HD-PVR: need call to external reset program

[timg11]

I'm still having problems with the HD-PVR failing ("locking up").

Shows fail to record, and I find numerous capture-related errors in the System Messages.
One message is something like "trying to reset HD-PVR". Whatever SageTV is doing to reset the HD-PVR is not effective. Once it has failed, only a power cycle will bring it back.

I have always had this sort of problem since I started using Sage V6, so I developed a custom circuit to cycle the HD-PVR power under command of a script that I can run from the desktop. I have historically re-started the SageTV computer once a day at 5am, and during that reboot cycle, I also run the HD_PVR reset script.

I think it would be very helpful for SageTV to provide a mechanism to call an external program or script (.CMD) when it is attempting to reset the HD-PVR. That way those of us that have hardware reset capability can have a usable reset when the HD-PVR fails, and won't miss as many recordings. A beta is a good time to add this capability. I have filed this as a bug report also.

[Spectrum]

This is currently possible using existing plugins and some scripting. Take a look here.

[timg11]

Thanks Spectrum - I was not aware that Sage Job Queue could do that. I'll check it out!

For anyone else who is looking for Sage Job Queue note that the current version is V3 (beta). There is a support thread, and the program itself is found here, and documentation for V3 is here.

[jbowdach]

Originally Posted by timg11

I'm still having problems with the HD-PVR failing ("locking up").

Shows fail to record, and I find numerous capture-related errors in the System Messages.
One message is something like "trying to reset HD-PVR". Whatever SageTV is doing to reset the HD-PVR is not effective. Once it has failed, only a power cycle will bring it back.

I have always had this sort of problem since I started using Sage V6, so I developed a custom circuit to cycle the HD-PVR power under command of a script that I can run from the desktop. I have historically re-started the SageTV computer once a day at 5am, and during that reboot cycle, I also run the HD_PVR reset script.

I think it would be very helpful for SageTV to provide a mechanism to call an external program or script (.CMD) when it is attempting to reset the HD-PVR. That way those of us that have hardware reset capability can have a usable reset when the HD-PVR fails, and won't miss as many recordings. A beta is a good time to add this capability. I have filed this as a bug report also.

How are you physically resetting the HD-PVR?

[eric3a]

Have a look at the SageAlert thread also as I explain how I've done it on my system.
Eric

[Striker:WG]

I just had my first HD PVR lockup in V7, and of course it happened on day 1 of a 5 day road trip.

Missed a bunch of recordings and suffice it to say the WAF has dropped considerably.

Its great that Sage tries to reset the HD PVR but it never seems to actually resolve the issue. Has anybody actually seen this effectively fix the problem on their HD PVR? I'm just curious.

I've heard of different solutions for power cycling the HD PVR, I know some people use a basic timer on a power strip to power cycle the unit once a day, others have it hard wired to the PSU in their sage server, and others like yourself have developed custom circuitry to accomplish the task.

I know most of this rests on Hauppage more so than Sage, but is there not something that can be done to just make this unit a stable product? Granted my stability level has gone through the roof with the upgrade to Sage 7, but that doesn't seem to hold true for others.

For anyone that has setup Sage Job Queue, does it allow you to schedule a system reboot during an interval if there are no current recordings in progress and none coming up in the near future? (eg. nothing recording now or within the next 15 minutes.) I'm starting to think a nightly reboot would be a good idea; but I often schedule movies to record during the wee hours of the night so we can leave our HD tuner available for other programs and live viewing during prime time hours.

-Striker-

[Slugger]

Originally Posted by Striker:WG

For anyone that has setup Sage Job Queue, does it allow you to schedule a system reboot during an interval if there are no current recordings in progress and none coming up in the near future? (eg. nothing recording now or within the next 15 minutes.) I'm starting to think a nightly reboot would be a good idea; but I often schedule movies to record during the wee hours of the night so we can leave our HD tuner available for other programs and live viewing during prime time hours.

-Striker-

Yes, but it's a bit of a hack. SJQv3 (and older) is designed to work on media files and system message objects. It was never meant to be a generic crontab/scheduler, however, with a little bit of effort you can determine a good time every night to reboot your system. You just have to anchor your ruleset off of a recording that you know will always be on your system (i.e. something you've archived). Let's say that it's the movie 'Pulp Fiction'.

if [IsObjMediaFile == true && TimeUntilNextRecording > "15M" && IsSomethingRecording == false && $.GetShowTitle{} == "Pulp Fiction" && TimeOfDay < "08:00"] {
REBOOT
}

Make sure the program you trigger returns an error code > 0 so as to signify to SJQ that the task 'failed' and ensure SJQ is configured to allow auto requeuing of failed tasks. If you don't do that then the task will only ever run once. Then just make sure the REBOOT task reboots your system.

NOTE: I don't actually do this, never tried. I believe others have and can speak to its effectiveness. But the ruleset defined above will allow you to trigger that REBOOT task between midnight and 8am. There are a bunch of caveats... for example, you'll want to touch a file or something to signify that you've done a reboot for the day otherwise you may trigger multiple reboots between midnight and 8am if there's no scheduled recordings. There are undoubtedly many other gotchas that I'm not thinking of right now. Others who actually do this might chime in and offer their wisdom.

I plan to add a generic crontab/scheduler into SJQv4, but as of this writing SJQv4 is still just a series of random thoughts in my head and though I may have claimed a v4 beta for Q1 or Q2 of 2011, that seems less and less likely every day.