[GUIDE] How to play local media when the Boxee servers or internet are down

[nfodiz]

UPDATED 6-30-2012

If your media is on USB storage or SMB shares, steps 1-5 should get you going

1. Unplug the ethernet cable from the WAN/INTERNET port on your router (cable from your modem to your router) or disable the WAN interface from your router's configuration menu.

2. Turn on your Boxee...You will be prompted with a screen that says "Boxee can't connect to the internet. You can still use Boxee but some of it's features won't be available."

3. Select OK and continue to the main menu.

4. The bottom of the main menu should say "Boxee is offline... Featured content will return when Boxee can connect to the Internet"

5. At this point if it is just the Boxee servers that are down, reconnect your ethernet cable to the WAN port on your router and see if it will let you play your local media. If it doesn't then continue to step 6

6. If you are using NFS and your Movies file sources are mapped to the devices network name, ex. nfs://MybookLive/nfs:/Movies then you probably won't be able to play any of your media under movies on the Boxee Box (I wasn't able to as it hangs with a spinning circle when I select to play the movie) This could be a router make/model issue and seems to only effect NFS shares for me. The share names seem to change from ex. NAS to NAS.local when you unplug the WAN cable and in return none of my media would play. I also could not browse inside the share by going to Files/Browse/NFS and clicking on the NAS.local share. SMB shares worked fine.

7. Hit your bottom menu button on the Boxee remote and select the gear icon and then select file sources.

8. Select Add sources then select your protocol of choice AFP - NFS or SMB then select to Manually Enter IP / Name

9. From here you want to add the IP address of your network storage, ex. 192.168.1.2 and then enter the username and password of the share if there is one or just click ok if not.

10. You should now be presented with a list of shares on your device, just click the Add Sources button to add them all and Tick VIDEO under media type and NEVER under Type of scanning and click the ADD button.

11. Now hit the bottom menu button on your remote to back all the way out to the main menu.

12. Select FILES then select the source you just added ex. 192.168.1.2

13. You should now see all available shares at that IP and be able to play any movie you like

Ideally you should add your file sources by IP address instead of network device name when creating and importing your media library and you will never run into problems when the boxee servers are down and you pull the ethernet cord from your WAN port on your router to force the boxee into offline mode.

This guide is tried and tested on firmware 1.5.1.23734

[Forhad]

The iformation is really helpful to me because most of the time the internet or server I am using are down.

[thietke-web]

1. Unplug the ethernet cable from the WAN port on your router or disable the WAN interface from your router's configuration menu.

2. Turn on your Boxee...You will be prompted with a screen that says "Boxee can't connect to the internet. You can still use Boxee but some of it's features won't be available."

3. Select OK and continue to the main menu.

4. The bottom of the main menu should say "Boxee is offline... Featured content will return when Boxee can connect to the Internet"

5. At this point if it is just the Boxee servers that are down, reconnect your ethernet cable to the WAN port on your router and see if it will let you play your local media. If it doesn't then continue to step 6

6. If your Movies file sources are mapped to the devices network name, ex. nfs://MybookLive/nfs:/Movies then you probably won't be able to play any of your media under movies on the Boxee Box (I wasn't able to as it hangs with a spinning circle when I select to play the movie) This could be a router make/model issue

7. Hit your bottom menu button on the Boxee remote and select the gear icon and then select file sources.

8. Select Add sources then select your protocol of choice AFP - NFS or SMB then select to Manually Enter IP / Name

9. From here you want to add the IP address of your network storage, ex. 192.168.1.2 and then enter the username and password of the share if there is one or just click ok if not.

10. You should now be presented with a list of shares on your device, just click the Add Sources button to add them all and Tick VIDEO under media type and NEVER under Type of scanning and click the ADD button.

11. Now hit the bottom menu button on your remote to back all the way out to the main menu.

12. Select FILES then select the source you just added ex. 192.168.1.2

13. You should now see all available shares at that IP and be able to play any movie you like

Ideally you should add your file sources by IP address instead of network device name when creating and importing your media library and you will never run into problems thiet ke web when the boxee servers are down and you pull the ethernet cord from your WAN port on your router to force the boxee into offline mode.

This guide is tried and tested on firmware 1.5.1.23734

Thanks for this information sir, This is really helpful.

[Catherine22]

As i am a new Boxee user i just wandering of such a info. Although i have not faced this issue yet but now it is known to me that how should i play local media when Boxee servers or internet are down. So thanks for your insight!

[Techgeek32]

Nice thread. Thanks for sharing.

[rwburnett]

This is ridiculous. So my six boxees are useless without internet. Super happy right now. Followed steps above and box won't let me in still. This should work automatically so my wife and kids can watch local content when Internet is down - WITHOUT having to call the friggen geek squad. Unbelievable. What if I didn't buy these boxes for web content at all?

[nfodiz]

At step 2 it shouldn't even try to login to your boxee account when no internet connection is detected. When you say "and box won't let me in still" where are you getting stuck exactly?

At step 2 are you turning on your box from a shutdown state?

[rwburnett]

Disabled WAN on router (why should I have to do this? how will i know when my internet is back on?) - stuck in continuous loop of this:

2. Turn on your Boxee...You will be prompted with a screen that says "Boxee can't connect to the internet. You can still use Boxee but some of it's features won't be available."

3. Select OK and continue to the main menu.

Turn it off and on - no better - still in loop. Am I crazy to assume that this thing would still work when god shuts off the internet? My background is "somewhat saavy" with a wife and four young kids that are not. I can't walk them through these steps when the internet goes down when I'm at work. Bottom line - when internet is down, this product should not behave any differently other than (obviously) web content. Should be able to turn it on, go to "files," and pick a movie.

[nfodiz]

So you are seeing "Boxee can't connect to the internet. You can still use Boxee but some of it's features won't be available." and when you click ok to continue to the main menu it never makes it to the main menu? Does it sit at a spinning circle?

And as far as using the boxee when the internet is down, the only part of the guide you MIGHT have to follow is from step 6 on. When you boot up boxee and no internet connection is detected, it goes into offline mode automatically (or should) but the Boxee might have problems playing files off network shares if you are using NFS and they are mapped to the network device name instead of ip address (this was the case for me) but once you follow the guide from step 6 and on you should never have a problem acessing movies from the files section. The same can be done by redoing your movies file sources and pointing to the shares ip address when importing your files into the library.

[rwburnett]

EXACTLY right:

So you are seeing "Boxee can't connect to the internet. You can still use Boxee but some of it's features won't be available." and when you click ok to continue to the main menu it never makes it to the main menu?

It does not freeze on the spinning circle - just goes back to the "Boxee can't con..." No main menu.

From your info - it appears this boxee does not have the ability to go into "offline mode" automatically. It does have the latest (official) firmware and works fine when internet is live. It is the oldest of my six boxees - like from the first manufacture run. Internet is back on now so this issue will be forgotten until the next outage but MAN was I mad last night. I'd like to find out why I couldn't get to this fabled "offline mode" you speak of...

Thanks for your concern and help nfodiz - you seem to be a real asset to this community. I'm sorry if any of my initial anger seemed directed at you and your efforts.