Stuttering - driving me crazy; help

[sabre]

Issue-On LiveTV and playback, there is a stutter every 5 seconds or so, like it has lost a frame. This is really driving me crazy (esp on sports), and is one of the last pieces of the puzzle for me (besides NvDVD setting-see other thread). Still in trial mode, but unless can figure not sure if i should implement (although also does it on BTV trial).

I have tried reclock, and that just served to cause more congestion whenever i hit the remote. Have moved around the pvr card (250-16) before. tried many different decoders and settings, and happens on all of them.

This is dedicated computer:
PIII, 600mhz
shuttle (Via) av61 board
512mb ram
gf4 mx440 video
120 gb drive
wintv 250


Anyone have any other ideas. Thanks

[falchulk]

Are you using overlay or vmr? Thats a pretty lowend system. I would suggest using overlay and trying diffrent dxva modes. Have you also tried the intervideo codec with the Hardware acceleration reg entry? Also, what OS are you using? If other then Win98, are you using NTFS? Is your drive defragmented? How much CPU usage are you seeing?

[sabre]

Thanks, i should have mentioned that i am using overlay and have done registry tweaks for intervideo (both for windvd 6 and the one that came w/ wintv). I have xp w/ sp2, and NTFS on two partitions - file partition is 64k format. recently defrag'd the whole thing. Prior to the registry fix, i had CPU usage near 100%, but with hardware assist on for decoding, CPU normally in the 40-50% range.

Yes, low end system, but is dedicated, and turned off most services that i can. and other than the stutter all else works pretty smooth (will try your NvDVD tip tonight). But that is a big other than for me.

[Opus4]

Also: What is the speed of the IDE controller? ATA/33, or faster? What recording rate? How does it perform at a lower recording rate?

- Andy

[sabre]

IDE specs
IDE Controller
2 UltraDMA 33/66 Bus Master Dual-channel IDE ports (4 drives max)

Normally use 2gb/hr - tried at 3gb/hr to improved picture as seen in prior posts. i have not tried a lower bitrate. at the higher rate still get the stutter. will try lower rate tonight, but hope not to lose too much pq.

[sabre]

Anyone have any ideas? thanks

[Opus4]

My original thought on the IDE controller was that _perhaps_ it or the drive was too slow to move all the data the system was trying to move. I don't really know if that would be the case, but I did see a system responsiveness improvement on my slow system when I installed an ATA/133 controller.

The 2nd part, about lowering the recording rate, was to see if perhaps the cpu was getting used up when those blips appeared and/or it put less of a strain on the drive system. If you monitor the cpu, does it go to 100% around thise glitches?

Norton AntiVirus seems to eat up cpu/memory scanning the mpgs as they are playing.

Anyway, these are all wild guesses, so who knows if they apply to you.

- Andy

[sabre]

Thanks for the suggestions. I did try to lower bitrate, but did not use much. In the past when it stuttered it did not raise the CPU %. Just now, after getting NVDVD 3 to show well, i notice cpu has jumped to about 70% from 50% prior. even when i use intervideo. wonder if that could result from changing the aspect ratio settings? Either way, still stutter.

I use AVG, so should be less overhead. Time to get some sleep, maybe something will trigger overnight.

[falchulk]

NVDVD3? Thats I assume you are using the post processor?

[sabre]

After a reboot, the CPU for sage was down to close to 30%, very nice for this unit. I am not using post-processor.

But I am still getting the constant stutter. I imagine that it is a hardware and not a software issue (wintv 250 or video card)?

[sabre]

I must say, I am close to giving up. I do not think it is my low powered computer b/c i know others have run sagetv even on a PII.

This is GREAT software, but a bit much for typical consumer retail (and i do not consider myself typical as i built the box just for sagetv).

I have tried just about everything, and still get stutter every 5 secs. Almost ready to throw it in as only 2 days left on trial b4 i must decide.

[falchulk]

Have you placed an official support request? This is not a typical problem. I have a via m10000 that stutters when the transparent menus are on the screen but is smooth other then that. That system is only as powerful about as powerful as an 500mhz intel box.

[sabre]

I have not. was not aware of it. But i also have not purchased the product yet. thanks

[falchulk]

They will still provide you support! They want you to buy the product and will help you get it working right.

[sabre]

ok, put in for support.

Furthermore, I sent some video to another computer and played with PowerDVD and the video had no stuttering at all, so i guess i can eliminate the encoder card as being the issue.

Also, i think but not sure, that if i play a prior recorded program it will not stutter, but if i watch livetv or am recording something while watching a prior recorded show, then will stutter.

Do you think it will help to put in a another drive - 1 for sagetv and programs and one for shows (right now i have a 120 gb partitioned).

[kny3twalker]

just to let you know

that whenever I play Doom3
and SageTV is scheduled to record and starts a recording

I get choppy playback in Doom3 and trashed recording

even though the pvr 250s use 0-2% CPU usage
there is defintely a performance level that needs to be achieved for both playback and recording

my stats are below

just feeling your pain

[mwhite]

Last night, I started getting the exact same type of stuttering problem on one of my PVR-250s, after it has been working flawlessly for months.

My system is based on a P4 2.8 and the CPU averages < 5% while recording, so I don't think the system is being overworked.

The problem shows up on my DirecTV input, but not on my cable TV input. I'm going to try to swap the cards around and see if I can move the problem to the cable input. If so, then it is probably the PVR card itself.

I'll post with the results after I try it.

-mark

[mwhite]

Ok, I fixed my stuttering problem on the DirecTV PVR-250.

Here is what I did.

I checked a recording that was made with the card using WMP and it played perfect, so I’m confident that the PVR-250 is encoding correctly. This indicates that there seems to be a problem only when watching live TV, and only on that PVR-250. The other PVR-250 (Cable input) has no problems when watching live TV at all.

Using Sage Client, I could watch live TV on the DirecTV PVR-250, but instead of stuttering, I would get some pixilation about every 5 seconds.

I moved the offending PVR-250 to a different pci slot and reinstalled the drivers and reconfigured the card in SageTV and now everything seems to be perfect again.

I remember reading somewhere in the forums that a PVR card should not be next to the video card, but this was not the case here. It was in the next to the last slot, furthest away from the video card. It new home is the pci slot furthest away from the video card.

I’m at a loss as to the sudden cause of the stuttering for this card. I had not made any driver or hardware changes in weeks and heat is not a problem, my system runs very cool.

Maybe the same thing might help someone else.

Your mileage may vary,

-mark

[David Lawrance]

For the record, I'm still having a problem with one card. The encoder had worked perfectly. I had been pushing quality and I think I may have baked components in my inadequately ventillated component cabinet.

But it is curious that stuttering seems to be more of a problem for more people now than before. I giess that could just mean more PVR-250 users using Sage.

It's just such a pain to have had everything working so well and now so marginal. I'll try a new card.

[sabre]

Bit of an update - on suggestion of sage folks, they said to try and set video renderer to default (i had overlay). And my gosh it seems that it worked. i want to watch more to be fully sure, but this simple change might help immensely.

However, when in menus or guide, the pciture does not show in the upper right, which would be an ok trade off for me.