Lag Fixed (I hope) w/ HDHomeRun 1080i content

[PredatorVI]

I have been fighting a problem with both poor recording and LiveTV quality using a Dell GX280 as the SageTV server. Initially I was running with the following specs:

• Dell GX280, Intel P4 3.2 Ghz w/ HT, 2 GB Ram, Intel 915 Integrated Graphics, 1 GB Ethernet, WinXP sp3
• Silicon Dust HDHomeRun
• Dell PowerConnect 2748 GB Switch
• NetGear ReadyNAS NV+, 4 TB

I had SageTV setup to record directly to a share on my NAS. This worked for all content except the higher def channels. I tried switching to a local hard drive recording directory with the same results.

I posted my issue here and it was recommended I get a better video card. I purchased a Sapphire Radeon HD 4650 PCI Express x16 512 MB and I still had the same problems. Content played fine via VLC even with Intel Graphics.

I then installed the trial version of BeyondTV 4.9 and it played and recorded flawlessly. I was so frustrated. The kicker was that SOMETIMES it seemed that SageTV would work fine. I couldn't tell what the magic issue was.

The one variable in SageTV that BTV and VLC didn't have was saving over the network. I tried disabling that before, but it still didn't help. However, I suspected an issue with SageTV using the wrong recording directory so I watched it more closely.

In SageTV I removed the network folder set as the recording destination and added a local directory. I backed out to the main menu, shut down and restarted SageTV, then started LiveTV. It played terribly. Looking closer, STV was still saving the LiveTV stream to the network share. I verified that the only recording directory set was the local directory. I then went and disconnected the network share while watching TV and the picture froze. When I stopped and restarted playback (keeping STV open), it began using the local directory and everything was just fine!

Somehow SageTV is holding onto the old recording directory setting, even after shutting down and restarting and I've been chasing ghosts for weeks now. I guess I should have looked more closely.

The thing that is confusing is that my network utilization never exceeds 6% or 7% and all CPU/Memory usage numbers look good as well, so what gives? Maybe my NAS sucks, yet I've streamed 4 DVD ISO playback streams simultaneously to 4 different clients without even a glitch.

If anyone has insight or ideas, I'm all ears....too bad I can't afford the new ReadyNAS Pro...YET.

Anyone else save directly to a NAS or other network share?

[gplasky]

Your write performance to a NAS is going to be a much slower than the read performace. Much, much slower.

Gerry

[PredatorVI]

I knew it would be slower, but I didn't think it was that slow. Since I have it hooked up to a UPC, I disabled all journaling, disabled all services that were not necessary and enabled jumbo frames (though I don't think the GX280 supports jumbo frames) and it still had problems.

I will just have to swap out a bigger HDD in the STV server and use it for recordings until I can afford the ReadyNAS Pro.

Has anyone in SageTV land used a NAS as a remote destination for recordings?

What about a plugin to allow transferring of recorded content to other destinations?