Hardware Upgrade

[benjamintm]

Is Sage optimized for multi-core processors? I have the opportunity to buy a Quad-Core Q6600 Core 2. Will I notice a benefit if I'm recording multiple shows (I have 7 tuners; 3 SD, 4 HD) while playing back video on an HD extender, and transcoding a show?

Thanks,
Ben

[Opus4]

Playing video on the HD extender shouldn't use much cpu on the server, since the HD100 decodes pretty much all it plays using its own hardware decoder.

But, yes, SageTV is multi-threaded & can use multiple cpus. Individual transcode jobs only use a single cpu, but if there were multiple MVPs, for example, it could transcode multiple streams using multiple cpus.

- Andy

[benjamintm]

The main reason I have for upgrading (aside from price) is that my hd extended is stuttering while watching videos and a recording kicks on. Looking at the activity monitor, it might be the processor is maxing out. This also happens with recorded shows. Right now I have an opportunity with the chip so I was wondering if it would resolve the issue.

Ben

[carlgar]

It is more likely that your network is overloaded. Do any of your tuners use the ethernet? Have you looked at your network activity?

[MattHelm]

Um, your setup should NOT be using that much CPU for record/playback.

I tested 4 HDhomerun tuners (2 devices, 4 tuners) a SD tuner, and played back 2 HD programs all at once on my 3600+ 2x (AMD's SLOWEST dual core), and I think I was at maybe 10% usage on 1 core! You sure you aren't doing something else with your server, or have a network problem?

But yes, a QUAD core should make sure the CPU isn't the problem.

[benjamintm]

Right now I have one HDHomeRun on the network. My network is all gigabit, so I don't believe the network is the problem. Looking at the network load on the server (which has a gigabit interface), I'm barely breaking 2%.

My current setup is this:

Intel E6300 Core 2 Dual
Asus P5B
2GB Memory
1 Aver A180 (1 HD Tuner)
1 Hauppauge 500MCE (dual SD tuners)
1 Avermedia AverTVHD (1 HD Tuner, 1 SD Tuner)
1 HDHomerun (2 network HD Tuners)
4 HDD (1 OS, 1 Backups, 1 Media, 1 Recorded TV), all 300 or 320GB and SATA II
Sonata 3 case with a EarthWatts 500 Watt power supply

The network consists of a Linksys WRT54g (running DD-WRT) with a Dlink Gigabit switch attached, to which is attached a Netgear gigabit switch, which has the HD Extender.

Ben

Ben

[carlgar]

7 tuners and only 1 recording disk? I would start looking at the disk I/O. What OS are you using?

[benjamintm]

I haven't had any problems yet, though I haven't taxed the system with all 7 tuners (had 3 HD and an SD going weekly). I'm using XP Pro.

The video playback issues seem to occur regardless of the number of tuners running. If even 1 kicks off, I can get video stutter. That occurs if I'm watching a video stored on another drive.

Ben

[carlgar]

Is the SageTV task itself that is using most of the cpu? If not, what task is?

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by benjamintm

Right now I have one HDHomeRun on the network. My network is all gigabit, so I don't believe the network is the problem. Looking at the network load on the server (which has a gigabit interface), I'm barely breaking 2%.

My current setup is this:

Intel E6300 Core 2 Dual
Asus P5B
2GB Memory
1 Aver A180 (1 HD Tuner)
1 Hauppauge 500MCE (dual SD tuners)
1 Avermedia AverTVHD (1 HD Tuner, 1 SD Tuner)
1 HDHomerun (2 network HD Tuners)
4 HDD (1 OS, 1 Backups, 1 Media, 1 Recorded TV), all 300 or 320GB and SATA II
Sonata 3 case with a EarthWatts 500 Watt power supply

The network consists of a Linksys WRT54g (running DD-WRT) with a Dlink Gigabit switch attached, to which is attached a Netgear gigabit switch, which has the HD Extender.

Ben

Ben

I'd look at the HD issue also. I'm using a P4 and as long as ShowAnalyzer isn't running I can record 4 SD shows (2 PVR 500's) and 2 HD shows (HDHR) AND play back an HD stream at the same time with no troubles.
I've got 2 SATA I 300gb drives. The first drive has my 80gig Boot/OS/Software drive and the rest is for recordings, the 2nd drive is set up with one partition for recordings. Actually now that I've got my 2nd HD Extender I can even have ShowAnalyzer running without trouble since Sage doesn't have to transcode HD down for my old MVP.

Also my HD Extender is hooked to a 10/100 switch attached to a gigabit connection.

So it shouldn't be your CPU causing the problems. My guess would be that you're maxxing out the hard disk pipe going in/out to that single recording drive. You've got possibly 7 tuners trying to write to that one drive as well as Sage trying to play back from the drive at the same time.
Do you have video on menus active? That won't help, I have video turned off on all menu's/background.