Have I finally gotten it right?

Question

Perhaps Winston would know, and any other of the many experts on this forum.
My TV was constantly locking up after putting it to sleep for the night. Either stuck on the Apple logo or nothing on the screen. Not responsive to either of 2 remotes whose batteries are fresh. Synching was either not working at all or would stop after about 2 gigs of content made its way to the TV over the course of 10 hours. My Extreme Base station was set to 802.11n b/g compatible to accommodate the two identical HP C7180 printers (which are 802.11g) we have on our network. Factory restore didn't help, and self diagnostics of the unit said all is OK with TV. I even went so far as to send it to the best Apple repair upgrade company we have in the US located in Kansas. They could find nothing wrong with the unit, which I got back yesterday. Suffice it to say I was getting very frustrated with unplugging and re-plugging the unit every day just to get it to work for a while.
So here is what I did. istumbler found at least 4 nearby networks on the same channel as my Airport Extreme. I tried changing the channel, without any luck there. Now I'm beginning to think my problems really are network related.
I turned off the wireless radios in both printers and now we print via Bluetooth. 2 less clients (802.11g) on the network and I then set the Airport Extreme to 802.11n only at 5ghz. It happens to be at channel 36 and there is nobody in our neighborhood either capable of or set to that channel according to istumbler. The only clients on our AEBS network, including TV are 802.11n. We do have another internet provider and another 802.11n wireless (Linksys) router, but its clients (children and guests) are all 802.11g, and that router broadcasts at 2.4 ghz. I know it seems silly to pay for 2 ISPs but I love having a backup network, just in case, plus the fact my wife (webmaster supreme) hosts and maintains many sites and to change her email address (Comcast) involves more problems than I knew about. The primary ISP is Verizon (connected to the AEBS) and the secondary ISP is Comcast (connected to the Linksys) who also provides our cable television. The Verizon service I bought is FIOS 20 MPS down and 5 MPS up. Very fast!
Last night I did not put my TV in sleep mode and left it on all night. As I hoped, both my wife's and my library were available in the menu this morning. All content from both computers streams perfectly with only a little stutter from the hi def podcasts from the Washington Post, but eminently watchable.
Tonight will be the first big test as we try to synch 120 gigabytes of content from my wife's computer as hers was the synching computer to begin with.
My question, do you think it's preferable simply to leave the TV on all the time. It does generate less heat (it is very well ventilated) and I assume uses less power when it's in standby or sleep mode, and do you think the switch to 802.11n only at 5 ghz may have been the solution to my problem all along.
Thanks and Happy New Year.
CD3

Answer 1

Thanks Woggledog.
The printers are no longer a network issue as we use the Bluetooth feature to print and no longer need the wireless network feature for those. The secondary network and ISP are for my wife's PC with an 802.11G adapter and her email address concerns that I mentioned, and for my children and guests. As far as the 5 GHZ network is concerned, I hope that I won't get any interference from the Linksys router or any of my neighbors. Maybe you can enlighten me on that issue. The pure 5 GHZ network is only for me, my wife and TV all of which are 802.11n.
As far as the sleep issue is concerned, I would prefer to sleep the unit, and I will try that tomorrow night after we try to synch all the content we want tonight. But, at the time, sleeping the TV seemed to be the issue connected with the TV locking up overnight. But as far as streaming and the libraries appearing in the TV menu, so far so good.
Cheers.
CD3