HD-PVR Stops Responding ~Once/Day

[ewelin]

And not 1 hour after opening my mouth, one of the boxes locked up again... I'm going to start tracking which box it is, maybe one of them is faulty.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by toricred

I was using the Evaluation version of WHS so I decided if I was going to get legal (which requires a re-install) I might as well install xfiles. The problem is that my storage drives weren't in the pool and during the Server Reinstallation the partitions were all destroyed. I'm doing it as a New Install now, but my wife and kids will not be happy about this development.

I'm pretty sure there are some pretty stern warnings during the installation that any drive attached to the system will have all its data removed. It actually says if you have data on the disks, that you should remove the drives from the system before installing WHS.

I know this is all water under the bridge. I do feel for you - and I've been in a similar situation so I know how you feel. When I moved to WHS, I thought I have backed up all my pictures to another disk that I then removed from the machine. But for some reason, a couple of the folders were empty (the transfer process created the folders, but did not move any files inside the folders). I lost about 6 months worth of digital pictures and my wife was not happy either.

[ewelin]

3 more lockups tonight.... on both units... man the WAF is really starting to plumit, just as she was really getting into this system. I really need ot make these things stable! Is there any tricks I haven't tried yet??? Cause this is pathetic!

[jerryt]

Originally Posted by ewelin

3 more lockups tonight.... on both units... man the WAF is really starting to plumit, just as she was really getting into this system. I really need ot make these things stable! Is there any tricks I haven't tried yet??? Cause this is pathetic!

Have you tried only a single HD-PVR per USB header? Or a separate NEC USB PCI card per hd-pvr?

Try the 1.0.5.301 drivers...

[ewelin]

Originally Posted by jerryt

Have you tried only a single HD-PVR per USB header? Or a separate NEC USB PCI card per hd-pvr?

Try the 1.0.5.301 drivers...

Each HD-PVR is on it's own NEC USB PCI card... only other thing plugged into that card is the null modem setup for changing the channel. The null modem changes the channel for the paired STB.

I'm starting to wonder if it's a heat issue.... I'm gonna angle the boxes tonight so more air flow hits the bottom of the unit.

[jerryt]

Originally Posted by ewelin

Each HD-PVR is on it's own NEC USB PCI card... only other thing plugged into that card is the null modem setup for changing the channel. The null modem changes the channel for the paired STB.

I'm starting to wonder if it's a heat issue.... I'm gonna angle the boxes tonight so more air flow hits the bottom of the unit.

Can you move the null modem USB to the motherboard?

My HD-PVR is on it's side with a fan.

My HD-PVR has not locked up since I removed the optical cable and went back to RCA audio cables only (stereo audio only with 1.0.5.301 drivers). Personally I think it locks up from the Dolby Digital Optical chip. Note only one type of audio cables should be connected at a time, either optical or RCA.

[bobsj2000]

Mine did it a couple times a day, I upgraded windows to win7 x 64 and haven't had a lockup since. I don't know if that has anything to do with it though..

RJ

[toricred]

Originally Posted by sic0048

I'm pretty sure there are some pretty stern warnings during the installation that any drive attached to the system will have all its data removed. It actually says if you have data on the disks, that you should remove the drives from the system before installing WHS.

I know this is all water under the bridge. I do feel for you - and I've been in a similar situation so I know how you feel. When I moved to WHS, I thought I have backed up all my pictures to another disk that I then removed from the machine. But for some reason, a couple of the folders were empty (the transfer process created the folders, but did not move any files inside the folders). I lost about 6 months worth of digital pictures and my wife was not happy either.

Actually the warning is there on a new install, but on a re-install it says you won't lose your data. Apparently that's only if they're in the drive pool. Live and learn.

My biggest problem with the rebuild was that the Internet Enhanced Security was now on by default and it wouldn't run the DirecTVSerialControl command so channels weren't changing. It took about 2 hours to figure out the problem, but it's up and running now. Even better since it is a fresh install.

[Savage1701]

My best options with HD-PVR's:

1. Fan underneath each one. Fan is above the ground and below the HD-PVR by an inch either side so no dead spots.

2. Not upgrading any driver that works or TME and ending up with hidden decoders.

3. NEC-based USB add-in card on a x1 slot if available. PCI slot as a last resort. MB USB port as a last, last, last, last resort.

4. USB-UIRT. A godsend if ever there was one for me.

[ewelin]

I'm really leaning towards a heat issue. I've noticed that the lockups usually come after the HD PVR has done at least 3 recordings in a row. I have since turn the units on their sides and now have a fan blowing onto the bottom of them.

Originally Posted by Savage1701

1. Fan underneath each one. Fan is above the ground and below the HD-PVR by an inch either side so no dead spots.

Can you show a picture of this? What sort of fan are you using?

I've seen a few ppl mod their units to add a large fan on top of them... Might end up doing something like this as it seems like a great solution, but I would prefer not to mod the cases and void any warranty.

[AJ Bertelson]

I thought I had a heat issue, I started out putting it on the side and it ran pretty well up until last week, locks up like you had. Rotated it to the other side and still locked up. I finally put it with rubber feet down(normal position) and did a stress test yesterday of 6 hours of recording that it passed.

No idea why that seemed to work.

E1, optical, WHS, and latest WHQL from SHS.

[ewelin]

So here is my current setup which is still unstable.

I have only one HD-PVR E1 connected currently to an NEC-based USB Addon card in the PCI slot. This is the only device plugged into this card. I have a second USB Addon card that currently has the serial null modem setup to control the STB. The HD-PVR is sitting on top of an 8" fan on high speed. Everything is on my WHS box which I just rebuilt from scratch last week and the drivers are the latest WHQL drivers from SHS. This unit is recording about 16 hours of programming a day, since it's the only unit hooked up. Ideally, I'd have 2 HD-PVRs and 1 pvr-350 hooked up, but I want the system stable before adding the other two pvrs back into the picture. It'll go about 4-8 and then lockup.

Also when I did the install of WHS, I made sure to install the drivers for the HD-PVR prior to installing and configuring SageTV. The only thing I copied over from my pervious setup was my win.biz file.

I'm at a loss, any other suggestions... I've spent countless hours reading the forums and think I've tried most everything, but maybe I'm missing something....

[gplasky]

And SageTV was installed thru the WHS console as an add-in? (You didn't just run the .msi file?) You've installed the latest version of java on the WHS box? Have you tried switching out the HD-PVR with the other one you have? Are you using the IR of the HD-PVR or a USB-UIRT? All updates done on WHS? I'm only using one HD-PVR on WHS with PP3 beta and a USB-UIRT and never had the lockup issue.

Gerry

[ewelin]

I initially tried both units at once and both would lock up, so I've been testing with just one unit to get it stable. I did switch yesterday afternoon from unit 1 to unit 2 and was excited as it went 8 hours without locking up, only to wake up to find every recording from 10pm on last night failed due to another lockup.

I did use the WHS addon and installed it via the console.

I'm not using any IR, i'm using the serial control method as outlined in this post:
DirecTV Serial Control Guide

Java is installed and up to date. I just bumped my Java Heap Size to 1024, to see if that would improve anything.

[ewelin]

that change didn't effect anything, just got another lockup :-( This is getting very frustrating.

If I have the HD200 on when the error occurs, the following popup appears on the extender:

There was a Capture Error in Playback.
Details:
ERROR (-4,0x8007001); There was an problem using the capture device. Please be sure you have the latest drivers installed for your capture device and that they are installed correctly.

Looking in the system messages I currently see:

The device input "Hauppauge" stopped producing data while recording "Life After People" on HSTRHD on physical channel 269. SageTV will try to reset the device. This may be caused by a channel that is no longer available.

This is the same basic messages that appears on every lockup. If i leave the server as it, every attempted recorded will fail as the PVR never resets. I have to manually go to my basement, exit the sageTV service, powercycle the HD-PVR, then start the SageTV service.

[jerryt]

@Ewelin

Try removing the optical cable and going back to RCA audio cables only. Setting the STB to PCM audio (stereo audio only) and finally use the 1.0.5.301 drivers.

Good luck...

[ewelin]

I am running compont only... i'll make the adjustments to stereo audio only...

Any suggestion on where to locate the 1.0.5.301 drivers?

[ewelin]

ok... found the drivers, going to roll back now and give those a shot...

[jsin]

For whatever it's worth: try changing the Recording Quality from "Best-H264" to "Great-H264" or "Good-H264". It seems to help (at least it helped me).

[Chriscic]

Try one box at a time until you have it stable as a starting point.

I suffered for about 9 months with constant HD-PVR lockups (you could easily search for all my anguished posts to make yourself feel better). My conclusion from the experience that most of the "solutions" you will find here are voodoo and it's defective HD-PVR units that cause the problem. I could be wrong but that's my opinion in case it's helpful. I RMA'ed my original unit 3 times before the lock-ups (which would happen on any of three machines I tried it on) magically stopped.

Good luck. I have two units now and have had one lock-up in about 6 months.