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Video problem..


guardian24

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Configuration:

 

Hardware:

CPU 3.4Ghz Intel P4 Celeron

1Gb 333mhz DDR ram

160Gb PATA HDD

Club 3D 6600GT

Technotrend pudget tt-1500C

Conax CAM

 

software:

Newest DVBViewer

Newest ForceWare

NVIDIA pure video decoder

 

No matter how i configure viewer, video lags. I mean that video stops every other second. Its really annoying. Could this problem be codec related or hardware related? I ve tried different types of codecs, ffdshow, nero digitall, power dvd 7 and nvidia. I have tried all modes, meaning overlay, vmr7 etc. and lots of different configurations from codecs. Does anyone have any idea what to do? Could this be caused by that celeron CPU? Another problem is that if i use ffdshow DVBViewer gives error message cannot reconect to codec once in a while. What can i do to this?

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Check View -> Filters -> DVBSource. What do you see there? Discontinuities? Error messages?

 

I have to look that when i get home.. i m on the for fewdays now, i ll reply to this on wednesday.

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Now i m back at home again. I took screencap from dvb source.

Discontinuities seems to be big number and i think thats bad? am i right? what can i do to it?

dvbsourcect5.th.jpg

 

when i took that screencap program was on only for 2,5minutes. What does those discontinuities mean?

I really am confused with this because i cant think whats wrong.

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Discontinuities seems to be big number and i think thats bad?

The driver or the device loses data and DVBViewer gets an incomplete stream. Each discontinuity means one or a sequence of missing data packets (each 188 bytes). There are several possible reasons:

 

- Bad reception. The signal is too weak or (particularly observed with cable) too strong, thus overamplifying the tuner. The latter can be solved by using an attenuator.

 

- Driver and resource conflicts. The device or the driver is not able to deliver the data in time, because another device (e.g. the graphics card) occupies the bus or a shared IRQ (interrupt request) extensively. Sometimes putting the card into a different slot helps.

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The driver or the device loses data and DVBViewer gets an incomplete stream. Each discontinuity means one or a sequence of missing data packets (each 188 bytes). There are several possible reasons:

 

- Bad reception. The signal is too weak or (particularly observed with cable) too strong, thus overamplifying the tuner. The latter can be solved by using an attenuator.

 

- Driver and resource conflicts. The device or the driver is not able to deliver the data in time, because another device (e.g. the graphics card) occupies the bus or a shared IRQ (interrupt request) extensively. Sometimes putting the card into a different slot helps.

 

Thaks for the info.. I think this might be from the signal. I just noticed that this lag doesnt show up at every channel. So its possible that signal is different in different channels. Even tough i will try to change the card to different slot. Is there anyway to investigate signal strenght? I think that signal should be ok, it comes from the cable.

 

edit:

i founded the way to see signal strenght. During lags signal strenght seems to be 30-46% is that enough?

Edited by guardian24
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I still have this annoying lagging problem. Is there anyway to buffer video before showing it? i dont mean timeshift. I mean function like smart buffer for recording. I noticed that the signal is rather weak, 35-55%. I know that there is amplifiers for antenna signals. I have been using one when i had terrestial tv solution, can those amplifiers be used in cable network?

Edited by guardian24
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Technotrend pudget tt-1500C

Conax CAM

 

No matter how i configure viewer, video lags. I mean that video stops every other second.

 

I have the Technotrend C-1500 since january 2006. After an half year without any anger similar problems started. Anyway what I tried: as soon as I start to look tv over the TT C-1500 (with all kind of dvb software), the video has had many 'framedrops', or to say it more exactly, missing packets. More with bda, less with wdm drivers, but all the time present.

 

Now the solution: It was the power supply, an "Be Quiet BQT-E5 350W". Funny enough, all other hardware was all the time functionable. No problems with an parallel working Technisat Airstar, also not with the whole equipment. Note: The voltage was as normal as possible (3.3V, 5V, 12V), there wasn't any sign of overloading. And I have many stuff inside the workstation (Radeon X1600/later an NV 7600GS, 4 burners, 2x500GB HDD, 2.8GHz Northwood, 2 TV cards, an Audigy 2ZS ...)

 

Now I'm using an Seasonic S12 430W because I found out that inside the old Be Quiet the Elkos starting to leak out (typical phenomen of an badly constructed supply, it was all the time used inside the specificas). As an "side factor" the TT 1500-C DVB card works again flawless. No framedrops anymore, smooth over hours of viewing. It seems that the Technotrend DVB card needs very well shifted "flat" voltages and is much more sensitive against small interferences in comparsion with other cards.

 

If you have similar problems with the card not only with DVBViewer, but with all other dvb programs too, then your power supply can be the problem.

 

Regards,

Dreamer

Edited by Dreamer-FLT
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I have the Technotrend C-1500 since january 2006. After an half year without any anger similar problems started. Anyway what I tried: as soon as I start to look tv over the TT C-1500 (with all kind of dvb software), the video has had many 'framedrops', or to say it more exactly, missing packets. More with bda, less with wdm drivers, but all the time present.

 

Now the solution: It was the power supply, an "Be Quiet BQT-E5 350W". Funny enough, all other hardware was all the time functionable. No problems with an parallel working Technisat Airstar, also not with the whole equipment. Note: The voltage was as normal as possible (3.3V, 5V, 12V), there wasn't any sign of overloading. And I have many stuff inside the workstation (Radeon X1600/later an NV 7600GS, 4 burners, 2x500GB HDD, 2.8GHz Northwood, 2 TV cards, an Audigy 2ZS ...)

 

Now I'm using an Seasonic S12 430W because I found out that inside the old Be Quiet the Elkos starting to leak out (typical phenomen of an badly constructed supply, it was all the time used inside the specificas). As an "side factor" the TT 1500-C DVB card works again flawless. No framedrops anymore, smooth over hours of viewing. It seems that the Technotrend DVB card needs very well shifted "flat" voltages and is much more sensitive against small interferences in comparsion with other cards.

 

If you have similar problems with the card not only with DVBViewer, but with all other dvb programs too, then your power supply can be the problem.

 

Regards,

Dreamer

 

Thanks dreamer.. i just bought 400w bequiet! power supply.. i have to try another power from my desktop computer..

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  • 2 weeks later...
Thanks dreamer.. i just bought 400w bequiet! power supply.. i have to try another power from my desktop computer..

 

I tried with anothre psu. nothing changed it still lags.

 

I ve been fighting with this machine from hell for whole day. Now i m really confused. When i use original software from technotrend, the technotrend mediacenter everything works just fine. Technotrend says that signal quality is perfekt but streght is 45-55% (same than in DVBViewer.) In my tests i used same codec in both softwares (intervideo for technotrend) in DVBViewer i also tried all other codecs that i have. Another interesting point is that lags dont show up all the channels. Pay TV lags all the time, free channels lags 20h/24h it doest matter that from wich mux channel is from it still lags.

 

i will include support.zip to this post if that helps.

 

please help me with this.. i have spent almost 2000€ to this system (including tv and computer) i know that it isnt that much money to everyone, but for me it is.

I m getting really frusrated with this. This DVBViewer is perfect software for my intentions, but i want to get rid of those lags.

support.zip

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Do you get the same lags resp. discontinuities in the TransEdit Preview or in DVBViewer GE? Both are available in the members area (read the included ReadMe!), and both don't support CI. So if the lags are caused by the CI resp. the ttapi.dll, they will not show up in DVBViewer GE/TransEdit.

 

Rightclick the TransEdit Preview Window for opening the DVBViewer Filter's property page. You may copy the file channels.dat from your DVBViewer Pro configuration folder (see About -> Info -> Version Info) to the GE installation, before launching DVBViewer GE, or to the GE configuration folder (see Info -> Configuration Folder), after having launched it once, so you don't have to scan the whole stuff again.

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Do you get the same lags resp. discontinuities in the TransEdit Preview or in DVBViewer GE? Both are available in the members area (read the included ReadMe!), and both don't support CI. So if the lags are caused by the CI resp. the ttapi.dll, they will not show up in DVBViewer GE/TransEdit.

 

Rightclick the TransEdit Preview Window for opening the DVBViewer Filter's property page. You may copy the file channels.dat from your DVBViewer Pro configuration folder (see About -> Info -> Version Info) to the GE installation, before launching DVBViewer GE, or to the GE configuration folder (see Info -> Configuration Folder), after having launched it once, so you don't have to scan the whole stuff again.

 

I ll have to try that tomorrow i will report results in sometime tomorrow..

Edited by guardian24
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I ll have to try that tomorrow i will report results in sometime tomorrow..

 

 

Now i m done with testing.. TransEdit Preview gives me discontinuities just like DVBViewer pro does.. I m totally out of ideas. I m going to try with different tuner cards to see if that does any change and i m going to try line amplifier to make cable signal stronger.. Actually i have no idea how those could solve anything, but i have to try something. :bye:

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New info about this problem. I tried antenna amplifier and stuff like that with no luck. Now i tested my card again with transedit and ran transedit preview for 30min and 0 discontinuities. Results with DVBViewer pro was 37 discontinuities in 1 minute and 480 discontinuities in 10 minutes, after that i stopped my testing. What i can do to make things to work also in DVBViewer pro? pls. help. i m losing my mind with this..

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and ran transedit preview for 30min and 0 discontinuities.

TransEdit uses the rendering mode, that is called "Unchanged" in DVBViewer Pro. Do both use the same decoder? Try to use the same Options/DirectX settings as for the TransEdit preview. Do you get discontinuities when you play radio channels resp. a TV channel with the Video PID set to 0 in the channellist? Requires a longer observation time, because the comparatively few audio data packets are not so easily hit by whatever causes it.

 

Recently I had a similar issue here, and some researches revealed that discontinuities were caused by the graphics card, if a MPEG2 decoder was using hardware acceleration.

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TransEdit uses the rendering mode, that is called "Unchanged" in DVBViewer Pro. Do both use the same decoder? Try to use the same Options/DirectX settings as for the TransEdit preview. Do you get discontinuities when you play radio channels resp. a TV channel with the Video PID set to 0 in the channellist? Requires a longer observation time, because the comparatively few audio data packets are not so easily hit by whatever causes it.

 

Recently I had a similar issue here, and some researches revealed that discontinuities were caused by the graphics card, if a MPEG2 decoder was using hardware acceleration.

 

During my tests i used same codecs.

 

I changed renderer to unchanged and that helped a bit. Then i changed from intervideo video codec to ffdshow that doesnt use hardware mpeg2 coding. That helped also a bit. Changing the video PID didnt seem to have any effect. I also tested radio and i dont get any discontinuities in there.

 

This last test was made like this:

 

Settings 1:

Rendering mode VMR9

Codec: Intervideo with hardware acceleration on.

Channel video PID 900 (original value)

Result: huge amount of discontinuities. Really awful to watch. test was also made with video pid 0 with same results.

 

Settings 2:

Rendering mode unchanged

Codec Intervideo with hardware acceleration on

Video pid original

Result: huge amount of discontinuities. Really awful to watch. test was also made with video pid 0 with same results.

 

Settings 3:

rendering mode VMR9

codec ffdshow

video pid 900

Result: Huge amount of discontinuities. Discontinuities showd up as pixelation of the picture not same kind of lags than with intervideo codec.

test was also made with video pid 0 with same results.

 

settings 4

rendering mode unchanged

codec ffdshow

video pid 900

Result: Huge amount of discontinuities. Discontinuities showd up as pixelation of the picture not same kind of lags than with intervideo codec.

test was also made with video pid 0 with same results.

 

So at the now i m still getting huge amount of discontinuities. But with ffdshow its nicer because video wont lag, it pixelates.

I m now using renderer mode VMR9 with ffdshow. Still getting annoying discontinuities. I hope that there still is something that i can do to make things better. For now my story is: At the beginnig i used technotrends own dvb software. It was full of shit. Then i bought DVBViewer pro (wich is nice) i noticed a discontinuitie proplem. I tought that my radeon 9250 is too slow and bought new nvidia 6600GT and i also bought 512mb ram more (for now i have 1gb.) Now i have tried different codecs, nero, intervideo, nvidia, ffdshow (is the best for quality but has somekind of stability issue, when using ffdshow DVBViewer crashes and says couldnt reconnect to codec,) cyberlind pdvd7 codec. With every codec and with both display adapters i have had the same problem with discontinuities. Only thing that works without (or with only with few) discontinuities is transedit preview. When i m using technotrends own software (with intervideo codec) picture quality is good and no lags, but that software sucks in everyother part than picuture quality.

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Do you have a ttapi.dll in your DVBViewer pro directory? If yes, what happens if you

 

- Close DVBViewer Pro

- Remove the ttapi.dll

- Restart your PC (just to clean everything up)

- Launch DVBViewer Pro

 

You won't be able to watch encrypted channels then, I guess (check it). Still lags?

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Do you have a ttapi.dll in your DVBViewer pro directory? If yes, what happens if you

 

- Close DVBViewer Pro

- Remove the ttapi.dll

- Restart your PC (just to clean everything up)

- Launch DVBViewer Pro

 

You won't be able to watch encrypted channels then, I guess (check it). Still lags?

 

Yes, i had the file you mentioned in DVBViewer folder, and when i removed it from there i didnt get any discontinuities (or only 1 or 2 during channel change) Now situation is better on freeview channels, but what i can do with pay-TV? Griga thanks for your help and patiense..

Edited by guardian24
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Ok, at least we have pinpointed the problem. It is caused by the CI, or by the way DVBViewer handles it, as I suspected. Maybe it's sufficient to untick the "Has CI Module" checkbox (Options -> Hardware) for switching it off. Unfortunately I can't help you further, because I have no experience with that part of the DVBViewer code.

 

Some words about the technical background: The MS BDA interface doesn't support CI, so every DVB card vendor implements his own method and interface, often enough poorly documented, if at all. So it is quite difficult for the DVBViewer Pro developers to find out how it must be used. Obviously the discontinuities are caused by the CI handling (via the ttapi.dll), because the TechnoTrend software somehow manages to use it without these flaws. There are users who reported similar problems, but others say it's working well with DVBViewer. So it's hard to to tell which conditions play a part and what has to be done... I don't know.

 

Nevertheless I'll send a mail to the DVBViewer head programmer and draw his attention to this matter. Maybe he knows something.

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Ok, at least we have pinpointed the problem. It is caused by the CI, or by the way DVBViewer handles it, as I suspected. Maybe it's sufficient to untick the "Has CI Module" checkbox (Options -> Hardware) for switching it off. Unfortunately I can't help you further, because I have no experience with that part of the DVBViewer code.

 

Some words about the technical background: The MS BDA interface doesn't support CI, so every DVB card vendor implements his own method and interface, often enough poorly documented, if at all. So it is quite difficult for the DVBViewer Pro developers to find out how it must be used. Obviously the discontinuities are caused by the CI handling (via the ttapi.dll), because the TechnoTrend software somehow manages to use it without these flaws. There are users who reported similar problems, but others say it's working well with DVBViewer. So it's hard to to tell which conditions play a part and what has to be done... I don't know.

 

Nevertheless I'll send a mail to the DVBViewer head programmer and draw his attention to this case. Maybe he knows something.

 

thankss griga.. I connected the seller of that module, he will send all the CI modules that he has (10pcs) for me to test does different CI behave somaway different.

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Hi,

 

i contacted Technotrend and they are also interested in which ci modules cause the problems, since technically we just send the pmt table via the official sdk to the card and the rest is done without our assistance.

 

Christian

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Hi,

 

i contacted Technotrend and they are also interested in which ci modules cause the problems, since technically we just send the pmt table via the official sdk to the card and the rest is done without our assistance.

 

Christian

 

Hi..

 

I got new CI-module from my supplier today. With this new one everything works better than ever before (system works perfectly.) No discontinuities anymore. Old CI was Technisat Conax CA-module (technicrypt <<CX>>,) new one is SCM Conax CA-module. I can confirm that this Technisat module causes problems with technotrend budget c-1500. I triend many pieces of technisat modules (all were same model) none of those worked. Then i tried different manufacturer and now everything works.

Edited by guardian24
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There is an interesting article about this topic in the German computer magazine c't (8/07, p. 132, CAMs for watching Premiere HD on a PC). Investigations revealed that some CAMs, when the CI queries them for the required voltage, reply 3.3 V, though they need 5 V, thus causing different problems. In some cases channels can not be watched at all, in other cases the delivered stream is more or less discontinuous. When used with STBs, the CAMs work correctly. The author assumes that many STB CIs don't query, but just give them 5 V. However, with PC solutions this seems to be a frequent issue, particularly with Omega and T-Rex.

 

That's in short what I've read there - maybe the reason for several issues reported here in the forum (mostly as "DVBViewer Bugs" :bye:)

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The easiest way is always to blame somebody else. As a result, it will never work properly. I haven't red the article but the voltage question is part of the physical layer of pcmcia.

 

When a module is plugged in the pin configuration is such that the power and ground are applied first, then the

data & control signals, and lastly the module detect pins. The module executes a power-on reset which,

amongst other things, places the output signal pins in a high impedance state so that no signals can interfere

with operations on existing modules. When the host detects the presence of the module it reads the Card

Information Structure in the module‘s Attribute Memory and determines from this the operating voltage (in

conjunction with the status of the Voltage Sense pins) and whether in fact this is a DVB Common Interface

module.

 

With my FireDTV I can reproduce discontinuities in combination with an irdeto SE4.7 module. Without smart card the setup produces errors which can't be possibly caused by wrong voltage detection..

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