How to avoid audio lag with server/external HDD setup?

[thadman]

I just recently purchased a WD 1TB USB2.0 external hard drive for media storage. It is connected to a Macbook Pro (2.4ghz Core2duo, 4gb ram) which functions as a server. I am using another Macbook Pro (same model) which can access the server over the network. Music files are stored on the External HDD and are played through songbird on the wireless Macbook Pro. Under energy saver preferences, the box titled "Put the hard disk(s) to sleep when possible" is left unchecked.

While playing music, audio lags every few seconds, sometimes for a second ... sometimes for several seconds. To suggest it is distracting and annoying would be a serious understatement.

Any ideas?

[Operandi]

I'm not sure this thread really belongs here but....

What kind of wireless signal strength are getting?

Also if Sonbird has options to adjust the buffer size of the MP3 decoder try that.

[thadman]

What kind of wireless signal strength are getting?

Signal strength is fine

[Saurav]

When you say lag, do you mean dropouts, where the audio stops for a while and then starts again?

Could be many things. I spent a few months fighting audio dropouts, and never identified a single root cause for my problems. It boiled down to a combination of upgrading from B to G, picking a wireless channel that reduced interference with my neighbors, trying a few different drivers for my PC's wireless card until I found one that didn't randomly drop the connection, installing open-source firmware on my wireless routers and tweaking the settings until they stopped reporting frequent packet errors (I think mostly increasing the radio transmit strength a bit helped). Then I switched my PC to Linux and went through a couple of drivers again until I found one that was stable under the kind of load that streaming audio generates (slow and steady, over long periods of time), and also messed with buffering settings on the server software.

Not sure how much you can tweak under OSX, or how much it'll tell you about what errors it's seeing, but the stuff I mentioned above are some of the things that might be a factor.

Also, if you have 2 wireless hops (client to router, router to server), try connecting the server to the router with ethernet, see if that helps.

[cjd]

Any other connection options on the drive? USB on the Mac is... not quite what it could be and *might* be part of the problem here.

I run a hard-wired linux server (bog standard Ubuntu 8.10 i386) as my Squeezeserver, full wireless 802.11g to every Squeeze including secured connection (WAP personal I think it is...) - even the Boom which is at 50% signal strength has no issues, and with different playback from either of the other two devices.

On the other hand, Squeezeserver and such have very healthy buffering built in to handle this kind of distribution. Songbird, perhaps not. So even small network problems from doubl wireless jumps or collisions in a faulty router can make a big problem.