Mailing List Archive

Jeff C wrote:

> Is anyone running an SBLive card with the default (OSS I think, not
> ALSA) drivers in RH9?
>
> I have swapped out my ES1371 card for a modern SBLive with the EMU10K
> chip but I haven't tried to recompile with ALSA yet. I am getting
> dropped frames and audio on live TV (PVR 250 card for capture).
> Playback from a file is perfect. Can someone who is using a PVR 250
> and an SBLive let me know how their performance is with live TV? I
> have a Duron 1.1Ghz chip and 384 MB of memory pushing a GeForce2 MX
> 64MB with TV out.

i have an athlon 1GHz, 256MB RAM, emu10k w/alsa. also a GeForce2 (with
the latest nvidia driver). live tv (and everything else) works great.
every now and then there are strange pauses in livetv, but i with kde
running there is a _ton_ of wasted memory, so i think thats my only
problem right now, drop kde and/or add more memory.

do you perhaps not have xv capabilities setup? if you run xvinfo in a
terminal, what do you see? and what is the cpu utilization like when
you're watching live? i see about 10% usage.

cheers,

CraigL->Thx();

At 11:39 AM 5/21/2003 -0400, you wrote:
>i have an athlon 1GHz, 256MB RAM, emu10k w/alsa. also a GeForce2 (with
>the latest nvidia driver). live tv (and everything else) works great.
>every now and then there are strange pauses in livetv, but i with kde
>running there is a _ton_ of wasted memory, so i think thats my only
>problem right now, drop kde and/or add more memory.
>
>do you perhaps not have xv capabilities setup? if you run xvinfo in a
>terminal, what do you see? and what is the cpu utilization like when
>you're watching live? i see about 10% usage.

Hi Craig,

I have just completed the ALSA 9 driver install. I just checked Myth and
it still had the jerkiness problem with live TV :(. I am going to reboot
just to make sure I don't have two sound drivers etc loaded. In the mean
time, here is the output from xvinfo. Anything you can suggest to tune
things up would be greatly appreciated - especially since we have very
similar settings. I am also running the latest NVIDIA driver.

[root@experiencetv utils]# xvinfo
X-Video Extension version 2.2
screen #0
Adaptor #0: "NV10 Video Overlay"
number of ports: 1
port base: 105
operations supported: PutImage
supported visuals:
depth 24, visualID 0x21
depth 24, visualID 0x23
depth 24, visualID 0x24
depth 24, visualID 0x25
depth 24, visualID 0x26
depth 24, visualID 0x27
depth 24, visualID 0x28
depth 24, visualID 0x29
depth 24, visualID 0x2a
depth 24, visualID 0x2b
depth 24, visualID 0x2c
depth 24, visualID 0x2d
depth 24, visualID 0x22
depth 24, visualID 0x2e
depth 24, visualID 0x2f
depth 24, visualID 0x30
depth 24, visualID 0x31
depth 24, visualID 0x32
depth 24, visualID 0x33
depth 24, visualID 0x34
depth 24, visualID 0x35
depth 24, visualID 0x36
depth 24, visualID 0x37
depth 24, visualID 0x38
number of attributes: 9
"XV_DOUBLE_BUFFER" (range 0 to 1)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 1)
"XV_COLORKEY" (range 0 to 16777215)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 66046)
"XV_AUTOPAINT_COLORKEY" (range 0 to 1)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 1)
"XV_SET_DEFAULTS" (range 0 to 0)
client settable attribute
"XV_BRIGHTNESS" (range -512 to 511)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 0)
"XV_CONTRAST" (range 0 to 8191)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 4096)
"XV_SATURATION" (range 0 to 8191)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 4096)
"XV_HUE" (range 0 to 360)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 0)
"XV_ITURBT_709" (range 0 to 1)
client settable attribute
client gettable attribute (current value is 0)
maximum XvImage size: 2046 x 2046
Number of image formats: 4
id: 0x32595559 (YUY2)
guid: 59555932-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 16
number of planes: 1
type: YUV (packed)
id: 0x32315659 (YV12)
guid: 59563132-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 12
number of planes: 3
type: YUV (planar)
id: 0x59565955 (UYVY)
guid: 55595659-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 16
number of planes: 1
type: YUV (packed)
id: 0x30323449 (I420)
guid: 49343230-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 12
number of planes: 3
type: YUV (planar)
Adaptor #1: "NV05 Video Blitter"
number of ports: 32
port base: 106
operations supported: PutImage
supported visuals:
depth 24, visualID 0x21
depth 24, visualID 0x23
depth 24, visualID 0x24
depth 24, visualID 0x25
depth 24, visualID 0x26
depth 24, visualID 0x27
depth 24, visualID 0x28
depth 24, visualID 0x29
depth 24, visualID 0x2a
depth 24, visualID 0x2b
depth 24, visualID 0x2c
depth 24, visualID 0x2d
depth 24, visualID 0x22
depth 24, visualID 0x2e
depth 24, visualID 0x2f
depth 24, visualID 0x30
depth 24, visualID 0x31
depth 24, visualID 0x32
depth 24, visualID 0x33
depth 24, visualID 0x34
depth 24, visualID 0x35
depth 24, visualID 0x36
depth 24, visualID 0x37
depth 24, visualID 0x38
no port attributes defined
maximum XvImage size: 2046 x 2046
Number of image formats: 5
id: 0x32595559 (YUY2)
guid: 59555932-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 16
number of planes: 1
type: YUV (packed)
id: 0x32315659 (YV12)
guid: 59563132-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 12
number of planes: 3
type: YUV (planar)
id: 0x59565955 (UYVY)
guid: 55595659-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 16
number of planes: 1
type: YUV (packed)
id: 0x30323449 (I420)
guid: 49343230-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 12
number of planes: 3
type: YUV (planar)
id: 0x3
guid: 03000000-0000-0010-8000-00aa00389b71
bits per pixel: 32
number of planes: 1
type: RGB (packed)
depth: 24
red, green, blue masks: 0xff0000, 0xff00, 0xff
[root@experiencetv utils]#

>>
>>do you perhaps not have xv capabilities setup? if you run xvinfo in a
>>terminal, what do you see? and what is the cpu utilization like when
>>you're watching live? i see about 10% usage.
>
>Hi Craig,
>
>I have just completed the ALSA 9 driver install. I just checked Myth and
>it still had the jerkiness problem with live TV :(. I am going to reboot
>just to make sure I don't have two sound drivers etc loaded. In the mean
>time, here is the output from xvinfo. Anything you can suggest to tune
>things up would be greatly appreciated - especially since we have very
>similar settings. I am also running the latest NVIDIA driver.

D'oh. Still no luck with my Live TV feed. Is there a performance testing
suite I can run to collect some more data to help pin point where I am
bottle necking? Playing back video is fine but LiveTV isnt. Craig, what
are your settings for Live TV?

-Jeff

Jeff C wrote:

> At 11:39 AM 5/21/2003 -0400, you wrote:
>
>> i have an athlon 1GHz, 256MB RAM, emu10k w/alsa. also a GeForce2
>> (with the latest nvidia driver). live tv (and everything else) works
>> great. every now and then there are strange pauses in livetv, but i
>> with kde running there is a _ton_ of wasted memory, so i think thats
>> my only problem right now, drop kde and/or add more memory.
>>
>> do you perhaps not have xv capabilities setup? if you run xvinfo in
>> a terminal, what do you see? and what is the cpu utilization like
>> when you're watching live? i see about 10% usage.
>
> I have just completed the ALSA 9 driver install. I just checked Myth
> and it still had the jerkiness problem with live TV :(. I am going to
> reboot just to make sure I don't have two sound drivers etc loaded.
> In the mean time, here is the output from xvinfo. Anything you can
> suggest to tune things up would be greatly appreciated - especially
> since we have very similar settings. I am also running the latest
> NVIDIA driver.
>
> [root@experiencetv utils]# xvinfo
> X-Video Extension version 2.2
> screen #0
> Adaptor #0: "NV10 Video Overlay"
> number of ports: 1

hmm, that's funny. my xvinfo doesn't show this. i have no idea what it
is, i had just assumed xv was xv, i only show this part:

> Adaptor #1: "NV05 Video Blitter"
> number of ports: 32

what did you have for video cards again? two of them? someone who
knows xv better than i, is the 'Video Blitter' one good enough for
highspeed mythtv images? i've noticed some lines accross the screen,
like the image is updated in the middle of a refresh (i know that the
vsync is supposed to fix this properely) i just wouldn't have thought
i'd have as many artifacts like that as i am.

anyway, back on to _your_ problem jeff ;-). the other thing that
caused me problems, was that i had dma transfers turned off, and i had
the debugging output from the ivtv driver.

to enable (or ensure its enabled) search for a program called hdparm,
get that installed, then type:

hdparm /dev/hda

you'll see:

/dev/hda:
multcount = 0 (off)
I/O support = 1 (32-bit)
unmaskirq = 1 (on)
using_dma = 1 (on)
keepsettings = 0 (off)
nowerr = 0 (off)
readonly = 0 (off)
readahead = 8 (on)
geometry = 4982/255/63, sectors = 80043264, start =
busstate = 1 (on)

you wanna make sure that using_dma == 1. if it isn't, this turns it on:

hdparm -d 1 /dev/hda

of course, if you're using other drives for your video storage, enable
dma on those also. the last thing that caught me, was the intense
logging that ivtv does, to turn that off make sure the entry in your
module config file to load the ivtv driver looks like this:

options ivtv debug=0

which turns off most of the logging.

hope that helps!

At 10:30 PM 5/21/2003 -0400, you wrote:
I have just completed the ALSA 9 driver install. I just checked Myth and
it still had the jerkiness problem with live TV :(. I am going to reboot
just to make sure I don't have two sound drivers etc loaded.
>>In the mean time, here is the output from xvinfo. Anything you can
>>suggest to tune things up would be greatly appreciated - especially since
>>we have very similar settings. I am also running the latest NVIDIA driver.
>>
>>[root@experiencetv utils]# xvinfo
>>X-Video Extension version 2.2
>>screen #0
>> Adaptor #0: "NV10 Video Overlay"
>> number of ports: 1
>
>hmm, that's funny. my xvinfo doesn't show this. i have no idea what it
>is, i had just assumed xv was xv, i only show this part:


>> Adaptor #1: "NV05 Video Blitter"
>> number of ports: 32
>
>what did you have for video cards again? two of them? someone who knows
>xv better than i, is the 'Video Blitter' one good enough for highspeed
>mythtv images? i've noticed some lines accross the screen, like the image
>is updated in the middle of a refresh (i know that the vsync is supposed
>to fix this properely) i just wouldn't have thought i'd have as many
>artifacts like that as i am.

The card is a generic (MSI) GeForce2 MX 64 MB with TV out... Encoder is a
WinPVR 250.


>anyway, back on to _your_ problem jeff ;-). the other thing that caused
>me problems, was that i had dma transfers turned off, and i had the
>debugging output from the ivtv driver.

Debug is off and DMA is on.

Drat..... I'm almost back to doing a fresh install and punishing myself all
over again...

One other question... I can't seem to find alsactl or figure out how to
unmute things with the mixer... How do you ensure your sound is enabled at
bootup?

-Jeff

On Wednesday 21 May 2003 10:30 pm, Craig Longman wrote:
> what did you have for video cards again? two of them? someone who
> knows xv better than i, is the 'Video Blitter' one good enough for
> highspeed mythtv images? i've noticed some lines accross the screen,
> like the image is updated in the middle of a refresh (i know that the
> vsync is supposed to fix this properely) i just wouldn't have thought
> i'd have as many artifacts like that as i am.

The Video Blitter Xv port doesn't wait for the vsync to display, which would
explain any image tearing you get. However the Video Overlay port does wait,
and so doesn't tear at all.

Isaac

At 10:54 PM 5/21/2003 -0400, you wrote:

>The Video Blitter Xv port doesn't wait for the vsync to display, which would
>explain any image tearing you get. However the Video Overlay port does wait,
>and so doesn't tear at all.

Aha, I was just watching live TV and when I exited my front end this was on
my console"

[root@experiencetv utils]# mythfrontend
Session management error: Authentication Rejected, reason : None of the
authentication protocols specified are supported and host-based
authentication failed
connecting to backend server: 127.0.0.1:6543
Changing from None to WatchingLiveTV
Input #0, mpeg, from 'rbuf://127.0.0.1:6543/var/video/ringbuf1.nuv':
Stream #0.0: Video: mpegvideo, 640x480, 29.97 fps, 16000 kb/s
Stream #0.1: Audio: mp2, 48000 Hz, stereo, 384 kb/s
Over/underscanning. V: 0.030000, H: 0.100000, XOff: 0, YOff: 0
Using XV port 105
Your soundcard is not reporting free space correctly.
Falling back to old method...
rebuffering (156673 256000)
rebuffering (231425 256000)
rebuffering (145409 256000)
rebuffering (131073 256000)
Changing from WatchingLiveTV to None
Changing from None to None

I am using the Alsa9 drivers with the SBLive card. I'm guessing the
rebuffering is equated to the skips and jerky playback I am seeing. Any
ideas on how to correct it?

-Jeff

On Wednesday 21 May 2003 11:00 pm, Jeff C wrote:
> At 10:54 PM 5/21/2003 -0400, you wrote:
> >The Video Blitter Xv port doesn't wait for the vsync to display, which
> > would explain any image tearing you get. However the Video Overlay port
> > does wait, and so doesn't tear at all.
>
> Aha, I was just watching live TV and when I exited my front end this was on
> my console"

If you're not replying to a message, don't quote it.

> I am using the Alsa9 drivers with the SBLive card. I'm guessing the
> rebuffering is equated to the skips and jerky playback I am seeing. Any
> ideas on how to correct it?

Get a faster machine? You've ignored a couple requests from people to say
what CPU usage looks like during playback.

Isaac

>Get a faster machine? You've ignored a couple requests from people to say
>what CPU usage looks like during playback.

Generally the CPU is 40-60% idle during playback but it does randomly spike
to 0% idle with USER CPU at 88% or more, but only for a second or so.

-Jeff

On Wed, May 21, 2003 at 11:51:56PM -0300, Jeff C wrote:
> Drat..... I'm almost back to doing a fresh install and punishing myself all
> over again...
>
> One other question... I can't seem to find alsactl or figure out how to
> unmute things with the mixer... How do you ensure your sound is enabled at
> bootup?

Why don't you stop f*cking with alsa? the OSS emu10k1 driver that comes
with the kernel, and redhat, works great. You're tossing 15 different things
into the mix that could be causing problems.

> -Jeff

--
Matthew S. Hallacy FUBAR, LART, BOFH Certified
http://www.poptix.net GPG public key 0x01938203

At 10:32 PM 5/21/2003 -0500, you wrote:
>Why don't you stop f*cking with alsa? the OSS emu10k1 driver that comes
>with the kernel, and redhat, works great. You're tossing 15 different things
>into the mix that could be causing problems.

I had seen conflicting information that suggested that the performance
problems I was seeing could be related to audio issues and that the ALSA
drivers were understood to provide higher performance.

At this juncture, rather than muck about and send too may more messages to
the list, I think I'll try and connect with some of the other RH9 users off
the list and compare notes on hw and sw configs and build things up slowly,
one package at a time, and attempt to get things working properly.

-Jeff

On Wednesday 21 May 2003 11:20 pm, Jeff C wrote:
> >Get a faster machine? You've ignored a couple requests from people to say
> >what CPU usage looks like during playback.
>
> Generally the CPU is 40-60% idle during playback but it does randomly spike
> to 0% idle with USER CPU at 88% or more, but only for a second or so.

So, basically, you're running out of CPU occasionally, which quite obviously
causes the skipping.

Isaac