2018-10-04, 05:54 PM
I am new to NPVR. I like it, but there seem to be some, dare I say, "warts"? I am afraid I need some help with what on surface would seem to be a simple task.
My wife watches a program aired daily (weekdays) on a cable news channel. For a variety of reasons she watches it time shifted. The task is to record the show daily but always automatically delete all but the latest weekday's recording. This was dead simple with Windows Media Center, which I am attempting to replace. The problem with NPVR is that I can't seem to make changes to series options "stick". It goes through all the motions but the end result is what I started with.
Our present setup:
Server machine is an Intel Core i5, running Windows 7 Ultimate, always on. (My desktop tower.)
Signal source is a pair of HDHR3 Primes, on wired LAN. All 6 tuners are available to NPVR.
Server software is NPVR + Emby + Emby NPVR add-in.
Guide service is Schedules Direct.
No tuners were set up in Emby. All recording is via NPVR. Emby access to tuners for live TV is via NPVR.
Client is the Emby channel on a Roku2 connected wirelessly, which is used for both live and recorded TV.
The TV has only two connections, the Roku and a sound bar.
I originally set up the series in question on 10/19. I created it with some parameters I wanted to change. What follows is my best recollection of what happened next.
I tried to modify the parameters shortly after initial setup, using the NPVR application on the server. In the guide, with the cell selected for that program on that day, I pressed "enter" on the keyboard and reached a dialog with options: Close, Update, Cancel, Find All. I chose Update and reached exactly the dialog I expected, which appeared to allow changing all options. I made the change and then clicked OK to exit and presumably save the changes. On re-entry to the update dialog soon after to make an additional change, I found the dialog showing the values before the previous change. I tried several time to make the change "stick", but each time found no feedback indicating the change had occurred.
I then decided to cancel the series entirely and start over from scratch. That seemed to work, but a new problem appeared. Although all subsequent days in the guide had the show marked to record (red), the current day was not scheduled. I re-entered the dialog and found it was set to record all new, but on OK, the current day was stubbornly NOT RED. Not wishing to skip that day's recording, I re-entered and set to record once.
I have since set up additional series recordings on the same channel, earlier and later than that time slot. I confirmed yesterday by scrolling the guide that all of those time slots are marked to record for all future weekdays in the current guide. However, the main desired program is marked to record only this week.
I installed the SQLite Spy program yesterday and used it to open a copy of the npvr.db3 file. What I found was that the RECURRING_RECORDING table has eight (8) entries for the recalcitrant program, all of which are marked enabled. The SCHEDULED_RECORDING table has entries only for this week, with recurrence_oid column set to the lowest value in the "priority" column of the entries in the RECURRING_RECORDING table for that show. That entry has match_rules dated 2018-09-19 which are the original rules I tried to update. The recordings are being made with 2 minute padding both ends, although I only want (and have tried to change) to 1 minute padding.
The other series have recordings scheduled for the remaining weekdays in the guide, with their recurrence_oid column set to the priority values of their respective entries in the RECURRING_RECORDING table. All of them record as specified and work as I wish.
Is it possible to straighten out the db so that it has correct rules for ALL recordings and doesn't miss future recordings? The algorithm used to manage the table with the eight series setups for one show seems to be somewhat obtuse. Do I need to wipe out the db and start over from scratch when I decide to change options for a particular series? As I stated above, I am baffled.
Although I have been developing Windows database applications for a couple decades, I have no experience with SQLite and don't want to make matters worse. Also, the IDE platform I use doesn't support SQLite (unless SQLite has an ODBC interface---I haven't investigated that).
Second issue:
When attempting to watch the desired recording on the evening of the 2nd, it appeared on the Roku Emby app that there were two recordings, one of which was dated the previous Friday. I stupidly deleted it (using the Emby app). This somehow resulted in deletion of the entire folder on the server for that program. All of this is Emby related, not NPVR. However, I wanted to examine the NPVR logs for the day to try to figure out whether it had recorded that day. What I found was there are no logs in the NPVR logs folder for that entire day. (The folder was recreated by NPVR for the recording on the 3rd.)
I believe that issue is somehow connected to a momentary power failure that occurred on the server computer causing it to hibernate for a few minutes shortly past noon on the 2nd. I happened to be typing into an application when it suddenly hibernated. After bringing power back up on the computer, it resumed with seemingly no incident. However, there are no NPVR logs that entire day. Logging resumed just past midnight October 3. My guess is the hibernation broke a memory-based connection to the logs and they disappeared in a puff of smoke.
The Windows Application log recorded several Event ID=0 entries for the NPVR Recording Service at the time of the incident. All of them have the message "PowerEvent handled successfully by the service." "Handled successfully" seems not quite accurate.
There are 5 entries at 12:03 PM, at :10, :12, :13 :16, :17 seconds.
There are 4 entries at 12:06 PM, at :21, :25, :25, :26 seconds
Prior to that incident, the last logged entry for NPVR was 12:51:46 PM September 25, "Service started successfully".
Third issue:
Live TV on the NPVR app has no sound. The computer has no speakers. The only output device is earphones. No sound in the earphones. Zilch. None. The Emby app produces sound, both on the server, and on its various clients. All other applications produce sound. The sound on the server motherboard (ASUS) is handled by a Realtek audio chip, manged with an ASUS supplied "Realtek HD Audio Manager". The Audio codec according to this manager is ALC892. In the Decoders section of NPVR setup, I configured all audio decoders to Microsoft except E-AC3, which only allows "Disabled". I have no idea how to set up that section. Presumably I have it set up wrong for NPVR usage of this chip.
I have not attached any logs, because the only NPVR logs available do not pertain to the time period of any of the events described above.
My wife watches a program aired daily (weekdays) on a cable news channel. For a variety of reasons she watches it time shifted. The task is to record the show daily but always automatically delete all but the latest weekday's recording. This was dead simple with Windows Media Center, which I am attempting to replace. The problem with NPVR is that I can't seem to make changes to series options "stick". It goes through all the motions but the end result is what I started with.
Our present setup:
Server machine is an Intel Core i5, running Windows 7 Ultimate, always on. (My desktop tower.)
Signal source is a pair of HDHR3 Primes, on wired LAN. All 6 tuners are available to NPVR.
Server software is NPVR + Emby + Emby NPVR add-in.
Guide service is Schedules Direct.
No tuners were set up in Emby. All recording is via NPVR. Emby access to tuners for live TV is via NPVR.
Client is the Emby channel on a Roku2 connected wirelessly, which is used for both live and recorded TV.
The TV has only two connections, the Roku and a sound bar.
I originally set up the series in question on 10/19. I created it with some parameters I wanted to change. What follows is my best recollection of what happened next.
I tried to modify the parameters shortly after initial setup, using the NPVR application on the server. In the guide, with the cell selected for that program on that day, I pressed "enter" on the keyboard and reached a dialog with options: Close, Update, Cancel, Find All. I chose Update and reached exactly the dialog I expected, which appeared to allow changing all options. I made the change and then clicked OK to exit and presumably save the changes. On re-entry to the update dialog soon after to make an additional change, I found the dialog showing the values before the previous change. I tried several time to make the change "stick", but each time found no feedback indicating the change had occurred.
I then decided to cancel the series entirely and start over from scratch. That seemed to work, but a new problem appeared. Although all subsequent days in the guide had the show marked to record (red), the current day was not scheduled. I re-entered the dialog and found it was set to record all new, but on OK, the current day was stubbornly NOT RED. Not wishing to skip that day's recording, I re-entered and set to record once.
I have since set up additional series recordings on the same channel, earlier and later than that time slot. I confirmed yesterday by scrolling the guide that all of those time slots are marked to record for all future weekdays in the current guide. However, the main desired program is marked to record only this week.
I installed the SQLite Spy program yesterday and used it to open a copy of the npvr.db3 file. What I found was that the RECURRING_RECORDING table has eight (8) entries for the recalcitrant program, all of which are marked enabled. The SCHEDULED_RECORDING table has entries only for this week, with recurrence_oid column set to the lowest value in the "priority" column of the entries in the RECURRING_RECORDING table for that show. That entry has match_rules dated 2018-09-19 which are the original rules I tried to update. The recordings are being made with 2 minute padding both ends, although I only want (and have tried to change) to 1 minute padding.
The other series have recordings scheduled for the remaining weekdays in the guide, with their recurrence_oid column set to the priority values of their respective entries in the RECURRING_RECORDING table. All of them record as specified and work as I wish.
Is it possible to straighten out the db so that it has correct rules for ALL recordings and doesn't miss future recordings? The algorithm used to manage the table with the eight series setups for one show seems to be somewhat obtuse. Do I need to wipe out the db and start over from scratch when I decide to change options for a particular series? As I stated above, I am baffled.
Although I have been developing Windows database applications for a couple decades, I have no experience with SQLite and don't want to make matters worse. Also, the IDE platform I use doesn't support SQLite (unless SQLite has an ODBC interface---I haven't investigated that).
Second issue:
When attempting to watch the desired recording on the evening of the 2nd, it appeared on the Roku Emby app that there were two recordings, one of which was dated the previous Friday. I stupidly deleted it (using the Emby app). This somehow resulted in deletion of the entire folder on the server for that program. All of this is Emby related, not NPVR. However, I wanted to examine the NPVR logs for the day to try to figure out whether it had recorded that day. What I found was there are no logs in the NPVR logs folder for that entire day. (The folder was recreated by NPVR for the recording on the 3rd.)
I believe that issue is somehow connected to a momentary power failure that occurred on the server computer causing it to hibernate for a few minutes shortly past noon on the 2nd. I happened to be typing into an application when it suddenly hibernated. After bringing power back up on the computer, it resumed with seemingly no incident. However, there are no NPVR logs that entire day. Logging resumed just past midnight October 3. My guess is the hibernation broke a memory-based connection to the logs and they disappeared in a puff of smoke.
The Windows Application log recorded several Event ID=0 entries for the NPVR Recording Service at the time of the incident. All of them have the message "PowerEvent handled successfully by the service." "Handled successfully" seems not quite accurate.
There are 5 entries at 12:03 PM, at :10, :12, :13 :16, :17 seconds.
There are 4 entries at 12:06 PM, at :21, :25, :25, :26 seconds
Prior to that incident, the last logged entry for NPVR was 12:51:46 PM September 25, "Service started successfully".
Third issue:
Live TV on the NPVR app has no sound. The computer has no speakers. The only output device is earphones. No sound in the earphones. Zilch. None. The Emby app produces sound, both on the server, and on its various clients. All other applications produce sound. The sound on the server motherboard (ASUS) is handled by a Realtek audio chip, manged with an ASUS supplied "Realtek HD Audio Manager". The Audio codec according to this manager is ALC892. In the Decoders section of NPVR setup, I configured all audio decoders to Microsoft except E-AC3, which only allows "Disabled". I have no idea how to set up that section. Presumably I have it set up wrong for NPVR usage of this chip.
I have not attached any logs, because the only NPVR logs available do not pertain to the time period of any of the events described above.
