Odd SageTV DVD play behavior but probably not related to Sage?

[Brent94Z]

Hey Guys!

Posting here because I don't think this is a SageTV problem even though it gives me a problem within SageTV.

I know my way around computers probably better than average but this has me stumped so am hoping some of you experts might be able to offer an idea.

I copy my DVDs to external hard drives. I do this by using a computer in my office which has AnyDVDHD on it. I basically just copy the DVD contents, over my home network, to external USB drives attached to my SageTV server in the living room using a program called CloneDVD which I use only to strip out foreign languages. This has worked well over the years and I have like 10 or 11 external hard drives from 1TB to 3TB storing my DVD collection from which I have played within SageTV using either SageMyMovies or the Gemstone Videos system.

The problem started when I ran out of room on my last 2TB Hitachi drive and bought a 3TB Toshiba. I first noticed an extremely odd problem where when I tried to use CloneDVD2 to copy the DVD it would create the folder on the new 3TB drive but would error out and NOT copy any VOB files. Sometimes it would start to copy for a second or two but then error out. Permissions on the new drive (FYI, I've tried several new drives, different brands even, since the one 3TB gave me a problem and same issue on all of them) are the same as on the older USB drives. From the same office computer where I have AnyDVDHD installed I can use Explorer to copy the files no problem so it doesn't seem to be a permissions error? Plus, I don't think it is possible to create the movie folder but just not make the file if a permissions problem. I've worked around this by leaving some space on an older drive, copying my movies there instead, and then running a daily program to just move the files from the older drive to the new 3TB drive. Sage then picks up the movies on the new 3TB drive and adds them nicely to my Videos menu.

This is where the problem starts though... any drive that CloneDVD wouldn't copy the movies to (why I have no idea) Sage will lock up when trying to play the DVD files from those drives. Sometimes it locks up after the first splash screen. Sometimes it locks up after one trailer preview, sometimes two. Sometimes, but rarely, it gets to the movie menu but then when I hit the PLAY option, it locks up there and by locks up I mean the spinning circle. To play these DVD files on my home theater PC (which is my Sage server) I take SageTV out of fullscreen and startup VLC. VLC will play these DVD files no problem??? Also, I have a couple HD300s and they will play the DVD files on the new USB drives no problem. The only thing that won't play the DVD files is my SageTV server which, unfortunately, is where I want to watch these files from 99% of the time.

I've tried switching to many of the different DVD options in the Setup menu but all have the same results... locks up SageTV at some point in the trailer previews. And, it always locks up in the trailers when switching between files. Either before the first trailer starts or after a couple of them but never in the middle... only when trying to play the next trailer file.

And, I did have like 10GB left on one of the older drives so just copied another movie to that drive. It copied fine using CloneDVD and plays fine so it isn't that some settings changed... it appears to be somehow related to the newer external USB drives and like I mentioned above, I've tried like 3 different ones and I have the CloneDVD issues and Sage lockups on all of them.

Do any of you have any ideas why this might be happening? Seems weird that my office computer with CloneDVD won't copy to these drives AND the SageTV server program is having issues too but nothing else. HD300s are fine, VLC on server computer is fine, etc. Very weird and I'm at my wits end trying to figure this out because I'm out of troubleshooting ideas

Thanks for any suggestions!

[ccsmoke]

Great programs btw 😄. Does the harddrive have a partition or is formatted to ntfs, want to make sure it's all gpt format to go over 2.2TB.

[Brent94Z]

Originally Posted by ccsmoke

Great programs btw 😄. Does the harddrive have a partition or is formatted to ntfs, want to make sure it's all gpt format to go over 2.2TB.

No partition and formatted NTFS. The problem drives do appear to the the 3 and 4 TB drives I have but they are external USB drives and from doing a little reading it seems like these can't be GPT format? Also, all available space does show so do you still think this could be the problem?

Thanks for the help!

[UgaData]

Are you formatting the drives yourself before use?

Or are you using the drives preformatted as they come out-of-the-box?

this may or may not apply, but I know if you try to use some of the larger preformatted drives as the target for the Windows 7 image backup, they flat will not work. If you format the drives yourself they will work just fine.

As already mentioned you will want to create the new drive/partition as GPT for 3TB and larger drives

You can also choose the block size if you do the formatting yourself. For drives that contain large files I always use 64K block size (actually, for all my data drives I use 64K blocks).

[Brent94Z]

Originally Posted by UgaData

Are you formatting the drives yourself before use?

No, I sure didn't. The external USB drives I had just plugged in and they worked.

Originally Posted by UgaData

Or are you using the drives preformatted as they come out-of-the-box?

Right out of the box.

Originally Posted by UgaData

this may or may not apply, but I know if you try to use some of the larger preformatted drives as the target for the Windows 7 image backup, they flat will not work. If you format the drives yourself they will work just fine.

So you are saying the drives appear to work fine for about everything but for some reason don't work to use as an image backup? If so, you may be on to something as my drives work just fine for everything else EXCEPT playing the DVD files via Sage and copying over the network via CloneDVD2.

Originally Posted by UgaData

As already mentioned you will want to create the new drive/partition as GPT for 3TB and larger drives

You can also choose the block size if you do the formatting yourself. For drives that contain large files I always use 64K block size (actually, for all my data drives I use 64K blocks).[/QUOTE]

Yep, my internal drives I do the larger blocks but never messed with the USB drives.

I did check and my 3TB and4 4TB drives are MBR and NOT GPT. I'm going to convert one that is mostly empty right now and see what happens

Thanks!

[Brent94Z]

Well, I tried formatting and converting a 3TB and 4TB drive to the GPT format. Same results... CloneDVD2 creates the folder with the name of the movie and the VIDEO_TS folder then errors thinking there is a problem with the disc.

Dang... I really thought that was the problem and was going to fix me right up but evidently not

[FriscoJohn]

Brent,

Did you ever figure out your problem with Sage not wanting to play DVD folders stored on an external USB drive? I'm having similar problems, however some DVD's on the drive play fine, others lock up, without any apparent difference between the DVD folders.

[Brent94Z]

Originally Posted by FriscoJohn

Brent,

Did you ever figure out your problem with Sage not wanting to play DVD folders stored on an external USB drive? I'm having similar problems, however some DVD's on the drive play fine, others lock up, without any apparent difference between the DVD folders.

No, I sure haven't But, I our problems may be different in that it seems like on the problem drives ALL the movies lock up (spinning circle) at some point during the previews. Sometimes though it does get to the main menu then locks up if I select "play".

I did get a couple 2TB drives and today or tomorrow I'm going to try to copy the movies from the larger drive onto the 2TB drives and see if that "fixes" my problem. Won't be a fix as much as a work around but I'm at a loss as to what to do next other than just not use anything bigger than 2TB?

[FriscoJohn]

Thanks for the update, Brent. My issue may indeed be a different problem. Based on what I saw in some other threads, I'm going to try changing the video and audio codecs to see if that makes a difference. I'll post if I have any success.

[KryptoNyte]

If you copy the ripped media folder to an internal hard drive (A SageTV import directory on the Operating System drive for example), will SageTV software or hardware still refuse to play it correctly?