HDHomerun stuck in FF mode on some recordings??!!

[Stuntman]

I have had a half dozen or so shows recorded in the last week that exhibit this behavior.. the videos start and play about 5 seconds correctly, then seem to jump into a fast forward mode.. no audio, with time skipping in what looks to be 3 second intervals..

Comskip spits out all types of sync errors during commercial skipping.. I ran VideoRedo Quickfix on the files and the video stream seems to correct, but the audio vanishes altogether!

The odd thing is that one tuner might be recording one show in HD and it is doing perfectly, while the second turner is the one having 'issues'..

Anybody else seen this?

I am getting good signal..

HDHOMERUN is using cable QAM

Could Drive I/O be a factor?

[carlgar]

What version of HDHR software are you using. I saw some PTS that seem to have been corrected with the 20080307 drivers.

[Stuntman]

Originally Posted by carlgar

What version of HDHR software are you using. I saw some PTS that seem to have been corrected with the 20080307 drivers.

I am using the 20080307 drivers.. never had this problem BEFORE I loaded those drivers though.. oddly enough!

[carlgar]

Are you sure about the version? I believe the problem was created by 20080305 drivers. It was then corrected 2 days later with the current drivers.

[Stuntman]

Originally Posted by carlgar

Are you sure about the version? I believe the problem was created by 20080305 drivers. It was then corrected 2 days later with the current drivers.

I will download them again and try to install them.. I'm usually pretty good about such things, but I'll give it a whirl.. just in case!

Edit: I just tried to install the 20080307 drivers and it gives me the options to "Modify/Repair/Remove".. I chose remove and then reinstalled it.. we'll see if that makes any difference.

[gplasky]

Drive I/O could definitely be a problem. For me I thought I was having a weak cable signal. Blockiness, stutter, bad audio, unwatchable. After replacing cables and getting an amp I was still having issues. Not on every recording but with no pattern either. Thought it was drivers or firmware version. downgraded, upgraded. Reinstalled Sage. Rolled back a version. Still was seeing what looked like weak signals. But signals were 95% plus. Finally tracked it down. The recordings I had issues with were being recorded to one particular media server. One of the upgrades to it must have messed with nic or a drive is going bad. I'm still troubleshooting that. But after removing that as a recording directory every single HD recording is crystal clear. Go figure.

Gerry

[Stuntman]

Originally Posted by gplasky

Drive I/O could definitely be a problem.
Gerry

Interesting! I am writing to a USB 2.0 Terrabyte external drive.. I saw that Sage had 4 shows being recorded last night at the same time.. 2 in HD, 2 in SD... One of the HD shows was working great, the other I had trouble with...

Is there any way to force sage to better spread out where it is recording to? I assume it now just writes to the drive with the most available space, but being able to tell it to spread it out to different controllers and different devices when multiple shows are being recorded might be a good thing???

[Mitch G]

I've had this problem on a couple of recordings as well and to be honest it's shaking my faith in the system.
(I've also had a problem where the playback jumps through to the end instead of fast forwarding but I'm not sure its the same basic problem.)

The scenario for me seems to be something like this (although I haven't proven it):
- A program is being recorded via the HDHR.
- A different program (previously recorded via the HDHR) is being watched.
- The program being watched completes about 5 minutes before the other program being recorded ends.
- The user presses stop twice to get back to the videos list.
- The little video window is now showing the program that is being recorded, or the user pops back to full screen mode and sees the program that is being recorded.
- The user tries to change channels or something to avoid seeing the ending of the program being recorded.
- Something bad happens. Evidence of the badness is usually that the program being recorded pauses/freezes.
- User is able to tune away from the program.
- User comes back to watch the program and hits play.
- Program appears to play back normally for about 2-3 seconds then goes into fast forward mode. User hits skip forward or back, program appears to play fine for about 2-3 seconds then goes into fast forward mode.

Here's my system set up:
Media server (SageTV 6.3; SageMC 6.3.7)
HDHR (20080307 version)
HD100 (latest firmware)

Some additional notes:
This appears to be a problem with the recording itself. Although I don't have a good way to playback recordings using other software (e.g. VLC), from what I can tell, even in VLC, the playback is sped up.


Mitch

[Stuntman]

Originally Posted by Mitch G

I've had this problem on a couple of recordings as well and to be honest it's shaking my faith in the system.Mitch

I hope you sent that to support as well! I can't be sure the things you mention happen in my situation, though I can't say they don't either! I can verify that the recording won't play correctly in VLC either.. it does appear to be recorded incorrectly. If I run VideoReDo's quickfix on it, the video stream seems to be corrected, but I lose the audio stream... it is almost like the two get out of sync with each other and one is trying to catch the other..

I was worried maybe this was a bandwidth problem, but my network seems to utilize between 1% and 4%.. thought maybe it is a drive issue, with there possibly being too much activity on a given drive (Multiple recordings, playback and possible Comskip all at the same time).. but haven't, as of yet, been able to find a solid connection..

Frustrating!

[Mitch G]

Good point about letting support know. I did send it in including a pointer to this thread.

I had the "other problem" occur tonight too.
(The "other problem" is that when you play a video it hops through to the end in 2 seconds.)
I was recording an HDHR show and watching a different show that was recorded using the HDHR.

So, maybe it is disk contention type of issues. But, people must do this sort of thing all the time. I don't know. But, I am starting to get quite annoyed.


Mitch

[phelme]

Originally Posted by Stuntman

Is there any way to force sage to better spread out where it is recording to? I assume it now just writes to the drive with the most available space, but being able to tell it to spread it out to different controllers and different devices when multiple shows are being recorded might be a good thing???

yes, there is. I have my two HDHR streams going to different drives. the property in Sage.properties is forced_video_storage_path_prefix and you'll find it on each encoder. it'll look like mmc/encoders/xxxxxxxxx/forced_video_storage_path_prefix=\\\\SAGETV-SERVER\\Recordings and you put your path to your drive/UNC as the entry.

[Stuntman]

Originally Posted by phelme

yes, there is. I have my two HDHR streams going to different drives. the property in Sage.properties is forced_video_storage_path_prefix and you'll find it on each encoder. it'll look like mmc/encoders/xxxxxxxxx/forced_video_storage_path_prefix=\\\\SAGETV-SERVER\\Recordings and you put your path to your drive/UNC as the entry.

Well, if I keep seeing the recording errors, I just might try that! What would be cool is if Sage dynamically determined where to record based on both it's schedule and space availability..

So, for example, just before a show is to record, sage would look at the upcoming schedule and determine that show 1 will use drive A, show 2 will use drive B, show 3 will use drive C, show 4 will use drive 1 again as it has the most space available... etc... some type of logic to minimize drive activity and optimize the usage... Maybe even put a drive profiler in there somewhere.. even as a stand alone app.. that will let Sage know what the expected performance of each drive is...

Just daydreaming I know.. but, why not?

[Mitch G]

Originally Posted by phelme

yes, there is. I have my two HDHR streams going to different drives. the property in Sage.properties is forced_video_storage_path_prefix and you'll find it on each encoder. it'll look like mmc/encoders/xxxxxxxxx/forced_video_storage_path_prefix=\\\\SAGETV-SERVER\\Recordings and you put your path to your drive/UNC as the entry.

hehe, you can ignore my question in the other "No Signal" thread.
I'm going to give this a try and see if it fixes things.

Thanks,


Mitch

[phelme]

Originally Posted by Stuntman

Well, if I keep seeing the recording errors, I just might try that! What would be cool is if Sage dynamically determined where to record based on both it's schedule and space availability..

So, for example, just before a show is to record, sage would look at the upcoming schedule and determine that show 1 will use drive A, show 2 will use drive B, show 3 will use drive C, show 4 will use drive 1 again as it has the most space available... etc... some type of logic to minimize drive activity and optimize the usage... Maybe even put a drive profiler in there somewhere.. even as a stand alone app.. that will let Sage know what the expected performance of each drive is...

Just daydreaming I know.. but, why not?

When I first bought Sage I thought this was how it did work, because it makes sense. Silly me.
I think all it does currently is look for the largest empty drive and dump everything there.

[Stuntman]

Originally Posted by phelme

When I first bought Sage I thought this was how it did work, because it makes sense. Silly me.
I think all it does currently is look for the largest empty drive and dump everything there.

Well, if this isn't a part of the product now, it may become so as we all add more and more HD content to our systems.. Hopefully somebody at Sage has already thought of it, or will see this and think.. "Ah Ha!!"

[Mitch G]

As far as specifying the directories is concerned, can I just use the paths given in sage.properties for seeker/video_storage?
Or, do I need to do something special to make them UNC paths?


Mitch

[Mitch G]

FYI: A couple of days ago I had this problem again and sent a log into Sage support. They said that this (FF/Skip through) problem is fixed and will be in the next beta to be released soon.