HDHomeRun (HDHR) Prime + SageDCT

[hb4]

Originally Posted by sflamm

I do both. I have a box with a Ceton PCI card with SageDCT that records to a NAS (no VLC).

I also have a HDHR Prime with SageDCT running local to the server and recording locally (with VLC)

No issues with either.

Both recording Comcast? BTW, how do you force them to a particular storage device? Replace Path?

[sflamm]

Correct - both record Comcast.

I didnt need to do anything special to have them record to a specific location.
In both cases I simply used a UNC path for the directory on my Windows 2003 based NAS.

For the SageDCT instance that is local to the Server/NAS I did change it to use the path rewrite functionality to avoid extra writes with a local storage path - but that was a modification made afterward as an optimization.

When I added VLC to the one SageDCT instance on the Server I did discover that VLC is very particular about the firewall. It absolutely needs to be enabled and configured correctly.

[hb4]

Originally Posted by sflamm

Correct - both record Comcast.

I didnt need to do anything special to have them record to a specific location.
In both cases I simply used a UNC path for the directory on my Windows 2003 based NAS.

For the SageDCT instance that is local to the Server/NAS I did change it to use the path rewrite functionality to avoid extra writes with a local storage path - but that was a modification made afterward as an optimization.

When I added VLC to the one SageDCT instance on the Server I did discover that VLC is very particular about the firewall. It absolutely needs to be enabled and configured correctly.

If I understand your setup correctly, you have one SageTV instance running on the Server box with both the NAS (using UNC path) and the local drive (using something like"D:/record_directory) set up as recording directories in Sage's Detailed setup. The NAS is a separate box.

Since the Ceton doesn't use Replace Path, it's recordings go to the NAS because Sage determines that the NAS has more space. The Prime has Replace Path directing to to the local drive so that's where its recordings go.

(this is a test of my understanding of how everything works.)

Since I am able to record using VLC to my local drive, should I assume I have configured the firewall for VLC correctly?

[reggie14]

I'm really confused by the replace path option. I have four hard drives in my server, and I use UNC paths (for a variety of reasons) for my recording directories on these four drives.

As I understand it, the replace path option is (sometimes) used to avoid the loopback when using UNC paths to record to local to drives. How would I use replace path to accomplish this?

To be more specific, say I have recordings paths to:
\\mediaserver\SageRecordings1 -> pointing to -> e:\Recordings1
\\mediaserver\SageRecordings2 -> pointing to -> f:\Recordings2
\\mediaserver\SageRecordings3 -> pointing to -> g:\Recordings3
...

In this case, how would/should I use replace paths?

[nyplayer]

I believe the replace path only works on 1 path... I find it completely useless as I have 4 recording drives also. I record to local drives and use mapped drives on my clients instead. Sometimes I have 8 HD Streams recording .. comskip live running on each recording and 2 Clients playing HD recordings. So recording to a nas or using replace paths is not an option.

[reggie14]

How common are the problems recording to a local UNC path? I don't understand why that would be problematic...

[nyplayer]

Originally Posted by reggie14

How common are the problems recording to a local UNC path? I don't understand why that would be problematic...

see this thread about hitting the nics 2x
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...postcount=1001

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...yer#post532454

You need to try it out each system is different.

[reggie14]

@nplayer

Hmmmm... thanks. I'm not sure what to do about this one. It still seems a little weird that I've been able to use UNC paths for HDHR recordings for a while now, along with UNC paths for other non-Sage related things, and haven't had a problem.

Is there really no way to use replace paths with multiple recording directories? I don't particularly want to go back to using drive letters. UNC paths are convenient for a variety of reasons.

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by hb4

malbec,
I think you and I are the only two watching this thread, and I'm not so sure about you.

There are probably a lot of folks, like myself, who are watching diligently. We are all waiting to hear that it works with little or no problems before we run out and get a cc for our unit and commit to this.
Like most of the problems here I am on a Comcast system so...... for now I'll stick with the 100% success using straight QAM.

[hb4]

Originally Posted by waynedunham

There are probably a lot of folks, like myself, who are watching diligently. We are all waiting to hear that it works with little or no problems before we run out and get a cc for our unit and commit to this.
Like most of the problems here I am on a Comcast system so...... for now I'll stick with the 100% success using straight QAM.

Just to be clear, my system with Comcast to the Prime and SageDCT with the VLC option and recording to a local drive is great. It's only when I add the NAS as a recording directory in SageTV that I have a problem. Thanks, Babgvant!

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by hb4

Just to be clear, my system with Comcast to the Prime and SageDCT with the VLC option and recording to a local drive is great. It's only when I add the NAS as a recording directory in SageTV that I have a problem.

It probably sounds silly, but an inability to use UNC paths is almost a deal killer for me. At first I just did it so comskip would work on my clients, but it ended up really simplifying other things too- particularly when I moved servers, and removed/replaced/added hard drives.

[sflamm]

Just to be clear, my system with Comcast to the Prime and SageDCT with the VLC option and recording to a local drive is great. It's only when I add the NAS as a recording directory in SageTV that I have a problem. Thanks, Babgvant!

use the UNC recording paths for the sagetv recording directories
inside SageDCT enable "path rewrite" and write to the local store
works for me

I have yet to try UNC path with VLC option without local path rewrite...

[hb4]

sflamm,
I believe you are saying that I should change all three of my local drives (C:, I:, and H: ) recording directories to UNC paths (manually, since they are not given UNC paths when using the Sage tree 'select current' mode), plus add the NAS (which I can discover within Sage and comes up as a UNC path); then use 'Replace Path' in SageDCT to direct the recording to the local drive.

That way, since my NAS has lots of space, all tuners except the Prime will record to the NAS. The Prime will record to the local drive.

[sflamm]

Almost. The "replace path" functionality only supports 1 directory.
It basically replaces the path before the recorded file name with a substitute.
You will need to choose to put all of your recordings in one location. For that location:

1. Make the top level directory a windows share.
2. Make sure that the permissions on the directory/subdirectories are such that the local SageTV account and the SageDCT account have full read/write permissions.
3. Change your SageTV recording directory to the UNC paths to the share (i.e. \\myserver\recordings)
4. Use replace path to replace "\\myserver\recordings" with "c:\recordings"
5. enable VLC


I dont see a way to use multiple recording locations with SageDCT and "replace path" enabled... as it is SageTV that decides which recording location to use and you cannot set that by tuner as far as I know. Therefore you are constrained to have a single recording location (use your NAS with lots of space).

[sflamm]

Actually you can force a recording location by tuner...

For the other tuners use this property:

forced_video_storage_path_prefix=


I'd recommend:

1. create a top level directory "recordings" that contains the subdirectories
c:

recordings

drive1
drive2

where drive1 and drive2 are windows symbolic hard links (i.e. mklink -h)

drive1 is a hard link --> d:
drive2 is a hard link --> e:

2. make the top level directory a share with the right permission (see previous email)

3. change all of your recording directories to UNC paths

\\myserver\recordings\drive1
\\myserver\recordings\drive2

4. choose which drive is your which tuner and set the "forced_video_storage_path_prefix" to the corresponding UNC (i.e. \\myserver\recordings\drive1)

If your NAS is a physical NAS, then of course you can just use a specific UNC for it and alternate UNC paths for the other storage locations.

[hb4]

I don't care about having separate recording directories by tuner; was just trying to understand how you were able to do it (see post 1540).

With your Ceton setup and no VLC, you are apparently not getting halts, NO PICTURE, etc. and maybe that's the difference - you can use the NAS because you don't get halts, etc. with the Ceton.

My problem has been that if I set the NAS as the recording directory in Sage, 'Replace Path blank', then enable VLC, nothing records on the NAS. If I don't enable VLC I get halts, NO PICTURE, etc.

In post 1531 are my logs that show the fail. If anyone can figure out from them why it's failing, great!

[sflamm]

With your Ceton setup and no VLC, you are apparently not getting halts, NO PICTURE, etc. and maybe that's the difference - you can use the NAS because you don't get halts, etc. with the Ceton.

That seems to be true with the Ceton versus HDHR Prime.

My problem has been that if I set the NAS as the recording directory in Sage, 'Replace Path blank', then enable VLC, nothing records on the NAS.

Understood. As I said previously, that's the one configuration I do not have - as my NAS is a windows 2003 server with hardware raid 5 cards so it is a local write for me.

My experience is that the problem is with the permission/firewall on that though... you should experiment with VLC to see if you can write to the NAS location...

[KJake]

hi hb4,
your issues sound similar to ones that many have had, including me.

what ended up being the most reliable fix was to stop using the onboard realtek network on my sage (prime) server and replace it with a good intel card and configure the send/receive buffers high.

also use the follow sagedct settings:
write buffer: 9216
rtp buffer: 262144

It also sounds like switching to VLC will solve issues from the cableco, but as I use unc pathing to the NAS, it isn't an option for me.

[reggie14]

Usually SageDCT works great, but my recording of Walking Dead had audio blips every minute or so, and green pixelation roughly every 10 minutes.

The HDHR utility shows signal strength at 89-90%, and signal and symbol quality both at 100%. My understanding is that that ought to be good enough.

Is this the sort of thing that the VLC option is supposed to fix?

[cat6man]

hi folks,

i'm a little late to the party but just bought a Prime and started to get it working today on XP (will move to W7 if i need to later).

short term, i want to get my clear channels working with sagedct (thanks babgvant............you're the man!)
once that is working, i'll go get an M-card.

so far, i have the 3 prime tuners visible, epg assigned to them, they show as configured in setup/information but don't don't seem to get tuning messages.
(i think i have to go back and add some ports to the firewall, also i'm only up to page 39 of this thread)

i have to admit i missed the fun of being on the (b)leading edge with you all.

looking forward to learning more on pages 40-last

contrary to my sig below, i haven't changed my sagetv setup in a couple of years now, but i can save almost $20 (for 3 cable STB) each month for the cost of a $3-4 M-card, so it is time to play with the electronics again.