[mythtv-users] Gigabyte Nforc3 + x86_64 + PVR150 + FC6 no worky

[cromworshipper-mythtvlist at yahoo.com]

Hi Brian.

--- Brian Wood <beww at beww.org> wrote:

> 
> On Nov 21, 2006, at 1:24 PM, <cromworshipper-mythtvlist at yahoo.com>  
> wrote:
> 
> > I had a MythTV setup working well with FC4 i386.  I did a clean  
> > install of
> > FC6 x86_64 which went reasonably well, but with one major problem.   
> > I'm using
> > the atrpms repository for nvidia driver, ivtv driver, and mythtv.
> >
> > The recorded video plays fine for a few seconds and then flickers  
> > or tears
> > very badly.  It's different for different channels, some play with  
> > only a bit
> > of tearing/flickering while others are much worse.
> >
> 
> As with any troubleshooting procedure you have to narrow down where  
> the problem lies. In this case the first thing would be to figure out  
> if the problem is with the recording or the playback.

I'm convinced it's the recording because all the shows that I recorded prior
to upgrading play back well.

> I'd start by looking at the direct output of the card with mplayer to  
> make sure the card is producing a good mpeg stream. Then record the  
> card's output directly to a file and make sure that's OK. Then have  
> Myth make a recording.
> 
> Do the Myth recordings play OK with mplayer or some other player?  
> This would confirm the card is recording OK because if it isn't you  
> do not have a Myth problem at all.
> 
> You might also have a problem with your drive subsystem. Check  
> obvious stuff like DMA being enabled etc. "hdparm -tT" will show you  
> your basic drive performance.

Again, I doubt this is the problem because all the shows recorded before the
upgrade to x86_64 play without a problem.  hdaprm -tT reported that each
drive reads about 57 MB/s.  hdparm doesn't report the DMA setting for SATA
drives, but it is on for the IDE drives and their read performance is about
the same.

> It's just a case of eliminating one thing at a time until you are  
> left with the problem issue.

Exactly.  What do I look at next?  I'm out of ideas.

My feeling currently is that there's a bug in either the kernel or the ivtv
driver.  One of the issues that showed up during all of this was the AGP
aperture.  I did not notice before, but it was set to 32M by the BIOS.  After
finding out that my Gigabyte motherboard hid that setting (Gigabyte users
take note: pressing CONTROL+F1 will add an additional menu to your BIOS setup
screen), I set the AGP aperture to 256M for my 128M geforce FX5200 and fixed
the hang when X started.  What other issues to I have to know about to get my
x86_64 install to work?

I think I'm going to be forced to go with FC6 i386.  

So far I haven't even got a "works for me" or a "me too" on the combination
of Athlon 64 running x86_64 + FC6 + ivtv with or without an nVidia card
and/or nVidia chipset.  Anyone?  Bueller?

Thanks for thinking with me, Brian.

John