Sound Issues with HD PVR2

[phelme]

Very interesting Gandalf, I know you'll keep us posted.

I have an interesting issue with my HD-PVR2, two weeks in a row now it's attempted to record "The Returned" on Sundance. And both recordings are complete trash. As in no PID, PMT etc. TS Doctor and their ilk cannot find anything to work off of. That particular problem so far is isolated to that show, on that network. My older HD-PVR (first gen) records the show correctly.

That show, "The Returned" is in French with English subtitles. Wonder if it's related to how the HD-PVR 2 interprets audio tracks.

Edit: The unique thing about that show is it has 7 streams: video, audio, a program service and 4 subtitle tracks. I sent a message to Hauppauge about it.

[gandalf]

Originally Posted by phelme

Very interesting Gandalf, I know you'll keep us posted.

I have an interesting issue with my HD-PVR2, two weeks in a row now it's attempted to record "The Returned" on Sundance. And both recordings are complete trash. As in no PID, PMT etc. TS Doctor and their ilk cannot find anything to work off of. That particular problem so far is isolated to that show, on that network. My older HD-PVR (first gen) records the show correctly.

That show, "The Returned" is in French with English subtitles. Wonder if it's related to how the HD-PVR 2 interprets audio tracks.

Edit: The unique thing about that show is it has 7 streams: video, audio, a program service and 4 subtitle tracks. I sent a message to Hauppauge about it.

Interesting. Somewhere in all this is a key to the problem but so far nothing seems predictable enough to help.

SageTV sees the HDPVR2 as "Hauppauge Siena Video Capture" and offers 4 modes - "Component+SPDIF", "Composite", "HDMI", and "S-Video". The option is not there for Component + RCA Audio. Now I have no problem with using optical sound but I am guessing that the PVR does because the digital sound carried over the SPDIF optical link seems to be taken as found by the PVR rather than decoded to baseband and recoded as defined in the settings. The problem I see with that is if the program source is in a format that the HDPVR is not expecting. Then it seems to either get the wrong PMT in its output or it sticks in two PMT entries for good measure. I get no problems with HD sourced material with AAC audio - once it has done a successful recording. The problem comes when the audio is not AAC (such as the AC3 audio typically used on SD sources). In these cases the PVR2 stream often starts with an AAC PMT which is what messes things up.

Your problem may be a variant of the same issue because the language is not what the PVR normally expects. If the coded PMT says "english" and the actual packets are "french" then a player would find no audio stream even though it is there. Did you try playing the stream file with VLC (or any player that is not too fussy about formatting)? I find that recordings always play with VLC even if SageTV and Windows Media Player refuse to play them properly.

If the PVR2 simply coded for what it saw there would be no problem.

Re TSDoctor - are you using the latest version? They added some coding to fix PMT errors after working with my flawed stream (the version I use is beta 1.2.94). The older version would have nothing to do with the flawed streams from the PVR2 - the latest version fixes them. One option you can try with TSDoctor is to use its advanced options to trim the start so it will ignore the first few packets where the mix-up occurrs. Another option is to tell TSDoctor (Expert Tools/TS Packet Filter) to remove PID $0000 (the PAT) and PID $0200 (PMTs) - it will then recreate PAT and PMT entries based on the packets it finds - which again fixes the problem (rather a brute force way - but it works).

Hauppauge Customer Service have finally given up trying to tell me that the problem "must be with SageTV because it is obsolete software". They have now, at last, passed the full case to their programmers for deeper research. The programmers have said that they know there is an issue with the way the PVR2 handles audio - fingers crossed they may work out a fix. Unfortunately, as noted earlier by others in this thread, most users of the HD PVR2 are gamers who use HDMI input - the problems relate to users, like us, who source via Component Video.

[Evil_Attorney]

Originally Posted by gandalf

most users of the HD PVR2 are gamers who use HDMI input - the problems relate to users, like us, who source via Component Video.

No, not true at all. My sound problems (back when I was testing out the units) happened on BOTH component/SPDIF and HDMI. I have older Directv tuners that do not encrypt the HDMI outputs with HDCP. HDMI had sound problems just as frequently. On several occasions I noted a sound issue on a channel, then switched back and forth between component/HDMI, with no sound on either. It seemed to me that the missing sound typically happened on sports and on network broadcasts of movies the most.

[phelme]

I have several TS interpreters and analyzers; none of them could open the files. I have the latest TS Doctor too.

VLC tries to open the files and finds no valid streams of any kind. It's like the HD-PVR 2 never writes out any program table at all. Looks like a bunch of nothing in the first packets.

The other possibility is maybe the HD-PVR 2 is misinterpreting something as copy protected and records the streams but decides it's not valid in the end.

I'm pretty sure I've locked the driver to record everything in AAC via Showbiz, I'll have to check on that.

[gandalf]

Originally Posted by Evil_Attorney

No, not true at all. My sound problems (back when I was testing out the units) happened on BOTH component/SPDIF and HDMI. I have older Directv tuners that do not encrypt the HDMI outputs with HDCP. HDMI had sound problems just as frequently. On several occasions I noted a sound issue on a channel, then switched back and forth between component/HDMI, with no sound on either. It seemed to me that the missing sound typically happened on sports and on network broadcasts of movies the most.

I stand corrected. Just goes to show how complex the problem is. Hauppauge frequently insisted to me that the problem I was showing them was caused by using separated inputs. Their solution was to use HDMI - which just shows how much their customer service people understand about HDMI / HDCP etc. I guess I assumed that they had no problems with integrated audio and video in the HDMI interface.

Out of interest, do you have any experience of using RCA audio and Component Video? I don't see how to do it because the options offered by the hardware do not include that combination, though it should be possible.

[Evil_Attorney]

I suspect that this isn't purely a sound output issue. I tried setting my Directv boxed to output only stereo (PCM I believe) and I still had some channels with sound issues and others without. I also tried locking resolution to 720p (I do native switching) and that didn't help. To me, that points to a third factor that is causing this.

[Evil_Attorney]

Originally Posted by gandalf

Out of interest, do you have any experience of using RCA audio and Component Video? I don't see how to do it because the options offered by the hardware do not include that combination, though it should be possible.

I have no clue how to get RCA to record. I wonder if there is a way to do it in the sage.properties file.

[gandalf]

Originally Posted by Evil_Attorney

I suspect that this isn't purely a sound output issue. I tried setting my Directv boxed to output only stereo (PCM I believe) and I still had some channels with sound issues and others without. I also tried locking resolution to 720p (I do native switching) and that didn't help. To me, that points to a third factor that is causing this.

I agree 100% that it is not as simple as just an audio issue. As an engineer I would like to understand the circumstances under which the "fault" occurs. At present I don't think anyone does - Hauppauge included.

I have given up trying to understand the cause - I just know, and can verify, that the HD PVR2 sometimes misbehaves in a specific way - messing up PMT entries in its output stream. I don't know what makes it do this. There should be only one CODEC named in a contiguous stream and the PVR2 frequently creates streams with more than one. I can show Hauppauge that phenomenon - but I cannot say what causes it.

[BobPhoenix]

Originally Posted by gandalf

I agree 100% that it is not as simple as just an audio issue. As an engineer I would like to understand the circumstances under which the "fault" occurs. At present I don't think anyone does - Hauppauge included.

I have given up trying to understand the cause - I just know, and can verify, that the HD PVR2 sometimes misbehaves in a specific way - messing up PMT entries in its output stream. I don't know what makes it do this. There should be only one CODEC named in a contiguous stream and the PVR2 frequently creates streams with more than one. I can show Hauppauge that phenomenon - but I cannot say what causes it.

The problems here are likely the same as with the Colossus card I'm using with HDMI from HR21 DirectTV receiver. They sure sound identical. Hopefully if Hauppauge can fix the drivers for the HD-PVR2 they will be able to do the same for the Colossus - assuming the drivers are not the same already.

[gandalf]

Originally Posted by BobPhoenix

The problems here are likely the same as with the Colossus card I'm using with HDMI from HR21 DirectTV receiver. They sure sound identical. Hopefully if Hauppauge can fix the drivers for the HD-PVR2 they will be able to do the same for the Colossus - assuming the drivers are not the same already.

Thanks for the info Bob.

So:
The problem exists on the HD PVR2 and the Colossus - but not the original HD PVR.
The problem also exists with the HD PVR2 on the Component Video / SPDIF and HDMI sources.

I will pass that on to Hauppauge to add to the case detail.

Anything else anyone can add?

[Evil_Attorney]

Don't the Colossus and the HDPVR 2 use the same encoder chip?

[popechild]

Is this the same as the "no audio on live tv" issue that I have with my PVR2? I almost never get recordings (favorites or manually scheduled) that don't have any audio when I watch them after the fact, but on the rare times that I try to watch something live using the PVR2, it often refuses to play any audio. Using the original PVR works fine. I should mention that I'm always watching via an extender (sometimes HD200 sometimes HD300).

I've been keeping an eye on this thread hoping this would help me know when there's a fix for my issue, but I realized I should make sure it's the same issue you guys are talking about.

[Evil_Attorney]

For me, yes it is the live tv issue. After sage took another look at the files after recording, it somehow got the audio right.

[phelme]

Originally Posted by Evil_Attorney

I have no clue how to get RCA to record. I wonder if there is a way to do it in the sage.properties file.

I could have sworn someone had figured this out (SHS maybe?), but I can't find how they did it to go with the Component video. Mine only shows with SPDIF in Sage.

[gandalf]

Originally Posted by popechild

Is this the same as the "no audio on live tv" issue that I have with my PVR2? I almost never get recordings (favorites or manually scheduled) that don't have any audio when I watch them after the fact, but on the rare times that I try to watch something live using the PVR2, it often refuses to play any audio.

Yes, I get that symptom. The problem seems to be related to the time delay after tuning before triggerring record. If you select a channel and watch it then SageTV tunes the tuner and immediately fires up the encoder. The problem seems to be caused somehow by the tuner output still settling down when the PVR2 starts encoding the stream.

You could try triggering a manual record of the show and then watching it - which is effectively what "live TV" is but the process might introduce a bit of delay and allow the PVR2 to get its act together. If you can schedule the recording beforehand that would be even better - you can still watch the recording "live" as it is being recorded.

[gandalf]

Originally Posted by Evil_Attorney

Don't the Colossus and the HDPVR 2 use the same encoder chip?

You may be right but I think they have different driver software - so it is worth making sure Hauppauge solves the issue for both.

[Evil_Attorney]

Not sure if you guys saw this, but SHS posted a new HDPVR2 driver: http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=60954

[phelme]

Hmm. Had another HD-PVR2 recording failure last night, Key & Peele on Comedy Central. Same issue, TS file with no streams found, even in VLC.

Hauppauge support would like me to recreate this failure scenario with Showbiz, haven't been able to so far. So I'm afraid they'll say it's Sage and punt.

I'm going to try the new driver when it's officially released.

(the source is a DirecTV receiver, locked to 720P and 2-channel PCM)

[Tiki]

Originally Posted by phelme

Hmm. Had another HD-PVR2 recording failure last night, Key & Peele on Comedy Central. Same issue, TS file with no streams found, even in VLC.

Hauppauge support would like me to recreate this failure scenario with Showbiz, haven't been able to so far. So I'm afraid they'll say it's Sage and punt.

I'm going to try the new driver when it's officially released.

(the source is a DirecTV receiver, locked to 720P and 2-channel PCM)

I know it doesn't help you (and probably just confuses things), but I've seen this issue exactly one time (but with a different capture device)...

A couple of weeks ago I had this happen with an episode of The Mentalist that was recorded with a HDHomeRun using clear QAM from Comcast. I had video, but no sound. VLC reported no audio streams. The interesting thing is that I also recorded The Good Wife on that same day using the other tuner in the HDHomerun (Good Wife airs immediately before Mentalist, both on same station - CBS). I had padding on both recordings. The recording of The Good Wife was OK and it picked up the first few minutes of The Mentalist (with sound). The recording of the Mentalist was bad (no sound) and it picked up the last few minutes of The Good Wife (also no sound).

Probably totally unrelated to your issue, but maybe not.

[phelme]

I have random issues with the HDHomeRun Prime too. I recorded Frontline on PBS this week, about 3/4 of it was fine but the last 20 minutes or so had timeline issues and it skipped to the end. That portion was unrecoverable and I'm still not sure who shot JFK.