ATV2 good, but not great!!

[Aragorn234]

The ATV2 is Good but not Great. I have Jailbroken the device and use Firecore for the ability to stream files from my NAS. This works well with only a few buffering issues on the odd occassion.
Firstly I will give you an idea of my home setup for Apple Devices.
Airport Extreme (current Generation)
iMac (may 2011 - Lion)
Ipad2
Apple TV (2nd Gen)
numerous other idevices.

My first concern is that I use the Apple TV and iPad to stream photos to our main TV. I am using the 5 Ghz network and i have 2 - 3 bars of service. However it seems to be slow and laggy at times. I have tried also to stream music as well as photos and this is not possible.

Recently the Airplay connection does not even appear on the iPad and I have to turn off and on all the devices and randomly starts to work again.
Any suggestions on how to improve performance or provent the drop out of airplay. I was thinking an Airport Express to extend the network to the lounge room and get a stronger signal. However I do not want to spend $100+ on a device that will not help

The Second issue is when I use home sharing to play music through my ATV iTunes will randomly crash on the iMac. I have fully updated to the latest version of everything. I go into the list and select, and iTunes crashes.

ANy thoughts.
Thnaks

 

[Sedulous]

I know you said you have a few bars of reception, but something is clearly intermittently interfering with your network.

 

[Aragorn234]

I agree that something is causing interference. However I am not sure what this is. It maybe distance or too many rooms between the devices. THat is why I was thinking that if I use an extender like the AP Express this may resolve some of the issues being experienced.

The other option is if I plug the ATV into Ethernet will Airplay still function and have better performance. I have ethernet cabled to the area for the PVR, I could always use this data point for the appleTV when required to Airplay.

 

[omni]

I know this will sound counter intuitive but have you tried connecting to G instead of N?

For me while N is faster I find G to be more stable when it comes to walls and what not.

Worth trying if you cannot hardware it

 

[Aragorn234]

I did use the other non 5Ghz band but performance was worse.
I will try the Ethernet connection and see if that improves the perfromance any