SMB shares "disconnected"... but not really

[xfortis]

I have followed and read numerous threads about configuring SMB to be compatible with the Boxee Box, and have done everything like setting up share permissions, uninstalling Windows live assistant thing, and a couple of other more complex setting changes.

Boxee won't find my computer in its scan. SO I manually entered my computer's hostname, browsed the resulting folders, and added them as sources.

Problem: All the folders that I added as shares show up as "disconnected" and Boxee won't/can't scan them for content.

Complication: I can access and play all the content on my supposedly "disconnected" shared folders by selecting the files themselves through Files/Local Media Folders, where the shares do show up and are 100% accessible. So while my files are accessible from the Box, they won't scan and so I don't have a nice looking library like I had hoped, only another file tree.

[dconti]

hey,

sorry you are having issues with this. Just to verify, if you go to the main menu, go over to files, go to network, your PC does not show up ever?

do you have your boxee box and your PC hooked up to the same router?

manually adding will let you add IP addresses or hosts we can't automatically find, and when that happens it tends to show as disconnected

[fellcross]

I have this exact same problem. I am using a Fedora 13 server with multiple Samba shares and have the exact same issues mentioned by the OP. All my drives are disconnected, but all files are playable through the Files section without a problem. I try to re-scan and it goes back to disconnected immediately with no real scan.

I've tried a reboot of both the server and boxee, have opened the Samba shares to public access, full read-write privileges, etc... with no change in the functionality of the Boxee Box.

I have Boxee on my Win7 PC and all the shares connect and scan normally.

[dconti]

I have this exact same problem. I am using a Fedora 13 server with multiple Samba shares and have this exact same issues. All my drives are disconnected, but all files are playable through the Files section without a problem. I try to re-scan and it goes back to disconnected immediately with no real scan.

I've tried a reboot of both the server and boxee, have opened the Samba shares to public access, full read-write privileges, etc... with no change in the functionality of the Boxee Box.

I have Boxee on my Win7 PC and all the shares connect and scan normally.

and you added your shares through the file browser (not the manual UI)?

[xfortis]

hey,

sorry you are having issues with this. Just to verify, if you go to the main menu, go over to files, go to network, your PC does not show up ever?

do you have your boxee box and your PC hooked up to the same router?

manually adding will let you add IP addresses or hosts we can't automatically find, and when that happens it tends to show as disconnected

Right. When I scan the network for other computers, my PC does not show up. I can still point the Box to my smb folders, I just have to enter the hostname of my computer manually. But even with all the smb folders added manually, they won't scan. They are fully accessible through the Files section of the main menu, I just have to sort through the file tree.

[fellcross]

and you added your shares through the file browser (not the manual UI)?

No my Samba (Fedora 13) server is not browseable, I use the Manual UI.

[dconti]

No my Samba (Fedora 13) server is not browseable, I use the Manual UI.

do you add by nbt name or by IP address?

when you say not browseable, does this mean you have netbios (nmbd) disabled? we do need netbios to be running to use smb shares.

[dconti]

Right. When I scan the network for other computers, my PC does not show up. I can still point the Box to my smb folders, I just have to enter the hostname of my computer manually. But even with all the smb folders added manually, they won't scan. They are fully accessible through the Files section of the main menu, I just have to sort through the file tree.

if we can't find it through the file browser, and it's on the local network, things are not good for the manual add as we will have trouble resolving the host.

same router for the box and your PC?
is the network type set to home?
is file sharing enabled?
do you have another PC you can verify the shares are set up correctly with?

[fellcross]

do you add by nbt name or by IP address?

when you say not browseable, does this mean you have netbios (nmbd) disabled? we do need netbios to be running to use smb shares.

I add it by IP address. And like I said, I can add the shares just fine by IP address and can even play movies from the Files section, it just won't scan them and says that it's disconnected when you view sources, but it's really not cause I can play them, I can even manually scrap them on IMDB, it just won't add them to my Local Content for Movies cause it doesn't scan it.

[Sadres]

I add it by IP address. And like I said, I can add the shares just fine by IP address and can even play movies from the Files section, it just won't scan them and says that it's disconnected when you view sources, but it's really not cause I can play them, I can even manually scrap them on IMDB, it just won't add them to my Local Content for Movies cause it doesn't scan it.

Having this exact same problem. I can see my shares, manually select and play files, but they remain permanently "disconnected" and refuse to scan.

[gizmotoy]

My shares will all perform normally, and then at some point become "Disconnected" and refuse to scan. Unlike others here, I can't access them using the manual browser.

The other computers on the network can still see the shares, so the host didn't go down. If I reboot the Boxee Box, it'll see the shares again for a few hours after which they'll become disconnected again.

Very frustrating. It seems like there's a couple issues with how SMB shares are handled.

[fellcross]

Thanks to Dconti for pointing me in the right direction. I still think it is a flaw in the software, but my problem is now resolved.

Background - Fedora 13 Samba Server, can manually add shares on BB using the IP address, but no scanning will happen and the share shows Disconnected. None of the shares are browseable on my server from other PCs.

How I got it fixed - Changed all my PCs on my network and the /etc/samba/smb.conf (Samba Config) to be on the same workgroup and added a netbios name, then made sure that nmb service (service nmb start) was running on the server, I can now ping my Samba Server through any device with just the name using broadcast netbios name resolution.

Also in the smb.conf file I made all the shares browseable=yes.

After those items were changed I could see my shares in Network on Win 7 and BB could now see AND scan them as well.

Hope this helps someone else.

Thanks again for the quick replies Dconti.

[ademko]

Background - Fedora 13 Samba Server, can manually add shares on BB using the IP address, but no scanning will happen and the share shows Disconnected. None of the shares are browseable on my server from other PCs.

How I got it fixed - Changed all my PCs on my network and the /etc/samba/smb.conf (Samba Config) to be on the same workgroup and added a netbios name, then made sure that nmb service (service nmb start) was running on the server, I can now ping my Samba Server through any device with just the name using broadcast netbios name resolution.


What settings did you use exactly, as I have the same problem (manual server name + browse files works great, but nothing is getting scanned). My server is ubuntu linux.

My computer doesn't show up in the list automatically, I have to add it manually... If that's required, how do I fix that?

My main share is browseable, but read-only. Is that a problem? (I have a another share is writable, and it didn't seem to make a difference). No shares require a username/password.

So close... :)

[clovis8]

I am having the same problem. If you could post a detailed explanation on how you fixed it that would be great.

[dconti]

Glad to hear that the pointer helped.

Here is the short version. We currently require that NMBD is running on the samba server. This means you need to ensure there is a netbios name available, and you need to ensure the nmbd service is running. Not a problem for windows fileshares, but i guess this is not the default for some linux configurations.

Browseable is an interesting point.

I'll look at making this easier in the future.

[clovis8]

Glad to hear that the pointer helped.

Here is the short version. We currently require that NMBD is running on the samba server. This means you need to ensure there is a netbios name available, and you need to ensure the nmbd service is running. Not a problem for windows fileshares, but i guess this is not the default for some linux configurations.

Browseable is an interesting point.

I'll look at making this easier in the future.


I wish I knew what this meant so I could fix mine also!

[fellcross]

I am having the same problem. If you could post a detailed explanation on how you fixed it that would be great.

I have Fedora 13 so some of these files and locations may be different.

/etc/samba/smb.conf example -


[global]

netbios name = phaseone
workgroup = PHASE
security = user
load printers = no
log file = /var/log/samba/%m.log
max log size = 50

[movies]
comment = Movies
path = /film/Movies
admin users = fellcross
writeable = yes
printable = no
force create mode = 0775
force group = phase
force user = fellcross
browseable = yes



Services Running:

smb (Samba Service)
nmb (Netbios Service) usually included with Samba but mine wasn't running, this was a big key.


The Steps I took are basically the following:

1) Set your smb.conf file with a netbios name and a workgroup to match the Boxee and other PCs on the network. In Boxee you set the workgroup under network settings.

2) Make sure that you start/restart smb and nmb

3) I do not know if you have to have the same permissions that I have. Hopefully the example above will help you troubleshoot.

4) Verification. I verified that Boxee would work by pinging the netbios name from my Win7 PC. If you can ping from command line, then your getting broadcast netbios resolution of the server, and then if your samba settings are right you should be able to go to Network (Network Places on WinXP) and see any browseable shares.

Hope this helps.

[tjwaggoner]

Ok,
I have the .9 version on my laptop and it finds everything in my library and scans it perfectly. Fetches all the data and thumbs for the cover art. This is the ONLY reason i bought the box.
Now the box wont even find the same drives (yes they are on the same network) and when I finally added it manually (nobody should have to do this) it still wont scan it and aggregate the data.
This box is a huge disappointment after using the software on my laptop, and while I appreciate the engineers on here trying to help; why are they having to? Why does this not work like the software on my laptop?

Edit: Thing is being sold in walmart and other large retailers---Do you honestly think that very many people are going to know what youre talking about when you ask if they can "ping the smb from command line" or any of that???? Your selling a home appliance, it needs to work without all complicated (to the vast majority of people) configuring.

[newsboys92]

I'm also having the same problem. I was using upnp for a while because I couldn't get Samba working, but after uninstalling windows live essentials (I'm running Windows 7 professional), I managed to get the Samba share to work with a username/password that I created.

Now, I can manually browse through the shared folder, but if I go into my sources settings, it says the source is disconnected, and it won't scan the folder, so I also cannot access my movies through the nice Files> Movies library feature.

I would really like this fixed.. I already have a PS3 for media streaming, and if I don't get problems like this fixed, I plan to return the boxee box :-/ I've been looking forward to this product for months, and it's kinda a let down between this, and subtitle issues (like the subtitle option being disabled while watching an M2TS file that is displaying subtitles, and I want them off - when I play the file in VLC on my PC it allows me to turn the subtitles off).
I was also put off by the fact that if boxee couldn't recognize my video file, it won't show up in the movies library. It should still show up in the library even if it's not identified, but just as a blank icon and by it's filename if it can't figure out what movie it is. But instead, the only way I can find unidentified files is to go through the folder manually.

It has so much potential, but still needs a lot of love and polish..

[Cheddoleum]

I had exactly this problem as long as the samba share was set up as "browseable = no" and "guest ok = yes", and and I was accessing it without credentials.

I redefined the samba share as browseable, set security to "user" and disabled guest access, restarted samba on the file server, deleted and recreated the connections on Boxee with the user credentials. Then restarted Boxee.

The Boxee box now keeps the connections open and scans successfully.

[newsboys92]

I had exactly this problem as long as the samba share was set up as "browseable = no" and "guest ok = yes", and and I was accessing it without credentials.

I redefined the samba share as browseable, set security to "user" and disabled guest access, restarted samba on the file server, deleted and recreated the connections on Boxee with the user credentials. Then restarted Boxee.

The Boxee box now keeps the connections open and scans successfully.

I'm running a PC with Windows 7, and as far as I'm aware of, there is no option for making the share 'browseable'. I have it set up with username/password credentials, as that is the only way I could get boxee to recognize the share in the first place. So now, I can browse the files on the BB, but the share is recognized as disconnected and will not scan, so I cannot use the files in the Movie library. :(

[venport]

I'm in the same boat. Sever is win7 x64 the bbox can see my files and play them via "file" however it wont scan my files and says "disconnected" on the shares menu.

XBMC was able to see and scan my files why is bbox having such a hard time?

[newsboys92]

well, I reinstalled Windows Live Messenger and Windows Photo Gallery, and now I can't access my samba share again. Those were the *only* two applications I installed from the windows live essential pack. There wasn't even an option to install the sign-in assistant.

Somebody help :-/

[ademko]

What settings did you use exactly, as I have the same problem (manual server name + browse files works great, but nothing is getting scanned). My server is ubuntu linux.

My computer doesn't show up in the list automatically, I have to add it manually... If that's required, how do I fix that?

My main share is browseable, but read-only. Is that a problem? (I have a another share is writable, and it didn't seem to make a difference). No shares require a username/password.

So close... :)

Ok, I got mine working. In addition to running nmbd, I had to open up my server's firewall tables a bit. I was only letting in port TCP/139, which has served me well thus far, but for the BB I also opened up TCP/137,138 and UDP/137,138,139. Works great now.

[clovis8]

I had exactly this problem as long as the samba share was set up as "browseable = no" and "guest ok = yes", and and I was accessing it without credentials.

I redefined the samba share as browseable, set security to "user" and disabled guest access, restarted samba on the file server, deleted and recreated the connections on Boxee with the user credentials. Then restarted Boxee.

The Boxee box now keeps the connections open and scans successfully.

It sure would be nice if someone from Boxee would post in here a simply to understand explanation for how to do any of this.

[fellcross]

I think for the windows server guys you just need to have netbois enabled on the server side and possible make sure that your shares are properly setup for the Boxee. I haven't seen if they confirmed yet that you HAVE to have a username/password on the share or not.

Here is a link to how to enable Netbios...it's not difficult.

http://ttcshelbyville.wordpress.com/2009/12/17/enable-netbios-over-tcpip/

[xfortis]

I have enabled Netbios and still have the same problem. Win7 x64 is my server OS.

Edit: I have also allowed TCP and UDP connections through 137-139, no change.

[xfortis]

I solved the problem on Windows 7 x64. I did a number of things and I'm not sure which one did it exactly.

1: Enable NetBios over TCP/IP. The method for this is simple and its mentioned earlier in this thread.

2: Allow TCP and UDP incoming connections for ports 137-139 in Windows Firewall. Here's how to do that:
Control Manager->Windows Firewall
On the top left, ->Advanced Settings
On the top left, ->Inbound Rules
On top right, ->New Rule...
Select "Port" click Next
First select TCP and enter 137-139 in the "specific local ports" field
Select Allow the Connection
Select all domains (You probably don't need to do all of them but I did)
Name it whatever you want (mine was Boxee Incoming port forward)
Click Finish
Create another rule just like the one you just did except select UDP instead of TCP

3: Change the name of your workgroup to something other than WORKGROUP (which is default). If you have a different workgroup name already, you can skip this for now and see if the previous changes have fixed the problem.

4: Once these changes are made, restart your computer.

By following these steps, the Boxee Box found my computer's shares no problem (no manually entering host names) and scanned them for content without a hiccup. My Boxee now works as I expected, and it is a fantastic little device. Hope this helps some people.

[m4t]

i've been seeing this issue both in boxee app for linux, and since i got the boxee box.

my setup is pretty straightforward: nas running samba 3.3.14, cifs only (port 445 only). all traffic is filtered except for port 445.

i'd rather not install nmbd. there are no windows machines on the network, and my other machines can access the share fine via cifs.

like others have mentioned, the files are browsable, but scans fail and the share shows up as 'Disconnected'.

considering i've already spent hours renaming my media like 'Movie.(2009).part1.avi', i'd like to be able to reap the benefits ;)

-matt

[dconti]

i've been seeing this issue both in boxee app for linux, and since i got the boxee box.

my setup is pretty straightforward: nas running samba 3.3.14, cifs only (port 445 only). all traffic is filtered except for port 445.

i'd rather not install nmbd. there are no windows machines on the network, and my other machines can access the share fine via cifs.

like others have mentioned, the files are browsable, but scans fail and the share shows up as 'Disconnected'.

considering i've already spent hours renaming my media like 'Movie.(2009).part1.avi', i'd like to be able to reap the benefits ;)

-matt

right now there's a hard dependency on netbios resolution. you can try adding your file source by IP, but even then i think it'll fail because it wants to use the lowest cost method of ensuring the server is online first (netbios == much cheaper than doing an smb stat).

[jimmycheng]

My shares will all perform normally, and then at some point become "Disconnected" and refuse to scan. Unlike others here, I can't access them using the manual browser.

The other computers on the network can still see the shares, so the host didn't go down. If I reboot the Boxee Box, it'll see the shares again for a few hours after which they'll become disconnected again.

Very frustrating. It seems like there's a couple issues with how SMB shares are handled.

I had this exact problem for several days. I did everything that was suggested here and it would still disconnect at some point, seemingly with anything that I did on the windows 7 x64 machine. Since last night, it's stayed connected and I can't explain why.

[m4t]

hey dan,
thanks for the prompt reply. i re-added via the ip address (rather than its dns name) and it scanned fine.

-matt

[dconti]

hey dan,
thanks for the prompt reply. i re-added via the ip address (rather than its dns name) and it scanned fine.

-matt

thanks for the follow up, good to know that worked. i will update the faq with this (fedora core apparently has nmbd off by default).

[joebob73]

Dan,

It looks like you're the guru for the samba issues. Currently, I am experiencing the "Disconnected" message on my Windows Home Server. I can provide a username and password and successfully browse by the Files menu, but it does not scan successfully. All of my shares are password protected.

Things I have tried:
1. Verified that there is no Windows Live on my server.
2. Enabled TCP/UDP ports 137-139.
3. Ensured Netbios is operational.

I've read posts where other WHS users are fine so I am not sure where my problem is. I have also read your post regarding getting shares working and applied as much of that as applicable to my server. All of my laptops, the pc version of Boxee, and desktops have no problems accessing the WHS share though. I also have a separate Buffalo NAS box that Boxee Box is successfully scanning.

So the question is: Is there something I need to do differently on the WHS box to get BoxeeBox to successfully scan? Browsing via Files is ok though.

Thanks a bunch for all of your guy's hard work.

[ajonline]

Does the average user expect to go through all of this.

[Striker444]

I too have been having this issue, tried all the suggestions in the thread with no resolve. I have updated the report for this issue on the bug tracker site, please click vote on the link below, hopefully it can be resolved quicker with everyones help.

http://jira.boxee.tv/browse/BOXEE-7491

[Jacob Boström]

Sweet!
In my ubuntu server install I enabled WINS and all issues disappeared. 'Local file sources' now get scanned and my 'Movies' and 'Shows' tabs function as expected.

Execute these two sudo commands below to enable it;

sudo sed -i 's/#.*wins support.*/ wins support = yes/' /etc/samba/smb.conf
sudo service nmbd restart

[aquenne]

im having this very issue, but its somewhat odd.

The scenario is i have a winxp machine with a few external hd's hooked up via usb.

Each of those ext hd's are shared. My WDTV finds them fine, and I can browse them manually in boxee box. When adding them to the source, 2 of the 3 scan no problem, but one always says Disconnected, even tho I can browse via the file menus in boxee.

I cant see it being any network netbois or whatever settings, as 2 of the 3 work fine.

any suggestions on what I can do or check?

[gribbli]

I had a pretty similar situation to this, however mine is definitely an issue with the Boxee Box rather than the server.

Setup: I have Ubuntu as my server system, which I have had up and running with Samba shares for quite a long time now. Prior to buying the BB, I was using a Boxee on a Revo in the living room and using the same server setup as it is currently.

Scenario: Basically I set up the shares on the BB through the settings->local sources menu, using the server computer name and smb un/pass, just the same way it was set up on my Revo - all worked fine.

Then a couple of days ago I unplugged the BB (including wired network connection) and took it down my folks for a show and tell, over there I hooked it up to their wireless N to show them some online content etc. When I hooked it back up to my tv/network later that day I was getting this very same 'Disconnected' error on all of the sources - even though they clearly were still connected fine and accessible via the files section, whereas the settings menu would just greet you with a 'Connection Refused' on interrogation.

I has a bit of a play around but knowing how much fun Samba can be - I took the lazy option of reserving an IP for the server on my router and just setting it all up again via the IP address.

Finally, rather than retiring the Revo to a life as a light dev box, at the last minute I decided to hook it up to my bedroom TV instead, all works perfectly while still using the same computer name and same original samba connections (the ones the BB can no longer see). Between that and the fact that no settings have been changed on the server, this leaves the BB as the only variable.

So this is either an issue with swapping from one network/network type to another, or the other possibility is that the BB is caching some network info that is not static - my guess would be the latter.

I did have a quick skim though the settings to see if there was a factory defaults but didnt notice anything obvious - is this option available?

I have a work around so it doesnt matter all that much to me, but I am hardly a novice user, so if this is a BB issue then the point is well made about the problems it could cause for the plug-n-play users the box is trying to attract.

[dconti]

hey guys,

it is worth noting that there are about 30 different root causes for a lot of the symptoms people are seeing here, unfortunately, and while a lot of them have been fixed up and many people are having a much better experience, obviously there are still a few bumps left.

if you are seeing your shares show up as disconnected, do try setting the default credentials. either to 'guest' for the username and no password, or to the username/password you use for your password protected shares, and see if that helps.

also, it's worth noting. the box doesn't cache smb credentials across reboots *except* the default credentials you add in the UI. so if you accessed a share and had to put in credentials, then mapped it as a source, then power cycled it, you really need to browse to the share in the file browser after booting and re-enter your credentials. this issue was the main reason we re-added the default credentials in the UI

[clovis8]

I have the default set to guest and no password but I am still showing as disconnected. It is getting beyond annoying that I cant seem to fix this. I have been trying since the boxee launch, Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[war59312]

Same issue here using Win7 x64 and tried everything in this post but nothing works.

I can play videos just fine, but since it shows up as disconnected I can NOT add (as in scan) anything to the shows and video databases.

Oddly I get no errors or anything when scanning a source, Boxee simply never adds anything to shows or videos after doing a scan.

[Striker444]

hey guys,

it is worth noting that there are about 30 different root causes for a lot of the symptoms people are seeing here, unfortunately, and while a lot of them have been fixed up and many people are having a much better experience, obviously there are still a few bumps left.

if you are seeing your shares show up as disconnected, do try setting the default credentials. either to 'guest' for the username and no password, or to the username/password you use for your password protected shares, and see if that helps.

also, it's worth noting. the box doesn't cache smb credentials across reboots *except* the default credentials you add in the UI. so if you accessed a share and had to put in credentials, then mapped it as a source, then power cycled it, you really need to browse to the share in the file browser after booting and re-enter your credentials. this issue was the main reason we re-added the default credentials in the UI

Tested with guest - no password, also gave the guest account full permissions to where the shares are, saved as default credentials, rebooted box, verified I could get to the share manually, no luck

Tested with my admin account, saved as default credentials, rebooted box, verified I could get to the share manually, no luck

Posted my new Boxee logs per your suggestions above in the trouble ticket below

http://jira.boxee.tv/browse/BOXEE-7491

Please let me know if there is anything else you would like me to try. I am more than willing to do whatever is necessary to help resolve this issue

[dconti]

i'm going through the sets of logs you and gregory have posted and will see if i can figure out what's going on from those - thanks for the detail on this.

[Lividhatter]

I am also having this problem. When i first hooked the BB up 2 days ago, it scanned my shares and all was well. Today it showed the disconnected meassage and i cant get it to scan.

When i click browse to add shares, I can see my computer (windows 7) and then when i click add share, it says its going to scan. Shortly after it will read disconnected.

If i manually go to that folder and click on a file, it will play without issue.

Have we figured out how to resolve this?

[frystejp]

I have the same problem aswell. I can play everything in the boxee-box through my shared folders from a win 7 ultimate x64 computer. But it wont scan the sources, i have to add them manually otherwise the box wont find em. But when i try to add the sorces to movies for example, it just says waiting to be scanned, and then i scan, and it says that it find 0 files and so on. When i check the sources it just says "disconnected". It seems wierd and i dont think there is something wrong with the file sharing, smb or windows, as it works fine to add them manually and i can play everything i have shared. But i have no clue at all why the boxee box wont identify the sources and be able to scan them.

[gribbli]

I would be interested to know how many people that are having this problem, had added sources before the firmware update that gave us the default smb auth option.

I only ask that because as per my previous post (where my work around was to us ip address instead), i figured out the reason why it wouldn't let me manually authenticate with the computer name was that I had done a firmware update in between and from then on it was ignoring the username and password that I was manually inputting. Presumably just jumping to the new default smb credential instead (of which I had none at the time).

As soon as I set the default smb credentials all of a sudden it liked my computer name again - even though these default credentials are exactly the same as the ones it refused to connect to when attempted manually.

I'm guessing that most of the system tests are being done with pretty clean boxes rather than ones that have a lot of data/metadata already set. It might be a good idea to include some regression tests against well established instances of the boxee database as it cant be a coincidence that so many people are finding great success with resetting to factory default and then updating to the latest firmware straight away.

[stevejones99]

I too am having a very odd issue with SMB shares becoming disconnected. I add the shares, they work fine and scan etc.

At random times when the Boxee is fired up the shares show as disconnected until the server is rebooted, once rebooted they operate as normal till a few days later when they stop again.

The files are being served off a Win 7 x64 machine and the same issue was encountered on a Windows Vista box. The issue also occurs when using XBMC.

Shutting down all applications or logging off the server makes no difference, only a full reboot. Shares remain available from other PC's on the network only Boxee seems to have difficulty connecting. I've also tried changing ports on the router and nothing seems to make a difference.

Has anyone encountered something similar or have any idea what could be going on.

Any help greatly appreciated!

[clovis8]

we have been having this problem since launch and boxee seems to care less. I would not hold my breath for a fix.

[frystejp]

we have been having this problem since launch and boxee seems to care less. I would not hold my breath for a fix.

thats a shame, i'm realy concidering changing to another kind of media extender.

[gregwa]

we have been having this problem since launch and boxee seems to care less. I would not hold my breath for a fix.

Funny how you think that the Boxee team doesn't care.. A member of the boxee team posted that they are looking into logs for two people just above your post.

I'm running shares on both Linux and Windows XP and don't have any problems. Ever consider getting a different OS if you aren't going to acknowledge that fact that Boxee Team IS working on it???

[philhu]

I have this same problem.

BB never sees my machine with all my shares on it. 3 other Win7 computers see it just fine. I've setup the share with permissions and a user/password. A win7 computer gets into the shares just fine using that user/pass. The server has firewall turned off!

BB never sees it. I try to add it by name or IP, both ask for user/pass, both say 'connection refused'

[gribbli]

I have this same problem.

BB never sees my machine with all my shares on it. 3 other Win7 computers see it just fine. I've setup the share with permissions and a user/password. A win7 computer gets into the shares just fine using that user/pass. The server has firewall turned off!

BB never sees it. I try to add it by name or IP, both ask for user/pass, both say 'connection refused'

Have you only tried manually or have you tried those credentials in the default smb as well?

[philhu]

Have you only tried manually or have you tried those credentials in the default smb as well?

Yes I have. BB manually cannot connect, connection refused. Locally on anothe win7 box, no problem, all video seen, and playable

I cannot even get the BB to see into the share to see the available shares!

[war59312]

also, it's worth noting. the box doesn't cache smb credentials across reboots *except* the default credentials you add in the UI. so if you accessed a share and had to put in credentials, then mapped it as a source, then power cycled it, you really need to browse to the share in the file browser after booting and re-enter your credentials. this issue was the main reason we re-added the default credentials in the UI

Decent work around, when you only have 1 source. :(

Please fix this bug!

[TimSykesNN]

Just to add to this. I have two boxees. I got one the day it came out and my SMB server worked find. Scanned all my movies and put them in my local media under “movies”. I got a second one after the first FW update and connected to the same server and same shares. II had the disconnected issue on the second box. I recently reimaged my media server and had to reset my SMB on my original box, and now that one shows disconnected as well.

The only thing I can think of it there was an issue with one of the FW releases that is causing this issue. If the share was added before the FW update it was fine, after the update it shows disconnected.

[jamiek03]

My Box was working fine since mid November. Recently it started losing the network connection through the shows movies etc. I was still able to browse network through files as others had explained.

I read above posts and did the following:

0. (I already had my folders shared correctly etc, but double checked them before proceeding)
1. Enable NetBios over TCP/IP
2. On Boxee Box, went through the automatic network setup again

My box has been functioning fine ever since with no network disconnected.

This was all on a Windows 7 64 bit PC sharing to Boxee Box.

[danneber]

I have same problem :( havent read all posts about this, but i guess that i just need to accept that i cant have my movies in movie folder? :confused:

[TimSykesNN]

So I ran the new update, and its still a issue. Is there a way to make a bug report on this because its really getting on my nerves that its not working.

[bek]

I don't know if I'm having the same problem, but my shares frequently become disconnected (pretty much every time I use my Boxee) and I have to rescan them manually.

(Win7, 64-bit, connecting via my admin account.)

[seand5018]

Rescanning manually seems to be the key, especially if your network ever craps out, like there is an intant of interupted service. Once it sees a share as disconnected it stays disconnected till you restart Boxee.

At least on the SMB shares I have between two old Apple TV's.

[Striker444]

So I ran the new update, and its still a issue. Is there a way to make a bug report on this because its really getting on my nerves that its not working.

Earlier in this thread explains that there already is one open and that its currently being investigated by the developers. Make your voice heard by clicking vote from the bug tracker below

http://jira.boxee.tv/browse/BOXEE-7491

According to what I see it will be resolved in the SP4

[haimomer]

I think i found some solution.
I had problem connecting to my win7 PC from my laptop (Also running Win7) that is running Boxee

I cleaned my arp table and arp cache on my laptop and it was solved (cause my network at home and at work are the same 192.168.1.xx) so the mac address in the arp table was wrong.
these are the commands I ran:
netsh interface ip delete arpcache
arp -d *

for now it is working for me :)

[sugewhite]

I think i found some solution.
I had problem connecting to my win7 PC from my laptop (Also running Win7) that is running Boxee

I cleaned my arp table and arp cache on my laptop and it was solved (cause my network at home and at work are the same 192.168.1.xx) so the mac address in the arp table was wrong.
these are the commands I ran:
netsh interface ip delete arpcache
arp -d *

for now it is working for me :)

How do you do this? The way it "should" work is plug it in, turn boxee tv on and scan everything with no problem.

[sugewhite]

My Box was working fine since mid November. Recently it started losing the network connection through the shows movies etc. I was still able to browse network through files as others had explained.

I read above posts and did the following:

0. (I already had my folders shared correctly etc, but double checked them before proceeding)
1. Enable NetBios over TCP/IP
2. On Boxee Box, went through the automatic network setup again

My box has been functioning fine ever since with no network disconnected.

This was all on a Windows 7 64 bit PC sharing to Boxee Box.

This was just to get your pc to sync with boxee correct?

[haimomer]

How do you do this? The way it "should" work is plug it in, turn boxee tv on and scan everything with no problem.

Maybe i wasnt so clear.. I am running Boxee on my laptop (on Win7) so i can access my arp table

[sugewhite]

Maybe i wasnt so clear.. I am running Boxee on my laptop (on Win7) so i can access my arp table

Thanks. I use the Boxee box. I downloaded the boxee program on my pc but dont use it. I can get to my files off my pc to my boxee box. I just cant get my media scanned..?

[haimomer]

after a while i wasnt able to scan from boxee on my PC also ...

[1loudsvt]

I think i found some solution.
I had problem connecting to my win7 PC from my laptop (Also running Win7) that is running Boxee

I cleaned my arp table and arp cache on my laptop and it was solved (cause my network at home and at work are the same 192.168.1.xx) so the mac address in the arp table was wrong.
these are the commands I ran:
netsh interface ip delete arpcache
arp -d *

for now it is working for me :)

i did this on my server and it fixed the problem! i have no idea why but it worked. as a reference i started having this issue after i lost power in the middle of watching a movie.

to do it on windows 7...
click start
in the search bar type "cmd" and press enter
you should now be at a command prompt
type "netsh interface ip delete arpcache" and press enter
it should say "ok"
type "arp -d *" and press enter
reboot server
turn on boxee and wait as it now scans all of your files :D

[irxc]

Hi all,

I too have had this problem and apparantly I just solved it on my BoxeeBox - by combining a couple of tricks I've read here.
The following is what I did to make it work;

* I changed my workgroup on the BB (from lowercase to uppercase, as it is on my server (WinXP x86).
* I re-ran the network setup on the BB and rebooted it thereafter.
* On the BB, I entered the username for the account logged on to the server.
* Activated netbios on the server.

Voilá, it works for me now. ..now I just gotta wait for the BB to scan all 10TB :p

[edit]: ..and during the night the BB lost the smb-shares again. Gonna try a factory-reset tonight, getting close to replace the BB with a laptop running xbmc instead, way to much hassle and bugs..

[hammadurb]

I just restored the BB to factory default, upgraded to the new firmware and set everything up again and it is working fine. The workgroup, default smb credentials, netbios, and everything else has been setup and enabled and the sources have been added again. It is currently scanning the media as we speak. I will update once everything has been scanned and I will restart the BB and see if the settings work after the reboot.

Update: After everything scanned, I shutoff the BB and turned it back on this morning and everything is still showing connected and all the media is showing up where they are supposed to.

[elrock]

Has anyone managed to solve this problem using a Mac? (My SMB share is on a MacBook Pro.)

[nashfunk]

Funny you ask about Mac users. I was just trying to figure this out. I'm on an older iMac G4, running OS 10.4.11.

I have the same basic problem as everyone in the thread. But at times my scan does connect, and finds a portion of my music library but only a fraction of it... only from certain directories it seems. Then just recently I started having the "disconnected" issue too. I got the BB in December and have never got it fully functional. I can browse my iMac even when "disconnected" and play whatever I want, but the scan doesn't work.

I'm going to start from scratch on the network config. and see what happens. But I gotta tell you... a lot of the suggestions and explanations here are over my head. I have no idea what half of this is saying. I'm on a wireless router and have a Wii and a Blu-Ray configured just fine. This box has been a pain so far. I'll keep trying. Any help is appreciated.

[onedown]

I have an network harddrive (Conceptronic grab 'n go CHD3NET) with smb (samba) turned on. I can browse through the movies and play them, with the boxee box "files menu", and can add the directory in the movie library, but then i also get "disconnect".

The directory on my mac (Imac '08 with snow leopard) is no problem at all in the movie library...

Anybody experience with a network harddrive?

[SSCR3]

Still showing all my shares as "Disconnected" although I can still see them in files like everyone else on this thread, also tried all the suggestions and nothing. Funny thing is that it worked okay the first day I had it.:confused:

[elrock]

I'm going to start from scratch on the network config. and see what happens. But I gotta tell you... a lot of the suggestions and explanations here are over my head. I have no idea what half of this is saying. I'm on a wireless router and have a Wii and a Blu-Ray configured just fine. This box has been a pain so far. I'll keep trying. Any help is appreciated.

Pretty much all the suggestions made in this thread apply to various flavors of Windows. It's still an unresolved issue for Mac users and we're waiting on a fix from Boxee, hopefully in the next software version.

[SSCR3]

Really suprised there is not more people with this issue. And I was ready to buy another box for the front room.:mad:

[SSCR]

I just had a thought, if I buy a NAS and throw my HDDs into that, will my Boxee Box stay "connected" to that? Might make me spend the dough early and just do that for a solution.:D

[Chuck_IV]

Really suprised there is not more people with this issue. And I was ready to buy another box for the front room.:mad:

Possibly one of the reasons why is that many use either a USB drive connected right to the Boxee, a NAS setup or an ethernet connected drive to store their files since anyone of those don't require you PC to be on, in order to stream. The issue doesn't seem to affect those setups.

I'm using an ethernet connected drive(Seagate GoFlex 2tb) and it has been perfect since I hooked it up last Sunday, not one disconnect.

[SSCR]

Possibly one of the reasons why is that many use either a USB drive connected right to the Boxee, a NAS setup or an ethernet connected drive to store their files since anyone of those don't require you PC to be on, in order to stream. The issue doesn't seem to affect those setups.

I'm using an ethernet connected drive(Seagate GoFlex 2tb) and it has been perfect since I hooked it up last Sunday, not one disconnect.

Cool maybe I'll pick up a NAS enclosure this week and see if that works.

[mktbra]

Exactly same problem here, some days it just works, some days all my shares are disconnected however I can access everything just fine through "files".

It would actually be better if it never worked since that would mean there is something wrong in my setting but when it works fine somedays this means that the Box is just behaving strangely and buggy...

Im on Windows 7 64bit.

[SSCR]

All right, I plugged my external drive into my Boxee and POW 10 out of 11 files all showed up in my "movies"...NICE. The one file was The Venture Brothers Season 4, but I knew I might have to tweak how I named that and it still not be picked up, I'm cool with that. One question, is there a specific way to unplug the drive from Boxee or can I just unplug it? Thanks-Don

[reddyreal]

Really frustrated by this. Basically, if you are adding files on a daily basis (I am), this permissions issue makes the external HD impossible to copy to!

I have my external HD using HFS+ with journalling disabled and I initially got the permissions correct to set it up. I have two folders on my external HD: One for my roommate and one for me. I applied the permissions to the enclosing folders but I guess once the Boxee Box goes to sleep, it resets these permissions???

If anyone has any further ideas, help would be appreciated. I'm cross posting this message in another thread, fyi.

[canuckle]

This is one issue that is getting annoying. It seems to be happening more frequently lately. My shares on my D-Link NAS get disconnected.

Sometimes if I remove and re-add the share and select scan now, the shares all reconnect after that.

Sometimes I have to log off Boxee and log back in again, or do a reboot of the box.

Sometimes I have to reboot the NAS and then everything reconnects. I know it's not the NAS, as my notebook can connect to the shares without issue.

I had it happen watching a movie the other night. Halfway through the movie, it stopped. When I tried to resume, I got the playback error msg. file can't be found. I then looked at my shares and they were all disconnected.

In this scenario I had to reboot my NAS when all else failed to reconnect.

Definitely one of the most annoying bugs.

[Striker444]

New update on this from the developers. I am going to try this tonight

rafael added a comment - 21/Mar/11 12:52 PM
please see if this temporary workaround helps:

windows default connection timeout is 10 minutes.
You can modify the SMB connection timeout value to be 1 minute.

by running
net config server /autodisconnect:1

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314882

or
You can modify the SMB connection timeout value by opening the Registry Editor and navigating to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\LanmanWorkstation\parameters. The specific key that you’re looking for in this location is the KeepConn key. This key is a REG_DWORD and contains an integer ranging from 1 to 65535. This number indicates the number of seconds that a connection will remain idle before timing out. For this change to work, you must modify this registry key on all Windows NT servers and workstations.

http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-5031564.html

[SSCR]

Besides that work around, are they still planning on fixing this for the next update?

[elrock]

That workaround can't do anything for Mac users. :(

A fix is scheduled to be included in the next update, and there seems to be a recent uptick in developer activity on it. I posted my debug log on jira yesterday; I hope that helps them figure out a solution.

[So Fresh]

That workaround does nothing, I did that weeks ago. BB just reconnects those sessions almost immediately. You can see what will happen if you set your autodisconnect to 1 by just manually ending all of those sessions and then watching what happens. They magically reappear.

[SSCR]

That workaround does nothing, I did that weeks ago. BB just reconnects those sessions almost immediately. You can see what will happen if you set your autodisconnect to 1 by just manually ending all of those sessions and then watching what happens. They magically reappear.

Hopes dashed once more......:(

[tnoyc]

I'm having this problem again.

I can view any content that I've placed on a share that has been manually added. I can view any of the content that shows up in "Shows" and "Movies"; if I go to the 'Files' menu item, I can brows all of the manually added shares and access all of the content therein. If I manually add a new share (I can only do so via defining a hostname/username/pass) I can then access the share through the newly created link in the Files menu/page.

What I cannot do, is brows the SMB workgroup. I can sometimes get it working again by a combination of rebooting my Windows 7 machine (where the shares are) and rebooting the Boxee Box. It is completely random as to what will make it work again.

I am able to view, browse, and access ALL of the defined shares from ALL of the other devices on my network. The Boxee Box is the *ONLY* device that *EVER* has this issue. The other devices are two Linux laptops, a Macbook Pro, a Linux desktop, and my Android phone. For something that is defined as being "aggressive" in accessing network shares, it fails constantly at something incredibly simple. There is something seriously flawed with the way Boxee is trying to connect to network shares.

[aleith]

Let me preface this by saying I am indeed a fan of Boxee, although by the end of this post it is not going to sound like that.

As soon as money enters the picture the software needs to have some level of polish, and quite frankly the amount of bugs and glitches in boxee box is astounding.

This shares disconnecting issue is absolutely ridiculous. The primary reason I bought this box was for local content, and up until now it has worked (almost) perfectly for it. This needs to be fixed immediately. Users should not have to wade through pages of technical posts to "fix" this themselves, it should just *work*. Samba shares are nothing new, and all of my computers/devices can see each other and have never seemed to have a problem. Boxee box, why cant you?

When this was free software I was running on my Apple TV I didn't complain when there was a problem (although, speaking of that, I don't recall having any problems whatsoever with samba shares when I was using that setup), but now I paid over $200 for this buggy piece of shit and it is starting to wear on me.

For the love of god get your shit together boxee, learn how to properly test your software with some of those millions you just received.

[elrock]

Good news: the bug has just been closed, which I assume means the fix will be included in the next firmware update coming soon. Let's hope it works for Macs as well as Windows machines.

I love my Boxee Box and fortunately I haven't experienced any of the show-stopping bugs reported by others, but this particular bug was very frustrating and I'm glad it seems finally to have been resolved.

[andreas@vogler.name]

I have The Same Problem on Boxeee on Ubuntu 11.4 64bit .
It seems that its not working. I Tried now 0.9.23.15885 from Source....
Have had Many Problems in Doing so, but the Bug Remains.

[switch81]

Ok, I got mine working. In addition to running nmbd, I had to open up my server's firewall tables a bit. I was only letting in port TCP/139, which has served me well thus far, but for the BB I also opened up TCP/137,138 and UDP/137,138,139. Works great now.

I'm having similar issues with everyone on this thread...

My setup involves a Mac Mini running the latest Boxee (0.9.23.15885), and a Ubuntu 10.04 media server with a samba share set up.

I have a netbios name enabled in my smb.conf, and I can ping my ubuntu machine from anywhere on the network. I can also use nmblookup or smbclient from my macmini to find the samba share on my ubuntu machine.

I can also add my ubuntu shares by manually adding the sources by search for the IP or hostname... but the shares end up disconnecting very quickly in Boxee.

A previous replier said that opening ports 137-138 for TCP traffic and ports 137-139 for UDP traffic... are these the ports that Boxee is looking for?

I was reading Ubuntu's samba documentation and found this:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Samba/SecuringSamba

Configure your firewall (iptables) to limit access to your server. Samba uses ports
- UDP ports 137 and 138
- TCP ports 139 and 445

Now, I don't have a firewall running my Ubuntu machine, but it doesn't seem to be listening to TCP/137-138, or UDP/139... could this by why the ubuntu share never shows up automatically???

Thanks in advance for any help you guys can provide!!!