[mythtv-users] Please Wait...

[Nick Rout]

On Mon, Apr 26, 2010 at 3:01 PM, Brent Bolin <brent.bolin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Apr 25, 2010 at 9:36 PM, Dave Day <david.scott.day at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 04/25/2010 09:34 PM, Harry Coin wrote:
>>
>> Are there any settings or other changes I can make to reduce the time
>> between choosing a recording and when it plays, or choosing a live channel
>> before it starts?
>> I'm wondering what is going on during the 'Please Wait...' that happens
>> between when a recording is selected and when it starts playing.  It just
>> takes so much longer than commercial DVR's that come with dish, cable
>> etc.    It makes 'surfing channels' pretty much impossible.
>> My setup is a master backend, a couple of slave backends, and a couple of
>> frontends.   Whether the frontend is a really fast box or an older model
>> seems not to matter.  Whether the show is 'dish 301 low def' or ATSC OTA
>> hidef appears to matter little as well.   What settings or setups can
>> improve the time between the choosing of a recording / channel and when it
>> begins?
>>
>> Thanks for such a great effort, all the minutes I don't watch commercials,
>> what a gift.  An online version of 'no erectile dysfunction or reverse
>> mortgage' spam filter.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>>
>> That very small delay is due to the fact that Myth buffers the program to
>> disk before presenting it to you, since you now have the highly convenient
>> ability to pause/rewind/fastforward LiveTV very much like you are already
>> used to doing on DVD's or your VCR.  It's a mighty small price to pay, I'd
>> say......
>>
>> Most Myth oldtimers don't "surf" much.  Instead they go "Advanced" ->
>> "Manage Recordings" -> "Schedule Recordings", where you can browse the EPG,
>> or browse lists of programs by many categories, or alphabetically, etc.  For
>> instance, I just ticked off the movies I want recorded for the next two
>> weeks.  And I already have the various repeating shows that I like scheduled
>> so I mostly browse the EPG for new ideas every few days and check the list
>> of recorded shows when I find myself needing some down time/entertainment.
>>
>> I had for years complained that I had 200 channels and nothing to
>> watch.....  Myth has made us realize how wrong that was.  There was way more
>> to watch (and of good quality) than we could ever have time for.  It just
>> wasn't being shown during my down time.   And Myth's search functions have
>> help me find programming that I thought had completely disappeared but had
>> just switched to  more obscure times and channels.  As a matter of fact, we
>> decided that we had so much more good content available that we canceled
>> cable and now use OTA TV and still have more content than we have time to
>> watch.  And it is saving us $125/month to boot.
>>
>> For instance, right now I have 30 recording rules defined.  Those rules will
>> have 87 "hits" over the next two weeks.  47 of those will record (the others
>> are shown multiple times and so don't need re-recording).  Now, that means
>> about 24 programs a week!  I can tell you right now, we don't have time to
>> watch all those, so we will have the pleasant task of sampling and selecting
>> the best and watching those.  Additionally, I am a bit of a cabinet
>> maker/carpenter so some of them are crafty shows that I skim and keep the
>> best of for future reference in case of similar projects.
>>
>> So, when we do have some down time, we go straight to "Recorded Programs"
>> and pick from that list.
>>
>> Enjoy,
>> Dave
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>> mythtv-users at mythtv.org
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>>
>>
>
> I agree with this very much.  We too have moved from cable to just OTA
> broadcasts.  It's surprising how much there is to watch when you can
> organize it on your time.
>
> Just to touch on what the original poster said about wait times.  I've
> noticed when firing up the front end for the first time in the morning
> it does take a little more time to start anything.  Either live TV,
> video or recordings.  Not sure if it's the front end making the
> initial back end connection etc...
>
> Is there anything that can be done to make this faster?
>
> Currently running mythbuntu running .22 fixes

could be all sorts of things, but likely some hard drives are spinning
up first thing in the morning.

Hard to keep 'em spinning when everyone these days seems to be intent
on reducing power consumption!

People say good quality ssd's are very fast, but getting enough ssd
storage to keep your recordings on is prohibitive.