[mythtv-users] Video card update fail

Stephen Worthington stephen_agent at jsw.gen.nz
Thu Oct 11 02:59:25 UTC 2018


On Wed, 10 Oct 2018 15:23:17 -0700, you wrote:

>On Wed, Oct 10, 2018 at 2:57 PM Greg Oliver <oliver.greg at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Oct 10, 2018 at 4:32 PM Allen Edwards <allen.p.edwards at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Oct 10, 2018 at 2:12 PM Mark Perkins <perkins1724 at hotmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 11 October 2018 6:53:56 am Allen Edwards <allen.p.edwards at gmail.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> My reply was too long with the log that Mark requested so it didn't get
>>>>> posted.  See end for comments without the log in THIS color.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>> Here is the log <http://l-36.com/mythtv.txt>.  I tried Steven's patch
>>> for the rtc and it didn't work. Not sure how important that is as I do not
>>> see the audio video sync issues in the log.

What does this command show:

ls -al /dev/rt*

This is what I get with my udev rule working:

root at mypvr:~# ls -al /dev/rt*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root        4 Oct  8 04:30 /dev/rtc -> rtc0
crw-rw---- 1 root mythtv 249, 0 Oct  8 04:30 /dev/rtc0

You can see that the /dev/rtc0 device is now group "mythtv".  For this
to work, mythfrontend must be running from a user that is also in
group "mythtv".  This command should show the users that are in group
"mythtv":

getent group mythtv | awk -F: '{print $4}'

Then check that mythfrontend is running as one of those users:

ps -ef | grep mythfr

This is what I get:

root at mypvr:~# getent group mythtv | awk -F: '{print $4}'
stephen
root at mypvr:~# ps -ef | grep mythfr
stephen   4990  3102  0 15:52 ?        00:00:00 /bin/sh
/usr/bin/mythfrontend --service
stephen   5002  4990 14 15:52 ?        00:00:25
/usr/bin/mythfrontend.real --syslog local7 -v media
root      5263 29743  0 15:55 pts/2    00:00:00 grep --color=auto
mythfr

So mythfrontend.real is running as user "stephen" who belongs to group
"mythtv".

>>> I did notice a block of color in the playback and there was nothing in
>>> the log at the time.  This was just a few minutes ago and not the session
>>> in the log.  I also noticed using VLC on my desktop that it is in the
>>> source file so not a Myth playback problem.  That means it is either 1) in
>>> the transmission 2) A receive error due to low signal strength, bad HD
>>> Homnerun channel, etc, 3) a problem in the backend.
>>>
>>> I don't know if I can put photos in this list so here is a link to a
>>> screen photo.  http://L-36.com/mythtv.jpg
>>>
>>> For now I will see if these latest changes make "Wife Happy" again.
>>>
>>> Allen
>>>
>>
>> I cannot remember (I think Mythbuntu 14) what version you said you were
>> running on things, but I would make sure you are not using Wayland, but
>> Xorg instead and use an older video driver (step down until you get desired
>> results) if that does not fix it.  I have no idea if Mythbuntu tracks
>> Ubuntu version numbering, so unsure if Wayland is even there or not.  I
>> would not recommend using Wayland with 3rd party (non-kernel included)
>> drivers - especially nVidia.  I do not use Wayland for more important
>> reasons to me, but it is worth a shot.
>>
>>
>I am running Mythbuntu 16.  If I said 14, it was an error.  I am not sure
>what Wayland is but I am running X11 so perhaps not Wayland.

I do not think Wayland is in Mythbuntu 16.x.  That happened in 17.10.

>I will see what my wife thinks about the latest changes. I am now running
>VDPAU Normal successfully.  There are some video issues but at least the
>one I saw was not in playback.
>
>I would still need to get audio to both the HiFi (SPDIF) and the TV
>(analog).  Right now I can do one or the other.  The only thing I can think
>of trying is to remove Pulse Audio which might have been installed by my
>son as part of troubleshooting.

Have you tried enabling both outputs in alsamixer and then selecting
ALSA:default as the output in mythfrontend?  That is what works for me
to get analogue and SPDIF at the same time.

>On a related topic, I can't seem to find which tuner was used to record a
>program.  I could swear that I could see that on the old Mythvuntu 8 system.

If you go to a recording and hit the I key twice (info on the remote)
the "Recording Input:" line shows you that.  Depending on your theme,
you may need to scroll down to see it.

>Also, the timer display on programs is gone.  I probably need to start
>different threads for these different problems if I can't find solutions
>with Google.

What do you mean by "timer display"?  Are you talking about the
progress bar across the bottom of the screen when you are playing a
recording and hit the I key once?


I am still looking at your mythfrontend log file, but there are a
couple of obvious things so far.  Your desktop size is showing as:

Desktop video mode: 2560x1024 60.000 Hz

which is a rather strange size.  Here is what mine shows:

Desktop video mode: 1920x1080 59.939 Hz

which matches my TV screen size.

I also have:

UI Screen Resolution: 1920 x 1080

where you have:

UI Screen Resolution: 1280 x 720

So what sort of screen are you using?  What is its native size and
frequency and what other output modes can it handle?  And what theme
are you using?

Generally, things work better when the output you are sending to the
screen matches the physical screen size.  TVs and monitors can handle
output of a different size to the screen, but they may have to
re-render it to do so, which can cause artifacts.  US TVs are
typically quite limited in the number of modes they support, where in
other parts of the world they support many different modes for various
NTSC and PAL screen sizes and frequencies.

From a terminal session opened on the X display, try running this
command:

xrandr

It should show all the video modes that are available for your display
and video card/driver combination.  Here is what mine shows:

root at mypvr:~# xrandr
Screen 0: minimum 8 x 8, current 1920 x 1080, maximum 8192 x 8192
DVI-I-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
VGA-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DVI-I-1 connected primary 1920x1080+0+0 (normal left inverted right x
axis y axis) 1600mm x 900mm
   1920x1080     60.00 +  59.94*   50.00    23.97    60.05    60.00
50.04  
   1280x1024     60.02  
   1280x720      60.00    59.94    50.00  
   1024x768      60.00  
   800x600       60.32  
   720x576       50.00    50.08  
   720x480       59.94    60.05  
   640x480       59.94    59.93  
HDMI-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)

I have an Nvidia 220 card and an old Sony Bravia KDL-32V5500 TV.  It
native display is 1920x1080 and 50 Hz, but it supports most other
TV/video frequencies, as you can see on the 1920x1080 line above.


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