[mythtv-users] Recommendations for Myth Frontend on Raspberry Pi?

[Tom Harris]

On Mon, Mar 13, 2017 at 9:59 PM, Tom Harris <thom.j.harris at gmail.com> wrote:

>
>
>
> On Mon, Mar 13, 2017 at 1:12 PM, Peter Bennett <cats22 at comcast.net> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On 03/13/2017 01:04 AM, Tom Harris wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Mar 9, 2017 at 12:46 PM, Phill Edwards <philledwards at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 9 Mar 2017 16:23, "Tom Harris" <thom.j.harris at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> There are a bunch of threads, files, etc. for getting mythfrontend
>>> running on a Raspberry Pi.  But, some of them appear no longer
>>> maintained/updated.
>>> So, I'm wondering what's the current recommendation for a Pi frontend
>>> deployment.
>>>
>>>
>>> This page says it's up to date for 0.28
>>> https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi
>>>
>>
>> I had some time to set up a new Pi3 frontend this weekend.  I basically
>> replicated the same experience from when I tried a little more than a year
>> ago.  1080i was still not usable for me.   It seems like others have this
>> working.. what am I missing?
>>
>> My experience was:
>>
>> 1. Spent a lot of time debugging.  This is a recurring theme in my long
>> experience with MythTV.  I got random frontend hangs, which I thought were
>> related to video decoding.  But, after much debugging got it down to the
>> "query_cache" settings in MySQL.  Once I disabled that the frontend became
>> reliable.
>>
>> 2. US Broadcast MPEG2 @ 720P works great.
>>
>> 3. US Broadcast MPEG2 @1080i does not work well.   I get video playback,
>> but with frequent audio hiccups and some video hiccups.  The default
>> de-interlacer setting of 'Advanced (HW)' was quite bad.  When I changed it
>> to "Fast (hw)' it worked much better -- but still had audio/video hiccups.
>>
>> MythTV version: 0.28 (up-to-date frontend and backend)
>> Video Settings: OpenMax normal,  Decoder: Openmax, renderer: openmax, OSD
>> Renderer: OpenGL; Primary deinterlacer: Fast(HW)
>> MPEG2 license enabled: verified by command line and CPU load during
>> playback
>> Output: HDMI @ 1080P on 4K TV
>>
>> Any tips on reliable 1080i MPEG2 playback?
>>
>>
>>
>> Did you look at the "System Performance" section in the Raspberry Pi Page?
>> https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi
>> If you still have a problem, try running with -v playback. See if there
>> are any audio sync errors or other messages displayed.
>>
>
>
> Thanks!  I re-read that and spent some more time getting the Alsa:Default
> working.   I had gotten static with that before and switched to
> OpenMax:hdmi.   I switched to Stereo and made sure all the DD/DTS/etc.
> options were disabled and Alsa:Default now  works and 1080i MPEG2 playback
> is smooth.
>
> With the Pi3, the UI is quite responsive.  I'll definitely be giving this
> a try to replace LibreElec/Kodi that I've been using for the last year.
>
>
A couple more notes on further testing:

- I had a few crashes of the frontend - but, after looking at the logs I
found that it was actually the kernel oom (out of memory) killer killing
mythfrontend.
  - I changed the GPU memory from 256MB to 128MB for some more head room
and playback is fine.  Is there any reason to believe this will be a
limitation?  The performance tips in the wiki recommend 256MB and
increasing to 320MB if playback was not smooth.

- I tested several themes earlier and I'm guessing that contributed to the
oom kills. I switch to a simpler 720p theme and the frontend memory usage
seems reduced.
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