Here are a few tips useful mostly on phones where speed detection is slower and not always reliable because of the low-bandwidth networks:

1) You can by-pass the speed detection all together by hard-coding a speed when you login to your Orb account:

- either use a speed parameter in the URL, like this for 30 Kbps for instance:
http://my.orb.com/orb/index.jsp?speed=30

- or use the Remember speed option after setting a fixed speed in the Tools page.

You should of course hard-code only a speed that is likely to be lower or equal than what you get normally with your phone!

2) If you didn't hard-code the speed you can perform a new speed test during your session by clicking on the New Test link at the bottom of the screen.

- Do this for instance if you notice a lot of buferring during a stream.

- Remember that your phone network bandwidth can vary widely based on your location or the time of the day.

--Laurent

Update for fast phones! (typically EVDO in the US)

The current speed detection may not be accurate for phones with very fast internet connection (200k and above) because the default payload is only 50k. Now you can add a new parameter in your Orb url to increase this payload and make the measure more accurate, like this: http://my.orb.com/orb/?spload=300 (this uses 300k)

By performing several speed tests in a row (using the New Speed Test link at the bottom) you'll be able to see if the measure is accurate for the value you picked.

If your phone doesn't respond after you have increased the payload value that must mean that you picked a number too high for the phone to handle it.

Of course, if you're sure to always get a great speed, regardless of where you are, you can always avoid all this by hard-coding the speed as explained before.

Well...I have a Cingular 8125 smartphone with Windows Mobile 5.0 and the phone also has built in WiFi.

Even when connected to my home WiFi...for whatever reason...the video being streamed to my phone (over WiFi) is only 30kbps.

I figured the "auto detect" feature would realize that I'm on a much faster connection (WiFi) and stream the video accordingly...meaning...much faster then 30kbps.

So, is there something I can do to speed up the video stream when connected to a fast WiFi connection?

You can try to do another speed test to see if Orb keeps measuring 30k, or you can hardcode a higher speed (in Tools page) if you're sure this is what you get.

This also might come in handy....

http://www.dslreports.com/mspeed

Though I'm unsatisfied with all the re-buffering that I'm experiencing...though it could be due to my cell carrier's network OR maybe some other setting that I can't find.... also the windows media player in windows mobile 5 has options for how much you want to buffer, etc.

Fiddling with that and selecting a larger amount to pre-buffer may be wise for fewer interruptions although it could initially take some time to start playing...I believe that's a worthwhile wait to "load"