[mythtv-users] powerdown a masterbackend box

[Johannes Niess]

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Am Sonntag, 15. Februar 2004 13:48 schrieb Henk Poley:
> > Van: Johannes Niess <linux at johannes-niess.de>
> >
> > The tricky part is to have the box power up again for the next recording.
> > How to do that depends on your hardware, kernel, BIOS setiings, etc. I
> > recommend to test both routes from the command line:
> > A) "apmsleep +1m" or " <set rtc alarm>; apm -S"
> > B) echo "2004-02-15 12:17:00" >/proc/acpi/alarm; echo 4 >
> > /proc/acpi/sleep
>
> I've used nvram_wakeup (to set the RTC alarm) on my Asus Pundit, and a full
> 'shutdown -h now'. Yes, it might boot slower than with hibernation, but
> takes even less juice.
>
> So that's a 3rd option.

That looks like directly messing with CMOS and is too dangerous for me. In the 
end alarm data from APM or ACPI ends up there, too. But that uses official 
code pathes.

>
> > Route A requires APM support in your kernel and luck that BIOS switches
> > off the fans.
> >
> > Route B uses ACPI and may need a 2.6 kernel. Even then it does not result
> > in a "resume from disk" for me, but in a not so clean reboot. With a 2.4
> > kernel you could also try to the other integers to /proc/acpi/sleep. But
>
> be
>
> > prepared for unclean shutdown.
>
> Doesn't it require more than this normaly (aka, most X servers don't like
> hibernation since the video-card will be reset, so you need to stop and
> start it, etc.)?

I end up sleeping in ACPI level S4 and the box is doing a standard boot when 
waked up.

>
> > As I have no dedicated mythtv box I need more intelligence before
> > shuting down. Load < 0.1 and no logins need to be checked.
>
> How did you add that, load checking? Some 'watchdog deamon' that kills the
> frontend and backend when both have been idle for X minutes? And and
> restarts it (how do you do that on a managed desktop?) when the machine
> wakes up again?

I'm planning to do that in the shutdown skript. But as I think about it, I 
might need to restart the backend before shutdown. "at" could handle that.

> I'd like to have my frontend 'always on'. But that seems to be impossible
> with MythTV 0.14, since the frontend connection keeps the backend from
> shutting down, and the frontend doesn't disconnect after some timeout.
>
> > P.S: When do the shutdown timers start? Before or after ad cleaning and
> > transcoding?
>
> Does commercial skip even work in Germany? (you are german, aren't you?
> noticing the .de adress)

I've set it to "notice" but it is not that much use. Especially when watching 
non-commercial channels. I'm looking forward for the com-free feature in 
0.15. It'll mark channels as having no commercials and skips commercial 
detection.

Greetings from Bonn,

Johannes Nieß
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