CentOS 5 64b with IBM JRE 1.6 32b

[bastafidli]

Just to save time for others, the combination of CentOS 5 64b with IBM JRE 1.6 32b doesn't seems to work. I have experienced tons of exceptions in log as described in this post (http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?p=419207) and Sage was unstable (music stopped playing randomly, remote placeshifter existing randomly). Local placeshifter wouldn't even start. The problems were resolved by switching to Sun JRE 1.6.0.20 32b

[drewg]

Originally Posted by bastafidli

Just to save time for others, the combination of CentOS 5 64b with IBM JRE 1.6 32b doesn't seems to work

While you were running it, was the IBM JRE any faster for you? I'm wondering if there is something about the Ubuntu kernels that makes it faster for us Ubuntu people.

Drew

[bastafidli]

I did the following comparison

New server: Core i3 540, 4GB memory, CentOS 5.4 64 bit, IBM JRE 1.6 32 bit (later switched to SUN JRE 1.6.0.20 32 bit)
Old server: P4 533Mhz, 2 GB memory, CentOS 5.4 32 bit, SUN JRE 1.6.0.11 32 bit
Client 1: Core 2 Duo 4300, 2GB memory, Ubuntu 9.10, SUN JRE 1.6.0.x, Placeshifter
Client 2: Core 2 Duo 8700, 4 GB memory, Windows XP, SUN JRE 1.6.0.19, Placeshifter
HD 100
1Gb network

I did comparison of playback only while troubleshooting some of my issues. On the clients I run the placeshifters side by side. On HD 100 I connected once to the old once to the new server. Just by browsing around and playing content I couldnt even tell significant the difference between the servers :-) and that is difference of 2 CPU generations not even taking into account the JRE. The first think which came to my mind was that on both servers the art caching comletely sucks, since when browsing my music library I still have to wait for the art to load :-(.

[drewg]

OK, it has to be something about the ubuntu kernels that sucks then. At least for me, the IBM JRE 1.6 speeds up menu navigation on my HD100 by at least a factor of two.

With the Sun JRE, if I power off the HD100 with the remote then power it back on, I can go get a beer and still be waiting for the GUI to load. With the IBM, it is less than 5 seconds. Same thing going from the main screen into the recordings screen. With the Sun, I get a spinning circle, and it takes ~5-10 seconds. With IBM, it takes less than a second.

I'd almost be willing to wait, but the bad thing for me is that when the Sun JRE throws up a spinny-wheel, I almost always get glitches in any recordings that are in progress, so the Sun JRE is a non-starter for me.

FWIW, my setup is:
Dual core Athlon64, 1 TB RAID, Ubuntu 8.04, 2.6.24-24 x86_64, 1Gb network, HD100

Drew

[bastafidli]

To be honest, after few days of use I have to admit that the new server makes the HD100 much snappier and e.g. scrolling through my video or music library is much smoother. But since the art loads after the fact (the screen scrolls first and only then art loads), the final effect doesn't represent such a dramatic improvement.