Random HDHR problems - dropouts, etc.

[valnar]

Does anyone else have this problem?...

Every now and then when I record a HD show (network QAM from WOW cable), it will have dropouts, pixelization or bad video & audio for no reason. 'Not the whole show, only part of it. It's almost like it's a bad signal, but my signal quality is fine. On other days, I'll record every show in my favorites just fine. There are no problems. It almost seems like a roll of the dice whether it will record properly.

This happens on maybe 1 out of 6 shows.

When watching the shows live on my HDTV's QAM tuner, there is never a problem - ever.

Is this a known problem with the HDHomeRun? I thought about putting it on it's own VLAN to test, but even when there is a problem my Sage Server isn't doing anything.

[Tiki]

I have similar problems, though for me it is much more often. Usually one or two spots in a 1/2 hour or 1 hour show in about 90% of my recordings. The glitches last anywhere from about 1-3 seconds.

I had assumed it was my setup, and I have taken several steps that have improved things (initially I would see these glitches every few minutes). The big culprit seems to be CPU usage. I noticed that any time my CPU pegs at 100% while the HDHR is recording, I will usually end up with a glitch in the recording. So, I took steps to try to reduce CPU usage.

1- I noticed that when I had Sage set to use the Slideshow screensaver, it would peg my CPU at 100% every time the slide transitioned (however, this doesn't happen if I run a slideshow from the Sage Photo area - only when it is acting as a screensaver). Anyway, I changed the screensave back to the Sage Logo and this got rid of most of the glitches.

2 - I saw on the HDHR forums that there were some tricks you could take to optimize your Ethernet port - I tried these and I think it helped a little.

3 - I recently bought an add-on Intel Gigabit Ethernet card, thinking the problem may be in my onboard NIC. This also seemed to help a little.

4 - I've noticed that glitches are more likely to occur if I have multiple shows recording at the same time or if I am watching something while something is recording.

5 - I've noticed that glitches are more likely to occur if I am recording an HD broadcast versus an SD broadcast.

I have not filed a bug report to Sage or Silicon Dust because I assumed it was caused by my somewhat under-powered computer.

One other comment - I've noticed that different decoders seem to handle the glitches a little differently. With the HD200, they are less jarring than when I playback on the PC with the NVidia decoder. The ATI decoder seems to be kind of in the middle (smoother than NVidia, but not as smooth as the HD200. Also, with the ATI decoder I tend to get a split second where the image degrades to millions of little colored dots - kind of looks like something from the Matrix (where the world is made out of tiny numbers and symbols).

[valnar]

I'm not sure any of those things pertain to me. I have low CPU usage, use the HD200 extender, have onboard Intel NIC's, don't use a slideshow, etc.

I think I'll try the separate VLAN next. Even though I have an Intel NIC, I just disabled TCP offloading to see if that would help.