report your pvr results here.

[swflscubadiver]

Originally Posted by swflscubadiver

Thanks for the heads up on this. I've e-mailed Julie with this information asking for an explaination of the discrepancy.

Here's the response back, it seems somewhat good:

You're right. The website does say record and playback simultaneously. Let me check into that.

Thank you for your input.

Julie
FTA Technician
SonicView USA
phone 866-205-6571
phone (Canada) 248-240-1704
Email: techsupport@sonicviewusa.com

[SystemDude]

I am really pleased that folks are getting responses to technical inquiries -- even if the responses are "I will check". I have dealt with way too many companies that seem to think customers are an annoyance. If SV can stay responsive and also solve some of these issues with a firmware upgrade, they will bubble to the top of this very competitive arena very quickly.

--------------------------------------------

And just to keep everybody up to date with pvr performance.....

I have been deliberately stress-testing my system, just to see where the limits are. Last night, overnight, I left the time shifter on 'auto' and scheduled two recordings that overlapped by about an hour, using just the EPG. Everything worked exactly as advertised -- both programs recorded fine, and the shifter was active when I checked it (I assume it was switched off during the overlap). I have a no-frills 500 Gb HDD, so I imagine this kept it hopping for a couple of hours, but all was fine. I will keep on doing tests.

I have had several pvr-related issues and difficulties, but despite those few, I still think this is one amazing box.

[big frank]

Originally Posted by SystemDude

I am really pleased that folks are getting responses to technical inquiries -- even if the responses are "I will check". I have dealt with way too many companies that seem to think customers are an annoyance. If SV can stay responsive and also solve some of these issues with a firmware upgrade, they will bubble to the top of this very competitive arena very quickly.

--------------------------------------------

And just to keep everybody up to date with pvr performance.....

I have been deliberately stress-testing my system, just to see where the limits are. Last night, overnight, I left the time shifter on 'auto' and scheduled two recordings that overlapped by about an hour, using just the EPG. Everything worked exactly as advertised -- both programs recorded fine, and the shifter was active when I checked it (I assume it was switched off during the overlap). I have a no-frills 500 Gb HDD, so I imagine this kept it hopping for a couple of hours, but all was fine. I will keep on doing tests.

I have had several pvr-related issues and difficulties, but despite those few, I still think this is one amazing box.

Great info Dude. I wish I could say I have had the luck with my PVR testing. I recorded three movies over the last few days. Two of them were unwatchable, freezing 8 or 9 minutes into them. The other worked fine. And I recorded a 1 hour show yesterday and the same thing happened. I'm running a brand new Maxtor one touch 500 gig drive formatted in FAT32.

[SystemDude]

Sitting at the computer just now, I had one of those "light-bulb" moments of clarity. I have been reading multiple posts about folks that have made recordings where the playback freezes up several minutes into the program, never to be unfrozen, and other effects. I have had the odd similar instance, but certainly not as consistent as these folks (I have had way more successful recordings than aborted ones, including recording two programs simultaneously onto one hard drive). And besides, those symptoms sounded vaguely familiar.......

Finally I remembered. In order to compensate for internal temperature changes, hard drives perform a routine called "thermal recalibration". Here's what Scott Mueller says about it in his reference guide, "Upgrading and Repairing PC's":

"Most hard drives today have sophisticated thermal compensation routines that make adjustments in head position relative to the expanding and contracting platters. Most drives perform this thermal compensation routine once every 5 minutes for the first 30 minutes the drive is running and then every 30 minutes thereafter. In many drives this procedure can be heard as a rapid 'tick-tick-tick-tick' sound."

Data cannot be read from or written to the drive during the one second or more while this routine takes place. On a normal desktop computer it is little more than a fleeting annoyance - kind of like the machine needed to take a breath. But I recalled that this routine was causing nightmares for manufacturers who were trying to record real-time data such as video or audio, and at one time drive manufacturers produced a line of what were called "audio/video" or "A/V" drives which minimized or eliminated the thermal recalibration cycles to allow recording with no perceptible breaks.

A visit to the Seagate site uncovered the following quote:

"Since there is no industry standard for A/V-rated hard drives, there is varying opinion in the computer world about what comprises an A/V hard drive. Generally, the industry consensus for any hard drive to be A/V rated is based on a few factors:
Does the drive feature thermal recalibration? All of the Seagate recent and current SCSI and ATA drives feature an embedded servo that eliminates thermal recalibration, so this is no longer a concern with any of our drives."

Note that Seagate emphasizes that even though their drives used to employ that feature, their current models do not. And they further hint that other manufacturers may have differing standards for this characteristic. Therefore, such drives may still be being marketed.

I have now pretty much convinced myself that the folks that are having regular freezeup problems with their pvr are victims of this hard drive design characteristic. The only way to know for sure is to research the exact model number of the hard drive, which may not be that simple to do (opening up the enclosure, etc.), or ask the drive manufacturer's tech support people. There is no "fix" for it -- a drive which uses this technique is simply not going to record video successfully, even though it might run Windows like a champ.

It has also been brought to my attention that some drives have a built-in "sleep" mode that spins them down after a period of inactivity to conserve power. Although a PVR drive is unlikely to have periods of inactivity (since you are probably using the time-shift feature), it's also worth checking out this possibility as well.

[big frank]

Dude, a thanks to ya for that great post (wouldn't let me send you a rep power again for some reason) which is well deserved for your post. I will have to contact Maxtor and see if this drive I just bought has that thermal technology you mentioned.

[baron1]

i sent him some for you big frank,not much but some as i think his post are above and beyond also

[big frank]

Originally Posted by baron1

i sent him some for you big frank,not much but some as i think his post are above and beyond also

Thanks Baron!

[SystemDude]

Frank and Baron:

Thank you! This board was/is a lot of help to me and I hope to return the favour if I can.

[big frank]

Originally Posted by SystemDude

Frank and Baron:

Thank you! This board was/is a lot of help to me and I hope to return the favour if I can.

WE will all just work together to make it happen!

[briarrabbitt]

I noticed I can't move the files in the USB menu. When I select "move" from the file menu it pauses for a few seconds then opens the folder window but there are no folders. Also when I try to navigate up and down in the folder window, it selects the files behind it and distorts the window. I have to exit the menu to get rid of the folder window.

Anyone else experiencing this?

[briarrabbitt]

I found that I cannot move files to the root directory of the hard drive. I made a folder in the SV_HDVIDEO folder and was able to move files into it. I have another folder in the root directory from my coolsat box but I can't move files into it either because it's in the root directory. Problem solved.

[dozzer19]

my results are not great at all, my acomdata 500gb hard drive constantly freezes during playback. i might be able to watch 5 minutes of a program that i have recorded or sometimes ten minutes. either way i have tried to recored several shows and hard drive seems to freeze all the time. can someone help please!!

[briarrabbitt]

Originally Posted by dozzer19

my results are not great at all, my acomdata 500gb hard drive constantly freezes during playback. i might be able to watch 5 minutes of a program that i have recorded or sometimes ten minutes. either way i have tried to recored several shows and hard drive seems to freeze all the time. can someone help please!!

Try leaving the time shift set to "manual" when you're recording. Worked on mine.

[dozzer19]

thanks, but i have tried that, and to no avail it still isn't working!!

[SystemDude]

Originally Posted by dozzer19

my results are not great at all, my acomdata 500gb hard drive constantly freezes during playback. i might be able to watch 5 minutes of a program that i have recorded or sometimes ten minutes. either way i have tried to recored several shows and hard drive seems to freeze all the time. can someone help please!!

Take a look at post #44 in this thread.

[swflscubadiver]

Originally Posted by swflscubadiver

Here's the response back, it seems somewhat good:

You're right. The website does say record and playback simultaneously. Let me check into that.

Thank you for your input.

Julie
FTA Technician
SonicView USA
phone 866-205-6571
phone (Canada) 248-240-1704
Email: techsupport@sonicviewusa.com

Ok, I received word back from Julie today on some of the PVR bugs and again, I'm very happy with the support they are providing:

This is a new problem that has just been brought to our attention. We have done some testing and found that there are some glitches in the advanced PVR functions. Specifically, we were able to start a recording, then go to a previously recorded program and play it back; but when we scheduled a recording, then began playback of a previously recorded program, the receiver switched to the scheduled program when the new recording started.

Your problem was slightly different.

We have informed our engineers. We believe it is a software issue, and we will be working on a correction in the next version of the factory firmware.

Thank you for your input.

Julie
FTA Technician
SonicView USA
phone 866-205-6571
phone (Canada) 248-240-1704
Email: techsupport@sonicviewusa.com

[big frank]

Originally Posted by swflscubadiver

Ok, I received word back from Julie today on some of the PVR bugs and again, I'm very happy with the support they are providing:

This is a new problem that has just been brought to our attention. We have done some testing and found that there are some glitches in the advanced PVR functions. Specifically, we were able to start a recording, then go to a previously recorded program and play it back; but when we scheduled a recording, then began playback of a previously recorded program, the receiver switched to the scheduled program when the new recording started.

Your problem was slightly different.

We have informed our engineers. We believe it is a software issue, and we will be working on a correction in the next version of the factory firmware.

Thank you for your input.

Julie
FTA Technician
SonicView USA
phone 866-205-6571
phone (Canada) 248-240-1704
Email: techsupport@sonicviewusa.com

That's encouraging news. But are they just waiting for us to tell them what the bugs are? If so, we should be getting free receivers for beta testing. Sheeesh.....

[big frank]

Systemdude,

I talked to Maxtor today about the information you posted in message #44 in this thread. They (the tech I talked to there) said that he wasn't aware of any software or firmware that checked for thermal temps, as leats in the 500 gig drive I'm using. He did say it would have to get really hot for it to do something like that anyway. So, I'm back to square one on figuring out what is going on with this HD.

I did have a problem last night with recording a movie. It kept freezing for a half second a bunch of times. Finally relized that the signal was really low from the bird and was causing the problem. All kinds of testing fun!

[SystemDude]

Originally Posted by big frank

Systemdude,

I talked to Maxtor today about the information you posted in message #44 in this thread. They (the tech I talked to there) said that he wasn't aware of any software or firmware that checked for thermal temps, as least in the 500 gig drive I'm using. He did say it would have to get really hot for it to do something like that anyway. So, I'm back to square one on figuring out what is going on with this HD.

I did have a problem last night with recording a movie. It kept freezing for a half second a bunch of times. Finally relized that the signal was really low from the bird and was causing the problem. All kinds of testing fun!

Don't it figure? You just get a good start at researching one problem and another one steps in..... At least you were able to identify this one. Probably a seagull messing with your mind.....

Sounds like the Maxtor guy did not really understand the question, because all drives need to do thermal compensation somehow -- it just depends how. If they no longer use the technique that was causing so much problem for video streams, so be it. But like you say, it puts you back to kinda where you started.

I suppose it's also worth checking if Maxtor uses a "sleep mode" on their drives (web site should tell you), which needs to be switched off for video service. But the symptoms just didn't quite match.

Shouldn't be this hard.....

[big frank]

Originally Posted by SystemDude

Don't it figure? You just get a good start at researching one problem and another one steps in..... At least you were able to identify this one. Probably a seagull messing with your mind.....

Sounds like the Maxtor guy did not really understand the question, because all drives need to do thermal compensation somehow -- it just depends how. If they no longer use the technique that was causing so much problem for video streams, so be it. But like you say, it puts you back to kinda where you started.

I suppose it's also worth checking if Maxtor uses a "sleep mode" on their drives (web site should tell you), which needs to be switched off for video service. But the symptoms just didn't quite match.

Shouldn't be this hard.....

I explined it to him a couple of times, but maybe he just didn't know. I believe that the drives do have a sleep mode. I noticed that when the drive sits for sometime and is not being used, the light on the front pulses, as opposed to flashing whe the drive is working (writing to/from) and constantly on when the drive isn't working and not in sleep mode.

The tech was supposed to send me the software to run the drive (utilities) but he didn't. I downloaded some other software for it from the website and will play around with it. I also have antther one of the same drive I use on my computer. Will do some more testing with it when I have more time. I have been recording some stuff just to see if I can duplicate someof the problems with it. So far, the last few recordings have worked without the freeze and lock up problem.

I did find another bug. I started a recording today about 3 minutes into a movie. Left and came back and it's still running into the next movie. It hasn't stopped. Been about 3 hours and still working. Will let it go for a couple of more hours to see if it's gonna stop on it's own. I also had a timeshift bug show up. I enabled timeshift via the RCU and instead of only recording 2 or 3 hours of timeshift, I got up the next morning and noticed that it was on it's 18th hour of timeshift. Had a 18+ gig timeshift file on the drive. haven't figured that one out yet either as I don't normally enable timeshift unless I'm watching something that I think I will want to use it.

I also got chastised on another site about voicing my opinion on these bugs. Super mod got mad and said I was borderline agressive or something like that. He was in the converstaion so I though it was okay, then ye closed it. Oh well, this is the site I like and will stay here. Much less heavy handed and friendly members here.