I'm officially giving up on my HD PVR and Directv dreams - for now..

[Shield]

Originally Posted by Brent

Things that helped me with playback on my HTPC:

1. Installed ArcSoft on the client PC and made sure it was using the ArcSoft H.264 decoder
2. Upgraded the client PC's processor from single core to dual core

None of these things are needed for HD100 playback - for that it just works and works well.

Check on the ArcSoft decoder - that part was simple. Verified in the directshow filters.
I've tried using both a Quad core 6600 and a core 2 duo extreme edition 2.93, both with Nvidia 8 series cards. It just wasn't fluid enough @ 1080i with fast action; I'd watch one sequence from the Directv box then the same thing through Sage and the HD-PVR.
You ever watch fast action sports on your pc client Brent? Ever skip around, like between pitches in baseball? I could get shows like House Hunters on HGTV-HD to playback pretty much fine, but I'm a sports fan. I couldn't deal with the microstutter when skipping through the shows. Record a baseball game or something and let me know your honest opinion.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Shield

You ever watch fast action sports on your pc client Brent? Ever skip around, like between pitches in baseball? I could get shows like House Hunters on HGTV-HD to playback pretty much fine, but I'm a sports fan. I couldn't deal with the microstutter when skipping through the shows. Record a baseball game or something and let me know your honest opinion.

This IS my honest opinion. I have no reason at all to tell you anything else. Trust me, my wife would not put up with those sort of problems on HER TV

My wife actually does watch HGTV a LOT, but I've watched quite a bit of baseball and olympics with the HD-PVR, mostly live and I'm not getting any skipping or anything. I'll pause once in a while and then fast forward back to live past the commercials, but not a lot of pause and replay or rewind/ffwd over and over. I'm just not seeing any problems. I've had a few times (probably two or three total) where the audio got out of sync, but that was when I was taxing the server while I was watching TV. I just can't understand why a quad-core is having trouble with playback while my lowly dual-core is handling it ok. There has to be more to this somehow...

Now move on to the HD100 and I can say without question I've had zero problems with HD-PVR playback - it's just been perfect.

One exception to this has been with my testing of the new, unreleased HD-PVR driver - but that has to do with the driver that most people don't have.

[Shield]

Originally Posted by Brent

I just can't understand why a quad-core is having trouble with playback while my lowly dual-core is handling it ok. There has to be more to this somehow...

Well Brent, surely you don't think either my quad or core2duo box at any point had the cpu maxed did you? I get about 30% at the most on the box I did most of the testing on, which is the 2.93 core2duo.
What output do have setup for your STB? 1080i or 720p?

Maybe I'm cursed. But I think when it comes to pure pc client playback, you'll find yourself far in the minority Brent.
Half of me blames it all on Hauppage and their drivers, but then I think about how going from 6.4.4 to 6.4.7 significantly increased channel changing time, so the other half of me blames Sage.
It's hard for me to honestly believe the Sage pc client and the HD-PVR were extensively tested before going to market. The HD-100? You bet.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Shield

Well Brent, surely you don't think either my quad or core2duo box at any point had the cpu maxed did you? I get about 30% at the most on the box I did most of the testing on, which is the 2.93 core2duo.

Actually I was thinking that was part of the problem, but obviously not.

What output do have setup for your STB? 1080i or 720p?

1080i

Maybe I'm cursed. But I think when it comes to pure pc client playback, you'll find yourself far in the minority Brent.

You might be right. But I know there have been others having success with client PC playback.

[unkyjoe]

Shield.

Do yourself a big favor "trust me on this" dedicate that PC and get an extender and do not look back

Then let the goodtimes roll and enjoy your HD without stuttering.

I still have 1 PC client, a high end machine, and I still have trouble getting Sage to run reliably and without stuttering sometimes on SD programs.

The HD extender must have some codec VOODOO that in my 20+ years of network repair, pc building etc does not.

I spent many months trying to perfect the PC client, to no avail

[Chriscic]

Originally Posted by unkyjoe

Shield.

Do yourself a big favor "trust me on this" dedicate that PC and get an extender and do not look back

And don't listen either, so you won't hear the audio sync problems

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Chriscic

And don't listen either, so you won't hear the audio sync problems

I'm not saying you don't have audio sync problems by any means. But just because you are, doesn't mean its universal. I'm watched baseball tonight on ESPNHD using my HD extender and it was perfect - no stuttering, no audio sync problems & perfect PQ.

[Shield]

Originally Posted by unkyjoe

The HD extender must have some codec VOODOO that in my 20+ years of network repair, pc building etc does not.

I spent many months trying to perfect the PC client, to no avail

You know, maybe our experience is the jinx! I am a network engineer for the Dept. of Defense, 13 years experience, 2 MCSE's, Novell, Cisco unified voice messaging certifications, and a 3.94 GPA with 2 classes remaining for a Bachelor of Science in Information Technology (graduating this December - two classes left!).
If only one of those 2 remaining classes could be "Advanced HD PVR playback in Sage-401"...

[Brent]

Not sure if it will help anyone, but I'm going to gather my setup information - especially that info pertinent to HD-PVR use and playback and post it here. Maybe there's something that would help others to compare to their setup.

[Shield]

Originally Posted by Brent

I'm not saying you don't have audio sync problems by any means. But just because you are, doesn't mean its universal. I'm watched baseball tonight on ESPNHD using my HD extender and it was perfect - no stuttering, no audio sync problems & perfect PQ.

I'm not saying it's universal either - hell I don't even have an extender. But Brent you have to realize many others ARE in fact having a sync problem - look at the threads about it.
I spent my money on a 4x2 active matrix switch and UTP Cat5 baluns to extend my server/playback machine all through the house. Which is why I hesitate about the extender - if I can playback 1080p movies with DTS all around without a single stutter, dropped frame or a/v sync problem I should be able to do it with the avc-hd content. At least that's what I think (or hope) anyway.

I wouldn't be shocked if the new Hauppage driver clears up a lot of these problems.

[Shield]

Originally Posted by Brent

Not sure if it will help anyone, but I'm going to gather my setup information - especially that info pertinent to HD-PVR use and playback and post it here. Maybe there's something that would help others to compare to their setup.

That'd be awesome. Feel free to get verbose. I like detail!

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Shield

I'm not saying it's universal either - hell I don't even have an extender. But Brent you have to realize many others ARE in fact having a sync problem - look at the threads about it.

Sean,
I do realize MANY are having trouble with the HD-PVR. I don't deny it. Just saying some of us are not. I really want it to work for you too so take it that way please.

I spent my money on a 4x2 active matrix switch and UTP Cat5 baluns to extend my server/playback machine all through the house. Which is why I hesitate about the extender - if I can playback 1080p movies with DTS all around without a single stutter, dropped frame or a/v sync problem I should be able to do it with the avc-hd content. At least that's what I think (or hope) anyway.

I agree - you should on a client PC with the proper CPU, decoder and videocard & it should work as well as an HD100. The decoder on the HD100 is good - real good as it was made to decode AVCHD. But still mostly what I want to say here is that it IS possible to get good HD-PVR playback from your clientPC.

I wouldn't be shocked if the new Hauppage driver clears up a lot of these problems.

I'm in the process of testing the new, unreleased driver on my backup PC and my second HD100 - playback is good and the file is a more standard AVCHD (in larger part because it will have the AC-3 in it), but they are sorting out some syncing problems some testers are experiencing hence the delay. Since I'm not experiencing the problems with the older driver I'm not honestly sure if the new driver fixes the problem or not. I really encourage you to e-mail Hauppauge with your issue if you haven't already and at least they'll know it's an issue to be corrected.

[ghostlobster]

Just to toss my hat into the ring here, I've got an HD-PVR hanging off my main machine and the overall video quality is really really nice. I generally just watch TV on the same system that has the HD PVR attached to it, although I'm also driving 3 clients off of it with one of them hooked up to an HDTV, and, again, no problems.
Yes, I watch sports, and lots of them. Surprisingly enough, I've found golf to be one of the best tests for video smoothness. When the camera is following a shot through the air, the trees in the background provide a perfect canvas for fast motion clarity and will root out any imperfections immediately. It's looked awesome. Additionally, I've watched a couple pre-season football games, and just tonight watched the Yankees/Red Sox game on ESPN HD. They've all looked great.

It took a boat-load of tinkering, but here's what I ended up having the best results with:
SageTV PC OS: Vista Home Premium SP1
Cable Box output: 720p
Video Resolution to TV: 1920x1080
PC to TV connectivity Method: Component
Audio connectivity to HD-PVR: Composite/analog (for now...until DD5.1 is supported)
h.264 decoder: ArcSoft (removed all others)
ArcSoft hardware acceleration: Disabled via TMT options
Video Renderer: Overlay
mpeg4 setting in SageTV: Directshow

My PC config is in the sig. Honestly, I don't see what a quad-core processor would buy anyone as nearly noone is writing any multi-threaded apps of any kind right now!

My biggest complaint with the HD-PVR is the channel changnig. With my wife constantly channel surfing, we end up with the spinning mcircle of death way too ofetn, and sometimes SageTV just locks up completely.

[Brent]

Originally Posted by Brent

Not sure if it will help anyone, but I'm going to gather my setup information - especially that info pertinent to HD-PVR use and playback and post it here. Maybe there's something that would help others to compare to their setup.

Originally Posted by Shield

Can't currently view HD-PVR live or recorded shows and probably will never be able to (for me) unless I upgrade my server to handle the transcoding that would be required.

Here's my setup which provides me HD-PVR liveTV and recorded TV that I'm very happy with.

HD-PVR Setup

• Cable Box output: 1080i
• Channel Control: USB-UIRT (hopefully firewire soon)
• Cable Box Video to HD-PVR: Component Video
• Cable Box Audio to HD-PVR: composite/analog (have tested with optical also)

Network:

• Wired Gigabit

SageTV Server PC

• Old Dell 8400 3Ghz, single core
• Memory: 1.5GB System Memory
• OS: Windows XP Home Edition SP2
• Other Video Cards: HDHomeRun, Hauppauge PVR USB2, Hauppauge PVR500
• Hauppauge HD-PVR Recording Quality Settings: Great-H.264

For Playback:
Client HTPC to TV 1

• OS: Windows XP Home Edition SP2
• Motherboard: ASUS M2NPV-VM Socket AM2 NVIDIA GeForce 6150 Micro ATX AMD
• Processor: AMD Athlon 64x2 Dual 5200+ 2.61 GHz
• Memory: 1.00 GB of RAM
• VideoCard: SAPPHIRE Radeon X1600XT video card
• SageTV V6.4.6.180 Client
• Java Version 1.6.0_05
• SageMC STV Version: 6.3.7a-fix
• SageMC Jar Version 6.3.7a
• Video Resolution to TV: 1920x1080
• PC to TV connectivity Method: HDMI
• PC to Audio Receiver Audio: Optical
• h.264 decoder: ArcSoft Make sure it's using Arcsoft (here's what I did for this since I had more than one H.264 decoder on that PC)
• Video Renderer: Overlay
• Mpeg4 setting in SageTV: Directshow
• Video Resolution to TV: 1920x1080

I'm getting excellent PQ and no stuttering or sync problems with this client PC watching live & recorded HD-PVR output


TV 2
HD100 - works great, easy setup and awesome PQ. It just works

TV 3
HD100 - See TV 2 for notes

TV 4 & 5
CATV Modulator pushes the same picture & audio from TV1 albeit SD.


Laptop 1
SageTV Placeshifter
Can't currently view HD-PVR live or recorded shows and probably will never be able to (for me) unless I upgrade my server to handle the transcoding that would be required.

MediaMVP on old small TV and used on occasion
Can't currently view HD-PVR live or recorded shows and probably will never be able to (for me) unless I upgrade my server to handle the transcoding that would be required.

My take on the HD100 Extenders fwiw:
While I enjoy (yeah I'm that crazy) tinkering with PC's, if I were starting from scratch, I would not build that client PC. I would instead purchase a third HD100 and be done with it. Its that good - it really is. I was one of those people who said he would NOT use an extender - it wasn't upgradeable, locks you into a certain software program etc. But after reviewing one for the blog (gave it away as I don't keep devices I review) I began switching to SageTV from BTV and eventually purchased my first HD100. It is the perfect Ultra-DVR/HTPC device to have next to your TV. I say this, but agree that you should be able to get the HD-PVR output to work on the properly configured and powered HTPC client just as well as you can on an HD100.

If I've missed anything your curious about let me know and I'll try to get an answer here. Hope it helps someone.

[Chriscic]

Originally Posted by ghostlobster

SageTV PC OS: Vista Home Premium SP1
Cable Box output: 720p
Video Resolution to TV: 1920x1080
PC to TV connectivity Method: Component

Why cable box output at only 720p, when you're running 1080 to your TV?

[gplasky]

Various users have found out that 720p from the box doesn't stutter but 1080i from the box DOES stutter. YMMV.

Gerry

[HelenWeathers]

God knows I've had problems with the HD PVRs. But In the last week I've only had one recording that didn't complete perfectly. I ended up pulling out my HDTV Wonder and nVidia DualTV cards and replacing them with Haup HVR-1800 and WinTV-250 to see what happened. I have had 95% reliability since then.

I did go to 1080i for a while but am now back to 720p so we'll see how that goes. I recorded Die Hard 4 at 720p and 1080i with the Arcsoft software some time back and the 720p version looked really good. The 1080i version seemed to me to have just a tad more detail but the picture suffered when there were diagonal lines of high contrast (ie black slopeing rooftop on white sky background). The edges of the diagonal line seemed to dance a bit. I think that was caused by a deinterlacing issue. Could be the HD PVR or the encoder?

I have never had audio sinc issues I could track except where they were out of sinc in the original source. I had so many problems initially that I monitored my recordings while they were taking place. If I saw audio sinc issues I would switch my monitor to the source (DirecTV box in my case). The sinc issues would always be on the source as well. If it was a signal from one of my local stations I would go to my OTA antenna, and sure enough the audio would be out of sinc there as well. So it wasn't a DirecTV problem. It wasn't a problem with the HD PVR either. It was a problem at point of origin.

Do I still have occasional problems? Sometimes but very few now. I am looking forward to new drivers.

[Chriscic]

Yea, I know, if Andy says its the Hauppauge driver, I'm sure it is.

Just want MY system to work

I just wish Hauppauge would go ahead and release the new drivers... just release them as a public beta already. Don't hold things up to get it perfect when the current drivers are already broken.

[ghostlobster]

Originally Posted by gplasky

Various users have found out that 720p from the box doesn't stutter but 1080i from the box DOES stutter. YMMV.

Gerry

Bingo! When outputting at 1080i I had a noticeable stutter with fast motion content, such as sports. Once I changed to 720p out of the STB, no stutter at all!

[Chriscic]

Originally Posted by ghostlobster

Bingo! When outputting at 1080i I had a noticeable stutter with fast motion content, such as sports. Once I changed to 720p out of the STB, no stutter at all!

Obviously you're giving up resolution, which I don't want to do. Although I may give it a try in the short-term until the new drivers are released, and yes I realize that on a practical basis the rez change isn't very noticeable. Esp. on my smaller TVs but for the 120" PJ screen I want that 1080 : )