[mythtv-users] Waited 2 seconds... Still... Any more ideas?

[Eloy A. Paris]

Tony,

"Tony Maro" <tony at maro.net> writes:

> Well, I still can't watch more than 15 minutes or so of live TV without
> a freeze.

I have been experiencing this nasty problem as well. Same symptoms you
report (the frontend freezes, both sound and image, but the backend
seems just fine. Killing the frontend with "killall -1 mythfrontend" and
restarting it again brings it back.)

> Here's what the system is:
>
> AMD 1800+
> Shuttle AK32VN Mobo
> 512 MB RAM
> Voodoo3 3500 w/ TV out
> ATI TV-Wonder VE
> SB Live Value
> On-board NIC
> Mandrake 9.2
> Homebrew LIRC receiver
> Both Frontend/Backend - no other frontends

I also have the same TV tuner card and sound card, although different
Linux distribution. However, I believe this problem has nothing to do
with hardware; it seems to me like an obscure bug in the frontend,
probably in handling of the ringbuffer.

> Here's what I've tried so far:
> *0.12 release
> *0.13 release
[...]

I am running 0.13 now, and upgraded from 0.11 directly to 0.13. I don't
remember seeing this problem with 0.11, but I am not sure since when I
was running 0.11 I had not moved the box into our family room and I only
used it to record shows, not for live TV.

> *Disabled APIC in the lilo.conf (mobo refuses to disable apic
> completely)
> *Added second hard drive, just for ringbuffer, on secondary IDE channel
> *Disabled all onboard components not in use (USB, Sound, floppy drive
> controller)
> *Recompiled my Kernel, trimmed to just what I need
> *ensured proper cooling

I think nothing like this will solve the problem since it is not
hardware-related. If your system is solid for recording and playing back
shows then you should be fine.

> Keep in mind when I say freeze... I mean the video freezes and the
> console is scrolling "Waited 2 seconds"...

Right, same here.

> If there's no ideas, I'm planning on swapping the mobo with a 1.2 GHz
> AMD I have here.  The 1.2 tends to get hot, so I didn't want it in the
> TV cabinet.  Not to mention I bought the Shuttle specifically for this
> project.  

As I said, I believe this has nothing to do with hardware. Instead, why
don't you try this that somebody else suggested here a few days ago:

Start watching live TV, then immediately pause (press the 'p' key) for
30 seconds. After 30 seconds have passed, press the 'p' again to restart
playing. The idea is to see if you get the lockup watching live TV 30
seconds behind the real signal.

I did this once two days ago and didn't get a lockup during the whole
time I left the live TV going (a full night, about 10 hours.)

Try this and report back.

> I'm getting rather frustrated here (er, rather my wife is,
> which is even worse ;-)

I hear ya. I'm on the same boat :-) I moved the MythTV box into our
family room and sold the idea to my wife. She loved it at first but now
is kind of hoping that I pull the plug on the box and reconnect the
cable to the TV directly. But I'm sure this freeze problem will be fixed
at some point.

> I see there have been a few other people posting this problem, but
> developers have seen strangely silent on this issue, offering no
> suggestions that I've seen other than requesting a backtrace once.
> Not faulting the developers, just assuming you guys have never ever
> seen this problem first hand and aren't addressing it right now.

Yes, I wonder why not everybody is having this problem. Seems very
reproduceable to me.

Cheers,

Eloy.-