Any suggestions before I stop using SageTV?

[Spectrum]

Originally Posted by atyrus28

You guys are kind of funny. You must have some sort of super faith in software and sage in particular. Are you all devs or something?

A Dev? Nope, just a user here as are most on these boards. Super faith? Nope but there are far more people that it works for than it doesn't.

Originally Posted by atyrus28

I test client/server software everyday. Software is the LEAST reliable part of a computer and yes sometimes software certainly does just flake out and stop working. I have been building PCs for myself and clients for over 10 years. I am no newb when it comes to hardware or software. If you read my earlier posts you would see I have run those tests and some more as well. I have already swapped out CPUs, memory, HDs, cables, PSUs ( I never buy junk PSUs ), sata cables, video cards and a motherboard. So I have rebuilt the whole machine... several times. The only consistent problem has been Sage. Windows is not malfunctioning nor any other software on the machine.

From your previous posts we have no way to tell your profession, your knowledge level, experience, etc. All we have are what you've said which is basically "It's broke." You have not mentioned what parts you've swapped in and out or their source, just that you have "rebuilt the system." Again, we have no way of knowing what you did apart from your parts list.

Originally Posted by atyrus28

Are their updates, of course there are, who in their right mind would leave a machine connected to the net and not update it's software.

You've never serviced industrial equipment then....

Originally Posted by atyrus28

If you trust NAT and your router "firewall" that's your business. I have an untangle machine in front of my entire network. Still don't trust that to be enough. There are far too many ways to get a problem. If you think not, that's your right. Just because it never happened to you, doesn't make it impossible. HP shipped digital photo frames with a virus on them. Sony shipped CDs with a rootkit on them.....

And?

Originally Posted by atyrus28

Regardless, I do appreciate the help but the "it works for me" is not a valid answer to problems. I have built two identical machines at the same time, one works with the same software and the other doesn't.

What does that tell you? It tells me either they were not built the same or you've got bad hardware in the mix; one or the other.

Originally Posted by atyrus28

Linux systems can be just as bad if not worse. My wife's laptop runs ubuntu just fine with few issues, my Pastor's ubuntu machine has random issues and my sisters system has been without issue for a couple of years. My clients barely have any issues at all (not good for business but oh well). You could even use a sys image and find that. The same VM snapshot works fine today, tomorrow it doesn't. Software is not reliable at all. Hardware is not perfect either but is much more reliable than software.

FUD - your making an emotional statement. There is no way to even begin to quantify that assumption.

Originally Posted by atyrus28

When the sage service gets hung up with java memory problems only sage takes a dump, the rest of the system is fine. When sage can't play video files or folders other software is just fine. The corruption of the video files, I lean toward the HD which has been swapped already. Corruption of sage files on two different HDs and on different controllers with multiple sata cables, not the hardware. If it were, one would expect the rest of the system to be having issues too. All video is on separate drives from sage and the OS. The capture device is an HD Homerun so not even local.

As I have said, the only consistent problem has been sagetv.

If there are no other answers and no more ideas, so be it. Sage will be dumped in the, great idea with lots of potential, but never really worked out.

Certainly your choice, sorry it didn't work out.

Originally Posted by atyrus28

Proprietary systems are just not worth the money in the long run.

Really? Hope your not a photographer, lawyer, industrial manufacturer, accountant, engineer, stock broker, doctor, banker, ... need I go on? All of those have needs that FOSS can't fill. The fact is there is (and probably always will be) that there is a market for closed source, proprietary software. If we had to wait on the asshats developing Gnome or Firefox and their ilk, the world would burn while they argue about removing the version number from the about box

Again sorry this isn't working out for you. Hug your wife (you mentioned earlier that she suffers from fibromyalgia and lupus) and find something that you like.

[macsupergeek]

I agree with Dave, and definitely don't over think Sage. I keep the system as simple as possible, no virus software installed or extra codecs or sage client -- just sage as a service (and I too have untangle as my internet gateway and firewall no issues as it sits on the WAN side all LAN traffic is unaffected) -- I have Sage 7, playon and subsonic all running as services on windows 7 64 bit 8 gbs ram - bmt, webserver and mobile webserver, with 2 hauppage 2250s and 2 hd-pvrs. But I didn't set all that up at one time, it grew over time and with stability I added more. So I definitely don't want to come at you with it works for me, but as many of the people here will say - sage has been a rock, yes there have been hiccups but I am still hard pressed to find a system that works as well as it does -- and I have used myth, replaytv, tivo, xmbc, appletv, and played with friends -- cablevision dvr, comcast dvr, and the fios dvr.

So I ask why mkvs? Do you like their chapter capabilities, have you tried h.264 mp4s instead or even avi's? Do your recorded shows get corrupt too or just the mkvs? Also, it seems that mkvs have a reputation of being corrupted -- if you google "mkv getting corrupted" a lot of people are complaining of the issue and many suggestions point back to HD issues or hardware fouling it up and those are not just sage people.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by panteragstk

This method has saved me a few times. Well worth the effort.

Davephan has 1750 posts.. 1738 of them involve imaging.. :-)

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Davephan has 1750 posts.. 1738 of them involve imaging.. :-)

Nice.

[PhilH]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Davephan has 1750 posts.. 1738 of them involve imaging.. :-)

roflmfao

[davephan]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Davephan has 1750 posts.. 1738 of them involve imaging.. :-)

I do post a lot about imaging, but I think you overcounted the number, unless you count my signature. I've been using imaging for over a decade back when imaging was new. Most of my imaging is at work where I do disaster recovery. I have recovered many servers with imaging (I specialize on servers and another group does workstations). Some of our data is mandated to be stored for 100 years. Data loss is not acceptable. Over the years I've talked many people that just don't understand the importance of backup and recovery. Computer systems can run for many years without problems. Or, they could fail a minute from now. You have to be prepared before the problem, not after the problem occurs.

I think that atyrus28's frustration could have been avoided. Imaging would have helped.

Dave

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by davephan

I do post a lot about imaging, but I think you overcounted the number, unless you count my signature. I've been using imaging for over a decade back when imaging was new. Most of my imaging is at work where I do disaster recovery. I have recovered many servers with imaging (I specialize on servers and another group does workstations). Some of our data is mandated to be stored for 100 years. Data loss is not acceptable. Over the years I've talked many people that just don't understand the importance of backup and recovery. Computer systems can run for many years without problems. Or, they could fail a minute from now. You have to be prepared before the problem, not after the problem occurs.

I think that atyrus28's frustration could have been avoided. Imaging would have helped.

Dave

hehe.. take it easy.. I'm not knocking imaging.. just the constant posting about it.. :-)

[davephan]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

hehe.. take it easy.. I'm not knocking imaging.. just the constant posting about it.. :-)

I know you were kidding Fuzzy. Does that "Buy me a beer" actually work? What's your beer count?


Dave

[Fuzzy]

I think I've received about 40 or so...

[atyrus28]

I know all about imaging whether it's for VMs or partitions or whole drives. They are not perfect either. Since I keep trying to explain the issues do not just happen all at once. Re-imaging still requires loosing things since no one images every day, except wealthy people or companies with tons of time and money for the storage space and offsite storage. (that would include the server group who has a vast amount of equipment for all kinds of back ups. I have worked for large companies data centers and backups are not perfect. The 100 year rule/disaster recovery you are speaking of, is a joke but I won't got there now.)

The biggest problem with the imaging aspect is that a week later or more after you have setup a weeks worth of, likes dislikes and other recording issues, etc you still have to do it over again and I am not backing up all my video, WAY too much room to be doing that.

So anyhow if you read my post I HAVE done the image aspect of this. I'm glad it works so well for you but imaging is not perfect and more than once the image has not worked when trying to use it for what ever reason. Whether windows, clonezilla, ghost etc.

I also never thought anyone knew my full experience so I decided to post it so we could move past the uninitiated aspect of advice.

No one is really adding information on what the issue is, just start over and maybe one of these times it will actually work. No one has addressed why Sage is running out of memory even when the no one has used it all day long.

I will have to reiterate this again. The system as a whole is not unstable, only sagetv as a client on the PC and the service to the extenders.

It would be nice if someone gave a hint or direction to take, or maybe a plugin that is known to have issues when xyz is also occurring. Remember I test software (specifically client/server based software) so the idea of digging around to find issues is very normal to me. At this point I am getting irritated at what direction to really go here. I don't run test cases, I do exploratory testing, the writing of the cases and major environmental setups. I have a whole test domain setup, with email, proxies, linux, windows, virtualbox, vmware, ESXi server, vmware server etc etc. I am hoping to get some more advanced advice that perhaps just isn't here.

With the level of plugins made by forum members, I was hoping to get a little more incite and direction. Maybe it just isn't available, that would be a bummer but so be it if that is the case. I find it ridiculous that you can't seem to reuse a lot of what you have when you re-install. Is it really not possible to reuse the wizbin or any other files used to store your recorded information with likes, dislikes, etc? Is sagetv really that one time limited? I find it hard to believe but i know it is possible. Client/server software usually requires some sort of DB whether local or server based. Those can and should reusable.

I am fully ready to dump the sage service in a VM but then I imagine I will have issues when trying to run the client side on the actual machine. I can't buy anymore licenses or extenders so I would really like what I already have to work.

Maybe this article explains why some people are overly offended by some things. I do not personally have that problem. I know that all software and hardware sucks some just cost more. As long as humans are involved in making them work they will never be perfect and prone to headaches and problems. They can however get to a point of causing the least amount of headaches and that is my ultimate goal with sagetv.

Right now it seems like I may just need to restart the service once a day automatically. Not a great solution but certainly seems to be one that others need to use.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by atyrus28

I know all about imaging whether it's for VMs or partitions or whole drives. They are not perfect either. Since I keep trying to explain the issues do not just happen all at once. Re-imaging still requires loosing things since no one images every day, except wealthy people or companies with tons of time and money for the storage space and offsite storage. (that would include the server group who has a vast amount of equipment for all kinds of back ups. I have worked for large companies data centers and backups are not perfect. The 100 year rule/disaster recovery you are speaking of, is a joke but I won't got there now.)

The biggest problem with the imaging aspect is that a week later or more after you have setup a weeks worth of, likes dislikes and other recording issues, etc you still have to do it over again and I am not backing up all my video, WAY too much room to be doing that.

So anyhow if you read my post I HAVE done the image aspect of this. I'm glad it works so well for you but imaging is not perfect and more than once the image has not worked when trying to use it for what ever reason. Whether windows, clonezilla, ghost etc.

I also never thought anyone knew my full experience so I decided to post it so we could move past the uninitiated aspect of advice.

No one is really adding information on what the issue is, just start over and maybe one of these times it will actually work. No one has addressed why Sage is running out of memory even when the no one has used it all day long.

I will have to reiterate this again. The system as a whole is not unstable, only sagetv as a client on the PC and the service to the extenders.

It would be nice if someone gave a hint or direction to take, or maybe a plugin that is known to have issues when xyz is also occurring. Remember I test software (specifically client/server based software) so the idea of digging around to find issues is very normal to me. At this point I am getting irritated at what direction to really go here. I don't run test cases, I do exploratory testing, the writing of the cases and major environmental setups. I have a whole test domain setup, with email, proxies, linux, windows, virtualbox, vmware, ESXi server, vmware server etc etc. I am hoping to get some more advanced advice that perhaps just isn't here.

With the level of plugins made by forum members, I was hoping to get a little more incite and direction. Maybe it just isn't available, that would be a bummer but so be it if that is the case. I find it ridiculous that you can't seem to reuse a lot of what you have when you re-install. Is it really not possible to reuse the wizbin or any other files used to store your recorded information with likes, dislikes, etc? Is sagetv really that one time limited? I find it hard to believe but i know it is possible. Client/server software usually requires some sort of DB whether local or server based. Those can and should reusable.

one-time? The recommended method of reinstall is to reuse your old wiz.bin file, bringing in all your favorites, metadata, watched history, etc. It is not recommended to bring in your old properties files, because on different OS installs and different hardware, the tuner ID's will most likely be different, and it's relatively painless to go through the setup wizard again. Channel lists can be saved/restored via a plugin.

Originally Posted by atyrus28

I am fully ready to dump the sage service in a VM but then I imagine I will have issues when trying to run the client side on the actual machine. I can't buy anymore licenses or extenders so I would really like what I already have to work.

Maybe this article explains why some people are overly offended by some things. I do not personally have that problem. I know that all software and hardware sucks some just cost more. As long as humans are involved in making them work they will never be perfect and prone to headaches and problems. They can however get to a point of causing the least amount of headaches and that is my ultimate goal with sagetv.

Right now it seems like I may just need to restart the service once a day automatically. Not a great solution but certainly seems to be one that others need to use.

I think the only one upset or agitated here is you. Speaking from many years with sage, I can tell you that I've never heard/seen these types of problems happening no a clean OS install, and NOT have them be hardware related. SageTV, in reality, is a very stable program, running in it's nice cozy JVM. It doesn't really interact with much outside itself in the way of other softwares, aside from tuner drivers.

Start off with a clean install of windows, then only install what you need to make sage work. Drivers for network, graphics, and tuner. Java. ffdshow. SageTV. Configure sagetv to run in service mode with the SageTVServiceControl.exe. Run sage, go through the wizard, setting up your tuners and recording folders, etc. Enable debug logging. It should find all your old recordings and bring them back in (go ahead and leave out the old wiz.bin at this stage). Run this way for a while, doing many test recordings, and playbacks. See if the problems occur (haven't really gotten a good description of what problems you were seeing anyways). Sage doesn't write to any media files aside from the actual recording process, and as such, I can't see how it would alter/corrupt the files in any way. (in fact, I'm pretty sure it opens them read-only)

Finally, after all this, have you even contacted support about the issue? These forums are not the support channel, they are a user-to-user discussion forum.

[panteragstk]

Honestly we are trying to help. You just aren't getting the answers you want.

Now then. I have 2 clients and a server. My server's job is as a sage server, subsonic server, sql server, and file server. That's it. I use XP because it is the original sage install from when I started using sage. It works. No issues whatsoever.

Having said that, my clients are another story. I've got 3 different video cards I've been testing for the past few months. One is the intel hd graphics, one is an nvidia 8800gt, the last is an old ati 3450. Most decoders don't like the intel graphics so I can't use it. I'll have perfect video playback and suddenly it will go nuts and have horrible video degradation. It isn't the drivers because multiple version have the same issue. I don't like chasing down issues like that so I started using my 8800gt. Video playback is perfect with multiple decoders. However nvidia's drivers are horrible. Always have been (I've been using their cards since geforce 2). For gaming I've never had issues with them except for Vista (another story). While video playback is great, in SMM the card refuses to release cached images. Eventually sage will just exit. Multiple driver versions haven't fixed that either. Then comes in the ati 3450. That card is so under-powered that the UI is slower than with the other two. I'll take under-powered because it doesn't have any issues with anything. Everything plays back perfectly, the ui doesn't exit randomly or slow down to where you can't navigate.

So from this I've learned that nvidia cards a great, but for some reason their drivers suck for sage. Not sure why, but it is easily repeatable. Intel is nice, but the video decoders don't like them.

Now after all that my client is perfectly stable. I'm grabbing a more powerful ati/amd card to get rid of the slowness and I should be set.

My gaming computer is another story. I use it as a client if I have to. It's license will go to another pc when I build it. It has all kinds of issues, but I don't care since it was a dev machine. I've installed every codec known to man and doing that is known to cause massive instability with sage. I could fix it, but there is no reason since it isn't meant to be a client.

So. Of all the issues I've ever had with sage they have wither been hardware, software, or driver related. I've found them all. It took months, but I finally figured it out. I reinstalled and reimaged at least 20 times.

I've worked on computers in one form or another for over 10 years. I've worked as a Network Admin for a few as well. I'm not new to troubleshooting, but sage has taught me that sometimes the software can expose things you never knew were there. My gaming computer is a perfect example. It can do anything thrown at it. Never has any issues at all. Playing back video in mpc-hc never has issues. SageTV is horribly unstable.

[tmiranda]

Originally Posted by panteragstk

Honestly we are trying to help. You just aren't getting the answers you want.

We need to cut the guy a break. He's obviously computer literate and knows what he's doing. If he's got hardware that runs other software without crashing, but Sage is giving him issues, there's a problem. And yes, I do appreciate all the advice folks have given, and I generally agree that something strange is going on which may involve hardware.

[valnar]

I will add my equally useless post and say SageTV is totally stable for me and I never have to reboot. I play everything from either the Sage server, client, placeshifter or HDx00 extenders without issue. I am running WinXP.

I did not read the whole thread, but my first troubleshooting step - if you are banging your head against a wall with your main Sage PC - is to try a different PC. If totally different hardware still doesn't work, then it's you.

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

We need to cut the guy a break. He's obviously computer literate and knows what he's doing. If he's got hardware that runs other software without crashing, but Sage is giving him issues, there's a problem. And yes, I do appreciate all the advice folks have given, and I generally agree that something strange is going on which may involve hardware.

I wasn't trying to be combative. I just gave him my troubleshooting experience with sage to let him know I've been there, and that sometimes there just isn't an explanation for the issues. Well, there is an explanation, I just never found it. I just worked around it with good results.

[Rezolution]

If you're 100% certain it's not the PC, it's possible that corruption is occurring at the network level. Maybe there is a bad NIC/Switch/Router/Cable somewhere in your network that is causing bad data to be sent back to the sage software running on your main PC.

[Ender]

At the beginning of July I was tinkering with my Sage System... (Win 7 32bit, 4Gb Ram, 3.5 useable, Collossus etc.) I am Running sage as a service, and running a local client on my server.

Now I did a few things because SMM was slowing down, and freezing on me if I navigated through my movie library too much. I thought I was just running out of memory for my Java heap so I increased it to 1385 fro 875. What a bad mistake, randomly while watching some recorded TV the client would just drop to the desktop.

It was most prevalent during H.264 recordings from my colossus, so i thought either I had a bad drive since all the failures were from files stored on one drive. So I checked it for errors, I tried different colossus drivers, video drivers, different codecs. Heck I even took my system backup from a week prior to the issue, but no joy.

Finally I tried setting the java heap back to 875, Nvidia drivers 270, and the 29111 Haup drivers. Well what do you know? I have not had a client crash now in the two weeks since I did this.

Maybe your issue is similar, and you have set your heap size too high. Just something to check out.

As for your consternation about loosing favorites, likes, dislikes, and general settings. Why do you not run a script to copy your sage install folder every day, to a different drive, and keeping let us say the last seven days worth? This way you will not loose too much time if you need to rebuild, or whatnot.

Sorry for the long winded rambling here but I hope it helps you out.

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by Ender

At the beginning of July I was tinkering with my Sage System... (Win 7 32bit, 4Gb Ram, 3.5 useable, Collossus etc.) I am Running sage as a service, and running a local client on my server.

Now I did a few things because SMM was slowing down, and freezing on me if I navigated through my movie library too much. I thought I was just running out of memory for my Java heap so I increased it to 1385 fro 875. What a bad mistake, randomly while watching some recorded TV the client would just drop to the desktop.

It was most prevalent during H.264 recordings from my colossus, so i thought either I had a bad drive since all the failures were from files stored on one drive. So I checked it for errors, I tried different colossus drivers, video drivers, different codecs. Heck I even took my system backup from a week prior to the issue, but no joy.

Finally I tried setting the java heap back to 875, Nvidia drivers 270, and the 29111 Haup drivers. Well what do you know? I have not had a client crash now in the two weeks since I did this.

Maybe your issue is similar, and you have set your heap size too high. Just something to check out.

As for your consternation about loosing favorites, likes, dislikes, and general settings. Why do you not run a script to copy your sage install folder every day, to a different drive, and keeping let us say the last seven days worth? This way you will not loose too much time if you need to rebuild, or whatnot.

Sorry for the long winded rambling here but I hope it helps you out.

Version 270 huh? Do you remember which one (270.xx)? I had the same issue and my ATI card fixed it. I knew it was an nvidia driver issue, but I got sick of trying different drivers. It would be awesome if you could help me eliminate that issue. The nvidia card I wanted (430) is cheaper than the 6570 I'm looking at.

EDIT: I hope you say the 270.51. I already have the 270.61 and those still had the issue with smm for me.

[Ender]

Originally Posted by panteragstk

Version 270 huh? Do you remember which one (270.xx)? I had the same issue and my ATI card fixed it. I knew it was an nvidia driver issue, but I got sick of trying different drivers. It would be awesome if you could help me eliminate that issue. The nvidia card I wanted (430) is cheaper than the 6570 I'm looking at.

EDIT: I hope you say the 270.51. I already have the 270.61 and those still had the issue with smm for me.

Actually upon looking I am using 266.58. And the issue with the client crashing has been resolved, as for SMM, I am not certain I have not really looked at it much since I stabilized the client.

[Savage1701]

I may not have this right, but here's another guess:

IF you are ONLY keeping your BD rips on an external USB 2.0 drive, and they are becoming corrupted, is it possible the controller in the external drive is flaky/not compatible in some way with write cache setting and/or fragmentation is occurring on the external drive? External USB 2.0 enclosures aren't exactly known for their high-quality SATA-USB interfaces.

Is it possible that you have an interrupt situation between the USB device and something it is sharing with?

Maybe you said in some of your other posts you tried rips to the internal drives; I guess if they corrupted as well then you would have an issue. I used an external 2.0 USB drive for a while and at times it could not handle a simultaneous read of an old show and write of a new one. But it did NOT corrupt as you are saying - a sort of creeping corruption.

Other odd things I have dealt with - as I mentioned earlier, Sage works clean as a whistle if I reboot it every other day. To me, this says memory leak. But others never have this issue. I only have it with HD-PVR usage, never before with just over the air ATSC, so I have chased gremlins as well.

I have had bad cables and electrical interference tile and pixelate HD material, but moving them around cleared it up. It never, however, made playbacks worse as time went on, as you are experiencing.

I'll toss out 7 things:

1. Defragment your external drive especially if you are writing/deleting rips to it. I use Disktrix as it lets me keep everything sequential and fill from the outer, faster tracks into the slower ones.

2. Again, try a regular pattern of therapeutic cold boots, including anything external like an HD-PVR every other day.

3. High-quality PCI or PCI-e x1 USB 2.0 card. Some of my USB ports on my Intel MB can't handle my HD-PVR and crash my system, some can.

5. I'm not being a snob here, but also, AMD boards/chipsets have quirks, frequently with SATA stuff. Can you test this on an Intel system? I have not used AMD in over 10 years, so I don't know what is state of the art anymore with their stuff.

6. As others suggest, make sure Java heap is right size. I have also read about registry settings for the actual Java .exe defaulting to too small a size, but that is handled differently. For instance, I can crash Sage on one system if I load up a couple Java-based presentation rooms.

7. Are you using Advanced Format drives improperly set up for your system? Ooops - never mind - Just saw you are using 64-bit Win7.

Just thoughts. You are obviously chasing something quirky and hard to nail down.