Recordings scheduled when no free tuners

[Croftie]

I'm getting two issues which may result from the same problem. When scheduling recordings NPVR doesn't always warn if there isn't a tuner free like it used to, it will schedule them and as a result padding is ignored and sometimes recordings fail.

Here is a screenshot of the status window taken at 22:01, logs are attatched too:



I had 4 recordings scheduled, 1 HD to end at 22:00 and three SD to start at 22:00, all recordings had 5 mins pre and post padding.

Tomorrows World A Horizon Special - HD
Stopped recording at 22:00 but stayed in the status window untill 22:05

Celebrity Juice - SD
Started at 22:00

The Body Shocking Show - SD
Started at 22:00

Lee Nelsons Well Funny People - SD
Started at 21:55

The padding is essential because programs don't always stick to the scheduled times.


Another more serious situation I've had a few times is recordings stopping completely, I set several recording over the evening, one of them started recording including the padding, another due to start at the same time with the same padding started but without the padding and stopped the other recording, so all I got of the first recording was the 5 mins of pre padding and the second recording had the start cut off because the pre padding wasn't recorded. If this happens again I'll post the logs.

It seems NPVR has stopped been able to recognise if a tuner is free when scheduling recordings and so tuners are double booked, then when a recording begins it starts juggleing them around but can't keep them all in the air because there arent enough tuners.

[Kiwi]

Are these manual recordings or EPG recordings?

[Croftie]

Their EPG recordings.

[johnsonx42]

I'm not seeing any problem there. Padding isn't considered part of the recording; all scheduling and tuner allocation is done without considering the padding. Then at recording time, NPVR attempts to do the padding if possible, but it's not always possible and wasn't in this case.

The only minor problem I see, which I've reported before, is that when NRecord switches a busy tuner to a new channel as it did at 22:00, it doesn't properly stop the existing recording; this is why you see the "Tomorrow's World..." program still recording until 22:05, even though it really isn't recording any longer - the NDigitalHost stopped delivering data on that stream at 22:00. A bit untidy, but mostly cosmetic.

Another more serious situation I've had a few times is recordings stopping completely, I set several recording over the evening, one of them started recording including the padding, another due to start at the same time with the same padding started but without the padding and stopped the other recording, so all I got of the first recording was the 5 mins of pre padding and the second recording had the start cut off because the pre padding wasn't recorded. If this happens again I'll post the logs.

There was a bug that could cause this to happen in 2.5.9, but has been fixed in 2.6.2 (actually it was fixed about 6 weeks ago with a patch for 2.5.9 which I personally tested). I don't expect you'll encounter this issue again.

[Croftie]

I'm not seeing any problem there. Padding isn't considered part of the recording; all scheduling and tuner allocation is done without considering the padding. Then at recording time, NPVR attempts to do the padding if possible, but it's not always possible and wasn't in this case.

Aaah noooooo, that hasn't always been the case has it? I definatly would of noticed this before now, padding was always honoured and NPVR wouldn't allow me to add a recording if there wasn't a free tuner. Is it possible to have an option so we can choose whether NPVR honours padding or not?

The only minor problem I see, which I've reported before, is that when NRecord switches a busy tuner to a new channel as it did at 22:00, it doesn't properly stop the existing recording; this is why you see the "Tomorrow's World..." program still recording until 22:05, even though it really isn't recording any longer - the NDigitalHost stopped delivering data on that stream at 22:00. A bit untidy, but mostly cosmetic.

I imagine the only time that can cause problems is when using excessive padding, there is one 2.5 hour program I record which is split into 2 parts in the EPG by a 5 mins news program, instead of recording the two parts I just record the first part with sufficient padding to cover the second. If padding was ignored for this I'd lose half the program. I suppose I could setup a manual recording but that's more inconvenient than just using padding.

There was a bug that could cause this to happen in 2.5.9, but has been fixed in 2.6.2 (actually it was fixed about 6 weeks ago with a patch for 2.5.9 which I personally tested). I don't expect you'll encounter this issue again.

I instaleld 2.6.2 on the 4th April and this happened on the 8th, there were loads of scheduled recordings around the same time so maybe it's not completely fixed and only happens when there's a lot going on. If it does happen again I'll report it.

[Jaggy]

Is it possible to have an option so we can choose whether NPVR honours padding or not?

This has been asked for a few times in the past (Oh & I am totally in the for having it camp) .... sub hasn't said he won't do it... but then again he hasn't said he will either..... so.....

there is one 2.5 hour program I record which is split into 2 parts in the EPG by a 5 mins news program, instead of recording the two parts I just record the first part with sufficient padding to cover the second.

and I'm in the exact same situation (except it's Lotto that splits it in half) & I do the same as you do & not honoring padding in this situation is really not very good for the waf

[johnsonx42]

Aaah noooooo, that hasn't always been the case has it? I definatly would of noticed this before now, padding was always honoured and NPVR wouldn't allow me to add a recording if there wasn't a free tuner. Is it possible to have an option so we can choose whether NPVR honours padding or not?

This behavior has always been the same, nothing has changed in this regard since day 1, except that it now tries much harder to make the pre-padding happen; post-padding I think still gets cut without much consideration.

I have advocated for NPVR to have two types of padding, soft-padding which is the same as now, and hard-padding which is considered a mandatory part of the recording (or some other means to forcibly extend an EPG-based recording, whether it's called "padding" or something else). My advocacy in this matter has been to no avail.

I imagine the only time that can cause problems is when using excessive padding, there is one 2.5 hour program I record which is split into 2 parts in the EPG by a 5 mins news program, instead of recording the two parts I just record the first part with sufficient padding to cover the second. If padding was ignored for this I'd lose half the program. I suppose I could setup a manual recording but that's more inconvenient than just using padding.

With the current logic, you'd be better off scheduling the second part with enough pre-padding to cover the first part. As to the manual recording option, I've found it a bit annoying to be repeatedly told the solution to my request for "hard-padding" is to just use manual recordings, as if that would be just as good somehow.

I instaleld 2.6.2 on the 4th April and this happened on the 8th, there were loads of scheduled recordings around the same time so maybe it's not completely fixed and only happens when there's a lot going on. If it does happen again I'll report it.

see if you still have the NRecord log from then; there have been some logging changes that reduce the volume of logging and the 4 NRecord.log files (.log, .1, .2, & .3) now cover a longer period of time. (edit: actually you probably don't... one area that produces more logging than before is the attempt to move recordings to accomodate padding; if you have 5 minutes pre-padding on all your recordings, your NRecord logs probably fill up in a day or less.)

[Kiwi]

Although I use manual recordings and set all pre-padding and post-padding to zero and thus do not have the problem:

I do feel that the program logic should be tweaked such that the pre-padding and post-padding should be considered as part of the whole recording, so in that case, the actual start time should take into account the pre-padding period, and the actual end time should take into account the post-padding period.

[Croftie]

Thanks all, I have put a request in the wishlist forum, if you want to add to it the post is here.

This behavior has always been the same, nothing has changed in this regard since day 1, except that it now tries much harder to make the pre-padding happen; post-padding I think still gets cut without much consideration.

Let me rephrase. something changed making it possible to schedule a recording even if a tunner isn't free, whereas before it wasn't, you'd instead get a popup asking whether to procced or not. You do still get that popup but not all the time like before

I suppose the only thing to do for now is to be carefull when scheduling recordings or use manual recordings instead.

[johnsonx42]

Let me rephrase. something changed making it possible to schedule a recording even if a tunner isn't free, whereas before it wasn't, you'd instead get a popup asking whether to procced or not. You do still get that popup but not all the time like before.

Can you post logs showing this happening? There's no way I can think of that NPVR will allow a recording to be scheduled with no available tuner to schedule it on (again, without considering padding). This is the most fundamental and basic part of the scheduler: there MUST be a tuner available to schedule a recording, or the recording can't be scheduled. I've seen nothing that suggests this logic has broken in any way.