Live TV stutters in server / PC client setup

[cumak]

So, the read operation is more file intensive but is the file written at a more moderate rate that the network can sustain? What if I tried to put the live TV buffer on the client, so the more intensive read operation happens locally and the write operation happens over the network?

[sub]

That may work. Worth a go. Obviously not set up that would work with multiple clients though.

[A_Brass]

Sub, thanks for trying to help with this issue I know this type of usage is not really supported. But . . . .

In my case the stutter is on the "server" the client runs smoothly. For now lets remove the "client". Just consider a GBPVR computer with the config.xml recordings folder changed like this:
example: "f:\recordings" changed to "\\mediaserver\recordings"
and the Live TV buffer changed like this:
example: f:\livebuffer or \\mediaserver\livebuffer

Same folder, same PC, just giving its location as server address rather then the local ("f:\") address. When set up like this watching in progress recordings stutter as does timeshifted TV. It works fine when I change the folders back to "f:\.. . .."

Do you think its actually looking across the network for the folder?

I know its not really designed to do this but I don't understand why its not working. Well it works just not very well.

Anything you can offer to help me understand would be great!
Thanks for a great PVR.

[sub]

Sorry, I dont know.

[jsteele]

A_Brass

If I recall my SMB stuff correctly (its been a while) if you use UNC addressing (\\mediaserver\recordings) the system goes to the network transport to do the I/O even if the target resolves locally. Using the local address (f:\) is significantly faster as the network transport is not involved.

[A_Brass]

Using the local address (f:\) is significantly faster as the network transport is not involved.

It appears that that is the case. I guess I'll just change my recording drive letter to Z on the server. On the Client I'll create a maped network drive to the same Z drive. I hope it works better.

Thanks Sub, jsteele and everyone else for your input.

[cumak]

A_Brass - I tried that same exact setup with the drive mapping. Please let me know if you're able to get live tv playing back smoothly.

Sub - I tried moving my live tv directory to the client to test your idea about the network latentcy when reading the file, but I ran in to a few problems and I did't have time to work on it last night. I won't bother you with details about that, but I was curious why the MVP doesn't have this same problem. Does the MVP read the file in a more straightforward manner?

How difficult would it be to add a "network client" option to the playback configuration, that would allow GB-PVR to read the file without jumping to the end for the latest timestamp? It seems that GB-PVR is already 95% ready to work in a client/server configuration, and this would be a really great feature to include.

Thanks.

[sub]

Sub - I tried moving my live tv directory to the client to test your idea about the network latentcy when reading the file, but I ran in to a few problems and I did't have time to work on it last night. I won't bother you with details about that, but I was curious why the MVP doesn't have this same problem. Does the MVP read the file in a more straightforward manner?

The MVP is very different, and more of a push mode, with everything occurring on the server (except the final decoding step).

How difficult would it be to add a "network client" option to the playback configuration, that would allow GB-PVR to read the file without jumping to the end for the latest timestamp? It seems that GB-PVR is already 95% ready to work in a client/server configuration, and this would be a really great feature to include.

Having the most recent presentation timestamp is very critical, so I'm not sure what my alternative is. I may be able to do is slightly less frequently. I can investigate in future, but it wont be for the next release. I've already got too much on my plate.

[wtg]

...I was curious why the MVP doesn't have this same problem. Does the MVP read the file in a more straightforward manner?

I'll chime in here just because I believe I know the answer to this one. The MVP doesn't really read the file at all, instead it asks the server to send the video and just receives the streamed content from the network. It doesn't do any file seeking, but relies on the server to do it.

In the case of running GBPVR on a client computer, the GBPVR "client" doesn't have any smarts about a GBPVR server - it thinks it's the server and it's reading content off the network. It has to manage all the file IO itself, so it's work is much more intensive than what the MVP has to do.

I'm sure sub will correct me if I'm wrong.

[sub]

yep, thats a pretty good answer.