[mythtv-users] Xorg CPU usage - stuttering video

Rich West Rich.West at wesmo.com
Thu Apr 26 00:45:32 UTC 2007


Eric wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I'm having a problem running mythtv. I've tried searching on google and
> asking in the #mythtv-users support channel on IRC--no satisfactory
> answers so far.
>
> When I first boot my system, log in, and run mythtvfrontend, everything
> seems to work fine. CPU usage is low, even with mythcommflag running.
> But after many hours of watching recorded TV or navigating the menu,
> video playback gets choppy. The sound skips a little and the framerate
> reduces to an uneven 15 or 20fps (this is my guess from looking at the
> screen). If I check top when the system is having this problem, I see
> that Xorg is using almost all of the CPU time.
>
> The "half" fix is to press the forward button followed the back button
> on my remote--that fixes the stuttering sound but the video remains
> choppy. Xorg CPU usage remains high. After a while, the sound stuttering
> comes back.
>
> The "full" fix is to kill the X server with ctrl-alt-backspace, log back
> in, and run mythtvfrontend. After doing this, Xorg CPU usage goes back
> to normal. Of course, if I keep mythfrontend running for several more
> hours, the problem crops up again.
>
> HARDWARE
> --------
> CPU: Athlon XP 2500+ (1.83GHz)
> MEM: 1GB DDR PC333
> Video: XFX GeForce 6800 (NOT ultra)
> System HDD: Seagate ATA 160GB
> Video HDD: Seagate SATA 250GB
> Tuner: Hauppauge PVR-150
> Remote: Microsoft MCE remote with USB IR receiver (came with the
> PVR-150)
>
> SOFTWARE
> --------
> OS: Ubuntu Edgy Eft 6.10
> Kernel: Linux eric-desktop 2.6.17-10-generic #2 SMP Fri Oct 13 18:45:35
> UTC 2006 i686 GNU/Linux
> Video driver: nVidia binary driver v87.74
> XvMC: "XvMC Standard" reported by mythtvfrontend
>
> If you can provide any insight into this problem, I would really
> appreciate it. :)

I had a similar problem with my "proof of concept" system when I was 
starting out with MythTV in November and it turned out to be a 
compatibility problem between the motherboard and the nVidia card.  You 
could try updating the nVidia driver to the latest version to see if 
that helps..

-Rich



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