Another CPU Usage Problem

[ben_95sl1]

I've spent some time logging cpu usage over 24 hours, and monitoring it while watching recordings on sage, and discovered that every time sagetv service updates wiz.bin/sage.properties, sagetv service will run full cpu usage for about 50s. I occasionally get a nasty stutter or two at the same time. Unfortunately, I discovered that sage will update those files very often....such as deleting recordings (manually or auto) which happens on a regular basis with IR enabled.

ALso, when the EPG guide update occurs, it takes 10min from once it starts for it to return to normal low cpu operation. During much of that time, it uses 100% cpu. This doesn't bother me very much since I've successfully changed the scheduled update time to occur early enough in the morning that nobody will be using the system.

Perhaps this is perfectly nomral behavior for sagetv, but lately it seems far worse then normal. I can't pinpoint when i noticed it first.

I have sagetv setup as high priority, the service runs normal...I think/hope high priority minimizes stuttering.

I'm using ver 2.2.8, with an amd 2000+ XP, 512mb ram, kt400 mb, PVR150, XP sp2, Java 1.5...and it's been running for about 6 months. wiz.bin is 9MB, and the wiz.bak is 15mb (I removed the bak file and it made a new one of basically the exact same size)

Any suggested courses of action? I could try to run without my current wiz.bin and bak and see if it's related to updated/reading those files. However, if there is something wrong with the wiz.bin file, how can it use it at all?

I'm coming to the conclusion that having playback and recording on the same machine is a PITA.

thanks for any help

[Narflex]

It's odd that your Wiz.bak is so much larger than your Wiz.bin. That means its cleaning out a lot of info each time it does the DB maintenance. Anything suspicious in the log file? You can turn it on with the property: debug_logging=TRUE

(yes, that's the first time this property has been publicly posted in the forums)

[ben_95sl1]

ok, thanks...that is info overload....i got it to do an epg update after enabling logging....and the log files are sagetv_0 (262kb) sagetvclient_0 (~2mb) and sagetvclient_1 (~10mb)

CPU goes to between 65-100% for most of the epg updating-13min!

it updated wiz.bin and .bak...basically same sizes as before

the sagetvclient logs are filled with mostly a billion of these:

Wed 11/23 21:30:34.461 Received command of:WIZARD_SYNC from Socket[addr=localhost/127.0.0.1,port=42024,localport=1511]

Wed 11/23 21:29:29.979 Received command of:WIZARD_SYNC from Socket[addr=localhost/127.0.0.1,port=42024,localport=1511]

and the sagetv log seems to be the one of interest: a total of 7 scheduler awoken and successive complete schedule statements (with the stuff in between omited for simpicity) after i forced epg update. It didn't finish until 13min after epg update started.

Wed 11/23 21:21:33.013 Scheduler awoken
stuff in between
Wed 11/23 21:23:12.663 COMPLETE SCHEDULE-----**&^%&*-------COMPLETE SCHEDULE

etc....
Wed 11/23 21:23:12.517 Scheduler awoken
Wed 11/23 21:26:10.282 Scheduler awoken
Wed 11/23 21:28:33.564 Scheduler awoken
Wed 11/23 21:30:00.337 Scheduler awoken
Wed 11/23 21:32:42.057 Scheduler awoken
Wed 11/23 21:34:14.211 Scheduler awoken
Wed 11/23 21:34:14.510 COMPLETE SCHEDULE-----**&^%&*-------COMPLETE SCHEDULE <---last one

I don't see any big errors: any suggestions?

....I have another instance where the cpu usage went up before I started epg update:

starts with:
Wed 11/23 20:53:58.059 Sending DB to client of size:9240040
other stuff
Wed 11/23 20:54:14.582 Scheduler awoken
more stuff
Wed 11/23 20:54:15.366 COMPLETE SCHEDULE-----**&^%&*-------COMPLETE SCHEDULE
then the seeker seems to do somthing, then stop....

and at that time, CPU drops back down.

I don't see why the service doesn't throttle itself so that working out the schedule won't affect the playback....playback is sooooo much more important.

[ben_95sl1]

just to update....I think the problem somehow was related to the external zap2it EPG plugin required for canada on sagetv 2.X (just a hunch). I tried everything with sagetv 2.2.8 and continued to have problems (new properties file from scratch, new wiz.bin, etc). Once I upgraded to 4.1.3 using the included canadian EPG listings, it works just as it used to: perfectly stable, no stutters/cpu usage problems. I use the same wiz.bin I've always been using, size of the wiz.bak is now about the same as the wiz.bin, which may or may not mean anything.