ERROR (-3,0x80004005) on Playback

[laddepp]

Hello,
Finally made the plunge, upgrading from 2.2.8 to 5.0.4. I'm really excited as a lot has changed!

I'm getting the following error when trying to playback any archived media files from any physical media (hard drive or CD):

There was a Playback Error in playback. Details:
sage.PlaybackException: ERROR (-3,0x80004005):
There was a problem accessing the filesystem for playback.

Some background:
I backed up my Frey Technologies folder to preserve my existing database/settings/etc from 2.2.8. I refomatted my drive so I have a C:\ for the windows install/programs, M:\ for media (formatted 64K sectors as recommended), X:\ is my swap partition, F:\ is my DVD drive.
Fresh install of Windows SP2 + Updates.
I moved the Frey Technologies folder back to Program Files and installed SageTV 5.0.4 right on top of it. The upgrade appears be OK (also, I'm using the Java client bundled with 5.0.4)

My machine:
P4 / 1.8 Ghz / 512 MB RAM / 80G HDD (divided into partitions listed above). Plextor USB capture device.
It's not the greatest machine in the world, but it's mine

Oh, and the weird thing: I can watch live TV using the "Great" quality setting.

Questions or input welcome. Thanks all!

[Opus4]

Do you mean old existing recordings won't play, or what? If it is an existing file, look at its Detailed Info screen & scroll down to see where it thinks the file is located. It may still think the recording is on the old system's location... and could continue to do so unless it can 'see' the drive shown in the path so that it can figure out the file is no longer in that location.

- Andy

[laddepp]

Unfortunately, I'm not in front of my box, and I won't be in front of my box for several hours...

Assuming that SageTV thinks that those files are in their old locations, is there any way to point it at the right place? In my sage.preferences file, I specified M:\Sage TV (using the correct notation) as the recording directory. Also, I specified M:\My Videos & F:\ (my CD/DVD drive) as a library location for media files. In SageTV, each archived (videos not recorded by SageTV) media file shows up as a folder with 2 items. When I open the folder, nothing is in it.

I'm sure I'm missing something ... what is it? (One thing to note: I am not using the SageTV Service).

Thanks for your help.

[Opus4]

If the files are pointing to a drive that doesn't on your new configuration, and since you are not using service mode, just create a mapped drive letter for the 'missing' drive. Set it to point to some empty directory. Restart SageTV & it should then be able to determine that the files are not in their old locations.

- Andy

[laddepp]

I do apologize if I am being dense here...

I checked the detailed properties of my media files, and they are listed to be in their old locations. I recreated the exact path (empty directory) to the old location, restarted SageTV and that did not seem to help... it still thinks the files are there. I verified that all users can access the old path.

What I don't understand is, I specified my CD/DVD drive as a media center file location. Yet, it doesn't seem to try to look there. Is there any way to change, via a configuration file, the path to all of my files? I triple-checked my sage properties/preferences file to be certain that my old paths were not in there.

Thanks.

[Opus4]

You exited SageTV completely before restarting, right?

I'm not sure why it would still see the files in the old location if there are no files there. To see if SageTV can actually see that directory, on the server try using Media Center -> Browse Media Files -> Play a Selected Media File. If you can browse to the empty dir, then I would think that means that SageTV can see it when checking the recordings.

- Andy

[laddepp]

Yes, it can see the old directory path by browsing for media files. It still didn't update the location of my recorded files to the new path though.

So, I copied all of my recorded shows to my new media center import directory, and now I can at least play my old recorded shows.

I think I'm OK now... my only concern is that it may still be trying to look in old locations for files. If that is the case, I don't know how to resolve that (I didn't have enough time last night to really examine it thoroughly). If I continue to have problems, I will post again.

Thanks for your help.

[gcomrie]

I am having a similar problem. I have a server (V5.0.4.92) and a client (V5.0.4.92-Client). Everything works correctly on the server. The client, on the other hand, can not play any recordings. The client used to work, but stopped within the last month or so. This was about the same time that I installed updates from Microsoft and updated to the new version. I have been using the Server for about a year and a half (v2.x) and the client for about 6-7 months (v3.x).

I know that the client can access the file system because I have some of my DVDs ripped to the same directory and they play without incident in the client.

If I browse to the recordings through the client (Media Center -> Browse Media Files -> Play a Selected Media File) or in Windows, I can play the files. As a test, I installed the client on another machine (in trial mode). That machine is also unable to play any recordings. I get the same error: "sage.PlaybackException: ERROR (-3,0x80004005): There was a problem accessing the filesystem for playback."

I have totally removed java and Sage from both systems, re-installed and get the same results. Please let me know if there is any other information that would help to troubleshoot the issue. My wife is getting frustrated (the client was a Christmas present for her), so any help is much appreciated.

-Gordon

[peterjb]

I too had suddenly began having this problem on a vanilla standalone SageTV install. Lucky for me it was only on my test machine! I had just installed a new capture device, so I thought that it was the culprit. Unfortunately for me it wasn't. Files played on the same machine with ZoomPlayer & Media Player with no problem even after the device/drivers/inf/registry entries had been removed. But SageTV still failed to play anything!

I uninstalled SageTV 5.0.4 ( deleting the entire directory contents after the install failed to ) and then re-installed. It's now working fine.. But for how long I don't know! I suspect that something else I've updated or installed is the real culprit, but I'm still not sure what it was!

Cheers

Peter

[cvitech]

I was having the same problem with my server and client. I noticed I was using drive letters to access the files and changed to using UNC Paths instead. That fixed the problem.

[Abev107]

getting the same error too. For about a month now, although really annoying, I have learned to live with it.

I made no changes to the comp, it just started happening. To get around it I just keep retrying my action until it works.

The error pops up anytime I make a new selection from a menu. Some days it is less tenacious, other days it make take 10 times for me to start a recording or watch live tv.

I am reluctant to get deep into trying to fix it. Troubleshooting Sage can be a long term challenge.