Newbie video config issues

[storello]

The answer is probably in this forum somewhere but I have to admit that I'm getting a little overwhelmed by the possible combinations so I hope someone can help to get me started. The problem is that I was seeing a fair amount of stutter when playing live TV and after numerous adjustments and new video drivers things are only worse. Now the live TV only plays a couple of seconds and then SageTV seems to tank. I have to kill the process and then I get:

"Hanging application SageTV.exe, version 6.0.13.1, hang module hungapp, version 0.0.0.0, hang address 0x00000000."

Here's my config:

Windows XP SP3
Dell 4700 (2.8GHz CPU, 1.5GB RAM)
Nvidia GeForce FX 5200 driver version 6.14.11.7519
Some no-name LCD 720P TV attached via HDMI
SageTV version 6.5.9

Deccheck is only showing 2 decoders and they're both SageTV:
SageTV MPEG 1.0.0.65
SageTV MPEG-2 7.5.0.27713

Neither of these are marked as default.

I also did not fiddle much with the NVidia settings but did set it to single monitor, performance.

Could someone please give me their opinion on the best config settings to start with or let me know if you have any ideas on why SageTV is hanging?

Thanks!

[PiX64]

I would test to see if you can watch live tv in a window on the server rather than fullscreen on the TV.

I would also check to make sure my JVM/JRE was up to date

Next i would try upgrading my decoders for sage. Not 100% sure which ones i use at this point, but as soon as i get home from work ill take a look and post back.

When starting up sage and letting it run idle check the ram and cpu to see waht they are reporting via "taskmgr"

you may also try out the SageTV RC 6.5.18 found here:

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=42638

*Im sure some of the veteran Sage users can give you some more ideas, i just wanted to give you something to try until some of them get involved....

~Mike

[storello]

Thanks, Mike. You helped me with the last issue so you may recall that I had to reinstall Windows on my PC to get rid of a networking issue. The SageTV live TV was actually working well before I reloaded but I didn't have detailed notes about the config so I'm not sure what is different, but I do know the hardware is OK.

Java is at it's latest level: 6.13, and I don't have a monitor - just using the TV for that. The TV has both HDMI and VGA ports and I'm using HDMI (as I did before the reload).

I think the problem may be the most recent Nvidia driver because it wasn't crashing until I updated the driver. I also heard of other people having similar problems. I can see in the task manager that it runs at about 30% CPU when I start watching live TV which is the load I expect when it's working and it's using the Nvidia hardware. If I set it to use software only the CPU runs at about 75%. When I change channels, the CPU drops to 1% which indicates that SageTV is no longer running. Sure enough the screen will be frozen at that point and I'll have to kill the SageTV process.

I guess I'll reload the drivers from the CD which may keep it from crashing but when I was using that version there was a fair amount of stutter. The Sage HD200 is still working fine so this stutter is not the same as the old network problem stutter.



The

[storello]

Well I might have found the magic combination. I changed the video renderer from VMR9 to Overlay. I only tested for about 5 mins but changing channels didn't crash SageTV and I also didn't notice any significant stutter. There were some horizontal bands during faster motion but they're easier to watch then a stuttering screen so I can live with that.

[storello]

Just in case anyone else is looking at this thread: I found one more significant missing item. I thought I was using the decoder on the Nvidia graphics card but deccheck did not show any Nvidia decoder. Turns out you have to buy additional software from Nvidia for this functionality with the FX 5200 board. Information about this was posted in the Hardware thread.

I installed the decoder then set the decoder filter to Nvidia video and it's working even better.