looking forward to that "best mainstream room correction" video. I'm in the market for a new AVR, and they all have their own version of mic+software room correction. It'll be nice to see a real head-to-head of that tech.
I wish I had some of your "PROBLEMS." Very Adventurous!
All of this is just making me realize I don't want a smart home, and I work for a major ISP so I understand how a lot of this works and it just doesn't seem worth the trouble
i hate going into sub’s smart homes and ask to troubleshoot those devices myself.
just wire up everything to one single platform.
some customers have like three different brands of smart home products and i’m just like why do you make my job difficult? lol
Smart home uses 450-900MHz transmissions. Mostly they send data when used, anything using 2,4GHz or 5GHz is evil.
I remember when we track a rogue 2,4GHz network without SSID and MAC, that's was very intermittent only when my nephew drive his RCs.
Purchased the HT-A9's with the subwoofer. Linus' video was one of many vids that convinced me to do so. Overall pretty happy as I haven't experienced any problems like Linus. Hope SONY is able to address this or give us an explanation as to what's happening.
I think the video might give us that or on WAN show next week...
Maybe it's some kind of config issue
Maybe his is just broken
@@nisseost1 I could see that, but it sounds like he’s not really getting much help from Sony. I am assuming he’s tried to have them assist, but I know that assumptions are frequently wrong.
Same, his review was a major influence in my purchase of this unit. While I occasionally get drop offs on quality mode, it's been super solid on connection mode. I don't think I saw which mode he is running his system under. I can't tell the difference between the two settings but other audiophiles might.
The pants on fire bit was great 😂 GJ editors.
Massive props to the bravery and boldness of the team to say it as it is! Love LTT for their honesty. Thank you for admitting when you're wrong too 😁
I've been using metageek for years. Good stuff. Also, even a basic surround sound amp will come with a mic on a long cable. You set the mic in your listening position and run room correction, and it sets the room up for your speaker placement. It works well. Glad to see this - my latest p supports wifi speakers, so I've been thinking of setting up some back speakers in my living room. Good to know that that might be a bad idea.
He certainly knows how to do it that way, iirc it was even in James' upgrade video where the higher end AV amp had a fairly premium mic /tester included. I'm sure Linus' home theatre amp has one too.
"keyword optimized description (should be two lines long in the TH-cam text editor and include the product name) - Copy from Trello" my favourite description!
Linus's house makes me never want a smart house ever but who am I kidding, I'll never be able to afford a house anyway so I really have nothing to worry about.
Lol I have a smart home and have almost none of his issues lol. Also this issue is so dumb. Just wire the speakers to a receiver. No need for them to be wirleess
@@myaccount__7269 wooooowww. What a solution. Why didn't he think of that?????
Lmfao
Agree with the other commenter i have a smart house with absolutely no issues, linus just really sucks at smart home stuff. Any techie worth their salt knows that anything using the same band will interfere. He literally knows and explains this as one of the reason he chose z wave over zigbee (as zigbee can possible interfere with 2.4ghz wifi) what this tells me is he didnt bother doing any research on the wireless audio (as with all his smart home stuff) and ended up like this.
@@TheRealGigaCat idk ask Linus why he decided to not put wires into STATIONARY speakers when he was designing this house and they were doing all the work to it.
@@Fine_i_set_the_handle agreed. Out of all the cool tech things Linus did to this house using wireless speakers is the most dumb and pointless since speakers rarely need to move lol
gotta love when the template stuff stays. "keyword optimized description (should be two lines long in the TH-cam text editor and include the product name) - Copy from Trello"
Wow! Mad respect!!!
I have never seen anyone owning up to their mistakes at such a level...
I can see why those making the Wi-Fi standards are trying to tap into more varied frequencies if Linus is having this much trouble even now. Maybe that curse of never fully closing up your PC before you run a test applies here as well.
Not really, the point of all the explanation in the video is to prove that this sony system which claims to be different from wifi is misbehaving. It's tripping face first into its own feces.
There are no interference sources, it was just designed like shit and makes itself stutter because it randomly decided it wanted to change channels.
No other wifi device in the house is doing anything like this.
Just one more lane, wavelength edition
higher frequencies have smaller range and penetration so they should be interfering less and less though so that's a plus for sure
@@Fuego065 Really there should be at least 4 non-overlapping channels due to 4 colour theorem. Have not worked out if operating in 3D space (like an apartment building) would require a 5th channel.
@@leeroyjenkins0 Trust me: running a few wires is easier than installing radio tight mesh with proper grounding..
@13:15 this only shows it's not WiFi causing the issue. There still could be some 5ghz interference that's driving the Sony device nuts.
Didn't he have the other software looking for spikes in 5ghz signals outside of packets in Wireshark?
There was nothing on the spectrum, the first device shows anything there, not just wifi.
@@eduardosantiago6948 a Wi-Fi dongle is not a spectrum analyser it can only see 802.11 packets
@@edc1569 well, technically internally it can, the fast fourier transform is the same. The issue is it is constrained not to pass on more to the computer. I would be breaking out the proper RF analysis gear with this and looking at things like the waterfall charts showing all the noise over time.
@@edc1569 The wi-spy in not a "wifi dongle", it can scan for non wifi interference as well. The wifi dongles are the ones he bought in this video.
This!!! This explains a lot of my issues I had with an android tv box being so close to my router but having wifi drop outs so often. It is between my Sony soundbar and its wireless subwoofer, which could also have been wired being so close to each other, but no such option is offered by the hardware. It was driving me insane and I ended up buying a TP-link wifi extender just so I can connect the Android box via ethernet.
I had intended to purchase these, only thing that had prevented it was that they were almost entirely out of stock in my local market all of last year. Hopefully they can address the issues with a firmware update but yes, all of that said, the fact that the base control unit doesn't allow for a wired connection to the speakers is rather sad as they could have had wired and wireless built in without significantly impact to the B.O.M. per unit cost. I guess now back to the drawing board for another solution that offers the same benefits (ie. Extremely flexible speaker placement and sufficient digital smarts to not only do room correction but also account for far from ideal speaker placement, while also offering support for the modern standards such as Atmos) without the botched implementation.
Supporting both is non-trivial. The hardware needed to make a system like this work vs a wired one is very different and would require a completely different system architecture that would have to be baked into the way this system works.
I like the deeper dive content. In this case, could the dropped packets from the speakers themselves be the source of the frequency hopping? It doesn't look like it's happening often enough to be the source, but I could see a resend rate like that being interpreted by the software as a reason to try switching bands.
I was thinking the same.
this is the best video u have made in a long time, you actualy understaind the problem rather than barf out some bull to make another video. u being humble and understanding the tech, is why i watch you.
Someone accidentally released this yesterday. But hey it's finally up for real
Maybe a random question, but any reason the editors opt for mosaic blur instead of a Gaussian? I feel like the mosaic blur of any of Linuses windows is much more distracting (and eye-catching) than a Gaussian blur would be. Not a huge deal, just something I end up inevitably looking at more than Linus in these shots 😅
I feel like Gaussian would be easier to unblur than mosaic, no?
well... mosaic blocks more and is "easier", but I suppose they could have ran both? Mosaic first then Gaussian over the mosaic to "smooth" it. tho it might have been even better to white BG mask it?
I'm just wondering what is the reason is for blurring out his windows.
@@musicalock privacy! It can be easy to identify a neighborhood by memory if someone is familiar and I’m sure it just gives Linus some peace of mind. We are unfortunately in a world where the reality of some improbable viewer finding the home of influencers and doing something nefarious is too high, so I don’t blame him at all given how high profile he has become. Just wish there was a little less visual distraction :-)
@@musicalockIt's so that it's harder to figure out his house's floor plan just by looking at videos, which could be a problem if anyone wanted to rob him.
That’s super sweet that MetaGeek was able to help out so much! The parent company Auvik Networks Inc. is based out of Waterloo. 100% would recommend reaching out to them for network management software. Especially now that you’re using multiple sites.
I have the same sound system and my friend has been complaining about wifi instability & dropouts since I hooked them up. He did have a suspicion that it might be the speakers that's interfering with our wifi network but I told him it's impossible. Now I believe him lol. Definitely getting the hardware & software that's needed to try this method.
BTW, Keep up the good work, been watching your videos since I was 15 (2015) and I've learned so so much from it. Dropped out of school when I was 17 and started my career as an IT Technician since then. You've inspired me and made me what am I today. Thank you 😄😄😄
There's some kind of setting for this system to either prioritize sound quality or connection quality. In the last video, Linus had his set to "sound quality", and did not address that in this video. I'd be interested to see if changing that setting did anything for your friend.
Maybe having the Sony "router" right next to the Sub is not such a good idea, it has a large magnetic field and power supply. It is also at ground level in a cabinet with a large thick heavy object filled with metal coils probably blocking signal one whole side. I would try moving it up to the shelves and see how well it performs then.
i don't understand how they missed something like this.
If it's so fussy that Linus can't figure it out, your average consumer is going to be SOL.
Sony advertise those setups witht the base station right next to the sub. Even sometimes it is bult into the front speakers.
@@kikihun9726 The Sony marketing reps are going for style, not function for the brochure. Plus I bet the cabinet that it is in is very well built out of thick plywood. I would not be surprised if the TV shelf was 1" plywood given the age of the house and that a tube TV probably sat there originally (from his house tour video). Open air shelving with glass probably would let the signal through very well.
@@mike123abc More likely sony used a single wifi chip for internal wifi and the speaker connectivity and now it has interferrence issue. This would explain the lots of resent datas.
The downside of the all wireless house is that it generates an insane amount of electro smog. I LAN wire everything possible in my house as a base principle, even using power line adapters to reduce electro smog as much as possible. Leaving the wireless only devices using wifi. Another solution is to use hidden Enterprise wifi SSID with a Radius server ( common on home NAS’s ) 5 minutes lifespan encrypted key, you will need to enlist the devices and install a certificate profile on the devices to connect, but the bright point is that you have the highest security available for your wifi and the enterprise enabled wifi router (you need to activate enterprise mode on it) will ignore any wifi client requests and by so not answer back, staying hidden and lowering a lot wifi traffic. Also make sure you don’t have a subnet storm due to excessive broadcast.
I think it would be interesting to see what is inside of that qos packet that it sends prior and after channel switch. The speaker might find some parameter not acceptable but it is not noticeable right now. You should definitely try to test it in your lab as others said here in comments
Its not that easy. That packet is most likely some binary data specific to that device.
The QoS packet contains channel quality information. This information is what the broadcaster is using to choose between continuing the same channel or switching to another channel. But none of the objects in the house are moving, so I'm surprised that channel quality is varying. Maybe Linus should sit outside the room while capturing packets, just to be sure.
I know this is the least important thing in the video but thank you so freaking much for having that warning come on screen before you showed the flashing data, it's a small thing but it makes the experience so much better for me (and I assume people like me).
Linus this is a great video! I’m a heavy equipment mechanic for Cat and I love finding the true root cause of a failure! Keep up the good work and I’m super excited to see what all the lab team comes up with!
5:41 "That is our base unit that I hid on top of the other base unit. Get it hahaha that's a subwoofer... sorry, anywho"
Linus apologizing for his dad joke is funnier than the joke. XD
I lost it and had to pause the video to comment this. Don't be ashamed Linus! That was a great joke lol
I dont get it... Could someone explain?
@@sid6645 Bass unit.
@@Soul-Burn Hahahahahahaha
@@nszittai Oh yeah, didn't mean the joke wasn't funny, I only thought the apology was funnier. XD
Ahem, it says it's using 40MHz channel width which means the transmission uses BOTH channel 44 and 48. So it's not actually swapping, it's always using the "44+48" 40MHz channel (sigh, Wireshark!). Linus needs to check for traffic on channel 36 and 40 too, since those will *overlap* channel 44/48 if someone uses 80MHz or 160MHz channel width on channel 36. And in the brief glance we see of the ToNic spectrum view we see at 5:35 there appears to be at least 4 devices on channel 36 with 80MHz channel width which means they'll stomp over channel 44 and 48!
So the solution might be as simple as "reduce channel width to 40MHz on everything" - reducing channel width and using consistent channel width both help with preventing "stomping" on nearby channels so it'd give him a double-whammy. That's no excuse for Sony's firmware deciding to set itself up for this...
Other things: Sony is using terminology correctly with "Wireless Sound System 4.0", it's just Linus that is confused about what it means. Clearly it's a custom audio distribution system running ON TOP of Wifi, just as... every other such system these days (and what should be expected from what Sony said). It's probably using UDP packets to transport audio data via multicast. And no, broadcasting this doesn't waste bandwidth/spectrum, for this specific application sending individual audio streams to each speaker would use MORE spectrum/bandwidth than the broadcast approach. It does complicate the "lost packet" and the decoding on the satellites slightly but if they're mains powered that's may well be the right choice.
Thank you for commenting.
I was blinking at the end of this video wondering how so many smart people missed this.
Their brains were probably turning into mush after staring at millions of packets of data for hours, though, so I can understand that.
Been there many times myself.
Finally someone that pick up this.
*What is occuring is the one of the NIC system is not communicating on the channel-width/bond correctly. the Primary channel should be 40. Most likely the NIC driver or card is not capable of doing channel bonding. See this behaviour on warehouse RF scanners and cheap WiFi NIC cards.
Resolution, change the sony WiFi to 20MHz, plenty of throughput, or upgrade the NIC cards
Wireshark is an absolute godsend. Lost count of how many times it has enabled us to diagnose problems over the years 👍🏼
As an ISP technician I love that he realized his issues were caused by something inside the house and not an isp issue, awesome video
I'm so glad that this followup video was made. The last video blaming the zwave switches just didn't seem plausible to me. I was really hoping you would find some unexpected device that was causing strange interference but of course it turned out to just be a(probably) software bug on the Sony system.
I have a stupid amount of smart home stuff and I always seem to have random performance problems with a few of them. This just makes me think that while interference might be some of it, most likely these cheap wifi iot devices just have bad wifi stacks that don't deal with networks with lots of devices well.
LTT is just a video production company that talks about tech. When it comes to actual networking and systems knowledge, they show a hobbyist level which is why they get themselves in to situations like these. They make great content but you have to take some of this with a grain of salt, especially when there are paid advertisers involved. Maybe they should test out the products a bit better before making a video about them. They may have removed the videos, but they still collected the ad revenue for them.
It was obvious from the first video seeing the waterfall plot completely saturated as soon as they pointed their directional antenna at the Sony shitbox. Saturating whole spectrum bands with gibberish can't be good.
@@jenda386 well it's not gibberish, it's streaming audio, so that part makes sense. The problem is its hopping channels for no apparent reason. What ever parameters the software uses to determine when it needs to change channels must be faulty. Maybe triggered by a generally busy wireless space due to lack of testing. One would hope that the problem would be solved through an update but it's possible the wireless stack wasn't even built by Sony(it's just regular wifi it turns out) so fixing it might be complicated.
@@BobSchmidt they are definitely hobbyists. I think that's the value of the channel though. If you aren't in those specific industries then you get to learn with them to an extent. People often find better value in that than hearing from someone who is so deep in the topic that they can't properly relate to a general audience. Mistakes will be made, and as long as they rectify them I don't really see an issue.
From what I remember , they aren't quite just 'cheap off the shelf' usb adapters, but ones that support promiscuous mode, which is pretty much needed for wireshark type of stuff.
I don't really see much need for the Sony to be hopping or swapping bands, or not being able be told to stick on a user selected band. I'm all for some tech that would work in an auto mode that avoids congested bands, but when it's clearly not working as intended, then just let me go manual.
Boo to Sony though for the misleading terms on the product, but they'll probably say their 'specification' relates to how the packets are fed via QoS, or something.
For those of you who are confused, they made it private and made it public later
You just copied this from another comment...?
@@moortu no I don’t copy comments, I copy stack overflow code 🤣🤣🤣
the more smart home / wireless tech videos are released the more I like plain old wires
well... wireless is stupid after a point.
Ok boomer
@@dhkatz_ Enjoy all the extra interference.
I miss Toshibas toslink
The only time I go with wireless is if it’s something portable or that needs to be moved around a lot. Otherwise, wires are the way to go. Sometimes though the convenience of wireless does have its upsides, like it’s a lot easier for me to connect my pc in my workshop to wifi rather than run a new Ethernet cable across the backyard and all that entails.
Props for going back and amending a sponsor video.
Owning a mistake and helping others learn from it is a rare skill in the world atm where people stick with the wrong solution or mindset no matter what evidence is shown.
Well, already bought the Sony sound system because of LTT"s old video. After half year of use, I have not really notice any issues. But my house do not have nearly as many wireless devices as Linus' house.
Linus is a hell of an edge case, but this can impact people in cities living in apartments...
... then again if ya in an apartment you ain't got the money for this, and if you have money you'd be in an good mansion/ house out of the city...
Same. One thing I love about them is they support the LDAC Bluetooth codec so the audio quality is fantastic on my Sony XM3 headphones.
Has Sony made comment on this issue?
16 hours ago???
@Linus Tech did you raise this issue with Sony? It would be interesting to hear what they have to say about it. And it may be something that is fixable with a firmware update. Now that this been _proven_ to use standard WiFi, if Sony actually cares about their customers, a wonderful option would be to have the settings user adjustable so you can tell it to use a fixed WiFi channel.
It's POSSIBLE to help some of this as @SGCSmith and @Morgan Hill have pointed out in the 1rst upper Great Dissecting of Sony's dropping the ball as usual. It took them WAY over 2-3 years to push the update for 4K TVs ! DAM !!
I had to scroll through way too many comments to find this.... Was Sony contacted? What was the response? Did you tell Sony your findings?
I think a simultaneous spectrum analyzer capture needs to occur in tandem with the Wi-Fi capture. There may be spurious RF sources that are not Wi-Fi related causing the Sony software to hunt for a more clear channel
"intermittent problems are the worst"
Welcome to the life of a software engineer
This is a brilliant workout where the problem came from. As a consumer i would never been able to troubleshoot this problem. So thank you for this fantastic video
There are many receivers with room correction (dirac) also you should consider in ceiling speakers for the wife approval factor also a soundbar like the ambio from Sennheiser might fill your audio needs , you got a killer home cinema you can get by a mitigated experience in the living room also believe me being an audiophile for sometime I finally understand other people don’t care for sound quality as long is good enough they want something that works without intruding too much
Yes! I don't understand how Linus hasn't heard of Dirac Live. It is full state-of-the-art room correction, comes with many of the best new AVR options, and will blow the Sony system out of the water paired with any half-decent system. Plus the guys that made Dirac are super cool.
If you used Tonic to capture you could have missed a few frames since the adapter jumps from channel to channel, Metageek has another software called Eye P.A that let's you set static channels to capture.
I would also try and move the main unit away from the subwoofer because you can experience some sideband interference. Use Chanalyzer again to see if that is the case.
Also, 802.11n on such a new system. Yikes!
Yeah, since the sub is also wireless, I would think moving it somewhere more equidistant to all endpoints would significantly help.
That video is a perfect example of how you take advantage a mistake you made and how you can turn it on improving your problem solving completely.
Since the Nakamichi Dragon 11.4.6 system is coming out soon, I'd love to see an in-depth review of their wireless implementation especially if you decide to make a Holy $h!t episode about it. Unlike any other soundbar, they have been given the AVR decoder for Dolby Atmos rather than the soundbar decoder, which means in theory they have MUCH better room correction than any other "soundbar" in history. I use that term loosely because of a) the price of the unit and b) because of how many speakers are actually in the thing: 11 bed level drivers, 6 up firing drivers, and two DUAL driver subwoofers. They've marketed it as a plug n play system like any other soundbar, but with the fidelity and modularity of a true AVR-based system. You can turn off each and every driver individually as well as play stereo music in true stereo mode to avoid the kind fake upscaling that messes with the original audio. They're also claiming 3000W of total RMS power as well as over a dozen independent amplifiers and all the speaker enclosures are automotive-grade steel, so whatever wireless system they're using must be very, VERY powerful. It could prove to be a very interesting analysis.
That 3000W is probably limited to European markets since most North American plugs max out at 1800W continuous. Nonetheless it sounds like an interesting product.
@@grn1 Subs each have their own power.
@@spdcrzy Ah, that makes more sense (and in hindsight is kind of obvious). I suppose the next question is what other power levels does it support. The thing about audio amplifiers (afaik, something could have changed) is that they always pull their maximum power regardless of volume settings. To combat this and keep power consumption more reasonable most systems actually switch between multiple amplifiers of different strengths depending on volume level (you can sometimes hear a delay when changing volumes across thresholds). If those amps are always pulling max power it would be a nightmare for the electric bill.
@@grn1 I don't know what classes the amps are yet, but considering just how many discrete amps they were able to pack into SUCH a small footprint (all things considered), I'm guessing they're quite efficient.
okay... Why the hell would anyone use wireless system for your home theater surround speakers? Especially someone like Linus who essentially custom built the house around his gadgets. First of all, you still need to power the speakers, so it doesn't save you anything. Just run the speaker wires in the walls and ceiling and power it directly with the the receiver's amps. Serves him right.
Okay here me out. I only say this because I’m a helicopter tech but this may have no correlation. His sub is right there and I’m wondering if that can produce a low enough frequency to affect the internals of the controller. This is sometimes a common issue on helicopters components that are worn out the shaking causes them to do weird intermittent faults and there is no way to know the component is failing until it had completely failed. but if it isn’t built for that kind of stress it could be causing unnecessary switching of wifi band some kind of failure somewhere in the box. Just an idea.
I own these speakers and also had audio dropouts. After seeing the last video, I moved every device that was on 5ghz to 2.4 and haven't had any issues since.
@@marcogenovesi8570 I've been saying for years that having "license free spectrum" without any stipulations on what can use it was a BS move. There's a lot of devices like this and they will almost all use channels 36-48, the most used WiFi channels, because they would never work on DFS channels where they have to switch if they detect radar and its cheaper to not be DFS certified.
I was also able to completely block my Nintendo WiiU gamepad from working if I set my WiFi channel to 36 and completely hammered it with traffic. Anything latency sensitive needs to be on dedicated spectrum, not sharing with WiFi. Its why cordless phones in the EU/UK have their own dedicated frequency.
This could also explain why some people have had issues with the Samsung sound-bars with wireless rear speakers too. I'm guessing they're doing the same thing.
(Makes me want to Wireshark my setup to see if this is the case). I haven't had dropouts, but I was also using higher channels on my WiFi)
Sonos too from what I've heard as having odd or intermittent issues.
Interestingly, I use a Vizio soundbar with wireless sub and surround at rear. Zero issues encountered and from a system around $300 purchased at my local Sam's Club!!!😳🙄
@@fookingsog well sure, though they've had quite a few issues around data gathering and selling.
It's quite possible them speakers implement a good approach to wireless, since I've not actually heard about much problems regarding them, or they are used by people without a lot of other wifi devices, I dunno.
Loved this video. I learned about a ton of tools I could use some day! Thanks for having wireless speaker issues, Linus! You must really love your audience and making content!