Stuttering HD with HDHR

[HeadDocSD]

Sorry if you're sick of my posts (this is #3 today). I didn't post this to the Hardware section because I don't think its a hardware problem. I've recently got a HDHomeRun and I can't get smooth video from it. The video is unwatchable. My specs are:

Asus M2NPV-VM
1 GB RAM
Onboard GE6250 graphics
1 HDHomeRun (Can't get smooth video, another thread)
1 AVerMedia A180 (doesn't work with HD, another thread)
Hauppauge MCE150
Sage TV 6.3
Windows XP Pro
DVI --> HDMI to Sony HD RPTV

I have the HDHR and HTPC server connected to the same Gigabit D-Link DGS-2208 switch. This is connected to a D-Link Wireless-N DIR-655 Router. When I watch live or recorded HD with SageTV, the video is completly choppy and unwatchable. When I watch live video with the VLC viewer included with HDHR, the video is a little choppy at times, but entirely watchable. I've noticed that the CPU usage hovers around 100% when watching with both programs. (When I access the same tuner with Elgato EyeTV on my iMac (2.8Ghz, 2GB ram, wireless-N connection) the video is flawless)

Obviously under any circustances the CPU us being strained beyond capacity. Will adding a new video card such as one of these be enough?

http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16814121235
http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16814125062

Or do I need a new CPU? I was looking at this one:

http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16819103242

Any guidance would help. Thanks.

Matt

[shawncochran]

Originally Posted by HeadDocSD

I have the HDHR and HTPC server connected to the same Gigabit D-Link DGS-2208 switch. This is connected to a D-Link Wireless-N DIR-655 Router.

I may not be of much help, but, could you clarify something for me? Are you trying to watch the SageTV playback over wifi or is it just that there is a D-Link wireless router connected to your network?

[HeadDocSD]

My HDHR and Sage Machine are hardwired to a gigabit switch (not wireless). The HDHR does work flawlessly with a wireless setup on my iMac.

[technazz]

Does the HDHR work fine when you tune with VLC?

Technazz

[HeadDocSD]

Yes, with the exception of a few minor "stutters," which are more like brief screen artifacts. Both VLC and SageTV take CPU usage up to around 100%, but on Sage the video is unwatchable, whereas on VLC its pretty much fine.

[davephan]

I did not see your CPU specs listed in the string. What kind of CPU are you using? How are you watching the video on your TV? With an MVP?

If you are recording HD and transcoding it on the fly, it will require a lot of CPU processing power. You will need a fast dual-core to do it. I can stream HD video from my HDHomerun, that I just bought, to MVPs without stuttering.

I am using a dual-core 3.0 gig CPU. When recording SageTV and doing other things, the 'background' CPU utilization is 3 - 8 percent. When I watch a HD program on my MVP which is connected to my SD TV, the CPU generally runs between 22 - 55 percent on both cores. I cannot try running two MVPs at once, since I only have one MVP license.

My network utilization from the HDHomerun is about 20 - 25 percent on my 100 meg LAN. I am thinking of putting the HDHomerun on a cross-over into my second built-in NIC to take the traffic off my LAN. However, I haven't done it yet, since I haven't noticed any problems to other things caused by the HDHomerun network useage.

If your CPU isn't a least a fast dual-core, and you are using an MVP, then you'll have to upgrade at least your CPU. Or, buy a STX-HD100 to offload the processing from your CPU.


Dave

[HeadDocSD]

I did not see your CPU specs listed in the string. What kind of CPU are you using?

Sorry, I have an AMD Sempron 3500+.

How are you watching the video on your TV? With an MVP?

I have one MVP watching on SDTV. My main server/client using onboard graphics hooked DVI-->HDMI to my HDTV (Sony RPTV). Watching either way gives me problems. Its worse on my MVP than on my HDTV. My main questions now are:

1. Will it help to defrag my harddrive(250 GB with 100GB free right now)?

2. How much will a new video card (GeForce 8400GS or 8500GT) help?

3. Do I absolutely need a better CPU (dual-core) to process and run HD content?

4. Will moving my Sage Server and encoder cards (Hauppague MCE150 and Avermedia M780) to my WHS machine (Pentium 4HT @ 3.0Ghz; 2GB Ram) help the situation. This is my eventual plan.

Thanks for you help.

Matt

[paulbeers]

Originally Posted by HeadDocSD

Sorry, I have an AMD Sempron 3500+.



I have one MVP watching on SDTV. My main server/client using onboard graphics hooked DVI-->HDMI to my HDTV (Sony RPTV). Watching either way gives me problems. Its worse on my MVP than on my HDTV. My main questions now are:

1. Will it help to defrag my harddrive(250 GB with 100GB free right now)?

2. How much will a new video card (GeForce 8400GS or 8500GT) help?

3. Do I absolutely need a better CPU (dual-core) to process and run HD content?

4. Will moving my Sage Server and encoder cards (Hauppague MCE150 and Avermedia M780) to my WHS machine (Pentium 4HT @ 3.0Ghz; 2GB Ram) help the situation. This is my eventual plan.

Thanks for you help.

Matt

1. Degrag...not really. Are you running 64K clusters on the recording drive?

2. A LOT. Onboard video (other than some of the latest and greatest) is not up to the HD task

3. Yes if you are going to share HD content over the MVP. As stated you need a decent cpu to play HD over the MVP. My Intel Core 2 Duo e4300 at stock speed (1.8GHZ) is not upto the task. Over clocked to 2.4 and it can handle it no problem. your Sempron will NOT do.

4. Pentium 4 single core will not suffice for playing HD on MVP and the Sempron is not powerful enough to do HD with onboard video so technically No. moving to your WHS server will not fix your problems....

[SpiffyRex]

1. Will it help to defrag my harddrive(250 GB with 100GB free right now)?

Just your OS partition. Fragmentation in the recording drive is not important as long as your filesystem is using 64K blocks. Are you recording in your OS filesystem?

2. How much will a new video card (GeForce 8400GS or 8500GT) help?

For playback it's a must. Go with an 8600GT with DDR3 memory. I can post some recommendations if interested.

3. Do I absolutely need a better CPU (dual-core) to process and run HD content?

Yes, if you are planning to use the MVP and the HTPC at the same time.

4. Will moving my Sage Server and encoder cards (Hauppague MCE150 and Avermedia M780) to my WHS machine (Pentium 4HT @ 3.0Ghz; 2GB Ram) help the situation. This is my eventual plan.

No, because you still don't have enough horsepower to playback HD in your HTPC. You will still need to upgrade your video card.

I would suggest getting an HD Media Extender. It will solve all your HD playback problems and it's future-proof since it can play h.264 video. It even puts a lighter load on your server, compared to the MVP and it plays along with your future plan of moving the server to your P4 machine.

[personalt]

I have the same stuttering problem is this guy.. HDHR plays fine with its built in viewer.

My client machine is AMD 64X2 Dual 2.61 ghz. - GF 6800XT
My server machine is Pent 4 3.ghz

On Playback -I dont see either machine getting pegged on CPU. Both machines are at less then 20% CPU usage.

On Recording - Server usage seems really low

After testing I plan to mostly use a HD Extender.

My question is what horsepower is needed on the server machine? I assume that machine doesnt do much encoding and everything is done on the decode side by the client? Is that right?

On playback neither machine seems to be getting hit that hard CPU wise. I have the video files saved on 64K clusters...

But the playback is really choppy.... What needs upgrading here? or is there some setting I am missing.

[paulbeers]

Originally Posted by personalt

I have the same stuttering problem is this guy.. HDHR plays fine with its built in viewer.

My client machine is AMD 64X2 Dual 2.61 ghz. - GF 6800XT
My server machine is Pent 4 3.ghz

On Playback -I dont see either machine getting pegged on CPU. Both machines are at less then 20% CPU usage.

On Recording - Server usage seems really low

After testing I plan to mostly use a HD Extender.

My question is what horsepower is needed on the server machine? I assume that machine doesnt do much encoding and everything is done on the decode side by the client? Is that right?

On playback neither machine seems to be getting hit that hard CPU wise. I have the video files saved on 64K clusters...

But the playback is really choppy.... What needs upgrading here? or is there some setting I am missing.

For just recording, your Sage server will do almost nothing. HD streams are already pre-encoded so all your server is doing is recording the stream to the hard drive.

If you are NOT using MVP's as clients, then really it doesn't take anything more than your 3.2ghz pentium 4 to be the server as all of the playback is handled via your clients hardware.

What are you using for codecs? Purevideo? I know you stated that your hard drive is formatted with 64K clusters, but how is it connected? What about your network? Could that be a bottleneck?

Usually if your playback is fine in VLC, then most likely it is either a network bottleneck or hard drive issue as your client seems like it should be up to par.

[personalt]

Harddrive is inside the server not connected via USB or anything like that. It is a newer SATA I believe.

As far as the network it is a wired with just one peice of gear my netstream firewall acting as the hub for both. I dont think it would be the network as this is the same gear I moved over from my old house. However, when making room for the new logial drive formated in 64K I moved some files off the server across the network and thinking back the transfer speed seemed a little slow. I will double back and check that..

I hadnt looked at the codecs at all.... I guess it is time to RTFM on that. I figured if it played it was using the correct code. I saw another thread about codecs so will start reading on that...

[SpiffyRex]

My question is what horsepower is needed on the server machine? I assume that machine doesnt do much encoding and everything is done on the decode side by the client? Is that right?

Right... As long as you are using an HD extender and/or SageTV Clients. If you use an MVP or Placeshifter the server will have to transcode and that is a moderate load. I also have a P4 3GHz w/ a 7600GT and can play in both the server and the MVP as long as I'm not playing h.264 in the server (the MVP can't play h.264).

But the playback is really choppy.... What needs upgrading here? or is there some setting I am missing.

Get one or more HD extenders. If you must use your client machine for playback, get a GF 8600GT or ATI 2600pro.

I hadnt looked at the codecs at all.... I guess it is time to RTFM on that. I figured if it played it was using the correct code. I saw another thread about codecs so will start reading on that...

You are about to enter a world of pain! Go with HD extenders and save yourself. Seriously, whatever combination of video card and codec you choose, make sure you can play back mpeg2 AND h.264 HD. You should always look to future needs when you upgrade and h.264 is rapidly becoming the standard although you will not have to worry about your HDHR b/s OTA TV in USA will stay mpeg2. However, newer HD capture devices are beginning to encode h.264 so you will need an appropriate playback solution once that you upgrade your video capture device(s).

[personalt]

I cant friggin believe it but it was a network problem... I had put in my rack a switch that must have had some settings wacked out.

I had logged into the swtich to check traffic and noticed somethings that didnt look right. I did reset to factory defaults and on restart it was flying..

I plan to get some extenders when they come back in stock...

Thanks to Paul Beers.. I never in a million years would have guessed network as my regular network traffic appeared to work okay...

[garyellis]

So, what are the best tools out there to figure out if I have a network problem or network congestion? (Hopefully, free tools)

And what am I looking for when I test it?

I have a linksys G router and a GIGAbyte switch, 2 HD100's, an MVP, and a HDHR.

Thanks,

Gary Ellis

[SpiffyRex]

So, what are the best tools out there to figure out if I have a network problem or network congestion? (Hopefully, free tools)

For XP use the task manager and select networking, then click on View->Select Columns. This is good enough for solving basic network problems and measuring throughput. I like to use Qcheck for more complex and/or intermittent problems. Version 2.1 is free.

And what am I looking for when I test it?

It really depends on your HD content but generally speaking you should make sure you get 20-24Mbps between server and client(s), simultaneously if you are planning for concurrent viewing. Transfer a few compressed files (mpeg2, mpeg4, zip) and calculate throughput.

[paulbeers]

Originally Posted by personalt

I cant friggin believe it but it was a network problem... I had put in my rack a switch that must have had some settings wacked out.

I had logged into the swtich to check traffic and noticed somethings that didnt look right. I did reset to factory defaults and on restart it was flying..

I plan to get some extenders when they come back in stock...

Thanks to Paul Beers.. I never in a million years would have guessed network as my regular network traffic appeared to work okay...

Unfortunately when it comes to HD content and studdering, it can be a million different things. Just glad you got it figured out.

[flashbacck]

Unless you have some serious network traffic, I really don't think it's a network problem. I have a 100mbit router and can record 2 HD channels from my HDR and surf the web at the same time without any problems. If you still suspect network problems, it should be easy enough to download some short hd clips and play them back. There's some here:

http://www.fusionhdtv.co.kr/ENG/Download/Demo.aspx

I suspect this is a video card or video decoder problem. I used to have an Athlon 2400+ that could play HD material fine (albeit at 50% cpu), so I don't think it's your sempron 3500+. What video decoder are you using (detailed settings > audio/video)? The onboard Geforce6150 is suppose to support mpeg decoding and it's possible your video decoder just doesn't have it turned on.