Recurring recordings/episodes and Codec question

[bluphant]

Two quick questions for people who know more about this than I:

One of my usages of GBPVR is to have a stock of childrens shows on hand, so that when my kids want to watch TV, we can have some nice control over what they're watching. As such, I record a number of kids shows, and have a small issue I'd like some help with.

When I go to record a specific show, and choose all episodes on this channel, on any day (or whatever the verbage is) I get a "Failed" message, yet the recurring event does show up, and some episodes are flagged to record and show up in my pending list. These seem to be episodes that have not yet had episode-specific information delivered.

Now that GBPVR supports a more granular level of transcoding, I would like to start over with recording some of these shows, record at a higher quality setting, and then have GBPVR work its magic to make me XVIDs overnight.

Given all that, here's what I'm wondering about. I presume that under-the-covers, there is some way that GBPVR knows what it has recorded in the past, episodic information,etc. So I would like to keep the recordings I have now (maybe not episodic information, but want to keep them available). So I guess the question is, is there a way to purge the episode-specific information about specific shows, to allow re-recording of these episodes?

Second question - I'm finding myeslf in codec hell. I'm trying to get my codecs in order. I have some old DIVX files (not XVID) available for the kidlets. I had AC3Filter installed, after reading wiki, i've uninstalled it and gone with FFDSHOW. I'm using VMR9 (I think, I've been playing with the settings) with ffdshow as codec for both video and audio decoders. I have a license for Nvidia PureVideo (or whatever that codec is called) so I could use that, I've tried different combinations with little success). I was having an issue with sound only coming out of the right channel, so I switched to WaveOut which solved that problem, but it seems to have created another. As the video progresses, the video and audio synch gets progressively worse. Earlier today it was so bad that my 4-year old asked "me to fix the TV, its broken". Any suggestions?

Wow I'm a bit rambling today, sorry about that

-Blu

[sub]

Now that GBPVR supports a more granular level of transcoding

Actually nothing has changed on that front for quite a while. If you're talking about the transcoding option that appears when you schedule a recording, the last few releases have accidentally shown that never-completed feature. It doesnt function. You can hide it by setting <ShowTranscodeDuringSchedule>false</ShowTranscodeDuringSchedule> in config.xml.

Given all that, here's what I'm wondering about. I presume that under-the-covers, there is some way that GBPVR knows what it has recorded in the past, episodic information,etc. So I would like to keep the recordings I have now (maybe not episodic information, but want to keep them available). So I guess the question is, is there a way to purge the episode-specific information about specific shows, to allow re-recording of these episodes?

GB-PVR wont record a show if it knows a duplicate is sitting in the 'ready' or 'pending' lists, or in the recently deleted episode list. You can empty this recently deleted episode list by running "PVRX2.exe -removehistory".

[mikeh49]

Codec hell seems to be a common place, you should have lots of company! It seems to result from too many codecs and Windows way of handling them using the filter merit system. Here's what has worked well for me on a similar system with Geforce 6200. BTW, how are you connecting to the TV and what kind of TV (SD?, CRT? LCD? video card resolution?). You might try removing all decoders and starting over from a known baseline.

For SD output via S-video to a CRT TV, I found the Nvidia Purevideo to work well, for both video and audio decoders with a reasonable level of complexity. It seems FFDshow has a lot of capability but also a lot of complexity. Search for posts by csy or check the wiki for Purevideo configuration information, especially hardware acceleration and deinterlacing.

For xvid, I use the "standalone xvid decoder (koepis build)" and it works fine. For DVDs, I use AC3 filter for audio because it solved a low volume problem with previous versions of GBPVR (no idea if this issue still exists, AC3 filter works fine so I haven't made any changes). Some folks swear by AC3 filter and some swear at it; it works for me.

For the audio renderer, I always use the DirectSound:audio device selection. Has worked well for me on several systems, but I have only used 2ch stereo analog out.

Good luck.

[bluphant]

Hey-

I'm running a Samsung TXN3245FP Yes, I'm a geek and I remembered my TV model number offhand. This is a tube-based EDTV, capable of 480p. I run component cables from my GeForce and run in 720x480, the video driver is aware that I'm running an EDTV and has made whatever tweaks it does to get the output nice-nice. Its a good setup, but it also causes some issues since 720x480 is 16:9, and the tv is 4:3, so there are some ramifications (making sure guide stays on screen etc)

I'll do some playing tonight and see if going back to PureVideo solves my problem, and I'll do some reading on removing old codecs. I recently upgraded computer hardware, and that required a OS reinstall - so this box was just rebuilt <2wks ago. Given that, I don't have a lot of the baggage associated with a more "robust" machine....

Audio out is 2 channel, standard speakers in the TV.

-Blu

[bluphant]

Back to direct audio, nvidia codecs. I *think* I left on VMR9 not 100% positive -- sync is at least better if not perfect, some vids still have audio on right speaker only. I think I may have spent enough time on this for now, live with single channel audio for those titles. If anyone has any thoughts I'll give em a go tho....

-Blu