Still can't get rid of tearing at the top of the screen

[padre]

I've been trying all sorts of settings to get rid of some 'tearing' I'm getting at the top of the screen (viewed in the MPEG2s recorded by SageTV). It's about 4 or 5 lines at the top and it's real annoying.

I've trying playing with the Zoom settings and they don't seem to have any effect. Heck, I tried setting them to 200% and nothing.

I am using "Use Source" for the Aspect Ratio Mode. What's frustrating about this is I have a system in the basement, same computer make/model/configuration and it doesn't have the problem! The only difference between the two systems is one (that's having the issues) is a PVR350 and the one that's not is a PVR250.

Configuration:

Compaq 2.4ghz Celeron with 512mb RAM, 80gb Hard Disk, with Windows 2000 Server.

Suggestions?

Thanks!

Kevin

[ErsatzTom]

If it were me I would try swapping video cards between the two systems to see if the problem followed the card. If that didn't do it, I would try swapping the pvr cards. After that maybe try swapping systems to see if the problem stayed with the tv. At least then you would know where exactly the problem was.

t

[padre]

Can't swap the video, since it's integrated on the motherboard on both systems. And I really don't want to swap the PVR from one to the other, since the one is working perfectly (don't want to screw that one up!).

Hoping the Sage guru's would have settings for me to check instead.

[SHS]

dbl check you setting on each of them

[padre]

triple checked and more! I have VNC loaded on both machines, and dual head display on my other computer - so I looked at all the screens and subscreen, side-by-side and didn't see anything different. Puzzling.

[ErsatzTom]

I would, at the very least, take the one that isn't working and hook it up to the tv attached to the system that is working. If both work on that tv, then the issue is with the other tv (or, at least, the way your systems interacts with that tv).

t

[SHS]

Well then I guest there Ghost some where in system so there no telling what it could be padre

[falchulk]

Padre, what kind of video card is it?

[padre]

The Compaq uses an Intel 82845G/GL chipset for the video (embedded on motherboard).

Just a little confused, why do you think it might be the video card, when the problem is the encoded MPEG2 file generated by the PVR?

It's not that the video displays tears on the top on that machine, the resulting MPEG2 file has tears (displayed everywhere including after DVD creation).

[dkardatzke]

Do you see the same problems in the WinTV application?

[falchulk]

Not that it would be the video card itself. But using the overlay zoom in most new drivers would hide it. I am unfamiliar with that particular chipset though.

[padre]

The only other difference I can think of between the two units is - the one that's working fine is hooked up to a RCA DirecTV receiver and the one that's not doing well is hooked up to a Hughes.

By the way, I notice the tears on the TV (without going through the PVR), so it's probably an issue with the Directv. But I thought the zoom was suppose to allow me to compensate for this type of issue. It doesn't appear Zoom has any impact (I tried 50% to 200% and no change).

I was going to attach a copy of a snapshot I took from the output, to show what it looks like, but couldn't find a way to attach a JPG to my reply.

Heading out of town tomorrow, so I'll have to wait until I return to try swapping the two PVR boards (but based on the fact that I see the tearing on the screen without the PVR, I don't think it'll help).

[ErsatzTom]

No, if you can see it going straight to the tv, then there is nothing wrong with your system. I didn't catch that when I read your earlier posts. I'd think, like you did, that you should be able to zoom it off the screen but I don't have first hand experience with that so I'll leave advice on that to others.

t

[padre]

Tom, but there must be something wrong with my system, since the Zoom has zero effect on it. So that's my real issue, how to get the horizontal (or do I need vertical?) zoom working. I tried both at large and small numbers and saw no effect on the output.

[falchulk]

padre, have you cheked advaned display properties in windows. A lot of drivers havea zoom contol as well as bright/hue/sharp only for the overlay. Since yoy are hooked up to a tv, why not overscan to get rid of it?

[padre]

falchulk, you're missing the point. It's not the output to the TV that's screwed up, it's the MPEG2 recording! I want to have SageTV compensate for the lines at the top (and I thought that's what the zoom within Sage would do). Adjusting my TV is just a fix for that TV, doesn't do a thing to the MPEG2 files that I'll be using for DVD creation later.

[padre]

If you look at this thread on the "WinTV PVR & MediaMVP Board", someone else is seeing it as well (the photo they have posted is similar to what I'm seeing, except mine is screen-wide and a little thicker).

When I get back from Florida, I'm going to try swapping my DirecTV receivers (RCA in place of the Hughes). If that doesn't work, I might look into the driver issue.

http://www.shspvr.com/forum/viewtopi...ght=top+screen

[ErsatzTom]

From the manual:

Zoom Effects:
You have the ability to adjust the percentage at which the video is zoomed during playback. The default setting is 107 because it allows for overscan to the television set so you have no black borders on the video during playback. You can modify these settings to ?Stretch? a particular program during playback. This is especially useful when used with the Aspect Ratio settings to remove ?Window Boxing.

So the zoom effect shouldn't make any difference to the mpeg at all... just the way it is played back. I don't know much about the possible configuration changes you can make for the hauppauge cards in the properties files so I could be wrong but I think that you need to either get rid of the tearing when going straight to the tv or you need to crop the mpeg before you burn it to disk (doesn't sound fun at all).

t

[falchulk]

Padre, I understand your problem. I was just trying to give you a way to hide it rather then eliminate it. If it's not visible, it cannot irritate you right? Using the zoom in sage itself would have only have allowed you to hide it as well. It does not encode that zoom level into the mpeg2 file. Good luck with finding a fix, I know it would irritate me also.

[PVRUser]

Hi,

I am currently evaluating SageTV and Beyond TV 3.4. I had a problem in BTV where the top three lines displayed garbage. Snapstream's support said it was the channel info (closed captioning and such) that was not getting stripped away. They suggested I crop the top. I cropped three lines and it works perfectly. I did not have this problem in SageTV so I am not sure how to fix it or even if it is your problem. However, I just thought I would throw this out there just in case it was.