I recently ran into a problem that has come up just a few times during the last several months. Very intermittent and "seemed" to fix itself mysteriously within a day or less.
The problem: "unable to find capture device"
This problem started about six months ago. And then only 3 times (I think). Each time after playing with it or re-booting the PC it just fixed itself.
Some history. I have been running NextPvr around 6 years at this current location. Currently on version 4. I have a purpose built HTPC solely to act as my TV recording and viewing device. It has nothing but NextPvr and some support applications. No email, or other programs. In short a dedicated "super TIVO on steroids". I have other computers I can use for my day to day computing so this little HTPC is very optimized to do one thing and do it reliably. It's NEVER turned off and is only re-booted when needed to enable some Windows "must have" update etc. Running windows 7.
And it's been about the most reliable, trouble free THING in my life. <grin>
Today I had the very rare "unable to find capture device" error when I tried to start watching a live view show. No matter channel I selected ... no capture device. Normally when I'm not watching a live show or a recording the HTPC is running, but the monitor is turned off and the NPVR application is closed with ONLY the recording service running. So normally I turn on the monitor and start the NextPVR application and the full screen GUI pops up and I'm ready to enjoy.
So when this problem happened today, I checked everything. Everything seemed fine .. in fact there was already a recording in progress! I had only one (of the three available) tuners already in use but could NOT start to watch a channel live.
I shut down NextPVR and stopped the NPVR recording service, then restarted both, and of course NPVR then re-started a new session to continue the recording that was aborted. And I still could not play back any live TV and was given the "unable to find capture device".
I then rebooted the computer !! And then everything was back to normal again. Huh ??
Okay .. here's the fix ... And why this started happening on occasion from about six months ago on a very intermittent basis. Six months ago, I decided to add a little more functionality to my HTPC. Since I always had it turned on and usually was watching it, I thought I might add a small light weight email alerting program just so I could know if someone or something important was trying to get in touch. Never used my HTPC for anything other than NextPVR so that was an experiment. In the end I found a way to be notified when I got a phone call or email by a background process that was not very intrusive and didn't weigh down the system. It was nice. And I could optionally turn it off if I really didn't want to be bothered while watching a movie.
Then I started browsing the Internet on and off using the HTPC. No problem there either. But I wanted to keep my secure HTPC locked down as much as possible. So added a VPN application. This gave me an additional level of security during my browsing sessions.
This morning I was browsing the Internet and then finished my session. I shut off the VPN application when done browsing. BUT the VPN "service" was still running in the background. Then later today I opened up the NextPVR GUI and attempted to do a live channel view and I got that error.
So on a whim I started looking at my running processes .. and saw the "Proton VPN service" was still running. I shut that down and then my channel live view started working again. Made several subsequent tests and found that VPN while still running in the background was keeping my NextPVR Live view from working. Why? I don't know. It wasn't enough to exit the actual VPN application and close it. The actual VPN service was still running in the background. So I have to remember to STOP that service in the future.
This is why I never had the problem in the last several years .. Never used my dedicated HTPC for anything else. And I very seldom run anything else on that HTPC even today. But the addition of a few new non-PVR applications resulted in something upsetting the apple cart. Weird. Hope this helps someone else ... maybe someone can comment on why the VPN service doesn't play well in my situation. I guess I can always walk over to the "real pc" and use that for my browsing and email fix. <grin>
Yeah I guess after several years of reliable use, I can say, "It wasn't broke, so I fixed it".
The problem: "unable to find capture device"
This problem started about six months ago. And then only 3 times (I think). Each time after playing with it or re-booting the PC it just fixed itself.
Some history. I have been running NextPvr around 6 years at this current location. Currently on version 4. I have a purpose built HTPC solely to act as my TV recording and viewing device. It has nothing but NextPvr and some support applications. No email, or other programs. In short a dedicated "super TIVO on steroids". I have other computers I can use for my day to day computing so this little HTPC is very optimized to do one thing and do it reliably. It's NEVER turned off and is only re-booted when needed to enable some Windows "must have" update etc. Running windows 7.
And it's been about the most reliable, trouble free THING in my life. <grin>
Today I had the very rare "unable to find capture device" error when I tried to start watching a live view show. No matter channel I selected ... no capture device. Normally when I'm not watching a live show or a recording the HTPC is running, but the monitor is turned off and the NPVR application is closed with ONLY the recording service running. So normally I turn on the monitor and start the NextPVR application and the full screen GUI pops up and I'm ready to enjoy.
So when this problem happened today, I checked everything. Everything seemed fine .. in fact there was already a recording in progress! I had only one (of the three available) tuners already in use but could NOT start to watch a channel live.
I shut down NextPVR and stopped the NPVR recording service, then restarted both, and of course NPVR then re-started a new session to continue the recording that was aborted. And I still could not play back any live TV and was given the "unable to find capture device".
I then rebooted the computer !! And then everything was back to normal again. Huh ??
Okay .. here's the fix ... And why this started happening on occasion from about six months ago on a very intermittent basis. Six months ago, I decided to add a little more functionality to my HTPC. Since I always had it turned on and usually was watching it, I thought I might add a small light weight email alerting program just so I could know if someone or something important was trying to get in touch. Never used my HTPC for anything other than NextPVR so that was an experiment. In the end I found a way to be notified when I got a phone call or email by a background process that was not very intrusive and didn't weigh down the system. It was nice. And I could optionally turn it off if I really didn't want to be bothered while watching a movie.
Then I started browsing the Internet on and off using the HTPC. No problem there either. But I wanted to keep my secure HTPC locked down as much as possible. So added a VPN application. This gave me an additional level of security during my browsing sessions.
This morning I was browsing the Internet and then finished my session. I shut off the VPN application when done browsing. BUT the VPN "service" was still running in the background. Then later today I opened up the NextPVR GUI and attempted to do a live channel view and I got that error.
So on a whim I started looking at my running processes .. and saw the "Proton VPN service" was still running. I shut that down and then my channel live view started working again. Made several subsequent tests and found that VPN while still running in the background was keeping my NextPVR Live view from working. Why? I don't know. It wasn't enough to exit the actual VPN application and close it. The actual VPN service was still running in the background. So I have to remember to STOP that service in the future.
This is why I never had the problem in the last several years .. Never used my dedicated HTPC for anything else. And I very seldom run anything else on that HTPC even today. But the addition of a few new non-PVR applications resulted in something upsetting the apple cart. Weird. Hope this helps someone else ... maybe someone can comment on why the VPN service doesn't play well in my situation. I guess I can always walk over to the "real pc" and use that for my browsing and email fix. <grin>
Yeah I guess after several years of reliable use, I can say, "It wasn't broke, so I fixed it".
- Rich A
