help with sage file system

[ccerj8]

Hello,

Can someone please help explain the file system used by sage.

I understand that with NTFS file system, that all live tv recordings, and scheduled recordings are put into a large file.

My question is what is the default directory of where everything is stored.

Is live tv recordings recorded into a different directory or file, then the scheduled recording??

Also, Are the recording that are recorded , put into plain mpeg2 format, and can I just by going to the directory where the files are kept, play them through a program such as WIn media player or power dvd, or do the files have to be played through the sage software??

Thanks, ccerj8

[stanger89]

Sage records every show to an individual file, NTFS allows each show to be only one file (on FAT32 file size is limited to 2Gb I think) so most shows would have to multiple files.

The default directory is somewhere on the C: drive, in the Sage directory I think. One of the first things I always do is to change it to the drive I give Sage. I'll strongly recommend you give Sage it's own partition/drive to use (format it with 64k blocks while you're at it). If you can't dedicate a partition/drive for Sage to use, at least change the recording directory to something other than the C: drive.

Everything is recorded into the same directory, but as I said each show is its own file.

And yes, they're just plain MPEG-2 and can be played by anything that supports MPEG-2, although Sage has the best "couch/remote" interface so that's what I use to play them.

[Opus4]

Originally posted by ccerj8
I understand that with NTFS file system, that all live tv recordings, and scheduled recordings are put into a large file.

Each recording is put into its own file.

My question is what is the default directory of where everything is stored.

Is live tv recordings recorded into a different directory or file, then the scheduled recording??

SageTV has some default directory set when you first install it. ("Videos" in the SageTY directory?) Anyway... you can set it to use whatever directory you want, and can use muiltiple directories on multiple partitions. For each directory specified, you can set it to use 1) all available free space, 2) only XX GB, or 3) use all space except the last XX GB, which are to remain free. SageTV will record the next show to the video directory that has the most space available for it to use. All recordings use the same set of video directories; there is currently no way to specify that different types of recordings are to be stored in different directories.

Also, Are the recording that are recorded , put into plain mpeg2 format, and can I just by going to the directory where the files are kept, play them through a program such as WIn media player or power dvd, or do the files have to be played through the sage software??

Recordings are stored in the format the encoder card uses. For my Hauppauge cards, that is mpeg2; I have no idea whether other cards save files in a different format, but somehow I doubt it. You can play them in other applications, but you get all the show information displayed in SageTV, so it seems preferable to play the recorded shows there.

- Andy