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easygreenus at yahoo

Nov 21, 2009, 10:00 AM

Post #1 of 52 (4594 views)
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HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22

Hi,

I've been trying to track this problem down for a week now. When I record a regular
program like Monk, or The Big Bank Theory, the Hauppauge 1212 does an excellent
job. But, when I try to record sports programs, like a live NFL Football game, I get jumps.
While viewing, it looks like a quick jump over from 1 - 3 seconds. I has also happened
while recording Saturday Night Live ( SNL ).

Last night, I upgraded the firmware on the HDPVR to 0x12, which posts to this forum indicate
is the latest.

I also upgraded the kernel on my Fedora 10 backend to the latest supported kernel,
2.6.27.38-170.2.113.fc10.i686.

The problem is on the recording side. Not playback. If I replay in Edit Mode, and can
do a frame-by-frame advance, and the skip is still in the same place. The frames never
make it to the output file.

The mythbackend logs have these type of messages in the area where a skip occurs.
These were from recording ESPN News. The video was a replay of an basketball game
where a player was being interviewed and a replay of his dunk was on the screen.

What do these messages indicate?

2009-11-21 03:30:08.598 Started recording: ESPNEWS: channel 3305 on cardid 6, sourceid 2
2009-11-21 03:30:36.763 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
2009-11-21 03:30:36.767 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
2009-11-21 03:30:36.769 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.

<====== Basketball replay here
2009-11-21 03:31:48.552 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
2009-11-21 03:31:48.560 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
2009-11-21 03:31:48.561 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
<======= End Jump
2009-11-21 03:32:09.697 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
2009-11-21 03:32:48.376 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
2009-11-21 03:32:48.380 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected

Thanks,

Mike

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ayoung at teleport

Nov 22, 2009, 1:15 AM

Post #2 of 52 (4476 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

Mike Smith wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I've been trying to track this problem down for a week now. When I record a regular
> program like Monk, or The Big Bank Theory, the Hauppauge 1212 does an excellent
> job. But, when I try to record sports programs, like a live NFL Football game, I get jumps.
> While viewing, it looks like a quick jump over from 1 - 3 seconds. I has also happened
> while recording Saturday Night Live ( SNL ).
>
> Last night, I upgraded the firmware on the HDPVR to 0x12, which posts to this forum indicate
> is the latest.
>
> I also upgraded the kernel on my Fedora 10 backend to the latest supported kernel,
> 2.6.27.38-170.2.113.fc10.i686.
>
> The problem is on the recording side. Not playback. If I replay in Edit Mode, and can
> do a frame-by-frame advance, and the skip is still in the same place. The frames never
> make it to the output file.
>
> The mythbackend logs have these type of messages in the area where a skip occurs.
> These were from recording ESPN News. The video was a replay of an basketball game
> where a player was being interviewed and a replay of his dunk was on the screen.
>
> What do these messages indicate?
>
> 2009-11-21 03:30:08.598 Started recording: ESPNEWS: channel 3305 on cardid 6, sourceid 2
> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.763 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.767 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.769 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
>
> <====== Basketball replay here
> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.552 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.560 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.561 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
> <======= End Jump
> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.697 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
> 2009-11-21 03:32:48.376 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> 2009-11-21 03:32:48.380 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected

Well, at least I'm not alone. I was beginning to think I was as I not
found any posts about this issue. :)

I've seen the on a variety of different channels over the last month or
so. It seems to work ok if I record with outside of mythtv with cat
/dev/hdpvr > file.ts. It also seems work if I watch while it records
(that is as long as VDPAU doesn't give an error, but that's another
issue...). It would be nice if it gave some more information as to what
mythtv thinks detects the error as. I've tried turning on hdpvr driver
debugging and don't get much more there.

I've tried switching cables and put the HDPVR on it's side to help
ventalation. But I still get the error. I was running .21+fixes+hdpvr
and as far as I can recall I did not see this problem until I moved up
to trunk before .22 then .22RCs and later.

I have a Athlon X2 4200 on a MSI K8NGM2-FID (nforce MCP51) board. I'm
recording from DirecTV. What hardware are you running and what are you
recording from?

Alan

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jppoet at gmail

Nov 22, 2009, 9:17 AM

Post #3 of 52 (4472 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Sun, Nov 22, 2009 at 2:15 AM, Alan Young <ayoung [at] teleport> wrote:
> Mike Smith wrote:
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I've been trying to track this problem down for a week now. �When I record
>> a regular
>> program like Monk, or The Big Bank Theory, �the Hauppauge 1212 �does an
>> excellent
>> job. �But, when I try to record sports programs, �like a live NFL Football
>> game, �I get jumps.
>> While viewing, it looks like a quick jump over from 1 - 3 seconds. �I has
>> also happened
>> while recording Saturday Night Live ( SNL ).
>>
>> Last night, �I upgraded the firmware on the HDPVR to 0x12, which posts to
>> this forum indicate
>> is the latest.
>>
>> I also upgraded the kernel on my Fedora 10 backend to the latest supported
>> kernel,
>> 2.6.27.38-170.2.113.fc10.i686.
>>
>> The problem is on the recording side. �Not playback. �If I replay in Edit
>> Mode, and can
>> do a frame-by-frame advance, and the skip is still in the same place. �The
>> frames never
>> make it to the output file.
>>
>> The mythbackend logs have these type of messages in the area where a skip
>> occurs.
>> These were from recording ESPN News. �The video was a replay of an
>> basketball game
>> where a player was being interviewed and a replay of his dunk was on the
>> screen.
>>
>> What do these messages indicate?
>> 2009-11-21 03:30:08.598 Started recording: ESPNEWS: channel 3305 on cardid
>> 6, sourceid 2
>> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.763 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
>> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.767 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
>> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.769 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
>>
>> <====== � Basketball replay here
>> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.552 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
>> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.560 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
>> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.561 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
>> <======= � �End Jump
>> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.697 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
>> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
>> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
>> 2009-11-21 03:32:48.376 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
>> 2009-11-21 03:32:48.380 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
>
> Well, at least I'm not alone. �I was beginning to think I was as I not
> found any posts about this issue. �:)
>
> I've seen the on a variety of different channels over the last month or so.
> �It seems to work ok if I record with outside of mythtv with �cat
> /dev/hdpvr > file.ts. �It also seems work if I watch while it records
> (that is as long as VDPAU doesn't give an error, but that's another
> issue...). �It would be nice if it gave some more information as to what
> mythtv thinks detects the error as. �I've tried turning on hdpvr driver
> debugging and don't get much more there.
>
> I've tried switching cables and put the HDPVR on it's side to help
> ventalation. �But I still get the error. �I was running .21+fixes+hdpvr
> and as far as I can recall I did not see this problem until I moved up to
> trunk before .22 then .22RCs and later.
>
> I have a Athlon X2 4200 on a MSI K8NGM2-FID (nforce MCP51) board. �I'm
> recording from DirecTV. �What hardware are you running and what are you
> recording from?
>
> Alan

Out of curiosity, what else is happening on the computer when these
glitches appear? What is the system load? Are there any processes
consuming excessive amounts of system resources?

John
--
A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
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ayoung at teleport

Nov 22, 2009, 2:01 PM

Post #4 of 52 (4461 views)
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Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

John P Poet wrote:
> Out of curiosity, what else is happening on the computer when these
> glitches appear? What is the system load? Are there any processes
> consuming excessive amounts of system resources?

In my case not much. It is a dedicated FE & BE. It's happened at
different times of the day. Cpufreq is using the ondemand module with
sensitivity to upscale set at 31. Top is usually showing about 5% used
@ 1000Mhz for the backend with some blips of the hdpvr_buffer kernel
task using 1% of the cpu. If the frontend is running with VDPAU, I
usually see another 3-5% usage there if it's displaying a recording.
I've turned off all other services that I can. It's running just udevd,
lircd, watchdog rsyslogd, acpid, sshd, irexec, wpa_supplicant and
dhclient for it's wireless adapter, ntpd, smartd and of course mysql.
It also has PVR250 and a PVR1250 card. I'm trying to transition off the
250 to the HDPVR. That's not in use when the HDPVR is. The 1250 is
usually only busy in the evenings for OTA recording. It has 2GB of RAM,
so I don't see alot of swapping.

Alan
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cass at casscoenterprises

Nov 22, 2009, 3:37 PM

Post #5 of 52 (4449 views)
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Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

I have had 2 instances of this error that resulted in my mythbox actually
shutting down. I don't find any evidence of a kernel panic and the last
lines in the mythbackend.log are the errors above. Nothing in any logs that
I can find so I've no clue what actually happened.

All I know is that myth was on, recording a show, these errors showed up for
the entire length of the recording, and at 15:24 the machine shuts down.
Both recordings ended up being exactly 15:09.

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ayoung at teleport

Nov 22, 2009, 4:05 PM

Post #6 of 52 (4446 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

Derek & Cindi Cass wrote:
> I have had 2 instances of this error that resulted in my mythbox actually
> shutting down. I don't find any evidence of a kernel panic and the last
> lines in the mythbackend.log are the errors above. Nothing in any logs that
> I can find so I've no clue what actually happened.
>
> All I know is that myth was on, recording a show, these errors showed up for
> the entire length of the recording, and at 15:24 the machine shuts down.
> Both recordings ended up being exactly 15:09.

Ouch. I haven't seen that shutdown.

In the bad recordings I'll see instances where the recording will end
early (10-15 minutes) after showing the error once or a couple of times.
Other times it records the whole program and flickering will be there
for the whole program. Each time it flickers, it seems to log the error.

If it makes it all the way through the program, it then has the
flickering in any programs after that. I usually see that with back to
back recordings of The Daily Show followed by The Colbert Report. The
flickering in subsequent recordings continues I stop the backend and
restart the backend.

One other thing I forgot to mention, is when the flickering does happen,
the audio loses sync with the video. The audio does NOT drop out when
the blank frames appear. Sometimes during playback the audio jumps and
does resync with the video but then it starts to go out of sync again.

Alan
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easygreenus at yahoo

Nov 22, 2009, 5:10 PM

Post #7 of 52 (4447 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

Hi,

I'm running a 3.2Ghz Xenon with 4GB memory, 2 x 1TB disks mirrored for video storage,
an 80GB drive for Fedora Core 10, two Hauppauge Capture cards ( 150 and 250 ) in
addition to the new HD-PVR. When I'm recording an HD program on the HD-PVR,
top shows that mythbackend is the top consumer at 2% of the CPU.

In my case, its really recording sports that causes problems. Could it be the high
motion of sports? The encoder can't keep up, so skips ahead? Its very consistant
on sports. During the opening kickoff of the Bengals-Raiders game, I see the ball
in the air at about the 20 yard line, the receiver on the goal line waiting for it.
Then it skips to players getting up from the pile and running to the sidelines. There
had to be at least 5 seconds missing. I can coorilate the skips with the messages
in the log based on when the recording started, how far into the recording the skip
happened gives me an offset to look in the logs.

I noticed yesterday there was a new update to mythtv 0.22.

mythtv-backend-0.22-221.fc10.i386

I upgraded, but still have the problem.

I'm running the 2.6.27.38-170.2.113.fc10.i686 kernel and firmware 0x12 on the HD-PVR.

Thanks,

Mike

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easygreenus at yahoo

Nov 22, 2009, 9:57 PM

Post #8 of 52 (4440 views)
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Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

New symptoms.

First, I have found some normal programming with skips. They aren't
as frequent, or obvious. I think I seen 5 seconds skips in football, so
you miss the whole play. Seems like the skips in regular programming
are shorter, so not as evident.

Also, I had an instance of mythbackend crashing while recording with the
HD-PVR. The backend system stayed up, just mythbackend failed.
Here are he last lines in the log:

2009-11-22 21:40:48.115 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Start(): pthread_create failed.
eno: Resource temporarily unavailable (11)
2009-11-22 21:40:48.117 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
2009-11-22 21:40:48.118 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
2009-11-22 21:40:54.338 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Start(): pthread_create failed.
eno: Resource temporarily unavailable (11)
2009-11-22 21:40:54.340 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
2009-11-22 21:40:54.340 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
2009-11-22 21:41:00.595 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Start(): pthread_create failed.
eno: Resource temporarily unavailable (11)
2009-11-22 21:41:00.597 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
2009-11-22 21:41:00.598 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
2009-11-22 21:41:04.785 Running mythfilldatabase

I wonder if mythfilldatabase could have taken the backend down.

Thanks,

Mike

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david at istwok

Nov 24, 2009, 9:33 AM

Post #9 of 52 (4369 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Sun, Nov 22, 2009 at 10:17:45AM -0700, John P Poet wrote:
> On Sun, Nov 22, 2009 at 2:15 AM, Alan Young <ayoung [at] teleport> wrote:
> > Mike Smith wrote:
> >> What do these messages indicate?
> >> 2009-11-21 03:30:08.598 Started recording: ESPNEWS: channel 3305 on cardid
> >> 6, sourceid 2
> >> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.763 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> >> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.767 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> >> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.769 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
> >>
> >> <====== ? Basketball replay here
> >> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.552 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> >> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.560 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> >> 2009-11-21 03:31:48.561 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
> >> <======= ? ?End Jump
> >> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.697 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> >> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> >> 2009-11-21 03:32:09.704 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.
> >> 2009-11-21 03:32:48.376 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> >> 2009-11-21 03:32:48.380 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> >
> > Well, at least I'm not alone. ?I was beginning to think I was as I not
> > found any posts about this issue. ?:)
> >
> > [...]
>
> Out of curiosity, what else is happening on the computer when these
> glitches appear? What is the system load? Are there any processes
> consuming excessive amounts of system resources?

John, I'm on record of having this problem to varying degress ever
since I got my HD-PVRs. It happens less so after updating the HD-PVR
firmware to the latest and configuring the STB to output everything
including SD at the same HD resolution, but it still happens
frequently enough to be very annoying.

I had hopes the new motherboard/CPU I installed yesterday would fix
the problem. It did fix the 2 HD-PVRs on one EHCI controller problem,
but it didn't fix this stop/restart problem. This now makes 3
different systems it has occurred with.

Here is more information for the record. I see the problem on both
HD-PVRs which are connected to Motorola DCT-62x0s. The probelm does
not appear to be content dependent to me -- I see it equally on
sports, dramas, documentaries, etc. The problem does not appear to be
resolution dependent -- I see it whether or not the STBs are set to
720p or 1080i. Finally, my backend is way overpowered and is usually
85-95% idle so I don't think the problem has anything to do with
system load.

David
--
David Engel
david [at] istwok
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gbr at majentis

Nov 24, 2009, 9:48 AM

Post #10 of 52 (4371 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

> John, I'm on record of having this problem to varying degress ever
> since I got my HD-PVRs. It happens less so after updating the HD-PVR
> firmware to the latest and configuring the STB to output everything
> including SD at the same HD resolution, but it still happens
> frequently enough to be very annoying.
>
> I had hopes the new motherboard/CPU I installed yesterday would fix
> the problem. It did fix the 2 HD-PVRs on one EHCI controller problem,
> but it didn't fix this stop/restart problem. This now makes 3
> different systems it has occurred with.
>
> Here is more information for the record. I see the problem on both
> HD-PVRs which are connected to Motorola DCT-62x0s. The probelm does
> not appear to be content dependent to me -- I see it equally on
> sports, dramas, documentaries, etc. The problem does not appear to be
> resolution dependent -- I see it whether or not the STBs are set to
> 720p or 1080i. Finally, my backend is way overpowered and is usually
> 85-95% idle so I don't think the problem has anything to do with
> system load.
>
> David
> --

I've been running a single HD-PVR off a Motorola 6200 for the last few weeks, and I haven't seen this problem at all. I'm about to add another HD-PVR.

I have the 6200 outputting at 480p for SD and 720p for HD. My computer is a Pentium M @ 1.5 GHz. The SQL database is on the backend, but all storage is on another box, mounted via CIFs/Samba. The backend is running Mythbuntu 9.10, and I don't install the weekly fixes, though I'm considerring it.

Gerald

david at istwok

Nov 24, 2009, 1:03 PM

Post #11 of 52 (4356 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 11:48:08AM -0600, Gerald Brandt wrote:
> I've been running a single HD-PVR off a Motorola 6200 for the last
> few weeks, and I haven't seen this problem at all. I'm about to add
> another HD-PVR.
>
> I have the 6200 outputting at 480p for SD and 720p for HD. My
> computer is a Pentium M @ 1.5 GHz. The SQL database is on the
> backend, but all storage is on another box, mounted via
> CIFs/Samba. The backend is running Mythbuntu 9.10, and I don't
> install the weekly fixes, though I'm considerring it.

Can I have your 6200? :)

Seriously, what audio input are you using? I've been using s/pdif
ever since it's been supported which was well before the latest
firmware supposedly fixed the problems.

David
--
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david [at] istwok
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gbr at majentis

Nov 24, 2009, 3:04 PM

Post #12 of 52 (4350 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

----- "David Engel" <david [at] istwok> wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 11:48:08AM -0600, Gerald Brandt wrote:
> > I've been running a single HD-PVR off a Motorola 6200 for the last
> > few weeks, and I haven't seen this problem at all. I'm about to add
> > another HD-PVR.
> >
> > I have the 6200 outputting at 480p for SD and 720p for HD. My
> > computer is a Pentium M @ 1.5 GHz. The SQL database is on the
> > backend, but all storage is on another box, mounted via
> > CIFs/Samba. The backend is running Mythbuntu 9.10, and I don't
> > install the weekly fixes, though I'm considerring it.
>
> Can I have your 6200? :)
>
> Seriously, what audio input are you using? I've been using s/pdif
> ever since it's been supported which was well before the latest
> firmware supposedly fixed the problems.
>
> David
> --

So far I've been sticking with the standard 2 jack RCA audio.

Gerald

david at istwok

Nov 24, 2009, 4:33 PM

Post #13 of 52 (4353 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 05:04:01PM -0600, Gerald Brandt wrote:
> ----- "David Engel" <david [at] istwok> wrote:
> > Seriously, what audio input are you using? I've been using s/pdif
> > ever since it's been supported which was well before the latest
> > firmware supposedly fixed the problems.
>
> So far I've been sticking with the standard 2 jack RCA audio.

Interesting. I've been meaning to try the RCA inputs to see if that
had any effect. Is anyone who is having the stop/restart problem
using the RCA inputs?

David
--
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david [at] istwok
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jppoet at gmail

Nov 24, 2009, 5:11 PM

Post #14 of 52 (4348 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 5:33 PM, David Engel <david [at] istwok> wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 05:04:01PM -0600, Gerald Brandt wrote:
>> ----- "David Engel" <david [at] istwok> wrote:
>> > Seriously, what audio input are you using? I've been using s/pdif
>> > ever since it's been supported which was well before the latest
>> > firmware supposedly fixed the problems.
>>
>> So far I've been sticking with the standard 2 jack RCA audio.
>
> Interesting. �I've been meaning to try the RCA inputs to see if that
> had any effect. �Is anyone who is having the stop/restart problem
> using the RCA inputs?
>
> David

I have never uses the RCA inputs. Been S/PDIF from day one.

I really have no idea how to debug the issues described on this
thread, because I generally don't have the problem. I have two units
(C2 and E1), and they do glitch occasionally, but for me the frequency
is about once every 2-3 months.

I almost wonder if the problem is STB specific? Maybe some STBs (or
service providers) produce a cleaner video and AC3 signal than others?
Personally, I feed my HD-PVRs with a Directv H20-100 and H21-200.

John
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ayoung at teleport

Nov 24, 2009, 6:09 PM

Post #15 of 52 (4357 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

John P Poet wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 5:33 PM, David Engel <david [at] istwok> wrote:
>> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 05:04:01PM -0600, Gerald Brandt wrote:
>>> ----- "David Engel" <david [at] istwok> wrote:
>>>> Seriously, what audio input are you using? I've been using s/pdif
>>>> ever since it's been supported which was well before the latest
>>>> firmware supposedly fixed the problems.
>>> So far I've been sticking with the standard 2 jack RCA audio.
>> Interesting. I've been meaning to try the RCA inputs to see if that
>> had any effect. Is anyone who is having the stop/restart problem
>> using the RCA inputs?
>>
>> David
>
> I have never uses the RCA inputs. Been S/PDIF from day one.
>
> I really have no idea how to debug the issues described on this
> thread, because I generally don't have the problem. I have two units
> (C2 and E1), and they do glitch occasionally, but for me the frequency
> is about once every 2-3 months.
>
> I almost wonder if the problem is STB specific? Maybe some STBs (or
> service providers) produce a cleaner video and AC3 signal than others?
> Personally, I feed my HD-PVRs with a Directv H20-100 and H21-200.
>
>
> John

I've been using SPDIF since day 1. It's connected to a DirecTV H20-100.

I think part of the problem is that the error message is very generic
and doesn't provide information as to what the "Device error" is. Is
there anywhere we might want to look to patch to add additional
debugging output?

Alan
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david at istwok

Nov 24, 2009, 7:13 PM

Post #16 of 52 (4341 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 06:11:10PM -0700, John P Poet wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 5:33 PM, David Engel <david [at] istwok> wrote:
> > Interesting. ?I've been meaning to try the RCA inputs to see if that
> > had any effect. ?Is anyone who is having the stop/restart problem
> > using the RCA inputs?
>
> I have never uses the RCA inputs. Been S/PDIF from day one.

Which doesn't disprove my guess that it might be s/pdif audio related.

> I almost wonder if the problem is STB specific? Maybe some STBs (or
> service providers) produce a cleaner video and AC3 signal than others?
> Personally, I feed my HD-PVRs with a Directv H20-100 and H21-200.

It wouldn't surprise me if the problem is STB specific. From what I
understand, even for the same model STB, there are a lot of
differences from market to market regarding the firmware used and the
features supportted. The reason I'm starting to suspect the digital
audio is because the video is analog. Except for sync, there's not a
lot for the STB to screw up and the HD-PVR should happily encode
whatever analog values it receives. With the digital audio output on
the other hand, it could be much easier for things to go wrong.

David
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jarod at wilsonet

Nov 24, 2009, 7:44 PM

Post #17 of 52 (4349 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Nov 24, 2009, at 10:13 PM, David Engel wrote:

> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 06:11:10PM -0700, John P Poet wrote:
>> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 5:33 PM, David Engel <david [at] istwok> wrote:
>>> Interesting. ?I've been meaning to try the RCA inputs to see if that
>>> had any effect. ?Is anyone who is having the stop/restart problem
>>> using the RCA inputs?
>>
>> I have never uses the RCA inputs. Been S/PDIF from day one.
>
> Which doesn't disprove my guess that it might be s/pdif audio related.
>
>> I almost wonder if the problem is STB specific? Maybe some STBs (or
>> service providers) produce a cleaner video and AC3 signal than others?
>> Personally, I feed my HD-PVRs with a Directv H20-100 and H21-200.
>
> It wouldn't surprise me if the problem is STB specific. From what I
> understand, even for the same model STB, there are a lot of
> differences from market to market regarding the firmware used and the
> features supportted. The reason I'm starting to suspect the digital
> audio is because the video is analog. Except for sync, there's not a
> lot for the STB to screw up and the HD-PVR should happily encode
> whatever analog values it receives. With the digital audio output on
> the other hand, it could be much easier for things to go wrong.

fwiw, digital audio coming off my Motorola QIP-6200 into my hdpvr was pretty thoroughly hosed (had a really tinny quality about it, painful on the ears) until a firmware update about 6 months ago. Audio off a DVD player was just fine. So yeah, there's definitely some device-dependent issues that have to be dealt with on the hdpvr side.

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easygreenus at yahoo

Nov 24, 2009, 9:10 PM

Post #18 of 52 (4334 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

I'm using the stereo RCA connections on the HD-PVR for audio and I have
the jumping problem often. Constantly while recording sports programs.

I use Time Warner Cable, an SA3250 cable box, a dedicated backend
with 4GB memory. CPU usage is about 3-5% while recording from the
HD-PVR. I also have a Hauppauge 150 and 250 tuner cards in the
backend.

Running 0.22 with the 221 release, 0x12 firmware on the HD-PVR,
and FC10 with the 2.6.27.38-170.2.113.fc10.i686 kernel.

I've run the mythbackend with debug set to all and it doesn't give any more
useful messages.

Mike

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jeremy.thornhill at gmail

Nov 25, 2009, 10:45 AM

Post #19 of 52 (4311 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Sat, 21 Nov 2009 10:00:12 -0800 (PST), Mike Smith
<easygreenus [at] yahoo> wrote:
>
>
> The mythbackend logs have these type of messages in the area where a skip occurs.
> These were from recording ESPN News. �The video was a replay of an basketball game
> where a player was being interviewed and a replay of his dunk was on the screen.
>
> What do these messages indicate?
>
> 2009-11-21 03:30:08.598 Started recording: ESPNEWS: channel 3305 on cardid 6, sourceid 2
> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.763 DevRdB(/dev/video0) Error: Poll giving up
> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.767 MPEGRec(/dev/video0) Error: Device error detected
> 2009-11-21 03:30:36.769 DevRdB(/dev/video0): Stop(): Not running.

You are not alone!

I'd been running with an hd-pvr on a patched .21 fixes for several
months with a pretty high degree of success. Infrequently there would
be the odd failed recording, but that was usually attributable to my
cable box 'flaking out.'

Recently I updated to .22 and have been seeing more and more errors
like yours - only, unlike you, they always appear at the *beginning*
of a recording. When the failure occurs, the 'poll giving up' 'device
error detected' messages are recorded in the backend log. If I look at
the hd pvr unit itself, I can watch the blue light turn on and off in
time with these messages. Usually (but not always) some minutes later
the recordings stabilize and mythtv starts writing to a file.

I can't discern any pattern as to *why* this happens. Sometimes I can
record all day without seeing the problem, other times show after show
fails to start properly and I'm left with several hours of unusable or
partial recordings. I've compensated for this by padding the 'start
time' for recordings by a few minutes, which is normally adequate time
for things to start properly, but sometimes it's not. I've had entire
half hour recordings fail like this for the whole program run.

I've tried to replicate the failures using 'cat' but I've never had a
problem that way. It could just be I've never tried this at the right
(wrong) time.

FWIW my STB is locked at 720P, using optical (though I tried RCA with
no difference), changing channels with firewire, including a 5 second
sleep at the end of the channel change script. I'd LOVE to get some
clues as to what's happening here! I'm starting to vaguely suspect
that a recent update to the STB is causing some kind of issue, but I
don't know why that would be the case (video seems fine when I output
from the HD PVR's passthrough to my TV, or when I use 'cat').

Jeremy
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david at istwok

Nov 25, 2009, 1:45 PM

Post #20 of 52 (4296 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 09:10:06PM -0800, Mike Smith wrote:
> I'm using the stereo RCA connections on the HD-PVR for audio and I have
> the jumping problem often. Constantly while recording sports programs.

On Wed, Nov 25, 2009 at 01:45:18PM -0500, Jeremy Thornhill wrote:
> FWIW my STB is locked at 720P, using optical (though I tried RCA with
> no difference), changing channels with firewire, including a 5 second

Well, that makes two people who have had the problem using the RCA
inputs. Strangely, my own testing today seems to point that way. I
switched one of my HD-PVRs over to RCA inputs this morning and started
recording. It's now going on 6.5 hours without a glitch. I don't
believe either of my HD-PVRs has ever gone much more than an hour
before without at least one glitch.

David
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cass at casscoenterprises

Nov 26, 2009, 3:11 PM

Post #21 of 52 (4226 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

>I have had 2 instances of this error that resulted in my mythbox actually
>shutting down. I don't find any evidence of a kernel panic and the last
>lines in the mythbackend.log are the errors above. Nothing in any logs that

>I can find so I've no clue what actually happened.
>
>All I know is that myth was on, recording a show, these errors showed up
for
>the entire length of the recording, and at 15:24 the machine shuts down.
>Both recordings ended up being exactly 15:09.

Yesterday I again got this error resulting in a shutdown, and the resulting
video was the same 15:09. When I powered on the computer, I started getting
messages like this:

usb 1-7: device descriptor read/64, error -110

They showed up after the POST but before fedora shows the startup progress
bar. I've seen these errors before; I will see about 12-15 error messages
that take about 3-4 minutes to show up. What I did was shut off the HD-PVR
knowing that it was in a bad state, and the error messages immediately
ceased and fedora loaded.

This leads me to a question: do you leave your HD-PVR on 24/7, or do you
power it on when needed? I find that I have to power cycle the HD-PVR when
these errors polling errors crop up en masse. I was thinking of using an IR
blaster to power on and off the HD-PVR when necessary with MythTv (assuming
that I can set up Myth to power on the HD-PVR when a show is to be
recorded).

jeremy.thornhill at gmail

Nov 27, 2009, 10:11 AM

Post #22 of 52 (4189 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Wed, Nov 25, 2009 at 1:45 PM, Jeremy Thornhill
<jeremy.thornhill [at] gmail> wrote:
>
> I've tried to replicate the failures using 'cat' but I've never had a
> problem that way. It could just be I've never tried this at the right
> (wrong) time.
>

So, I do not think that my problem is with MythTV. Despite what I said
above, I *can* replicate the errors using cat.

I believe the 'device not running' stuff is MythTV's signal monitor
detecting that the HD-PVR hardware decided to stop recording. I don't
pretend to know the details of why, but it seems that sometimes the
hdpvr just mysteriously fails, and when mythtv detects this it tells
the HD-PVR to start recording again.

So, those 'gaps' that people are seeing are spots where the hd-pvr is
cutting out. Once mythtv restarts the device, the recording picks back
up.

I'm horribly perplexed by my situation though. My device seems to just
arbitrarily fail to start recording properly - once it's started, it's
fine. The first time I start recording with it after a boot, it's
fine. But after that it's a total crap shoot. Sometimes the next
recording is fine, sometimes it will fail 2 times and then start,
sometimes it will fail 20 times in a row!

Even more bizarre, if I rmmod/modprobe the hdpvr module, it will
always record properly immediately thereafter.

I'm at a loss. Is my hdpvr defective? Perhaps something subtle is
wrong with my kernel config? The debug messages from the hdpvr module
tell me almost nothing. I'm wondering if I could patch the mythtv
source to rmmod / modprobe the module when a signal error is detected,
as that seems to almost always resolve my problems.

Jeremy
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cass at casscoenterprises

Nov 27, 2009, 6:57 PM

Post #23 of 52 (4140 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

I would agree that this problem lies outside of Myth, especially after
having received the usb related errors that I listed in my previous post. I
think I will try the 1.5.6.1 firmware to see if that helps any.

Regarding modprobing the driver, I have found that I need to modprobe -r
hdpvr, power down the HDPVR, power up the HDPVR, modprobe hdpvr. Doing
either the modprobe or the power cycle doesn't always work.

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david at istwok

Nov 28, 2009, 8:34 AM

Post #24 of 52 (4079 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Fri, Nov 27, 2009 at 01:11:11PM -0500, Jeremy Thornhill wrote:
> I believe the 'device not running' stuff is MythTV's signal monitor
> detecting that the HD-PVR hardware decided to stop recording. I don't
> pretend to know the details of why, but it seems that sometimes the
> hdpvr just mysteriously fails, and when mythtv detects this it tells
> the HD-PVR to start recording again.
>
> So, those 'gaps' that people are seeing are spots where the hd-pvr is
> cutting out. Once mythtv restarts the device, the recording picks back
> up.

I thought everyone already knew this, but just in case... Mythtv has
a workaround for the problem for the problem when the hdpvr stops
recording. When mythtv hasn't received data in some period of time,
it assumes the hdpvr stopped and restarts the recording. If mythtv
didn't do this, the recording would end at the firts gap you see, the
backend would be wedged affecting later recordings and there would be
a lot more unhappy hdpvr users.

> I'm horribly perplexed by my situation though. My device seems to just
> arbitrarily fail to start recording properly - once it's started, it's
> fine. The first time I start recording with it after a boot, it's
> fine. But after that it's a total crap shoot. Sometimes the next
> recording is fine, sometimes it will fail 2 times and then start,
> sometimes it will fail 20 times in a row!

This sounds like an overheating problem...

> Even more bizarre, if I rmmod/modprobe the hdpvr module, it will
> always record properly immediately thereafter.

...and this sounds like a driver problem.

> I'm at a loss. Is my hdpvr defective? Perhaps something subtle is
> wrong with my kernel config? The debug messages from the hdpvr module
> tell me almost nothing. I'm wondering if I could patch the mythtv
> source to rmmod / modprobe the module when a signal error is detected,
> as that seems to almost always resolve my problems.

I don't know about your hdpvr, but I doubt it's your kernel config.
Yes, the driver debug is so terse it's of little use, at least for
this problem.

My guess is it's one of two things. 1) It's a firmware problem. Has
anyone been brave enough to try the new 1.5.6.1 firmware yet to see if
it improves anything? 2) It's a subtle driver problem that doesn't
affect the driver developers, and consequently, is not getting enough
attention. John P Poet is doing what he can, but the original hdpvr
driver developer has been conspicuously abesnt from this whole
discussion.

David
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david at istwok

Nov 28, 2009, 8:38 AM

Post #25 of 52 (4079 views)
Permalink

Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22 [In reply to]

On Thu, Nov 26, 2009 at 06:11:10PM -0500, Derek & Cindi Cass wrote:
> This leads me to a question: do you leave your HD-PVR on 24/7, or do you
> power it on when needed? I find that I have to power cycle the HD-PVR when
> these errors polling errors crop up en masse. I was thinking of using an IR
> blaster to power on and off the HD-PVR when necessary with MythTv (assuming
> that I can set up Myth to power on the HD-PVR when a show is to be
> recorded).

I leave mine on 24/7. My polling errors are almost always single
events that happen seemingly randomly about 1-2 times per hour. I
have had a couple of instances where the polling errors occured
constantly for a 5 minutes or so, but those have by been the
exception.

I don't think you can power cycle the hdpvr via IR.

David
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