Netflix Terrible Quality

[Chogbill]

Hi - I've had my EE TV box and internet for maybe around two months, and Netflix has never seemed to stream in full HD like I'm paying for. It seems to constantly be at 480p, 540 if I'm lucky.

Restarting the app and the box does nothing, and since netflix works fine in full HD on other devices I can only assumes its something to do with the box.

I've been through the help guides and changed the view settings from UHD 10bit to 8bit, which also did nothing. What could the issue be?

[DarrenDev]

If you go into the help section of the Netflix app on your TV Box, there's a network speed test.  This may offer some insight.

[Peter_W]

Good morning @Chogbill.

Welcome to the EE Community!

I'd hate to think you're struggling to get the most from Netflix when using your TV box; do other streaming services encounter issues when you're using this box, either with picture quality or buffering in general?

Is it a wired connection you're using too, or are you connected via WiFi?

Peter

[Chogbill]

Cheers Darren, didn't spot that. I'm getting 138.36 Mbps in the Netflix app, 290-ish when I run speed test in my browser.

[Chogbill]

Cheers Peter. Other streaming services work fine, no problems with 4K content via Prime. Just Netflix. I'm using wireless connection but as I said to Darren above, I'm getting 138Mbps when I run the network speed test in the Netflix app, so I don't tihnk it could be a wifi issue - before I switched to EE I never had single issue with Netflix running on the Sky Q box at 4k on a connection half the speed I'm on now either.

I also spoke to Netflix, who said I need to speak to someone at EE. Netflix works fine and in full HD via the app on my phone, and everything I have watched/am currently watching should be in full 1080p, but it just will not play above 480p. 

[DarrenDev]

A very strange one @Chogbill

Could I ask you to please check which HDMI port the TV Box is connected to?  Is it the same one that Sky Q was previously connected to?  We do know that some TVs don't support adequate content protection on all HDMI ports, which could explain why it's dropping the quality.  You could also verify this in the EE TV app - launch it, and try to watch a trailer.  I would expect it to fail if the port cannot protect content.

[Chogbill]

I had already done this actually - I plugged the EE box into a different HDMI port and the picture quality was terrible, so I switched it to the same as the Sky box which fixed everything except netflix! I tried some trailers in the EE TV app and they were fine too. I actually watched some things on netflix this afternoon and was actually in 1080p for the first time. Do speeds get throttled at night maybe? I'll see how its behaving later. 

[Chogbill]

Hi Darren, same thing happened again - just watched an episode of something, full HD. I watched a few episodes of the same show last night and was stuck at 480p. 

[DarrenDev]

Unfortunately we can't see anything about the Netflix app - only they can diagnose why the quality is dropping.  I would suggest 2 things though, the next time the quality drops:

1. Run the Netflix speed test to confirm the speed available at that time.

2. Try hard rebooting your TV (either turn the power off, or most TVs hard reboot when the power button is held down for a few seconds).  Coincidentally I'm just off a call with YouView discussing a related issue in the EE TV player, and we talked in detail about how different apps deal with different TV scenarios.

[Chogbill]

Hi Darren, sorry for the delayed response. I'm consistently getting around 140mbps on the speed test. I haven't actually managed to get anything playing in higher quality than 480p to test the speed when that happens. Surely it has to be an issue with the Netflix app on the EE TV box if netflix works as it should on my phone, and no other streaming services have the same issues on the EE box?

Obviously its frustrating paying for a service the box is unable to provide, but if I drop it to the lesser subscription I'd have to put up with adverts. 

Netflix are almost impossible to speak to aswell - when I did manage to speak with someone, they told me it has to be an issue at EE's end if it works ok on other devices which I'm inclined to agree with.