CPU 100% Utilization

[jphhughes]

Originally posted by carlgar
I would suggest that the next time you think Sage is hung you look at the CPU usage in the Taskmgr. I have noticed that when I think Sage is hung it is a result of the system task running and using most (95%-98%) of the CPU. I have seen the system task take the CPU for as long as 20 min. I believe that Sage is probably still running but very slowly because of little CPU time.

Just to confirm I have the same problems. Sage looks like its hung but if I wait long enough it recovers. During this period the CPU shows 100% utilization. Also I noticed that when making a channel change the cpu goes to 100% utilization and keeps it their for around 10 seconds. This can't be normal?

I still have video freeze and cannot get the second tuner to record without braking the file up into multiple files which generally do not play back continuously. If only one tuner is being used to record every thing works fine.

Are Hauppauge and Frey still working on a fix or do they consider the current drivers as having solved the problem? I sure hope not.

Like Calgar I tired the lates drives which we less stable that the 22162 drivers I am currently uisng.

If anyone has any Ideas on how to solve the second tuner recording problem please help. (By second tuner I mean the tuner that is recording a show while the other tuner is being used for livetv.)

[lotusvball]

I had the same problems and I finally was able to get it fixed. What I did was installed a second harddrive and set Sage to record to the new harddrive.

Everything has been fine since.

[jphhughes]

Thanks for the information. This is a dedicated PVR and has a 200MB hard drive that is partitioned C; 50MB D: 150MB. So I expect it should work. Currently I have sage pointing to the D: drive to record all video. Based on some posts I read here I am going to change the recording directory to the Sage default and see if this solves the problem.

[mikbro]

Can you give me the specifics on the source(s) you are using? How many Favorites you have, do you have IR enabled? Have you modifed the "lookahead" sage.property, and finally, how much RAM is in use/free at the time you have these problems....

[jphhughes]

I don't use IR its disabled, I have not modified the lookahead" property in Sage. I have a total of 512k Ram and with sage running task manager shows approximately 230-270k ram available.

I had Sage pointing to the D: drive for recording. I changed that last night as an experiment and used the default C: drive. I was able to recording five shows without the files being broken up. The problem with this is that the c: drive has only a 50MEG partition and the D: drive is 150MEG. SO I really need Sage to be using the D: drive. Also I am somewhat skeptical as to whether this really fixed the problems as it just doesn't make sense to me.

Also how does Sage look at disk space? From what I read it seems to just use all of the disk space unless you tell to no too. But does it know that their are multiple drive or partitions and in my case when the c: partition is full will it automatically use the D: partition?

By the ways after making this change I did not have any freezes or lockups. Again I think this may just be coincident. Thanks for your help.

[carlgar]

I would recommend you use the Leave Free option and set it for 1 GB. I think SageTV may have problems if it has a completely full disk.

[krutaw]

I'm not 100% certian that this is the same problem, however, it does sound very similiar. Here goes:

Whenever I watch a video via "Sage Recordings" when the video ends, the processor goes to 100% utilization. Upon investigation, the "System" process is the offender. If I leave the remote controll/keyboard/mouse alone, it will come back in about 1-5 minutes. If I hit anything (keyboard/mouse/remote control) it will stay locked up for up to 20 minutes (that's where I lost my patience and rebooted the box.)

Now, if I watch a video via the "Imported Videos" section, it works just fine.

Here's what I've tried:

Complete reinstall from scratch including OS without any modified STV's applied. ~ same problem

Here's my current setup:

AMD Athlon 1ghz processor
MSI K7n2g motherboard (NForce II chipset)
PVR-350 w/ OSD enabled
PVR-250
All drives formatted in 64K blocks
40gb drive dedicated to OS / Sage.tv application only
250gb drive dedicated to video (120 gb free)
200gb drive dedicated to video (80 gb free)
(4) 40gb network drives dedicated to video (at least 5gb free on each)
Custom case fan keeping *EVERYTHING* at room temperature

Customizations:
Malore's Commercial Skip STV
Followed Opus's instructions on how control Sagetv without focus (http://forums.freytechnologies.com/f...t=send+message)

Does this sound like the same problem, or should I be opening my own thread?

[carlgar]

I still see this problem on occasion, I have not yet been able to figure out what the system task does. I usually wait it out if I can. If the system task runs for too long ( I have seen it run as long as 20 mins). I can force SageTV back into action by setting the SageTV task to above normal. Once SageTV starts playing again I lower its priority back to normal. I don't know why but setting SageTV to above normal seems to cause the system task to stop whatever it is doing.

I did not notice any relationship that you mention with the remote/keyboard/mouse but will try to look into that next time I may encounter the issue. This could be why I don't notice it much, I now wait a while before looking into it. I do recall having change the priority a few days ago to get around the problem.

I really believe the problem is with the system task not SageTV, the system task is just using too much CPU and not allowing other programs to run.

[krutaw]

Originally posted by carlgar
I still see this problem on occasion, I have not yet been able to figure out what the system task does. I usually wait it out if I can. If the system task runs for too long ( I have seen it run as long as 20 mins). I can force SageTV back into action by setting the SageTV task to above normal. Once SageTV starts playing again I lower its priority back to normal. I don't know why but setting SageTV to above normal seems to cause the system task to stop whatever it is doing.

I did not notice any relationship that you mention with the remote/keyboard/mouse but will try to look into that next time I may encounter the issue. This could be why I don't notice it much, I now wait a while before looking into it. I do recall having change the priority a few days ago to get around the problem.

I really believe the problem is with the system task not SageTV, the system task is just using too much CPU and not allowing other programs to run.

Just when I thought I had something to look at.. blah. Last night I let my sagetv just sit there and wait. Yeah... this morning when I got up I found the processor still sitting at 100% utilization.

Interesting that you said changing the priority of SageTV seems to do the job. I wonder if running it at "AboveNormal" all the time would do the job too? Worth a shot anyway. Darn annoying problem.

While I agree that I don't think it's SageTV *causing* the problem, I personally think this is yet another wacky problem between SageTV and the PVR-350 drivers. Let me know if you're not using the PVR-350, and that will rule that out (and cause a grown man to cry!)

Anywho, I'll take a shot at leaving SageTV running at above normal, I mean, heck, it's not like I use the pvr machine for anything but a pvr anyway.. heck, don't even have a mouse/keyboard attached.

[carlgar]

I have tried leaving SageTV at the higher priority but that seemed to cause other problems for me. That is why I now reset it to normal. I don't recall what the problem was. I have seen so many problems they all seem to run together. However, I currently have a very usable system with the 350, but still encounter soft freezes with the 350.

When you were at 100% did raising the SageTV priority correct the CPU usage?

BTW: I am still running Sage 1.4, so my results may be a little different than yours.

[carlgar]

I just encountered the 100% usage problem related to the system task. I was using the mouse and keyboard but the system task only ran for about 3 mins. So I really don't think the keyboard or mouse have anything to do with the problem.

This did occur between programs. I just finished viewing one and was trying to start a new one.

[carlgar]

I just got hit again by the problem. Again it was between shows. This time after waiting 5 mins. I regained control by setting SageTV priority to AboveNormal and then restoring it to normal after SageTV starting playing. Again I was using the mouse and keyboard.

[ckron]

I just started over fresh with an Intel 810 based motherboard, the updated drivers from Sage, version 2.0.20, and of course my PVR-350. After watching my first recorded show on this new setup, I encountered this 100% utilization problem. Sure enough, the system process was running at like 97-98%. I waited for over 30 minutes and it did not stop. I tried increasing the priority of Sage and it still did not stop. Finally, I tried putting Sage to sleep and my utilization immediately went back down. What do you guys and gals think of that?

[strohmrs]

If you are a running an antivirus program, I highly recommend making the following change to reduce or elliminate pausing and high CPU utilizations during program and channel changes:

I added my recording folder, the Frey Technologies folder and all associated subfolders to Norton's Auto-Protect Exclusion list. So far no more long pauses between live shows and remote control delays including delays switching between different menus and submenus or jumping forward or backwards is now greatly reduced. Sometimes the delays would be long enough between shows that sage would just put itself into the screensaver mode early and then continue recording in the background when the hard drive light would finally go out. Guess Norton just can't keep up with virus scanning the 1-2 GB files as they are closed out. Sage is so much more responsive now!

Rick

[krutaw]

Originally Posted by jphhughes

I don't use IR its disabled, I have not modified the lookahead" property in Sage. I have a total of 512k Ram and with sage running task manager shows approximately 230-270k ram available.

I had Sage pointing to the D: drive for recording. I changed that last night as an experiment and used the default C: drive. I was able to recording five shows without the files being broken up. The problem with this is that the c: drive has only a 50MEG partition and the D: drive is 150MEG. SO I really need Sage to be using the D: drive. Also I am somewhat skeptical as to whether this really fixed the problems as it just doesn't make sense to me.

Also how does Sage look at disk space? From what I read it seems to just use all of the disk space unless you tell to no too. But does it know that their are multiple drive or partitions and in my case when the c: partition is full will it automatically use the D: partition?

By the ways after making this change I did not have any freezes or lockups. Again I think this may just be coincident. Thanks for your help.

JPHHuqhes~

I've found that if I run SAGETV at a priority of abovenormal, the processor will still flip out on the system process, but it's still usable and will eventually calm down.

[bipaboy]

This seems to be a pretty big problem with the system process hogging processing power. The system process is attirbuted to the Sage program in some way but i'm not sure what. This problem is beginning to annoy me and is a pain when you want to watch something. Using sage more and more makes me want to switch over ot Myth. Does the sage support crew folllow these forums? Do they have a solution for this?

windows XP without sp2 (lower overhead)
3x128MB memory
440bx chipset
celeron 1000
SB live! card
350 tv tuner using tv out
latest sage release
MSI fx5200 card
2 hard drives 12gig/200gig,first drive for system and second drive for video recordings