Homerun channels that just go away

[lolachampcar]

This is the third time I have had this type of problem so its probably time to ask.

My installation is-
clean hard disk
Vista Home Premium
HD Homerun 20091024 installed first with channel scans on both OTA digital tuners working just fine
Sage

Sage has "lost" the channels for the third time in about a month. The homerun software finds the channels just fine in its scan and they can be viewed without difficulty. Sage finds the tuners on the network but a full scan yeilds no channels. Close out Sage and open the HD TV app and all the channels are there and working.

This problem seems to happen when there is a power glitch, I am transferring ripped files to the server over the network or I do a Windows update (this time). I've not been able to nail down why it is happening. Sage does report six or so errors with tuning the HD when this happens.

I see posts about "remapping channels" and perhaps this is needed. How do you tell what needs to be remapped to what? This was not needed in my original install but I am willing to look into anything at this point.

Boy am I glad I have yet to turn off my Dish service.........

I just tried viewing past recordings and Sage no longer shows any recordings (although I can see them on the hard disk under SageTV) nor does it have any information on the favorites. I am uninstalling Sage now (might as well, I've got to redo the whole configuration anyway) and reinstall everything. I guess it is time to search on what files I need to save a copy of to keep my recording schedule if this is going to be a common problem.

Fifty channels found after removing and reinstalling SageTV. I have no idea how Sage was corrupted nor what part of the installation was corrupted.

[lolachampcar]

This post mentions the Homerun but I do not think it belongs in Hardware.

This is now the third time I have "lost" my dual OTA tuner in Sage where it is reported to have “native support”. Here is a quick summary-

New hard disk
New Vista Home Premium Install
New 20091024 SD Homerun install
New Sage install, all within the last four weeks

I do a channel scan for SD HR 0 and 1 and get all my wife's recordings set. It works for a while then there are a few tuner errors and no signal on all channels. The SDHR software "sees" all the channels without issue.

This last time Sage not only lost the tuners but it lost the listing of recorded shows (shows stil on the hard disk) and all the recordings I had scheduled. This machine is dedicated to Sage and serving three HD200s. It is not used for ANYTHING else. The only things that have been done with it are copying ripped files over the network from another machine and MS Vista updates.

I saw a lot of posts on the Sage forums about loosing SDHR channels and not being able to correctly scan for channels all the while the SD utilities work perfectly (thus the its not a hardware problem and why I feel this belongs in the Software section).

Is there anything I have to do to make the system stable? I’ve tried to keep things as simple and clean as possible with the hopes that the system will be stable enough to use. As it stands now, there is insufficient utility in the system to replace my Dish DVRs. If I can not make it better, I either bite the bullet and become a Sage slave administrator with all the spouse abuse that entails or I eat my investment and chalk it up to experience. The former will put a strain on my marriage while the latter seems a shame as the overall concept is very nice.

Any suggestions?

BTW - I have now read up on making backups of wiz.bin and the config files which will hopefully shave some time off the uninstall - reinstall sequence. I will back these files up once I finish re-entering the favorites recording schedule. This is small conciliation given that the need rears its ugly head when you want to watch something that should have taped but did not in the evening when you are least likely to want to fool around with reloading retail software.

* merged *

[Brent]

Just a guess but it sounds like a network issue - like the HDHR is losing the connection with your HTPC server.

[SpecialK]

I am having a similar problem.
I'm new to SageTV, been using it for about a month now and have seen this with every version of SageTV I have tried.
My situation is a little different in that I try to tune a channel from the guide and it will say "No Signal". I then remove the HDHomerun from my sources and re-install in SageTV. After re-scanning that channel works just fine.

I lose 1 or 2 channels randomly, yet a rescan always works again.

I know it is not a signal issue with the channel because the channels I am losing usually have a signal level of around 96% once I re-scan.

I am running latest SageTV 6.6.2.218 software 2009112501 on a new
Win XP Pro SP3 box Core 2 Duo 3 Ghz with 4 gig RAM and 1TB drive.
Extenders are HD200 also on 2009112501.
HDHomerun is on 20091024.


Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Specialk

[lolachampcar]

I am also seeing a situation where I rip DVDs on another machine on the network then copy them via Explore to the Sage server's media folder. I have yet to confirm with a step by step test but I am reasonably sure this is causing my three HD200s to crash on streaming data. The HD200s will interface with the Sage server to browse media and such but gives playback errors when I try to play any media be it live TV to mpeg4 files. I have to physically de-power each HD200 to get it functional again. I suspect something about a bulk transfer to the Sage server media folders crashes the steaming links.

This may also be taking out my HomeRun but I loose the ability to scan channels on the HR so infrequently (when compared to how often I transfer rips) that the HR channel loss is probably only occurring when I transfer data while the HR is steaming data (recording or viewing). This is just a theory and still requires testing.

Word of warning to those our there considering SageTV-
SageTV is a very nice product with some very appealing features. However, it may be packaged up like a retail product but be advised that it is by no means a stable appliance application and can not hold a candle to a Dish, Direct or Tivo DVR. I suspect it has roots in an open source development project as it still has the operational feel of something that is just not quite done yet. I went in to this project picking SageTV over Myth and a few others because I did not want to spend time messing with all these types of problems. Now that I am into it to the tune of a dedicated server, three HD200s, a Vip211 with R5000 and the HD HomeRun I really have no choice but to follow through.

If I were doing this again, I would treat SageTV and its associated resources like they had nothing to do with PCs and should all be set up in their own little world. I suspect this would have prevented some of my issues and improved my initial impression.

Please do not take any of this for Sage bashing. My goal is to simply point out that your approach to Sage will dramatically influence the return from your efforts and the aggravation you receive along the way. If I could do this over again, I would still choose Sage but would approach it with a different attitude.

[toricred]

Is your network 100MB or 1000MB?

[lolachampcar]

Current test server is 100 mbit.
New server going in today is MB resident 1 gig.

I am using a HP 8 port switch, 7 100 meg and one 1 gig port.

[toricred]

Do you also have 1 gig switches? If not then you won't gain much from your 1 gig NIC.