Colossus recording in slow motion

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by jphipps

The 800MB was the current and max used from the jvm monitor in Sage. My total is set to 1200MB.

For some reason, my HD-PVR would not work at all on my windows box, I attached it to my mac latop and did a manual capture and all worked fine. I re-attached it to my windows server, and now it works fine on there as well.. Must have been some strange state, I now have both the colossus and my HD-PVR working on sage, and they both seem to record fine right now with audio/video...

Thanks,
Jeff

if you have time can you do a test: start a recording using the Colossus, and watch it at the same time. then start a recording on the HD-PVR and let me know if you lose audio on the Colossus recording when the HD-PVR recording starts.
thanks - I have my system working almost perfectly, except for this one anomoly

[jphipps]

I did that test a few days ago when I saw some posts about it. I didn't seem to loose any audio using either one first. On my test, I would tune to a channel and then hit record, and then tune to a second channel and hit record on that one and then I would go back and check both recordings and they both always have audio. The only symptom I usually see is the choppy and skipping audio until I cycle sage.

I put in a scheduled task to cycle sage at 3am and for 2 days straight, all recordings have been without any issues.

My config is:

Colossus using HDMI to an H21 Directv reciever
HD-PVR using component and RCA on a H24 DirecTV reciever

I wonder if the issue with the audio drop is related to the optical audio connection? I had to use rca because the H24 only has HDMI or RCA for audio, no optical connections...

Thanks,
Jeff

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by jphipps

I did that test a few days ago when I saw some posts about it. I didn't seem to loose any audio using either one first. On my test, I would tune to a channel and then hit record, and then tune to a second channel and hit record on that one and then I would go back and check both recordings and they both always have audio. The only symptom I usually see is the choppy and skipping audio until I cycle sage.

I put in a scheduled task to cycle sage at 3am and for 2 days straight, all recordings have been without any issues.

My config is:

Colossus using HDMI to an H21 Directv reciever
HD-PVR using component and RCA on a H24 DirecTV reciever

I wonder if the issue with the audio drop is related to the optical audio connection? I had to use rca because the H24 only has HDMI or RCA for audio, no optical connections...

Thanks,
Jeff

I can't connect the Colossus via HDMI, as my Sat receiver doesn't have HDMI output. I'll try RCA from that unit as a test, but I am suspicious it has something to do with computer drivers (Realtek - ATI).
Thanks for the heads up.
Oh, what's your motherboard, processor, OS?

[tvmaster2]

that seems to have nailed it: if I change the Colossus audio in Sage from Component/SPDIF to just Component, Colossus doesn't lose audio when a HD-PVR recording starts.
HD-PVR is still getting audio via SPDIF.
Time to send a bug report to Sage I guess - and Hauppauge

[jphipps]

That is good to know.... I guess I was lucky my new receiver was limited...

Thanks,
Jeff

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by jphipps

That is good to know.... I guess I was lucky my new receiver was limited...

Thanks,
Jeff

yeah, that seems to be the key: don't use SPDIF. But how stupid is that?
Why would SPDIF connections have anything to do with it?

[gplasky]

The HD-PVR suffered the same growing pains. First couple of drivers didn't even support 5.1. Is anyone really surprised at some of the same issues between the two?

Gerry

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by gplasky

The HD-PVR suffered the same growing pains. First couple of drivers didn't even support 5.1. Is anyone really surprised at some of the same issues between the two?

Gerry

So do you think this is solely a Hauppauge error, or should I send the Sage log files I made to Sage support just in case?

[sleonard]

Send them in. They and we need to know what is going on.

I sent a second set of logs the other day and support replied that the Colossus driver locked up but suggested I check out my server hardware (drive, memory). I shut down Sage last night and ran the Western Digital Diags on the recording drive. It took all night but passed with flying colors. I am going to run Memtest86 next.

It really is looking like the Hauppauge drivers at this point. The HD-PVR drivers still have problems and it's been out for 3-4 years.

S

[TechBill]

I still having this issue so I guess it the Colossus drivers that causing this problem since SageTV support said they couldn't find anything wrong in their software that would cause this problem.

But reading the forums I notice folks who having success with Colossus are running at least 4G of memory and set javaheap at least 1024 so I am thinking about ordering some memory for my server increasing it from 2G to 4G then increase my javaheap to 1024 to see if that allow me to use Colossus without bringing my server down.

I am still running SageTV using my longtime PVR-500 while my two Colossus is sitting in the motherboard unused.

Bill

[jphipps]

I would definately consider expanding to 4gb and win 7 64bit. (win 7 is more for disk size more than anything if you want to exceed 2tb filesystems.....

That being said, I have 4gb and win 7 and still have issues with the colossus card. The beginning of the week, I started cycling sage every morning at 3am through the windows schedule, and have not had a single issue with a recording using a colossus and an hd-pvr...

Thanks,
Jeff

[TechBill]

Originally Posted by jphipps

I would definately consider expanding to 4gb and win 7 64bit. (win 7 is more for disk size more than anything if you want to exceed 2tb filesystems.....

That being said, I have 4gb and win 7 and still have issues with the colossus card. The beginning of the week, I started cycling sage every morning at 3am through the windows schedule, and have not had a single issue with a recording using a colossus and an hd-pvr...

Thanks,
Jeff

Cycling would not work for me because my issues would come up within 6 or so hours depending how often it need to change channels.


Bill

[Rico66]

Originally Posted by TechBill

Cycling would not work for me because my issues would come up within 6 or so hours depending how often it need to change channels.


Bill

If you record more, then you need to cycle more often.

I still don't buy into this being a Hauppauge only issue. How would this explain that restarting the service (or client depending on the situation) fixes the issue (until the next time)?

[TechBill]

Originally Posted by Rico66

If you record more, then you need to cycle more often.

I still don't buy into this being a Hauppauge only issue. How would this explain that restarting the service (or client depending on the situation) fixes the issue (until the next time)?

That the problem about cycling more often, I just don't see a slot in my time to recycle the server more often without interfereing my recording.

Morning-Afternoon it recording a bunch of kids shows

Evenings it recording bunch of mine and my wife shows that there so many it sometime would need to record the reruns at later hours because both tuners are busy

Like most shows is shown again in 2 hours later even it showing for the first time.

If it cycle during the start of recording or the middle of recording, will it resume recording after the cycle or will SageTV try to record one of the rerun later?

Bill

[sleonard]

Originally Posted by Rico66

If you record more, then you need to cycle more often.

I still don't buy into this being a Hauppauge only issue. How would this explain that restarting the service (or client depending on the situation) fixes the issue (until the next time)?

Originally Posted by Support

... due to Windows threading restrictions; the calls into capture devices must be done from the main application thread, so when they hang; it's basically fatal

<... to the main application thread. i.e. - Sage> (added by me)

This is from a reply I got from Sage Support after submitting logs.

S

[Rico66]

Originally Posted by sleonard

<... to the main application thread. i.e. - Sage> (added by me)

This is from a reply I got from Sage Support after submitting logs.

S

That addresses the server side, but how dows that explain the client side? Certain Colossus recordings are problematic for the client. As mentioned a couple of times, I've seen issues (like stuttering) on recordings within the Sage Client. The same recording plays back fine outside. There's no capture device involved at that stage. A side effect is that memory increases dramatically.

[jphipps]

Found another interesting thing... I have been cycling sage about once a day, and it seemed my colossus and hd-pvr have been recording pretty well for the past week, but occational shows on the colossus would be in slow motion with no sound. Tonight I started watching a show that was partway recorded, and it was in slow motion and no sound, and the recording on the hd-pvr was fine. I checked my directv reciever that the colossus was recording (using hdmi) and found I had Dolby Digital turned on. I turned off the dolby while the recording was playing on my extender live ( in slow motion with no sound) and it imediatly started recording correctly with sound. So it seems with my hd-pvr using RCA and no dolby and the colossus using hdmi with no dolby, they seem to recording fine ( at least in the past hour I was tseting ). I will stop the cycle of sage and see if the issues clear up by not using any 5.1 on either devices...

Thanks,
Jeff

[sleonard]

I just read this thread and his timeline problems sound very similar to some recordings made by my Colossus. I do have a 2250 in the server and using the latest drivers with this problem. It is not set up in Sage because I don't have an antenna hooked up yet but I'm now wondering if the buggy 2250 driver could be affecting the Colossus and HD-PVR recordings somehow.

I think I am going to uninstall the 2250 and drivers from Device Manager tonight and see if that helps.

S

[TechBill]

It pretty much tell me when my java heap get near to the Max setting it would start to play sluggish and the whole server would feel sluggish (logging in remotely to reboot)

I have my java set to 768 since when I tried to set it at 1024 SageTV server refuse to start probably because I only have 2 Gig of ram in it. When the java heap get to about 712 that when it start to feel sluggish and if i let it keep going then it will crash the whole server

I already ordered 4 Gig of ram and hopefully that will allow me to set my java heap higher which give me more time to record before needing to reboot because I noticed in this forum most folks with 4 Gig or more are able to reboot nightly.

I have the computer set to reboot at 4am nightly but it just choppy and crash before it get a chance to reboot so I am hoping that more memory will allow it to reach the reboot time before it get sluggish.


Bill

[korben_dallas]

Haven't had any OS or SageTV server crashes, but am definitely seeing some Colossus recordings in slowmo. Hadn't noticed prior, but tonight there was an overlap where the HD PVR was recording when the Colossus started, so that may be a factor. That would support a driver problem hypothesis.

How do we report issues to Hauppaugge?