Suspend and resume with SageTV

[Beefcake550]

ACPI is exactly what again? It has to do the power savings modes, right? I get confused because my nForce2 motherboard has something called APIC (with regards to IRQs) and I always get the two confused.

Anyhow, I haven't played with the software from Fusion to see if it will wake up the computer from S3 to record. I am just now playing with all of this power stuff now to see if I can get the PC to shut down during the late night hours when no one is watching TV.

At the moment, I have no issues with studdering in HD that are related to ACPI. Every now and then during high motion scenes, it'll seem like I get a frame drop or so and I just live with it. The drops don't occur if I'm not recording it, so I imagine it is related to my system speed. Also, I'm viewing QAM content from Charter Comm, and I remember you have an antenna, so perhaps that is another variable in the equation.

-Beef

[jbuszkie]

There was a whole slew of threads on AVS on having to disable ACPI for fusion. I haven't kept up or not to see if it was still needed with the F3. They added more buffers (I think) on the F3 so it might be more robust.

I just rebuild my OS and I will try again to use ACPI. Maybe the software is better now. If not.. It's back to the "standard" pc vs ACPI...

I thought you were using Saesem??

[Beefcake550]

yeah, well I WAS using Sasem. You probably remember that I have both. ATI's latest driver fixed the DxVA stuttering problems I was having with the Fusion3, so I use it now because I can also setup the Recording Scheduler and it works. For some reason, the Sasem unit seems to stutter when I am recording and watching at the same time. This is most probably linked to the speed of the system, not the Sasem. My CPU util spikes to 100% when trying to watch and record on Sasem (since I have to use software decoding). On the Fusion, it's great since I can have DxVA turned on.

The other thing I also noticed is that the Fusion3 is able to tune in (albeit a little flaky) the PPV channels from Charter. It's not perfect, but it does work.

Finally, it also seems like Dvico actually is making improvements to their product whereas Sasem hasn't had anything new for quite some time.

I still use the Sasem for SD TV as it has a hardware MPEG-2 encoder. I am thinking about selling the Sasem and buying a PVR150-MCE for SDTV. The quality should be the same (same chipset for SD) and the pricetag is much cheaper ($60).

Of course, one benefit of keeping the Sasem is that I can then use the fusion to record 1 HD channel while I watch another on the Sasem (assuming the system can handle it). I haven't tried this, but it may be neat.

-Beef

[mwhitlock]

**NOTICE**: This is PRE-RELEASE ALPHA software. It may contain bugs which would prevent its proper operation. Use only for testing purposes and at your own risk.

• Improved consistency of schedule refreshing code and fixed log issues

While there is still much to be added to SageWake, I am growing more confident that the 2.0.x line is stable and works as intended. I have been running it on my own system for over a week now and the logs look correct. I have not been allowing my system to sleep due to some lengthy BitTorrent sessions, so I don't know for certain that SageWake 2 would have been waking my system up for recordings, but I have no reason to suspect otherwise.

I would encourage users to try SageWake 2 at this time, but not to depend on it for mission critical recordings. Post any anomalous findings in this thread.

EDIT: See below for latest version.

[Beefcake550]

Looking good. I can't wait until the feature jbuskie asked for. This is where you can tell SageWake that I want to put the machine to sleep after the the recording is done. So, when 10:15pm roles around, and I don't want to stay up to watch the show until 11pm, I can just hit a button and sage will shutdown on it's own at 11pm.

In addition, I would like SageWake to be smart enough to handle shutting down after consecutive records are done. Picture this...It's 9:15pm and something is recording until 10pm. Then, at 10pm, there is another show to be recorded. I'd like to be able to hit a button at 9:15pm and have SageWake shutdown the PC after the 10pm show is complete.

Anyhow, great work thus far. I truely love this software.

-Beef

[mwhitlock]

That's the next thing I will be working on. I already have the necessary support functionality built in, so it will be just a few lines of code to add this feature.

[mwhitlock]

**NOTICE**: This is PRE-RELEASE ALPHA software. It may contain bugs which would prevent its proper operation. Use only for testing purposes and at your own risk.

• Log at every show boundary for improved consistency

I'm not certain whether this bug would have affected waking, but I have a feeling it might have. For efficiency, I reuse a single waitable timer object for performing system wake at (starttime - leadtime) and for logging recording events at starttime and stoptime. I think this bug may have been causing the timer not to get reset to the proper wake time in some rare cases. Should be working now. The log should also make a bit more sense now too.

EDIT: see below for newer version

[jbuszkie]

Originally Posted by mwhitlock

**NOTICE**:

• Log at every show boundary for improved consistency

Was the only change from your first release. I'm waiting for the delayed turn off feature before I try your new version.

Oh.. And thanks for the great utility!

Jim

[mwhitlock]

It's coming. I have to take care of a few impending school projects before I can work on SageWake again.

[jbuszkie]

Originally Posted by mwhitlock

It's coming. I have to take care of a few impending school projects before I can work on SageWake again.

How's those school projects coming!! I'm, at least, waiting for the next version that will allow to you tell SAGE to sleep the computer when it's done recording! :-)

[supernoob]

I'm still a little confused on this program.

Does it put the computer into suspend for me? or must I do that manually?

If it does it for me, does it only kick in when I put sage into sleep (screensave on) <---that would make the most sense

for the terminate option, do I have to list everything in the sytem tray? for example: LCDC, HauppaugeIR, IntervideoWinDVD thing, Motherboard Monitor ect...?

Thanks.

The main reason I looked into using this is because my hard drive seems to getting quite hot. With no easy way to cool it (custom built case) I feel this is my best option to allow it to cool down.

[jbuszkie]

Originally Posted by supernoob

I'm still a little confused on this program.

Does it put the computer into suspend for me? or must I do that manually?

If it does it for me, does it only kick in when I put sage into sleep (screensave on) <---that would make the most sense

I can answer parts of your question.. sagewake will NOT put your computer to sleep.... well that's not completly true either.. It will normally work like this... You manually sleep the computer or set the timout thing to auto suspend. Sagewake will then wake the computer when it needs to record something. Sagewake will then put the computer back to sleep ONLY if no keys were pressed and the mouse wasn't moved. Basically if you touched the machine, you'll have to manually sleep the computer. As for the terminate thing.. I think you only need to terminate if things don't wake up nicely for you. For instance, I don't need to terminate anything.

Jim

[julesjohn]

Are there any considerations with SageWake for those of us that don't use a monitor/keyboard/mouse on the PVR machine but only Terminal Server into it for administration?

Just curious regarding power management and it's interaction with SageTV and SageWake. Thanks.

[supernoob]

Originally Posted by jbuszkie

I can answer parts of your question.. sagewake will NOT put your computer to sleep.... well that's not completly true either.. It will normally work like this... You manually sleep the computer or set the timout thing to auto suspend. Sagewake will then wake the computer when it needs to record something. Sagewake will then put the computer back to sleep ONLY if no keys were pressed and the mouse wasn't moved. Basically if you touched the machine, you'll have to manually sleep the computer. As for the terminate thing.. I think you only need to terminate if things don't wake up nicely for you. For instance, I don't need to terminate anything.

Jim

Ah bummer, not as usefull as I thought then. As far as having the computer auto suspend, are you talking about just the regular windows power management? What happens if say the 2 hour power down time comes around and sage is currently recording somthing. Will windows know that or will it just shut down and sagewake will wake it right back up, missing a few minutes of the show.

whats the easiest way to put the computer to sleep via the hauppauge remote?

[julesjohn]

I am wondering if it is possible to force my machine into standby or hibernation with my Hauppauge remote and wake it up as well with the remote - via SendMsg() commands either to Windows or SageWake.

I say this as I don't have a monitor connected to my SageTV desktop and at the end of the day it is nice to force the hibernation. During the day I don't want it to hibernate too quickly of course so I can let it follow the power management settings of course.

In the AM I like the SageTV desktop to wake without having to press the power button. So not sure if a call to SageWake is appropriate or not but the key is that Sagewake knows (can check) from the schedule if it is ok to hibernate immediately or if it needs to wait for a recording in progress to finish for example.

I guess I could try a BUTTON={run(shutdown -h)} to hibernate but I miss what SageWake provides and I don't know about coming out of hibernation.

Thoughts? Thanks.

[mwhitlock]

Originally Posted by julesjohn

Are there any considerations with SageWake for those of us that don't use a monitor/keyboard/mouse on the PVR machine but only Terminal Server into it for administration?

Just curious regarding power management and it's interaction with SageTV and SageWake. Thanks.

You might want to use the --noresuspend option to prevent SageWake from putting your computer to sleep when recordings are done, since I'm not sure whether a Terminal Services session will count as "user is present."

[mwhitlock]

Originally Posted by supernoob

What happens if say the 2 hour power down time comes around and sage is currently recording somthing. Will windows know that or will it just shut down and sagewake will wake it right back up, missing a few minutes of the show.

SageWake will not let your computer go to sleep if SageTV is recording something. That includes the automatic idle timeout and manual attempts to suspend or hibernate the computer.

[mwhitlock]

Originally Posted by julesjohn

I am wondering if it is possible to force my machine into standby or hibernation with my Hauppauge remote and wake it up as well with the remote - via SendMsg() commands either to Windows or SageWake.

I have been giving some thought to building and selling (on a limited scale) a box that would sense an IR code and close the circuit through a pair of wires that would be connected in parallel with the power switch on your PC case. This would have the effect of simulating a press of the power switch when the box receives a certain IR pattern.

The hardware inside would be fairly simple: an IR receiver and some kind of cheap microcontroller. I have thought too about having a "learn" button that would let you change the IR code that the box reacts to, but that would increase the complexity a lot because it would then need flash memory, and I'm not certain of the best algorithm to determine if a received IR code is "close enough" to a previously sampled code to be considered a match. It'd be easier to hard code the pattern recognition.

[julesjohn]

Originally Posted by mwhitlock

You might want to use the --noresuspend option to prevent SageWake from putting your computer to sleep when recordings are done, since I'm not sure whether a Terminal Services session will count as "user is present."

This is interesting but I am almost never logged in via Terminal Services. I just use it when I absolutely have to. My SageTV box automatically logs in as a designated user. So ideally Sagewake prevents my machine from hibernating for scheduled recordings, and any live use of SageTV as used by my Hauppauge Remote. All my output is from the PVR 350 via it's TVout.

So far this appears to be working fine. Nice work.

[julesjohn]

Currently I am able to force my PVR desktop into Hibernation via my Hauppauge remote (irremote.ini) by using the run command to a free application called Wizmo and giving it the hibernation switch.

Again though not ideal if SageTV is in the middle of recording a show and I will see today if SageWake still wakes up for my next scheduled recording from a forced hibernation like this.

But still also would like to see a way to force the machine out of hibernation by the remote too. I don't see this being possible but worth bringing up.