Could this be SageTV related?

[dshields]

Several weeks back I set up a new, dedicated SageTV server with SageTV 4. I'm running a fresh install of Win2k3 and no other software except DirMon2, comskip and SageTV. I use a MediaMVP client. I was so happy with everything that I bought 2 more MediaMVPs and a SageTV Windows client license too - for another machine.

My new MediaMVP clients forced me to upgrade to SageTV 5. Since then it has all be downhill over the course of a week or so. I'll skip all the issues related to the Windows client for now, but what I would appreciate opinions on is whether SageTV 5 is responsible for my server problems or whether it is just a coincidence that the problems started after the upgrade.

My SageTV server is locking up every day or two. The first time I thought it was a fluke. But after several more lockups, I know it's a real problem. Here is the typical situation:

Everything will be working fine with a MediaMVP client... I will turn off the client (all clients) and go to bed. Because the server is a dedicated computer with nothing but SageTV 5.0.2 service, DirMon2 and comskip, it runs all the time. At some point the next evening I will turn a client on and there is no server. I go out to check on it and it is locked up. Nothing will get its attention except a restart. In my experience this is highly unusual for Win2k3. Even more unusual is that Windows will not boot unless I do a power off. A warm boot doesn't work. When I boot up, there are no errors in the Event log, and no signs of trouble that I can find anywhere. The lockup date/time appears to be unrelated to any action I'm doing.

Does this sound like it could be related to SageTV? I didn't upgrade DirMon2 or comskip and I don't run any other software on this server. It has never done anything but run SageTV, so I don't think there is a problem related to other software.

Advice, anyone? Thanks.

[DFA]

First, I would disable Dirmon / comskip and see what happens. Also, could be some hardware problem. I know you don't want to have Sage down, but see if the problem occurs w/o Sage even running. When these things happen to me, I start coraling it by eliminating what it isn't.

If reasonably sure it is not the PC, I would put in a technical support request.

Not having MVP's or clients, I am not much of source but others might have suggestions.

If r
DFA

[dshields]

Thank you for the suggestions. This is a tough one to trouble shoot because it takes 1-2 days for the problem to appear. That's a lot of time to not have SageTV running. (This kinda reminds me of why I gave up on ReplayTV - I was having hardware problems that caused me to miss recording shows.)

Anyway, I don't want to sound like I'm complaining to anyone in particular because it's not even possible yet to know what part of the system is at fault.

What I do know so far is that I left the server running since yesterday without SageTV, comskip or DirMon2 and it did not have a problem. Today I fiddled around with SageTV settings and noticed that one of my 3 PVR 150 cards seemed to be configured incorrectly. I'm not sure how that happened, but I guessed it may have been related to the forced shutdowns (killing the power to my server to get it out of the lockup).

Tonight, in the process of changing the settings in SageTV, the server locked up again. So now I know SageTV is at least involved somehow. This is a lockup like I rarely, rarely see in Win2k3. The clock stops, the mouse freezes, the whole UI freezes, and even Ctrl-Alt-Delete has no effect. Pushing the reset button makes it restart, but it won't completely boot. It requires a power off to reboot.

I find it hard to imagine that SageTV alone could do that, so now I'm leaning toward the PVR 150 (or a hardware problem). However, there is definitely a chance that SageTV is involved because I was using it when I caused the lockup.

Has anyone ever had any similar experiences? (I didn't think it was possible for Win2k3 to lockup like that, actually.)

[cslatt]

I had a similar problem once and it was heat-related. A fan in my computer had burned out and stopped running properly. The heat from the CPU running 100% doing Comskip processing was causing the whole machine to overheat and that was causing my lockups. No idea if that's the cause of your problem, but it is something to look into.

[dshields]

Looks like this was SageTV after all! I'll keep the forum updated, but the hard lockups that appeared to be hardware related now seem to have been caused by SageTV. The symptoms I was having have mostly (maybe completely) cleared up after a full reinstall of SageTV.

[dshields]

So far, so good. No more lockups. I didn't change any hardware, just reinstalled SageTV (complete reinstall) and NVidia DVD decoder.

In all fairness, I would be shocked if a Java app (SageTV) could do this to Windows Server 2003. But one of the drivers possibly could...

[jquinlan]

Originally Posted by dshields

Has anyone ever had any similar experiences? (I didn't think it was possible for Win2k3 to lockup like that, actually.)

I had a similar lockup problem with a Win2K server I was building to upgrade current SAGE Server. I got Windows 2K loaded, all service and critical service packs, loaded SAGE, loaded my hardware 2/PVR250 & 1/PVR150 and copied over my bin and property files over for SAGE. I also have 2 MVP's attached to the servers network. Started the SAGE service and things would run for about 2-3 hours and then lockup; no mouse, no ctrl-alt-del response. Looked for some motherboard testing programs that are ISO bootable so I don’t have to destroy my Win2K install and found it to be a bad stick of memory. I also thought about the CPU and heat but monitoring the temperatures did not find anything before it would lockup.
Repalced the memory with a new stick and everything has been running since. I did reinstall Win2K and all my drivers just to make sure the bad memory did not leave and problems behind.

[dshields]

I'll let everyone know if my problem comes back. If it does, then I'll presume there is a hardware problem and investigate it further. But so far, the evidence makes this look like software was the culprit.

jquinlan, in case I need it in the future, what diagnostics tool did you use?

[jquinlan]

Originally Posted by dshields

... what diagnostics tool did you use?

Sorry about not get back to you. I get the name of what I use tonight and report back.

[dshields]

Originally Posted by jquinlan

Sorry about not get back to you. I get the name of what I use tonight and report back.

Thanks. I can offer another report that my server is still running strong. I have not rebooted it, and it has not locked up again since I did a complete, fresh install (re-install) of SageTV 5.0.2.

I'm monitoring handles and memory using a performance counter log and everything is running fine, around the clock. I don't play back any shows on my server. I use a MediaMVP for that.

FWIW, I have not been watching any shows -- but my lockup problems in the past were also occurring when I was not watching any shows. ... so I'm hoping for the best.

[dshields]

One more update. I think it is safe to say this issue is completely closed now. There was no hardware problem. Reinstalling SageTV clean solved the lockups.

I haven't had any issues since my last post (haven't even rebooted the server). I have recorded many shows and watched a couple (with the MediaMVP client), all without any problems.

[jquinlan]

Here is the CD ISO boot tool I use to diagnose a machine:

Ultimate Boot CD: http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

It contains many tools to test many pieces of a machine. It even contains some DOS tools for viruses.

dshields, glad to her you are working.

[dshields]

My lockup problem did return. I previously posted that this was solved, but it was not. My server was locking up every week or so. Sometimes it would go as long as 2 weeks, but other times it would lock up several times in one week.

As far as hardware, I ran memtest86 on the computer for 24 hours and the RAM passed all tests. The CPU temp almost always stays below 27 C.

I got to the point where I pretty much gave up on SageTV. That's why I stopped posting here.

However, about two weeks ago, I got an idea. I wondered if the problem could be hard disk related. On my server, I had 3 large HDD's mounted at NTFS folders (i.e., the drives didn't have drive letters assigned, but had paths assigned).

I had noticed that the SageMVP client always reported the wrong amount of space available - that's what gave me the idea to investigate this.

I assigned drive letters to the drives and changed my settings in SageTV accordingly. That was about 2 weeks ago, and so far, no lockups.

I would appreciate hearing from any other SageTV users who have multiple hard disk drives mounted without drive letters. If you have paths assigned to drives, please let me know if you have had any problems with your system locking up when one of the drives fills up.

That's what was happening to me - when the path-mounted drive would fill up, SageTV (or Java) would lock my server up. The only way to recover was to power off the system.

If we can confirm this problem, it would be good to report it to SageTV devs.

[blade]

There was some discussion about mounted drives here.

I know back when I didn't let Sage delete any recordings it would freeze up and require a reboot if I ran out of drive space. This was with local drives with drive letters not mounted drives. I guess the same would happen if the free space is reported wrong and Sage fills up the disk.