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R2-D2

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 10:26 am

Frequent contributor Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 12148

I had a quick look at what might cause the TS buffer to get dropped unnecessarily, and on my first attempt I got a single recording to drop the buffer. But I didn't have complete logging attached, so I tried again (lots of times) and could no longer reproduce it. Confused

So that sounds like a bug, doesn't it?

So I'm after some help to find reliable situations that cause the dropped buffer when a single recording starts. [Xp] (V5) and [Xw] should be installed to counter the obvious problems, although it would also be interesting to see if they make much of a difference. (Don't even think about trying 5.14.X/5.15.X firmwares... Laughing

)

If the unnecessary dumping could be fixed, then it's maybe worth considering some alleviation of the necessary cases (like saving a buffer that's being used).

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Paladin

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 2:21 pm

Regular contributor Joined: 20 Apr 2006 Posts: 99 Location: Lichfield

R2-D2 wrote:

So that sounds like a bug, doesn't it?

You didn't set that recording on the same channel as the TS buffer did you Smile

R2-D2

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 2:45 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 12148

Paladin wrote:

You didn't set that recording on the same channel as the TS buffer did you

That's one of the necessary cases, at least from the point of view of the Toppy firmware which doesn't like doing overlapping recordings the same channel .

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Andy K

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 5:26 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 14 Jun 2005 Posts: 3520

well I'm quite pleased you are looking at this, but most of all shocked ! Wink

Personally i think that current channel gets moved to another slot/path (them 3 things, 1 playback and 2 record ?) which causes the loss. I say this because usually you see a drop out in video while it gets transfered.

I know you love to fix problems, but personally I think it would be better if you could work on a system where by the buffer gets saved to a rec if your not at time zero when your about to loose it. (as I may have mentioned before Wink

) (i.e a 2nd recording starts). But maybe that will be part 2.

glenmcfar

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 5:41 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 07 Dec 2006 Posts: 4519 Location: Dundonald, Ayrshire, Scotland

In my attempts to break the timeshift buffer I came up with this. Note the bookmark positions... Anyone seen that before?

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R2-D2

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 6:18 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 12148

Andy K wrote:

But maybe that will be part 2.

Did you miss the last paragraph? Smile

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Andy K

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 8:08 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 14 Jun 2005 Posts: 3520

yeah I see bookmarks all over the place loads. (when using timeshift). Not linked to loosing the buffer as far as I have seen.

I guess I now understand what the last para means Smile

simonc

Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2008 10:43 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 12 Apr 2005 Posts: 5648 Location: Cheltenham

Take it from me, timeshift is a tricky bugger, so I'm not surprised the bookmarks are a bit squiffy. It did my head in trying to get Quickjump to deal with timeshift. I'm still not convinced it handles it entirely correctly...

R2-D2

Posted: Tue Nov 11, 2008 9:27 am

Frequent contributor Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 12148

Nobody?

I've just managed to do a logged failure (dumped buffer), and comparing that against a very similar success showed the only differences in the logged data were the channels being used. Confused

It seems more likely that the log didn't contain the critical data rather than the failure being caused by the channel (or being random), but stranger things have happened in the past...

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R2-D2

Posted: Tue Nov 11, 2008 8:17 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 12148

Latest thoughts are that it might be timing related, possibly because of other activity.

The firmware does something very odd if the timer is chosen to start on slot 1 because slot 0 is currently being used for timeshifting (which is quite common): it moves the timeshift to slot 1 and re-allocates the timer to slot 0. I can't really see the point of this, and the way it moves things seems (to me) to be incomplete. I suspect it could be missing something subtle, which sometimes causes the house of cards to topple. It might explain why the timeshift buffer can either be lost or you're just dropped to Live.

Next thing to try is disabling this "feature"...

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R2-D2

Posted: Tue Nov 11, 2008 10:20 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 12148

Following that line of thought: [Kt] KeepTimeshift dumps the pointless slot-moving bit of code. In constructing this patch I found that a few of the very early (2003/4) firmwares I have didn't appear to have the code (which is quite normal and I didn't investigate further) -- the only other exceptions were two firmwares for the TF5020 and TF5030 (which I think are Russian... [link to other thread... Smile

]). Now these firmwares are from this year and late last year, and investigating further shows this stupid bit of code is missing from the routine, with no other apparent changes. Seems like someone else spotted the crappiness of that code and fixed it, as has been seen before a couple of times... And (of course) the fix has not been brought across to any other firmware.

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glenmcfar

Posted: Tue Nov 11, 2008 10:26 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 07 Dec 2006 Posts: 4519 Location: Dundonald, Ayrshire, Scotland

You truly are a hero. A geeky one, but a hero nonetheless Wink

Glen.

humphrey1

Posted: Tue Nov 11, 2008 10:56 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 25 Feb 2006 Posts: 205 Location: Hannington

I concur. Great work. Going to try this now.

This new patch makes one realise (yet again) how much one becomes conditioned to accept useless 'features' as being just 'one of those things that the Toppy does'...

...and quite how good the Toppy must be in other respects for us to have put up with them...

...and how great the Toppy is once R2-D2 has patched out its imperfections. Smile

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Andy K

Posted: Thu Nov 13, 2008 7:08 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 14 Jun 2005 Posts: 3520

Within 3 minutes of installing it i've had a problem !

Not sure whether this is to blame at the moment, I'll investigate after I finish recording.

F/W 5.12.25 PHT2UFXp2Xw3RpPcBf2BqRsRh3He3Ra3Cf2CtAb Kt
Timeshift OFF (yeah ok a but unlikely and silly)
Was recording ITV1 and watching Live.
I pressed blue (quickjump -15s or maybe f/w -10s) and the box rebooted.

EDIT1: Enabled timeshift Pressed blue and it rebooted again

Without recording, just the buffering it still reboots. I'm guessing it doesn't like 5.12.25

EDIT2: removed patch and rebooted. It still does it Sad

Any sugguestions which patch may cause this sort of thing welcome. I guess I better put some unpatched firmware / tappless and see what happens Sad

EDIT3: Tapless (and without Kt) it still reboots. So I guess that means it much be a patch

R2-D2

Posted: Thu Nov 13, 2008 7:37 pm

Frequent contributor Joined: 18 Dec 2006 Posts: 12148

Andy K wrote:

I pressed blue (quickjump -15s or maybe f/w -10s)

Blue doesn't do that on later UK firmwares, doesn't it? And while it's interesting to discover quirks about 5.12.25, you may be banging your head against a wall. Certainly there's not much I could do to help since I can't even run it.

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