new 250Gb drive - huge audio delay

[dex1]

Hello Everybody!

I just added a 250Gb 7200rpm 8Mb cache WD drive to my Sage Server for storage. Formatted it to 64K blocks. Now I'm getting audio delay of over 4000ms. Any ideas?? Where did I mess up?

System:
P4 2.53 533Mhz bus
XP Pro
640Mb RAM

The OS is running off of the original drive, an 80Gb 7200 RPM where I had audio delays of only 250 to 500ms.

Thanks!

[IVB]

Is it a slave to the your original master, or a 2nd master? you should have 2 drive controllers on your mobo.

[gplasky]

Make sure that new drive is using UltraDMA mode and not PIO mode. Check it out in your device manager, properties of the controller. Make sure is also shows up properly in your BIOS.

Gerry

[dex1]

Thanks to both of you. I've got a new 250 card showing up tomorrow and will double check both of those things when I go to install it.

right now i know that both drives are on the same channel but I didn't think that would affect it too much given that it worked fine when everything was running from a single drive (and thus single channel).

OK, now question:
I set the new drive to CS thinking that would be the best option since I could not easily get to the main drive. Is it best to run in master/slave (and if so which should be the master) or set both to CS. Or is it really just best to put them on diff controllers?

One other interesting thing is that the board that is experiencing the huge and varying audio delay is the video blaster board.... the 250 that is currently in there is fine recording to the new drive...... but the VB worked pretty well (small audio delay) when there was only one drive.....

I'll set it up however you guys recomend and will also check the UDMA setting now.

Thanks!!!

Jay

[dex1]

update - surprise surprise, it was PIO and was not even enabled inthe BIOS which makes me wonder why it worked at all.

I enabled it in the BIOS and it is now showing as UDMA on the IDE channel properties window. (still on the same controller.)

[dex1]

Sorry for all the posts..... just wanted to let everybody know that I picked up this 250Gb drive from circuit city for $149 AR. I think the deal is still active.....

[AJ Bertelson]

Compussr has a 160gb drive for 60 bucks also

[gplasky]

You should be fine on the same controller channel. What I do is have my 2 hard drives on channel 1 because because they will use the same UDMA (ATA133). I have my DVD/CD-ROMs on the second channel because these devices are slower (ATA 33 & ATA66). This way the hard drives should perform at their peak.

Gerry

[dex1]

Excellent, thanks Gerry. tonight should utilize that VB card and will check it out. When the new 250 card arrives tomorrow is there any way to tell Sage to use the 250's before the VB?

Thanks again,
Jay

[lovingHDTV]

dex1,
there is a way to set your tuner card priorities, there was a thread here recently about it.

hope this helps a little,

[ErsatzTom]

Adjust the encoder_merit setting for each tuner in the properties files.

t

[dex1]

Thanks Tom, I am hoping you meant literally open the file in notwbook and change the merit from 0 to 1. Also, I am hoping that the higher number will mean higher priority for use instead of the other way around!!

thanks again!
jay

[dex1]

i need spellchecker i meant "notebook"...

[ErsatzTom]

I'm not positive about which values produce which resulst, but it should be easy enough to determine emperically. And yes, I meant open the file and edit it. But make sure that Sage is not running (not even sleeping) while you change it.

t

[dex1]

whoops, what happens if it was?

[ErsatzTom]

It will overwrite it before it ever gets a chance to read it.

t

[dex1]

ah, yes i see. no prob. just went and re-changed it.

And...... it 'appears' from a cursory glance at the three shows that were recorded tonight by the VB card after the change from PIO to UDMA that the audio sync is ......... PERFECT!!!!!

Thank you all so much!!

now that I'll be out of slots for tuners, did I read somewhere on this forum that the server can also use tuner cards installed in client machines ?????

I really have to say again that this product and the people around it are just fantastic. I WANT TO BUY STOCK IN THE COMPANY!!! (will you take PDAs and iPods in trade?? lol)

thanks again,
jay