Introduction

You have just joined the Korbyt family and your now ready to start displaying your customized content on your monitors for the very first time. Or you could be a seasoned Korbyt veteran who has decided to expand the Korbyt platform to another location within your business with new players (KDAs) at a new location. In this article we will cover what troubleshooting steps you can try so that content can be pushed from the cloud to your KDA. We will also cover the characteristics of players that are unable to communicate with Korbyt.com.

Network Requirements

All KDAs must be on a network that allows incoming and outgoing HTTPS traffic to Korbyt.com. This must also include all Korbyt.com subdomains. If the players on your network are behind a firewall port 443 must be opened. If this is something you suspect isn’t allowed on the network or the subnet your player is connected to you may need to reach out to your IT and ask how an exclusion for Korbyt.com can be made on the network. KDAs also have the option to configure proxies if this is the preferred method for your IT to use so that communication can be made.

These network requirements MUST be met before players are able to show as provisioned within your tenant and must be maintained so that you can continuously update your content. For more information, please reference the Korbyt Player Network Connections

At the bottom of this article we also provide some useful questions you can use to ask your IT department if they become involved in the Troubleshooting

Player Only Showing Provisioning Screen / Pending Status in CMS

Situation: Your player is showing the initial Provisioning Screen and will not show content.

Normally, after successfully provisioning a player connected to your tenant, it should start showing either assigned or default content

This means that your player has not fully connected to your tenant and could indicate

• Your player has not been added to your tenant yet – See Adding Players to your Korbyt Tenant - Provisioning

• Your player may not be able to access all the Korbyt.com services it needs to connect to your tenant – see Korbyt Player Network Connections

• If the player had been showing content and has returned to this screen, it indicates the player was removed from your tenant and needs to be provisioned again

When players are added to Korbyt in your tenant, they will show with a Pending Status, and after it completes its first initial connection, it will show its status as Active

A player that is in Pending status for longer than a few minutes indicates a problem that might be caused by:

• The player is not able to connect to Korbyt

  • This might be network security – see Korbyt Player Network Connections

  • The player might not be correctly connected to your network

    • Check the network cables and the network connection

  • The player might not be powered on

• If you have checked the player and its network connections, it might also indicate an entry error (typo) when the device provisioning token was entered

  • The provisioning token is what displays as the player name while the device is pending

  • If an entry error was made, you can delete the incorrect player and provision again with the correct information

Player Not Updating with New Content

Situation: You have a player that has been connected to your tenant and have consistently uploaded content to this player without issue. But now the player doesn’t get the new content and continues to play the old that was assigned.

• This could be a sign that although the player has had communication with Korbyt.com, there may have been changes made to your network recently that no longer allows this communication.

• This could also be caused if you are using dynamic tagging and the new content is not tagged properly.

Characteristics: Players in this situation presented with network issues will continue to play the old cached content until it is able to reach out to the cloud once again for new content. Even if the player is restarted. This is as designed, and a useful feature that will prevent the screen from being blank while the networking issue is sorted out. If you have insured that the tags (if tags are in use) are correct but the content remains unchanged on the player, please try the troubleshooting options below in “Tenant Troubleshooting”.

Troubleshooting Player Connection in the CMS

Within your tenant, there are some very useful tools that will help you determine if your player is online and communicating with Korbyt.com.

1. Does your player show as Active or Inactive?

2. Does your player show a recent Heartbeat or Checkin?

To determine this, it is recommended that you change the view of your Players section, and then select the List View option, so that all of the information you need is provided

• Open the Mega Menu and click Players

  • Click the List View Option if needed in the upper right

    

• You will then see detailed information about the player, including Last Heartbeat and Last Checking that provide details of the player connection health

• If all is operating normally

  • Last Heatbeat should display as “Just Now”

    • Heartbeats happen every minute

  • Last Checkin should be anywhere from Just Now to 15 Minutes ago

    • Normal check-in schedule is every 15 minutes

If you wish to check a player’s ability to communicate when it is listed as Active status, you can navigate to the Players Edit screen and send the Display Identity command

• For detailed steps on editing the player’s information and sending commands see Controlling and Configuring Media Players in the CMS

• If you send the Display Identity command within the next minute, the player should start showing a watermark of its information in the lower right section of its screen

  • You can see this by looking at the screen the player is connected to

  • If the player is remote, you can use the Get Screenshot command to retrieve an updated screenshot with the information showing
    

    

  • If the player is now showing its information, it confirms that your player can communicate with your CMS properly

  • You can now send the Hide Identiy command throught the CMS to turn off this information on the display

A player status of Inactive indicates that there have been at least 2 consecutive missed check-ins or approximately 35 minutes of missed heartbeats.
Troubleshooting a player that is Inactive needs to be done outside of the CMS, as the inactive status indicates a lack of communication between the CMS and the player

Continued troubleshooting can be done

• On the Player Configuration Page, if available for the player

• Or physically at the player itself

Configuration Page Troubleshooting

Please read this section ONLY if you can reach the configuration page of your player by using the “Player Config Page” button or by typing in the player’s ip address in a different window within your Chrome browser. If you have found that you are unable to reach the players configuration page, please skip this section and navigate to the “Physical Troubleshooting” section of this article. However, if you can reach the configuration, please try the following.

1. Test using the Download Speed Test feature.

On the players configuration page, you will see the advanced tab, select it. You will then see an option towards the center of the page called “Download Speed Test”. Within that section copy the following:

URI: https://korbyt.com/ws/healthcheck

Insert this into the URL option and hit the speed test button. If your player returns the following Image 1 (Health Check Failure Error), it isn’t open for communication to Korbyt.com and you should review the final section of this article with your IT, “Questions to ask your IT”.

Image 1 (Health Check Failure Error)

2. Test connection using the Port Check.

On the players configuration page, you will see the advanced tab, select it. You will then see an option towards the center of the page called “Port Check”. Within that section, test using the following:

Hostname: www.korbyt.com

Port: 443

Then hit the Port Check button. If your player returns the following Image 2 (Port Check Failure Error) this port may not be open for communication to Korbyt.com, and you should review the final section of this article with your IT, “Questions to ask your IT”.

Image 2 (Port Check Failure Error)

3. Review some of the errors generated by your player.

Players that are unable to communicate to Korbyt.com may generate the following errors. These errors can be seen by selecting the KDA info tab. You may see errors similar to the following (Image 3-4).

Image 3 (Agent Logs)

Image 4 (Network Logs)

4. If you are using static network information verify it is configured properly.

This suggestion is only true for players that are not using the “Obtain an IP address automatically” option. If you are, you’ll want to ensure that you don’t have the device set with the same IP address as another device. Also check that the subnet mask, Default Gateway, and DNS information is correct. This configuration is located under the network tab of the player configuration page Image 1 (Player Network Configuration).

Image 1 (Player Network Configuration)

Physical Troubleshooting

If you have made it to this section, tenant troubleshooting has failed and you are unable to reach the player’s configuration page. This could mean that there is a physical issue that needs to be investigated. Please try the following troubleshooting steps to get your player back online.

1. Ensure the network cable is secure and lights are showing.

On the back of the player, the network cable should have lights flickering. If not you may want to push and tightly secure the cable to ensure the connection is secure on both the player and the Ethernet port side.

2. Ensure the network cable is connected to the correct plug.

Some of our players have both Ethernet ports and console Ports. You must ensure the cable is plugged into the correct port or the player will not be able to connect to the network. The image below Image 1 (Aries correct Network Port) shows the correct port that should be used.

3. Try another port on your network equipment.

Sometimes network ports on switches or network panels go bad. If you have the ability try another open port.

Image 1 (Aries correct Network Port)

Screen Completely Blank/Black

Usually a screen being completely blank is not caused by a player error
This might be an indication that

• The screen is not powered on

• The screen is on a different input

• The cable is not fully connected to the Screen or the Player

• Check the Content Assigned to esnure a Blank content is not assigned

Errors Displaying On The Screen

If the monitor displaying to the KDA is displaying any errors:

1. Verify if the errors are PXE boot errors – If PXE boot hard Drive errors are displaying the KDA will have to be RMA. example of error:

   

   • Take a picture of the error and e-mail it at support@rmgnetworks.com a

   • PXE boot network error, verify is the Company allows the use PXE on their network

     

   • KDA is attempting to boot up using PXE. Steps below are to assist in disabling the PXE boot on KDA
     a). Plug in a USB keyboard and reboot the SDA. While it is restarting, press the DELETE key for KDA to get into the BIOS.”Press tab”
     b).You are looking for the BOOT Options and need to make sure that an option is NOT ENABLED that reads something like – Boot from network – or – Use PXE first.

     

a

Questions to ask your IT

1. Is port 443 open on the network or subnet where the player resides?

2. Is HTTPS traffic allowed for incoming and outgoing requests on the network or subnet where the player resides?

3. Has Korbyt.com and all of its subdomains been whitelisted so that communication can be made?

4. Is there a proxy available that the players should use to accomplish communication to Korbyt.com?

5. Does the network have any Access Control or Mac Address filtering options configured that could prevent the device from joining the network?