HD-PVR Stops Responding ~Once/Day

[jerryt]

@ewelin

I thought the recommendation was for a NEC PCIe USB card, that the PCI version did not have the bandwidth required for a HD-PVR.

You might try a standard motherboard header and see if it is your PCI cards.

[Chriscic]

A PCI USB card has many more times the bandwidth than required by the HD-PVR. It's recording at what, a puny max of 13Mbps?

[ewelin]

Originally Posted by 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).

That was one of my first changes to try

[ewelin]

Originally Posted by Chriscic

A PCI USB card has many more times the bandwidth than required by the HD-PVR. It's recording at what, a puny max of 13Mbps?

Right... they said a pcie would be better, but pci would be fine as well.

so i installed the 1.0.5.301 drivers, but now my TME will not run, appears the version I have installed with only work with 1.5.6.0 or newer as that's what's included on my CD :-(

anyone know what version of TME was worked with hdpvr 1.0.5.301 drivers?

I was really hoping to have things sorted out tonight so I could record V LOL... may have to watch it live now

[ewelin]

ok have one hd-pvr setup and running with the 1.0.5.301 drivers... we'll see how long it goes.

[ldw58]

Originally Posted by ewelin

ok have one hd-pvr setup and running with the 1.0.5.301 drivers... we'll see how long it goes.

I am having problems with the 6.0 & 6.1whql drivers.

Does anybody know where can I get 1.0.5.301 drivers? I've Google'd all kinds of Hauppage archive references and it's not on their general release site.
Thx,

[ewelin]

http://www.shspvr.com/ftp/download/wintv-hdpvr/

[ewelin]

device failed again.... next idea....

[jerryt]

Originally Posted by ewelin

device failed again.... next idea....

Ideas?

Have you checked the PCI USB card for power saving mode? Don't know if the setting exists, but it has been talked about for motherboard USB ports.

Do you have a different computer to try the HD-PVR on?

Filtered 110 power source?

Different USB cable?

A Different HD-PVR power supply?

A Different computer power supply?

[ewelin]

I guess I could try the unit on another PC... but that wouldn't really solve much as sageTV needs to run on my WHS box... But I guess that would let me know if the HD-PVR is bad or not.

No adjustments on the PCI USB card... I even plugged my home automation controller into the other USB card to make sure it never went to sleep or anything and it's been running there well for 3 days.

Filtered 110 power source... that's an idea... Right now the HD-PVR is plugged into a surge strip... Maybe i'll go direct to wall.

Not sure about the PC PS... I have a 750watt PS in there and it's definitely got more than enough power for the system.

Thanks for the ideas....

[ewelin]

put the HD-PVR onto a filter I had for my washing machine and it's been stable for over 12 hours now. Longest stretch since I got the unit.

[Chriscic]

Also, you have multiple HD-PVRs right? If one locked-up, replace with the next and see what happens.

[ewelin]

Yes, I have two.... so far it's been up for 16 hours... seems to be doing well. I had two warnings about recording stoppage during one of the shows, but looking at the show there were no red lines. I did notice that show had 3 files instead of just one. So it seems like it was the power line filter...

Thanks jerryt for the suggestion, I would have never thought of that, even though I should have as that's the first thing I think of when there are issues with something on my home automation.

[jerryt]

Originally Posted by ewelin

Thanks jerryt for the suggestion, I would have never thought of that, even though I should have as that's the first thing I think of when there are issues with something on my home automation.

Please provide details about this filter you are using? Is there anything unusal about your house electrical installation? Is there any devices communicating on the power lines?

There is alot of people including myself who have had this HD-PVR lock up problem. I would like to try a filter and see if I can use later drivers and optical audio cable.

[jerryt]

Originally Posted by ewelin

I had two warnings about recording stoppage during one of the shows, but looking at the show there were no red lines. I did notice that show had 3 files instead of just one. So it seems like it was the power line filter...

I would look to putting your HD-PVR's on a UPS (Uninterruptible power supply).

[ewelin]

The electrical wiring in the basement is all new, but I do have home automation installed in parts of the house. It's an Insteon based system, so yeah, there are signals going over the power line and the Insteon PLC is connected to the same outlet the power strip the HD-PVR is connected to.

I have a really old washer, came with the place, and it puts a lot of noise on the power lines so I had a 15amp filter on it. That is what I hooked my HD-PVR into and has been solid for almost 24 hours now and has done 14 hours of recordings. This is the exact unit I have:

15 Amp Plug-In Noise Filter

I actually see it's currently on sale, I think I paid 27.99 for mine from a different supplier. I haven't hooked the HD-PVR up to my Kill-a-watt to see what it's actual load is, but one might be able to get a lower rated filter. Not sure on this.

Last night I updated my drivers and TME to the latest releases as I could not get older versions of TME to display anything. I use TME to debug my serial connection to verify everything is running correctly.

I had thought about connecting the HD-PVRs and the STB to my UPS, but I'm not sure if this is something I want to do or not. My and router are the only things currently connected to my UPS and it can run for about 3-4 hours which is usually enough for the outages here. Although if a short outage killed the usage of the HD-PVR, I may have to do so.

[jerryt]

@Ewelin
That filter blocks X10 signals. I wonder if the number of lock up you have had are related to your home automation equipment...

Very glad you have had 24 hours of no lock ups. Proof that these forums work good to solve problems.

[ldw58]

Originally Posted by ewelin

http://www.shspvr.com/ftp/download/wintv-hdpvr/

Thank you!

[ewelin]

I'm goign to connect the power supply on my second HD-PVR and have it run powered on, but not connected to my PC to make sure the first box is still stable. If everything is still on tomorrow, I'm goign to plan to add the 2nd HD-PVR into my system.

Any recomendations on the best way to add a 2nd unit? Do i have to update the drivers again or anything?

[ewelin]

connected the 2nd hd-pvr and within 10 minutes it locked up... So I figured there was probably a driver issue. I shut down sage, ran hcwclear, unplugged the HD-PVRs, restarted the PC, plugged in the HD-PVR and ran hcwdriverinstall.exe, then turned sage back on...

it still locks up within an hour of turning on. Both units are on the same power strip which is connected to the filter. Did I not go about upgrading the drivers correctly or something? I got one stable, now to get the other one stable.