Okay, slap my ass, and call me stupid. It WAS a multicast problem. It would’ve been nice if you would’ve directed me to the check-box that needed to be checked instead of suggesting an education on Multicast vs Unicast from the ground up, and that completely turned me off on trying to solve this. i actually ended up solving this completely at random when i was trying to do something completely different.
The fix for me was to select System –> Administration –> Firewall. You have to then enter your root password. “Trusted Services” is selected by default. Whaddya know?? There’s an item there that says “Multicast DNS (mDNS)” and the box was un-checked! So, while i was in there trying to do whatever it is i was trying to do, i also checked that box, and my Firefly started working. i do not remember if i had to restart my network and/or the box first, but i’ve been up for a few days now with no problems.
Long Live Firefly! It’s WAY faster than Windows Media Sharing! That is, once you turn all the knobs into just the right orientation so that it’ll finally actually WORK!