Overheating causing stuttering

[rwrjr]

Well after searching all the threads and trying the fixes listed in the Beta Software forum, (Java 1.5, registry change, running without service, etc...) I believe my stuttering problem is due to overheating.

I've been running successfully for a couple of months now. I have two PVR-150 cards and one USB Plextor tuner. I started noticing stuttering on one of the 150 cards two evenings ago. I disabled the offending PVR-150 figuring that I'd look at it later as I still had two tuners. Then yesterday morning the 2nd PVR-150 started stuttering. Shoot, had to disable that one, leaving the external Plextor as my sole tuner. Went to work and did a little forum searching and returned home to try the fixes above. Did all the recommended changes and re-enabled 150s, both still stuttered.

The only change I could think of was external, HEAT. I live just outside Washington D.C. and the weather has warmed up considerably this week. So I tried a test. I turned off the whole PC and let it cool off for two hours. Fired it back up and no stuttering.

I'm going to see if I can move one of these cards to a different slot and see what types of quiet cooling augmentation are available. I probably won't get to it until this weekend but I'll report back with the results.

Man I'm going to miss watching one hour shows in 40 minutes by blowing past the commercials.

[m0ng00se30]

It makes sense that your video card is the one suffering from the heat. Because if you can play it cooled off and everything is fine then its not the 150s or your source files would be stuttering.

Heat is a big problem for me as well. I have not seen it manifest itself as stuttering tho. My problem is that I'm using one case for everything. 4HDs, 3-250s... blah blah and withouth hooking up a refridge to it.. I'm not sure how cool I will get it. I had to turn off comskip cause it was causing the cpu to overheat. ANYWAY... with my 250's and 9800 I haven't seen the skipping that you are experiencing, but as we've seen every machine is different.

--Mike

[salsbst]

http://www.atechfabrication.com/prod...ink_system.htm

[Naylia]

Try configuring your fans so that air is pulled across your pci cards. A easy thing to do may be to put an Artic Cooling VGA Silencer on your video card as this will move the air around in the area of the pci cards. Or another option could be an intake fan on the front or side of the case (if yours supports mounting one there) that blows air across the cards. Or a psu with a 120mm fan on the inside that is mounted so that it pulls air from the area of your pci cards.

Make sure you've bundled your cables nicely and out of the way so that your not restricting airflow in that region and also that you don't have anything blocking your vents. I used to have an ide cable hanging in front of some vents and it completely prevented air from coming into the pc through there. I routed the cable around and out of the way and knocked 15 degrees off my cpu temps.

[DFranch]

Have you tried defragmenting your hard drive?

[rwrjr]

The plextor records & plays back from the exact same drive without stuttering. The PVR-150s do also, when they are cool. Once they heat up, the stuttering starts.

[silkshadow]

First, install motherboard monitor (http://mbm.livewiredev.com/) and use their database to seach for other people using your mobo and you can see if heat is really the issue.

If its heat, then the easiest fix is to buy more fans. What case are you using? Make sure every fan hole has a fan in it. Then you can buy things like:

http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77194
http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=75060
http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77094

Then there are also 5.25" bay fans.

[rich_l]

Silent PC Review

Excellent forums and website for silent cooling solutions.

[rwrjr]

Thanks Silkshadow,
I have an Ahanix case, http://www.ahanix.com/ahanix_product.asp?pid=8. This is a fairly large case and there is a lot of open space inside. The only place where things are a little tight are the PCI cards. I have two PVR-150s, one FX5200 AGP card, one X-Card, and one wireless NIC card. There is one empty slot between the PVR-150s.

My case has two 60mm exhaust fans in the back, and of course the PS fan is blowing. There are no more fan cutouts in this case and I have no 5.25" bays for fans.

I have a P4 2.4GHz and I use the Silverstone heat pipe CPU cooler, http://www.silverstonetek.com/products-nt01.htm

I guess I should clarify about the overheating. I think the system as a whole is running at a "normal" temp. The only things that are overheating are the two PVR-150s. I know this through several tests of turning the system off once stuttering starts, and once it's cool, restarting. The stuttering starts after several hours. I have an external Plextor that never stutters. Even when starting the system, while it is still cool, playback of shows that were recorded while stuttering show the same stuttering. So the cards doing the recording/encoding (PVR-150s) are introducing the stuttering.

I'm investigating several cooling options and once I rectify the problem, I'll report back.

Thanks for the links.

[silkshadow]

Thats a sweet case! I don't know if this will help, but I had a cooling problem with a video card (it was a non-Sage overclocked box). I was going to buy all that liquid cooling crap but that stuff's expensive . I was maxed out on slots and drive bays so I tried taking out all the other PCI cards and seeing if that helped. It did, so I slowly added cards back in. Eventaully I discovered that the Adaptec SCSI card, which was originally placed next to my video card, was the culprit. I stuck that one at the far end and put the gigabit ethernet next to my AGP slot. Didn't have any more heat issues with the card. Good luck!

[BobPhoenix]

Originally Posted by rwrjr

I guess I should clarify about the overheating. I think the system as a whole is running at a "normal" temp. The only things that are overheating are the two PVR-150s.

Then you might try one of these it might help to cool them:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...118-204&depa=0

BobP.

[rwrjr]

I'm now running cool and I don't have any more stuttering, even though the temps in the DC area have warmed up again.

I used to use the Ahanix D5 case, http://www.ahanix.com/ahanix_product.asp?pid=8. Nice looking case in our entertainment center. The problem is that there are only two 60mm fans in the back and no significant air intake in the front. My CPU zone was showing 140-142 F and zones 1 & 2 on the MB were between 105-110F.

I switched to the Silverstone TJ06, http://www.silverstonetek.com/products-tj06.htm. This is also a nice looking case, but it is a bit of a monster and being a tower doesn't fit in our entertainment center. No problem since we have about 15" behind the center where the new case now lives. Now the CPU zone is showing 100-105 F and zones 1 & 2 are in the high 80s, low 90s. BIG DIFFERENCE!!!

I can hear the fans when the TV is off, but they are very quiet. When the TV is on, even with a quiet show, I can't hear any fan noise. If space and price isn't a problem, I highly recommend this case.

[jpsmall]

I just started having this exact same problem up here in Philly with my Ahanix D5 case. I've been pulling my hair out the last few days trying to figure this out. Only I'm using Hauppauge 250's instead of 150's. probably the same thing though. My processor usage also jumped up as well.

I'm bummed your solution is a new case. I don't have the space/location options you've got.

I'm going to check playback of already recorded shows after giving the PC some time to cool down, see if the stuttering is "embedded" in the files from the PVR's.

[rwrjr]

For me, the stuttering was part of the saved files. Later playback when system was cool proved that. Have you confirmed that you have a heat problem by letting the box cool down and seeing if the stuttering goes away for a while?

I'm sure there are other cases out there that will cool better than the D5. I'm bummed because the D5 looked really good in the entertainment center.

Before I ordered and received my new case I removed the 6 screws holding the lid on the D5 and slid it back about 1/2" so it could draw in more fresh air. I also left the glass doors to my entertainment center open. This seemed to help a little bit, but the thing still ran hot.

Good luck.

[jpsmall]

The stuttering may be part of the saved files, but allowing the computer to cool down overnight did not change the stuttering of live tv the next morning. I also noted that my CPU usage is much higher than it used to be on both playback and background recording. Who knows, maybe I fried something in my system permanently. I am going to have to do a piece by piece analysis. No fun.

I don't think its my 250's because the same symptoms are on both. I've never fried a processor before, is it possible it keeps running just much more inefficiently?

[m0ng00se30]

I've had a card start stuttering, and it was embedded in the file. I removed the card, and resinstalled and the stuttering went away. This was only on one card and not all tuners, tho.

[jpsmall]

That'll be my weekend project. I'll wipe out and reinstall both 250's. I'll probably also pull my DVico HDTV card out since i'm not really using it for now.

[jpsmall]

Turns out it was a bad hard drive. Windows had received so many errors from the drive it automatically switched from DMA mode to PIO mode. Apparently this really taxes the CPU. Anyway, that's why I was seeing high CPU usage during both playback and background recordings.

Still, the HD errors could have been caused by excess heat. Ahanix D5 owners be aware of your temps!!