Live TV start / stop stutter

[GoodGuys]

Hello,

For a while now, I have had an odd problem. When starting Live TV (I use Hauppauge-350, live-preview, VMR9), many times things are fine, and them sometimes I got a strange situation:
Start watching, all is well for 2-3 seconds. Then the image freezes for 1-1.5 seconds, and then continues correctly for 1-1.5 seconds, and then freezes again and te cycle repeats.

I've been experimenting with different settings, and here's what I found:

1. I have left it in this state for 5 minutes, and it did not get better.
   
2. It happens a lot less with Overlay.
   
3. Some channels do it more than others, but I can't pinpoint a specific difference.
   
4. Changing the live-tv preview buffering from 500ms to 750ms has helped a lot.
   
5. Switching to InterVideo decoder and Muxer, also reduced this a lot.
   

I don't believe this has something to do with horsepower. My system is an Athlon64 3000+, with 512MB of CL2.5 ram, a PCIe nVidia 5300, 200Gb SATA.

Thanks,

GGF

[SleepyHollow]

Hello,

I have the same problem. Something to do with Athlon 64 and PCI-E?

My Configuration:

Athlon 64 3000+, Winchester
PCI-E Nvidia 6600 GT
Harddisk 2 IDE 120 + 200 GB
1 GB RAM

The original software from Hauppauge works. Really strange behavior. :mad:

Anybody with some hints or workarounds to fix this mess?

Thanks in advance,
SleepyHollow

[GoodGuys]

Yep, my WinTV from Hauppauge never does this either.
I think it is related to the difference between VMR9 and Overlay. I know that in Overlay, I had only seen it once, and I can't be sure about that. For now I presume that Overlay doesn't do this, and VMR9 does.

[wtg]

Look at the sticky thread at the top of the support forum, Disappointing MPEG2 Decoding. What you describe is a common problem many people have with DirectX 9.0c. You may see an improvement by selecting the Deinterlace filter, but the source of stuttering problems for many is quartz.dll provided with DirectX 9.0c, and the solution is to downgrade the quartz.dll file back to the DirectX 9.0b release.

Good luck,
Tim

[GoodGuys]

Been there, done that, no good, sorry.
Downloaded the quartz.dll file that was posted to here, replaced it, and tried again. Still happens.

[SleepyHollow]

Been there, done that, no good, sorry.
Downloaded the quartz.dll file that was posted to here, replaced it, and tried again. Still happens.

I tried it too. The same problem. Tried even different quartz.dlls because the link at this forum seems to be version "c". Always the same.

Stuttering! Freezes! Unstable Behavior!

Has it something to do with the OS? I use Win2K.

Greetings
SleepyHollow

PS: Maybe I give MythTV a try.

[GoodGuys]

Don't despair, SleepyHollow. First, you can try a few things that have helped me (although I don't like'em):

1. Increase the pre-buffering (is that the name?) delay to 750ms.
   This helped me a bit. Reduces the frequenecy of stutter happening.
   
2. Switch to Overlay.
   This also reduced the situation dramatically, but not completely, and for me - it has a problem of being displayed beyong my TV's scren edges (too far) and I can't control it.
   
3. Disable LivePreview.
   Not fun, but works!
   

GGF

[GoodGuys]

Hi,

Can we get Sub and some other of the more experienced users to comment, please?

Thanks,

[sub]

I dont know. Try a different MPEG2 decoder. Try defragmenting your drive. Make sure you have any other processes running in the background that could be causing it.

[GoodGuys]

Well, I am using the InterVideo NonCSS Decoder for Hauppauge. I do own a legal copy of PowerDVD too, so I can install it and see if there's a difference.
Regarding defrag - I don't believe that could be it. Its fragmentation level is extremely low. All I have on it are about 4-5G of stuff, and it's a 200Gb SATA.
Processes - what should I look out for?

Thanks,
GGF