Comskip not working since HD-PVR upgrade

[Skiier__Dude]

Hey all,

For the past several months I have been trying to get Comskip working properly with recordings from the HD-PVR and have been unable to find a solution.

My setup:
WHS running on AMD dual core 2.7Ghz machine with 2Gb RAM
1 x HD-PVR running 1.5.6 recording HD from BellTV (DishNet STB)


Comskip: 0.80.025 - launched via Comskip Monitor

Synopsis:

Comskip Monitor runs and launches Comskip without any issue. Comskip successfully processes the .ts files and creates a .txt, .edl and .log file. The commercials however, if marked at all, are never marked correctly and are not even close. Sometimes Comskip will mark 3-4 commercials in a 30 minute show. The timestamps will be way off, too long or too short. Other times, it will mark a single 10 second commercial at a random inaccurate location. In other words, it's broken!!!

This issue SEEMS TO HAVE arisen after I upgraded the HD-PVR from the previous version to 1.5.6 (1.5.6 fixed the Dolby Digital recording/playback issue I was experiencing). I'm not certain whether the upgrade is a red herring or not. I have some older recordings that were recorded with the HD-PVR and their 1.5.3.0 load. If I delete the .txt and .edl Comskip files associated with these shows, and let Comskip do it's thing -- commercials mark just fine.

Actions taken to date:
Comskip:
- upgraded to latest and greatest loads
- changed detect methods from 43, 47, 111, and 255
- changed volume_slip and all other settings recommended by Erik
- went back to default comskip.ini -- just in case I had changed something by mistake and started over
- contacted Erik, sent him sample video and he has pointed to something strange with the recordings

HD-PVR:
- Installed and reinstalled 1.5.6 (no change)
- Changed STB audio output from Dolby to PCM (no change)
- Downgraded driver to 1.5.3.0 and tested recordings (no change)
- Upgraded driver back to 1.5.6 (no change)

Today I have completely removed the HD-PVR install by running HCWclear, rebooting the WHS and re-installing 1.5.6. I am still seeing no change. The resulting .edl file is completely blank and the .txt output has a single commercial marked.

Here is the summary from the Comskip .log file from a bad recording.


---------------------
Initial Commercial List
---------------------
No change

Logo fraction: 0.6010
Maximum volume found: 2554
Average volume: 649
Sound threshold: 500
Silence threshold: 100
Minimum volume found: 0
Average frames with silence: 58
Black threshold: 25
Minimum brightness found: 33
Minimum bright pixels found: 0
Minimum dim level found: 0
Average brightness: 1088
Uniformity level: 500
Average non uniformity: 448
Maximum gap between logo's: 247
Suggested logo_threshold: 0.7750
Suggested shrink_logo: 5
Max commercial size found: -1
Dominant aspect ratio: 1.8100
Score threshold: 1.0500
Framerate: 25.00
Total commercial length: 0:00:00.00
Block list after weighing
----------------------------------------------------
# sbf bs be fs fe sc len scr cmb ar cut bri logo vol sil corr stdev cc
0:- 0 0 0 1 53657 0.00 2146.240 0.15 0 1.81 EL b 10880 0.60 6490 580 0.000 108

53657 Frames Processed
################################################################
Time at end of run:
Fri Sep 18 17:15:03 2009
################################################################

A full copy of the Comskip .log file is attached from a bad recording (SportsCentre) and a older good recording (The Office). I am hoping someone has a recommendation as I can't seem to find the smoking gun here.

One of the differences I see is that the newer recordings report frame rate of 25fps while the older one reports 59 fps?

[tomfisk]

Are you running the donators version of comskip? That is the version that will process the h.264 files.

[Skiier__Dude]

yes, running donators version of Comskip

[sic0048]

I'd remove 1.5.6 and go back to the previous firmware and see if that fixes the problem. It seems that 1.5.6 added some weird issues for some people. This could just be another example of that.

[Skiier__Dude]

So it looks like I have corrected this issue.

I removed 1.5.6 using HCWclear (downloaded from the Hauppauge HD-PVR support page). I rebooted, ran HCWclear again and then installed 1.5.3.

Commercial skipping now functions once again. The trade-off is that I have now lost the ability to record 5.1 audio and have had to revert back to PCM audio again.

My next attempt will be to completely remove 1.5.3, reinstall 1.5.6 and see whether the Comskip problem comes back. It would be nice to have the 5.1 audio back.

[stanger89]

Weird, I've been comskipping for weeks with AC3 and the 1.0.5.3 drivers. Actually I don't think the drivers ever had any effect on comskip for me.

[Skiier__Dude]

Yeah, it's weird. If I change the feed of my STB to output Dolby rather than PCM with 1.0.5.3 then the audio and video get way out of sync. The new release fixed that audio sync issue (as noted in Hauppauge's release documentation) but then I lost Comskip.

I'm guessing that Hauppauge implemented something in software to fix the audio sync issue on the DishNet STBs that does something that Comskip doesn't like. I sent the recordings to Erik and he saw the same issues. Might have just been a software issue with my implementation so I will try a complete removal and reinstall to see if it fixes the problem.