The Splashtop app will stream your PC or Mac screen to your tablet through the network real-time, so the performance mainly depends on the following two conditions:
- Bandwidth capacity and the actual available bandwidth
- Power of computer
Here are some suggestions for improving streaming performance when using the Splashtop app to stream your computer screen to your tablet or phone:
- Use a powerful computer, for the computer on which the Streamer is installed. Dual core or above is recommended. Check to see if the computer meets the system requirements (refer to this link for details).
- Use your tablet in a stable and strong networking environment. Basically, public locations like Starbucks, or an airport, won't have good networking quality, even if you are using 3G to connect.
- Optimize your network bandwidth between your computer and wireless router:
Connect your computer directly to your wireless router using an Ethernet cable instead of through Wi-Fi. - Sometimes, QoS (Quality on Service) settings on the router (firmware) may limit the bandwidth usage by default for each connection thread. Turning this option OFF should significantly improve the streaming performance, especially if your computer is very powerful and the Splashtop app is used on the same local network.
- Modify the firewall settings on the Streamer side to make a direct local connection when your tablet/ phone and your computer are on the same local network. Click here for more info about adjustments to firewall settings. Please follow the instructions to get rid of the firewall from them (i.e. Microsoft Security Essentials may cause streaming latency between tablet and computer; see the MISC section below for more info), or disable the firewall settings on your home router.
- Optimize your display resolution: On your tablet or phone, set the display resolution to 1024 x 768, or 800 x 600, to minimize the streaming data size if your xDSL or 3G data plan is slow.
NOTE: If you adjust the resolution on the tablet side, your computer resolution will automatically be scaled down during the connection session, and will automatically be restored to the original resolution when disconnected. - Optimize your video mode (may not be supported by some Android devices):
During the connected session on your tablet or phone to your computer, bring up the "Controls" with a 3-finger tap, or via a double-click on the icon located at lower right corner. Select the icon with 'A' from the Control bar, and set the video mode to Smooth (See more...).
NOTES:
• By default, the Splashtop app session uses Sharp video mode, but it is often the case that Smooth video mode is more suitable for movie playback.
• Smooth mode will consume more CPU power when streaming video to tablet, so It's better to use Smooth mode only when your computer CPU is powerful enough, such as Dual-Core. - If your client device is running Android, and there is a customized ROM (such as a Galaxy Task 14 ROM) with ad-blocker embedded, this would block Splashtop streaming, and cause serious latency. Take it out to see if there's any difference.
MISC:
**Feedback from one of our users: "The DPC (Deferred Procedure Calls) latency was too high, causing drop-outs with streaming audio or video. The solution for me was to test disabling Microsoft Security Essentials Real-time protection. After confirming that this solved the issue, I then followed the instructions to add MsMpEng.exe to the exclusion list. Also added the Splashtop Remote files to the exclusion list. Do this at your own risk. If you want to check the DPC latency yourself, download the DPC latency checker at https://www.thesycon.de/eng/latency_check.shtml. Other useful links are: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/protect/forum/protect_start/mse-... and https://www.sevenforums.com/sound-audio/22369-realtek-windows-7-64rt....
The issue could be resolved by changing how Microsoft Security Essentials works. If you are not using MSE and are still having the issue, I'd strongly recommend checking out the DPC latency checker, and the thread mentioned above on sevenforums.com."
**For Android devices: There is a known issue on the Android audio module (Xoom) on version 3.0. It will cause audio popping on the Android client side. This can be fixed by updating to Android version 3.1.
HINT: If you run Splashtop Streamer on a computer that is not very powerful (i.e. Core-2-Duo) and don't want to consume much CPU so that you can run more applications, you can reduce the streaming frame rate by importing the registry file attached to this article.
For Windows:
- Download the attached file to your local drive (fps.txt). The frame rate default in this file is 5 (DWORD in Hex is 00000005). You can modify the value to be '3' if you want the CPU to consume less.
- Rename the file to be fps.reg.
- Double-click on it to import it to your system. This may trigger a system warning message; if so, please agree to proceed.
- Close the Streamer and manually launch it again to make it take effect, or simply restart the computer.
- Try to connect again to see if it works better in your environment. Adjust this value up or down to fit your personal case (in Hex).
NOTE: This hidden feature conflicts with Smooth mode. Therefore, please keep video mode in Sharp mode when you enable this feature.
For Mac:
- Prepare an Editor tool to edit the Mac plist file. Here are two samples:
a). Xcode4 (Apple Inc): https://developer.apple.com/xcode/, for Lion only.
b). PlistEditor (third-party): https://www.fatcatsoftware.com/plisteditpro/ - Go --> Go to Folder…, then input the path ~/Library/Preferences/
- Select com.splashtop.Splashtop-Streamer.plist and edit it using an Editing tool such as those mentioned above.
- Add a new Child, named “SharpFPS”, Type: Number, Value: 5 (or 3 or...).
- Close the Splashtop Streamer, then re-launch it.
NOTE: This value of parameter can't result in a precise frame rate like Windows, there's a little fluctuation.
For example:
Fps value=5 — The real frames-per-second rate could be 5~10.
Fps value=15 — The real frames-per-second rate could be 15~22.