Dbox2 Recording to PC issues

[franko180]

I've got my Dbox2 set up to record to PC. I had this working successfully Sunday night and recorded "top gear" off BBC2 without any problem, using the timer.

I've since had a couple of issues with the box and couldn't view any TV. I resolved this by entering a new key using FTP, going to "location and scanning" and enter my local area and then doing a service scan.
Since doing this the channels came back and I organised them in to "bouquets", so far so good.

But, since doing the above my recording function has become unreliable. If I press "blue" to begin recording it begins recording but repeatedly displays "The recording was aborted, since the data could not be written fast enough." Each time the message is displayed it begins writing a new .TS file, so the result is one program is broken in to multiple .TS files.

If I do a timer recording the situation is even worse, it only writes the .XML file to the share and doesn't begin writing the .TS file at all.

I'm pretty sure the performance of my network and server is fast enough to handle this, the server CPU is not thrashed, the disks are SATA2 and the Network card is running at 1GB on a Gigabit switch.


I'm using Evocamd and my image details are:

Image: Beta 7.1 - Full
Cycle: 7.10
Imagetype: Snapshot
Date: 02.11.2008 15:05
Creator: Lincsat

I'm still very new to the Dbox, I only started using it at the weekend, is there anyway to optimise the box to give it better performance? I'm assuming the dbox is struggling to write the data, as my server/network I think is in good shape.

One thing I might try to do is delete unwanted channels from the bouquet, maybe this will improve performance/free memory of the Dbox?

Edit:
I got it to record for an hour today off the timer, but there was some occasional corruption to the image on playback and when the recording got to the end the box locked up with the "progress bar" displayed on the LCD and the web server was inaccessible and the unit was frozen so I had to remove the power and reboot it.

I'm considering trying another image on it.

[TwinTown]

Originally Posted by franko180

I've got my Dbox2 set up to record to PC. I had this working successfully Sunday night and recorded "top gear" off BBC2 without any problem, using the timer.

I've since had a couple of issues with the box and couldn't view any TV. I resolved this by entering a new key using FTP, going to "location and scanning" and enter my local area and then doing a service scan.
Since doing this the channels came back and I organised them in to "bouquets", so far so good.

But, since doing the above my recording function has become unreliable. If I press "blue" to begin recording it begins recording but repeatedly displays "The recording was aborted, since the data could not be written fast enough." Each time the message is displayed it begins writing a new .TS file, so the result is one program is broken in to multiple .TS files.

If I do a timer recording the situation is even worse, it only writes the .XML file to the share and doesn't begin writing the .TS file at all.

I'm pretty sure the performance of my network and server is fast enough to handle this, the server CPU is not thrashed, the disks are SATA2 and the Network card is running at 1GB on a Gigabit switch.


I'm using Evocamd and my image details are:

Image: Beta 7.1 - Full
Cycle: 7.10
Imagetype: Snapshot
Date: 02.11.2008 15:05
Creator: Lincsat

I'm still very new to the Dbox, I only started using it at the weekend, is there anyway to optimise the box to give it better performance? I'm assuming the dbox is struggling to write the data, as my server/network I think is in good shape.

One thing I might try to do is delete unwanted channels from the bouquet, maybe this will improve performance/free memory of the Dbox?

Edit:
I got it to record for an hour today off the timer, but there was some occasional corruption to the image on playback and when the recording got to the end the box locked up with the "progress bar" displayed on the LCD and the web server was inaccessible and the unit was frozen so I had to remove the power and reboot it.

I'm considering trying another image on it.

u recording direct file or server using winserver

[franko180]

Direct recording. I just re-flashed the box and am now setting it up again to see if it will behave better.

[TwinTown]

Originally Posted by franko180

Direct recording. I just re-flashed the box and am now setting it up again to see if it will behave better.

try using winserver / vlc i found that better for recording....but that was a few years ago.....tried it recently for a bew img and worked perfectly but it was only fo 10mins or so

[Rodboy]

For direct recording make sure spts mode is set to on in miscellaneous settings.
Also it will only work properly if you use ucode 014.

[franko180]

Originally Posted by TwinTown

try using winserver / vlc i found that better for recording....but that was a few years ago.....tried it recently for a bew img and worked perfectly but it was only fo 10mins or so

Mmm. I applied the flash again, checked everything seemed to be set correctly, but again the bl**dy thing keeps stopping/starting on the recordings with the same error message. Its disapointing because it seemed like a good option.

I'll have to investigate your option, but it sounds like trouble, are there any good guides for setting that up?

[TwinTown]

Originally Posted by franko180

Mmm. I applied the flash again, checked everything seemed to be set correctly, but again the bl**dy thing keeps stopping/starting on the recordings with the same error message. Its disapointing because it seemed like a good option.

I'll have to investigate your option, but it sounds like trouble, are there any good guides for setting that up?

u could try these their old but still apply to a lot of imgs, i think

stream to dbox2.pdf

DBoxWinserver.pdf

"stream to dbox" here the mount settings are relevant for recording

cheers

[franko180]

Originally Posted by TwinTown

u could try these their old but still apply to a lot of imgs, i think

Attachment 4601

Attachment 4602

"stream to dbox" here the mount settings are relevant for recording

cheers

Ok, so whats the difference here? In direct recording its attempting to write directly to a share on my server, but this process keeps stop/starting, I assume due to the 10mbit Network interface (why didnt they make it 100?!).

How is the streaming better?

Edit:
I tried to download the version of VLC mentioned in some guides - "VLC 0.8.6 final release" but the version I could find was "vlc-0.9.4-win32.exe". Once installed I've found this to be choppy and stuttering slightly on playing back movies off a network share, but exactly the same files play back smooth in Windows Media Player Classic. So I'm expecting 'grief' getting this to work. I might try to find 0.8.6 and see if that is choppy on simple playback, before I try to stream with it.

2nd Edit:
I selected Set Video Mode to Direct X and it plays back without chopping now on 0.9.4, so I'll try to see how this streaming thing works.

[TwinTown]

Originally Posted by franko180

Ok, so whats the difference here? In direct recording its attempting to write directly to a share on my server, but this process keeps stop/starting, I assume due to the 10mbit Network interface (why didnt they make it 100?!).

How is the streaming better?

Why we can't use direct file recording?
DBox2 offers a direct file recording as a recording device. So why to use a 3rd party program and why to not record directly to your Windows (write enabled) share folder? It is working. It creates TS files which You can play back on the DBox2. But when You start the recording, it stalls after a 10-15 sec, saying the network speed is not enough to transfer the RAW TS files! To prevent this, turn off O_SYNC in direct recording settings.

have a look at ur direct file settings first.....never did much use for me though - UDRec in dboxwinserver seems better for me from what i remember

[franko180]

Originally Posted by TwinTown

have a look at ur direct file settings first.....never did much use for me though - UDRec in dboxwinserver seems better for me from what i remember

I've checked my direct recording settings and the O_Sync was already off. Its a bit frustrating that on sunday night the box recorded one hour of TV fine, but since then the direct recording isn't reliable.

I've found the following helpful guide written by Lincsat on these forums here > Dbox 2 recording\internet problems

I've followed this through to the letter and have got VLC to stream content over to the DBox correctly, but my issue now is that the DBox doesn't record through VLC. I can press Record and the DBox displays "Recording" but VLC doesn't react or save anything. Does VLC need to be configured to expect a stream and to save it somehow?