Stability Issues with 0710Beta3? Please post here....

[colinjones]

I am trying to get together a picture of who (if anyone) is having stability issues with beta3. I have had a lot of issues, and rebuilt many times with many different combinations of settings, but am still having these issues. The question is being asked, is this just my hardware, or a more general issue with beta3, or a combination of both. If you have had any stability issues during using beta3, can you post here, please, and answer the following questions?

Stability: TV works initially, but then stops receiving TV and comes up No Signal; you get video through TV, but no audio; after using TV, video for DVDs, video files, etc doesn't work but sound does; after a while for no obvious reason video stops working; screensaver stops working; other stability issues.

If you have had any of these types of stability issues (rather than just installation issues around getting your monitor/TV to work), please can you post here and briefly explain which you have had, and also provide the details below:

Motherboard make/model
Chipset (eg nVidia xxx onboard/ATI card/nVidia 7300GT card)
CPU model and clockspeed
TV Tuner card
Chose VDR or MythTV
64bit or 32bit
CD install or DVD

[wbs]

0710Beta2

MythTV works for about 20 seconds, then the screen freezes.  Same for composite or TV input.  Sound has a hum to it.

Motherboard make/model:                                                           ASUS M2N32-SLI
Chipset (eg nVidia xxx onboard/ATI card/nVidia 7300GT card)            nVidia GE Force 8500
CPU model and clockspeed                                                          AMD Athlon 64 X2
TV Tuner card                                                                          Happauge DVR 950
Chose VDR or MythTV                                                                MythTV
64bit or 32bit                                                                           32bit
CD install or DVD                                                                       DVD

[geoffrey]

I am experiencing stability issues although not neccessarily connected to the TV function.  My set up is listed in my signature.  I use Myth TV and installed with the DVD.

My system seems to simply hang/freeze every so often.  It has happened several times while using the "Computing" feature (watching Youtube videos) and several times while the system was simply idle.  This morning the Flickr screensaver was running but my network was not functioning (other non-mce rlated machines on the network had no internet access) and the LinuxMCE box was unresponsive.

A reboot seems to get everything going again.

[royw]

I'm experiencing the occasional lockup problem.  I've spent hours searching thru logs hoping for a hint without success.  My original hypothesis was a thermal problem.  So installed lmsensors and added noisy fans.  The other day I hit a repeatable scenario that will lock the system.  Just start copying a lot of media (dvd) files to an nfs server.  Observed about 30% CPU load with highest reported MD temp of 52C (CPU highest 40C).  Using IR thermometer, highest observed temp was 92F.  Upgraded BIOS the other day and have had one lockup since.  Ran memtest 2 hours, no problems.  Currently thinking it might be my linksys PCI ethernet card.  Plans are to replace card and if that don't work replace MB.  And if that don't work, then it's got to be LMCE...

Motherboard make/model                 Gigabyte GA-MA69G-S3H (don't recommend, ATI graphics)
Chipset                                          nvidia 7600 GS (replaced fan with silent cooler)
CPU model and clockspeed                AMD 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4800+
TV Tuner card                                 none
Chose VDR or MythTV                       MythTV
64bit or 32bit                                  64
CD install or DVD                             dvd, new install, hybrid

Other hardware:
Zalman HD135 case (don't recommend, bad airflow)
Zalman ZM600-HP power supply (very quiet)
2GB RAM TWIN2X2048-6400C4
WDC WD5000AAKS
WDC WD10EACS
Linksys gigabit ethernet pci adapter

Problems Solved
It was a combination of thermal and a bad router.  The system has been stable past few weeks.  One issue remains where dvd playback will go to low frame rate (motion in video stutters).  This typically happens after ripping a few dozen movies and watching a few movies over a few days.  Rebooting the core/hybrid restores frame rate to normal.

[orionsune]

I am also experiencing some issues.

1. MythTV sometimes will work for about 20 seconds then freeze, sometimes 5 mins and freeze.  Sometimes 5 hours and freeze.  Very random.

Also

2. My system will lock up at least once a day, causing me to reboot it once a day.  I will come home from work, and it's locked up.

Very annoying.  I am going to try and install 7.04 tonite.  I started off using 710 Beta 3, and have had to re-install 20 plus times before collecting all the proper hardware and equipment.  I finally have everything lmce wants, and a setup i'm happy with, so I install one last time (or so I thought), and ended up with this.


Nforce6M-A Motherboard
AMD X2 3800+
4 GB DDR2 667Mhz RAM
80GB SATA HD
PVR-150 MCE Tuner
Nvidia 6800 PCI-E Video Card
On board NIC
Intel 1GB NIC
Generic DVD-RW
Using MythTV
Installed 710B3 AMD64

Has anyone an update on this?

Did anyone solve their problem? How?
Did reverting back to 704 solve the problem for any of you guys?
Does the am64 version only one affected?
I also suspected overheating initially, but again after some investigation, my system is running well below tolerance limits.

[seth]

I solved my mythtv issues by disabling sync to vblank and wiki'd the process
 http://wiki.linuxmce.org/index.php/Nvidia_Card_Tweaks_For_Better_MythTV_and_UI_Performance

This resolved all of my issues. It also helps to run mythfrontend as root in a kde desktop konsole session, and change the Bit Rate, to a lower variable under transcoders default and LiveTV settings.

I have mine set for 4000 and max set to 4500.

This may also help.

Best of Luck 

[orionsune]

I had followed your wiki instructions on a previous installation, not for stability issues but just because it claimed better performance.  Normally i'd say that would explain why I didn't have this problem on my previouis install, thanx for pointing that out.

I tried this on this installation and it does not help.  Myth freezes within 1 to 20 seconds like clockwork.  I just can't believe i've put all this effot research and money into building a nice settop box for lmce, and when I get all my hardware collected and finally builld the final box, this is what happens.  It must have something to do with my hardware.

Previously I ran a old ass socket 754 motherboard.
AMD Sempron 3800
AGP Nvidia 6200
1GB RAM
PVR 150MCE
(never locked up, never froze)
Piece of shit right?  So I put together a

ECS NCFORCE6-MA
AMD X2 4800
4GB RAM
PCI-E Nvidia 6800
(freezes withint 1 - 20 seconds)

I'm begining to suspect video hardware.  I've ran a comprehensive test of memory, video, hard drive with no errors.  Also I can run mythtv from kde as root and it NEVER freezes.  So it's clearly an issue with lmce.  It's starting to look alot like hell.

I'll be building another AGP based system tonite.  a socket 939 AMD X2 3800 with an ATI 1950, and if the ati doesn't work I have a nVidia 6200 AGP to fall back on.

[orionsune]

After alot of useless troubleshooting I finally came up with this...

Well, the only thing I knew for sure was if I run mythfrontend from kde, it never freezes.  So what is the difference I ask myself... so I took a look at what kind of command line options lmce uses to fire up mythtv with "ps -ax | grep mythfrontend" and found in my case it uses

Code: [Select]

/usr/bin/mythfrontend -v all -w mythfrontend -geometry 1280x720

so I ran mythfrontend using the same command line options, but inside kde and try to watch tv, it freezes.
if I run mythfrontend with no command line options it doesn't freeze...

[colinjones]

Time to progressively remove each of the options (there's only 3 so it won't take long!) Until it stops freezing again in KDE. Then re-add all but the last one and confirm it was only that option. Then maybe tinker with it to see if there is a stable setting for it. Either way, log a mantis about it as it sounds like an easy thing to fix...

[orionsune]

I played around with my tuner cards buffers settings.  Didn't seem to help any, but this is what I used and placed in /etc/modprobe.d/options

Code: [Select]

options ivtv enc_yuv_buffers=32 enc_mpg_buffers=16 enc_vbi_buffers=16 enc_pcm_buffers=16


[colinjones]

Sorry, I meant the command line options you discovered that LMCE uses but you don't.

[orionsune]

Time to progressively remove each of the options (there's only 3 so it won't take long!) Until it stops freezing again in KDE. Then re-add all but the last one and confirm it was only that option. Then maybe tinker with it to see if there is a stable setting for it. Either way, log a mantis about it as it sounds like an easy thing to fix...

I would if I could get the activation email from them.  I've been trying to create an account on mantis for a month, i have probably 30 or so fake aliases, tried different email addresses too. So I gave up a long time ago.

[colinjones]

That was just a function of a more general email issue that the LMCE sites were having at the time (including these forums) - try again now - the email issue was fixed a week or so ago.

If it still doesn't work, after you have all the details on what you tried, you can send me them and I will log the ticket for you.

Colin

[orionsune]

That was just a function of a more general email issue that the LMCE sites were having at the time (including these forums) - try again now - the email issue was fixed a week or so ago.

If it still doesn't work, after you have all the details on what you tried, you can send me them and I will log the ticket for you.

Yes I actually tried one more time before making that last post about it, I still recieved no e-mail.

Time to progressively remove each of the options (there's only 3 so it won't take long!) Until it stops freezing again in KDE. Then re-add all but the last one and confirm it was only that option. Then maybe tinker with it to see if there is a stable setting for it. Either way, log a mantis about it as it sounds like an easy thing to fix...

I did narrow down the command line option causing mythtv to freeze.

Out of the command:

Code: [Select]

/bin/sh /usr/bin/mythfrontend -v all -w mythfrontend -geometry 1280x720
(might want to be sitting)the parameter "-v all" is the culprit.  How does logging level cause that?  Well I was so skeptical, I ran myth with and without that single option probably 20 times.... it never froze when I ran it without "-v all"... but when I use "-v all" it freezes withint 1 - 20 seconds like clockwork.

So my next question, can someone tell me or point me to what and where the command is being called from so I can remove that parameter?

[colinjones]

no idea where it is called from... you could do a "find"!

Have logged the issue - http://mantis.linuxmce.org/view.php?id=4014