2011-03-14, 11:31 AM
Hi, now that 2.0.3 is here I took the plunge a few days ago and updated from GBPVR. My system: XP SP3 on a quad core, dual-tuner HVR2200, NZ freeview using DVB-T with line of sight of kaukau.
Firstly let me say I am impressed with the setup - other than checking prerequisites and noting sentiments that npvr works well under Win7, I found setup a breeze. Sub, you've done a good job on tuner setup, much easier than gbpvr. And very timely tuning a new setup - was not aware that stratos had started broadcasting on DVB-T :-)
I have encountered a few issues which I'll list here and follow up with some usability observations...
1) When I start npvr on my 4:3 PC screen (which is a lot of the time) npvr always starts up in widescreen mode. It does not remember the last setting (although it does seem to remember the approximate size), even with 4:3 preselected in the settings. Reproducable.
2) The aspect ratio problems seem to cause drawing issues. Cycling thru them via F7 does not seem to fix; I think it can only be remedied if the window is resized when you first get to the TV guide (before viewing a channel)? See AR1.jpg; in AR2.jpg I thought I'd see a replay of '7 days' (but of course it was tsunami coverage), and when I tried to fix the aspect ratio some of the video resized but a lot of garbage would not go away.
3) I think I'd heard multiplexing was enabled in npvr so I started 'quick record' for 4 programs (cool - on my dual-tuner). When I tried starting a 5th I got a 'no tuner available' message, and after a second or 2 I tried escaping from the message... but I guess there is no focus handler in the message box and the escape exited the TV Guide instead. Reproducable.
3) After the test in (2) I started to cancel the recordings, but after cancelling the second, npvr hung. Wonder if it was caused by npvr freeing up one muxed channel per tuner or both on one tuner... not sure which order I tried to free them in... I could test again if this isn't a known issue.
4) After killing NextPVR and NRecord, restarted the recording service via NTray, then started nPVR again. after killing other 2 recordings (presumably resumed after service restart) NextPVR was using 16-25% CPU and I was only sitting on the TV Guide screen.
5) It seems the status of the tray service does not always show activity - more than once I've started a quick record and the tray status shows nothing. Also on sunday I started quick record of one program (program had already started) and then quickly started another, but after selecting the second when I returned to the quide, it no longer showed the first in red. Under recordings it shows both as failed, 'device failed to start' but I have no idea why that would be so in this case.
Observations:
6) IMHO the TV guide is harder to read... would be easier with a smaller font and making more use of the lower part of the screen (or instead of displaying 8 channels, 7 like gbpvr) - see guide-old.jpg, guide-new.jpg. Maybe my default font is defaulting to bigger than expected (although I have no special XP theme setup) - I've seen quite a few bits of truncated text - couple of examples in truncations.jpg.
7) In the TV guide the current time marker shaded all currently playing programs in grey in gbpvr - it was easier to see where programs start, finish and overlap. Also very handy if scrolling forward several hours, serves as a great visual marker in the guide when scrolling back.
So there is my little list. I really like the feel of npvr but on my rig it does not (yet) seem as robust as gbpvr. Anyone else encountered any/some of these issues?
Cheers
Firstly let me say I am impressed with the setup - other than checking prerequisites and noting sentiments that npvr works well under Win7, I found setup a breeze. Sub, you've done a good job on tuner setup, much easier than gbpvr. And very timely tuning a new setup - was not aware that stratos had started broadcasting on DVB-T :-)
I have encountered a few issues which I'll list here and follow up with some usability observations...
1) When I start npvr on my 4:3 PC screen (which is a lot of the time) npvr always starts up in widescreen mode. It does not remember the last setting (although it does seem to remember the approximate size), even with 4:3 preselected in the settings. Reproducable.
2) The aspect ratio problems seem to cause drawing issues. Cycling thru them via F7 does not seem to fix; I think it can only be remedied if the window is resized when you first get to the TV guide (before viewing a channel)? See AR1.jpg; in AR2.jpg I thought I'd see a replay of '7 days' (but of course it was tsunami coverage), and when I tried to fix the aspect ratio some of the video resized but a lot of garbage would not go away.
3) I think I'd heard multiplexing was enabled in npvr so I started 'quick record' for 4 programs (cool - on my dual-tuner). When I tried starting a 5th I got a 'no tuner available' message, and after a second or 2 I tried escaping from the message... but I guess there is no focus handler in the message box and the escape exited the TV Guide instead. Reproducable.
3) After the test in (2) I started to cancel the recordings, but after cancelling the second, npvr hung. Wonder if it was caused by npvr freeing up one muxed channel per tuner or both on one tuner... not sure which order I tried to free them in... I could test again if this isn't a known issue.
4) After killing NextPVR and NRecord, restarted the recording service via NTray, then started nPVR again. after killing other 2 recordings (presumably resumed after service restart) NextPVR was using 16-25% CPU and I was only sitting on the TV Guide screen.
5) It seems the status of the tray service does not always show activity - more than once I've started a quick record and the tray status shows nothing. Also on sunday I started quick record of one program (program had already started) and then quickly started another, but after selecting the second when I returned to the quide, it no longer showed the first in red. Under recordings it shows both as failed, 'device failed to start' but I have no idea why that would be so in this case.
Observations:
6) IMHO the TV guide is harder to read... would be easier with a smaller font and making more use of the lower part of the screen (or instead of displaying 8 channels, 7 like gbpvr) - see guide-old.jpg, guide-new.jpg. Maybe my default font is defaulting to bigger than expected (although I have no special XP theme setup) - I've seen quite a few bits of truncated text - couple of examples in truncations.jpg.
7) In the TV guide the current time marker shaded all currently playing programs in grey in gbpvr - it was easier to see where programs start, finish and overlap. Also very handy if scrolling forward several hours, serves as a great visual marker in the guide when scrolling back.
So there is my little list. I really like the feel of npvr but on my rig it does not (yet) seem as robust as gbpvr. Anyone else encountered any/some of these issues?
Cheers