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NFL Game Pass Choppy

6K views 6 replies 3 participants last post by  rparamount 
#1 ·
Hi folks, I'm using NFL Game Pass for the first time and am noticing that tonight's Arizona/Green Bay game is very choppy. However other games on the service are completely fine. I've tested this on three different computers in the house and verified it happens on all of them. I've done all the usual troubleshooting (I'm a computer tech by trade), and have verified that it's not an issue with any of my machines.

My question is this - for those of you that have Game Pass, are you experiencing the same issue? Once again I am only seeing the issue with the Arizona/Green Bay game, and not with any of the other ones. All the other games play perfectly smooth at maximum quality. I also have the Shaw 50 Mbps service and have absolutely nothing else running on any other device in the house doing any uploading or downloading.

Thanks for any info on your own experiences you can provide. I'm currently on hold with technical NFL Game Pass tech support to see if they're having issues with that particular game.

-Thanks, RP
 
#2 ·
Same problem with Gamepass. I am with Teksavvy on a 50\10 line. I have spoken with Gamepass tech support and as expected they have assured me the service is fine. I went through all the steps with them as they wanted to verify it was not a computer issue (I tried a new gaming PC\HTPC -i7, 680gtx, 16gigs of ram and a 2013 i7 iMac with a 680mx) same problem as the default response was that hardware might not be powerfull enough. They concluded by saying they would make a note and look into it, and that was that. There is a 200 page plus thread at the nfl gamepass uk forum about the subject. We are not alone. That being said some games are much better than others, but if I look real hard I can detect micro stuttering in almost every stream. I just dont want to look that hard as it will ruin it for me as I pay a lot for this service. Cheers
 
#3 · (Edited)
Thanks for the heads up kevcol64. I agree, I can see the same micro stuttering you're referring to.

I ended up finally getting in touch with tech support via email and they were no help whatsoever. They just asked me to check all the same things that I already told them I checked to begin with. It's like they didn't even read my email.

I also tried the online chat and got put in a hold queue and then it eventually dropped me from the queue and told me to call them on the phone. So I tried contacting them via phone and got put in a hold queue and they eventually just hung up on me. Email was the only way they responded.

I have now asked them for a full refund (they told me via email that they don't give partial refunds) and I am waiting to see if they do it. If they do then I will go and buy Sunday Ticket through Shaw instead. If they don't then I'll just put up with it until next year.

All I can say is this - Game Pass support is awful, and they do not acknowledge their own issues. The streaming delay/buffering/stuttering issues are beyond horrible for the over $250 bucks I'm paying for this service for Season Plus. All I can say is I will not recommend this to anyone.

If anybody is considering NFL, then I would suggest staying with your television provider and getting Sunday Ticket/NFL Network instead.

This actually makes me wonder how good the NFL service will be with the Xbox One that is coming out. I wonder if it just leverages Game Pass or if it's a different service altogether? If it leverages Game Pass, then you are going to have tons of people in for a big disappointment and this won't be good news for the NFL.

-Cheers, RP
 
#4 ·
I assume that on at least one of the computers you tested that you are connected via a cable and not WiFi? Some strange things can happen on wireless.

I assume you've tested the download speed on at least one of the computers by downloading a large file from a known good server and calculating the bitrate, or at least going to Shaw's speedtest site?

http://speedtest.shaw.ca/
 
#5 ·
Hi 57, at least in my case all the systems are hard wired (home network, nas... all via Cat6a). I never buffer on any of the online services, Hulu, Vudu, Netflix, iTunes... The playback issue is uniquely a gamepass problem. I pull a solid 50 plus meg from any of the speedtest sites. You are spot on about the WiFi hence the large expense of having cabling strung throughout the home while I was having the HT room done.

rparamount let me know how it goes with the refund, I was only on the service 15 days when I asked and they said no. I bought season plus also. I thought for a moment that it might have been the DNS bouncing service I was using to get around blackouts, but after resetting that and retesting, same result. Good luck! Kevin
 
#6 · (Edited)
Hi 57, yes I've done everything you've mentioned but I do appreciate the great suggestions. I should add, that I'm a network engineer by trade and troubleshoot and design enterprise networks for a living. Because of this, my house runs an enterprise grade network with enterprise grade switches(not residential consumer grade switches), and professionally cabled (by my own wiring team from my company) and tested/certified with Fluke networks testers.

Also, all other Internet streaming services I use work without a hitch. It was only Game Pass that exhibited the problem and only with the specific game I mentioned. I can honestly say - not just in my own personal opinion, but in my professional opinion that there is an issue either with Game Pass itself or an issue somewhere between the Arizona/Green Bay game they were streaming and Game Pass's data center which may have caused the problem or if they are streaming the different games from different data centers in different locations, it's possible the problem could even exist somewhere between the network path of that data center and my house.

I also tested on 3 different computers in my house. One desktop, and two laptops. All 3 computers are fairly new with quad core cpus, and between 4 to 8 gigs of ram depending on the machine. All computers are running SSD drives. The desktop was a PC with Windows 7, one laptop was running Windows 8, and the other laptop was running Mac OS X. All computers are running the latest updates and security patches. I also tested with and without anti-virus programs running. Not just disabled, but with anti-virus completely uninstalled. I also tested on Firefox, IE, and Safari. I also tested all 3 computers both wired on my gigabit network and wireless as well. I turned off all startup programs and made sure nothing else was running in the background.

Despite all of this - In every single test I did, only the Arizona/Green Bay game had an issue. The Shaw speedtests I ran came in at 48 Mbps download, and 2.85 Mbps upload. I pay for the shaw 50 Mbps service which is advertised as 50 Mbps down/3 Mbps up. So I basically had my entire pipe available to me. I also monitored CPU, memory, disk, and network usage on all machines and I never even came close to maxing any of those out. For example, the CPU at the most peaked at 30% usage.

I can get into more detail on all the tests I've done that I haven't mentioned above, but trust me, I've covered all the bases. At this point I'm hoping they'll give me my refund. They have emailed me back and have asked me to send them yet another email officially asking for the refund - which I find odd, since I already did that. So maybe that's their way of making sure I actually want the refund and haven't changed my mind. I'm going to respond to them now and say that I do indeed want the refund. I will let you folks know if I do receive one from them.

On another note, they have given me extra links to do a speed test directly to their data center (their own in house speed test) and I passed those speed tests no problem as well. This may be why they are willing to refund me.

-RP
 
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