[mythtv-users] Fast CPU, DMA enabled on HD, Xv enabled, still getting pauses in Live TV

Tue Aug 19 10:50:16 EDT 2003

Did you try compiling without -march=athlon-xp?
Just leave it at the default (i586??)...

Someone had a similar problem, and this was the case.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Joe V" <joevph at yahoo.com>
To: "Discussion about mythtv" <mythtv-users at mythtv.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2003 3:44 AM
Subject: Re: [mythtv-users] Fast CPU, DMA enabled on HD, Xv enabled,still
getting pauses in Live TV

> Okay, now I'm starting to go nuts.  I've gone through
> the mailing-list archive, and have tried all sorts of
> things.  Changing DMA parameters, recompiling MythTV
> with -march=xthlon-xp, trying "nice" on mythbackend,
> and several other things.  And I'm still getting
> skips, and with this hardware, I don't see how I could
> be having problems.  All I want to do is run
> mythbackend and mythfrontend on the same PC without
> stuttering in the video/audio.
>
> Perhaps based on my hardware/software setup, somebody
> can make some additional recommendations.
>
> Hardware:
> - Albatron KX400-8X motherboard (brought the ECS board
> back to Fry's, too many problems) - VIA KT400 chipset
> - Athlon XP 2400+ CPU (2GHz real speed, 266MHz FSB)
> - 512MB RAM (DDR333) - the BIOS indicates that the RAM
> is running at 133MHz * 2.5 (333MHz)
> - Matrox G400 Dual-Head (hooked up to a monitor, so
> using Xv)
> - Western Digital Hard Drive UDMA 100
> - Soundblaster Live! 5.1 (using in full-duplex mode
> with kernel drivers)
> - Leadtek Winfast TV 2000 XP (I put in gbuffers=8)
> - Tulip clone Ethernet card (no onboard NIC)
>
> Software:
> - Red Hat Linux 9
> - Recompiled the kernel, Linux-2.4.21, included the
> low-latency and preempt patch
> (/proc/sys/kernel/lowlatency shows 1)
> - Before compiling any software, I set CFLAGS and
> CPPFLAGS to -march=athlon-xp
> - MythTV 0.11
> - Killed off as many of Red Hat's services as possible
> - Using twm as the window manager.
>
> hdparm -Tt shows:
> /dev/hda:
>  Timing buffer-cache reads:   128 MB in  0.41 seconds
> =312.20 MB/sec
>  Timing buffered disk reads:  64 MB in  1.42 seconds =
> 45.07 MB/sec
>
> I'm using ext3 filesystems for everything, two
> partitions, one for root, one for /home. which is
> where MythTV files are stores (using symlinks from
> /mnt/store).  The ext3 filesystem is mounted with
> noatime, and in grub.conf, I put in
> rootflags=data=writeback.
>
> I'm not really stressing things out, I'm recording
> RTJPEG at 480x480, MP3 quality 7.  Switching to MPEG4
> (as suggested in a post in the mailing-list) didn't
> help any.  I have plenty of CPU time (it never goes
> higher than 50% user, never less than 30% idle.  Not
> using jitter control, not using experimental A/V sync,
> just using the default options.
>
> The only thing that I can think might possibly causing
> some problems is that I have only one hard drive for
> everything.  Either that, or I do I need a real 2.4GHz
> machine (i.e. Intel?)
>
> Please folks, any suggestions?  Any at all?
>
> -- Joe
>
> --- Joe V <joevph at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > Brian,
> >
> > Well, it helps a bit...  I upgraded to bttv 0.7.107
> > (and specigied gbuffers=10), put my hard drive and
> > DVD-ROM on seperate cables (don't know if that will
> > help much), as well as forcing 32-bit operations,
> > and
> > the stutters, when they happen don't cause such as
> > big
> > of a delay.
> >
> > I don't recall any stutters last night when I put my
> > DDR400 module (running at DDR266) from my desktop in
> > the machine with those changes (watching for a good
> > 30
> > minutes), so it could be a memory bandwidth issue as
> > well as a bttv driver issue (and maybe the HD).
> >
> > I'll keep experimenting and see what works.
> >
> > Are you using your machine as just a frontend, or as
> > both frontend and backend (as I'm doing)?
> >
> > -- Joe
> >
> > --- Brian <brian at boid.isa-geek.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > I'm having no issues running .11 with a k7s5a,
> > duron
> > > 1.1, 512mb of pc133, ata100 drives, TV Wonder VE,
> > > generic 2.4.21, bttv 0.7.107 (Could not get 0.9.x
> > to
> > > run properly)
> > >
> > > Hope this can help point you in the right
> > direction
> > > :/
> > >
> > > Cheerios
> > >
> > > :)
> > >
> > > On Sat, 16 Aug 2003 23:37:16 -0700 (PDT)
> > > Joe V <joevph at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > > This is completely strange, I don't understand
> > it.
> > > >
> > > > I upgraded to an AMD Athlon XP 2400+ (real
> > speed,
> > > > 2GHz), with an ECS KS57A Pro motherboard today.
> > > The
> > > > motherboard isn't the greatest, but for $89.99
> > for
> > > the
> > > > combo, you can't really beat that.
> > > >
> > > > Anyway, I have my profile for Live TV setup for
> > > > 480x480, RTJPEG, MP3 Audio compression, level 4
> > > > (middle of the pack or so).  When I run "top", I
> > > see
> > > > that mythbackend ranges from 20-43% (CPU), and
> > > that
> > > > mythfrontend ranges from 3-15%.  I have DMA
> > > enabled on
> > > > my hard drive (hdparm shows this), XVideo is
> > > enabled
> > > > on the second head of the Matrox G400 I'm using.
> >
> > > The
> > > > card being used is a Leadtek Winfast TV XP 2000
> > > Deluxe
> > > > (bttv), and I'm using the 2.4.21 kernel,
> > unpatched
> > > > from kernel.org.
> > > >
> > > > Despite this, I still get a stutter in the
> > > video/audio
> > > > every now and then (if you average it out,
> > > probably
> > > > once every ten minutes).  The output of "top"
> > > doesn't
> > > > seem to spike any, so I don't think that it's
> > the
> > > CPU
> > > > not being powerful enough (it should be).
> > > >
> > > > I've tried a bunch of things...  Swapping RAM
> > > > (currently I'm using PC133, but I took the
> > DDR400
> > > from
> > > > my desktop out and tried it), I've tried not
> > > enabling
> > > > the second head on the Matrox (using a monitor),
> > > using
> > > > ALSA and OSS, using KDE and Blackbox, heck,
> > almost
> > > > everything I could think of except changing the
> > > video
> > > > card (maybe that's it?).  I've also turned off
> > > > unnecessary services in Red Hat 9 (turned off
> > > > sendmail, cups, etc.).
> > > >
> > > > Does anybody have any further suggestions?  At
> > > this
> > > > point, I'm almost suspecting a hardware problem
> > of
> > > > some sort.
> > > >
> > > > -- Joe
> > > >
> > > > __________________________________
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> > > --
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