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[glynor]

This was discussed under the WhiteCap thread that was around a little while back (http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?board=3;action=display;threadid=24620), but I figured I would ask for it under it's own heading.  When playing music through MC with a visualization running the visualization "pauses" periodically while MC does the "Saving Database routine.

Can we please have this modified (or some word on why not)?  I like to use MC for DJ-ing and run the Visualizations out on   LCD projectors (G-Force is perfect for this) but the pauses which occur on just about every song are so unprofessional.

As can be seen from the Whitecap thread above it: 1) isn't just me, and 2) is irritating at least a few others.

Thanks!

[Matt]

Saving database pauses should be all but gone with Media Center 11.  If you haven't tried it, please do so.

Thanks.

[glynor]

I am using MC 11.0.133 currently (and just finished downloading 140).  They are definately still there when playing back MP3s (I now use VBR, but most of my old ones are CBR 256) and using either G-Force or WhiteCap.  I rarely use the built-in visualizations anymore (thanks Andy), but I can check.

My system is no super-computer, but compared to the general population I imagine it can hold it's own:

Microsoft Windows XP 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build 2600)
AMD Athlon 1660 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 1048 MB, Free - 429 MB

(That's a Athlon XP 2000+).  The memory I have in this is extremely low latency, high -quality stuff, hard drives are SATA WD Special Edition 7200rpm's in a RAID5.  Only bottleneck I can think of is that almost all of my media is on a network server (also RAID5 but only connected through 100Mbit LAN (haven't coughed up the loot for a Gigabit switch yet).

The pauses are shorter, I'll agree with that, but they are definately still there.   Is anyone else seeing this with v11?

[Matt]

What makes you think the pause is from saving the database as opposed to some other system process?  Is it only choppy when the statusbar text changes in MC to "Saving..."?

[KingSparta]

I Think It Works Well\Good

[glynor]

What makes you think the pause is from saving the database as opposed to some other system process?  Is it only choppy when the statusbar text changes in MC to "Saving..."?

Exactly.  And, I wouldn't really call it choppy.  (It used to be choppy with v10, but not with v11, as I said, it is improved).  It pauses just for as long as the statusbar reads "Saving Database" and then resumes as soon as the statusbar clears.

After thinking about it a bit, I realized that I have my library living on the same server (network drive) that holds my media.  In the past I switched it back and forth from a local drive to the "media" drive for a variety of reasons.

While others mentioned that they too had this issue in the WhiteCap thread, who knows which version of MC they were running.  Is it possible that having the library on the remote drive is causing the problem?  I can certainly move it, but don't want to bother if that's not it (eg. if it caches that data anyway and doesn't actually access the files when it does the "saving database" routine).

[glynor]

I wanted to mention that I did some thorough testing and I determined that the reason I was having this issue was that I had MC's library data living on a Network Drive (it was in my "Users" drive which is on a remote machine).  It could be that this issue would have been fixed when I migrate to Gigabit Ethernet (this weekend) but possibly not... Either way, I am now operating with a "local" database, and it works flawlessly.

The severity of the issue varied decreased previously with some of the builds (the frequency of the database saves seemed to be lessened), however drastically worsened with the most recent builds.

If you are having problems with long "pauses" where the UI becomes unresponsive when the "Saving Database" message appears in MC's bottom statusbar, then this is likely the cause.  If you need to have a network database, contact me and I will detail the workaround I developed (which basically entails scripting some automated copys and backups of the database to and from local drives).

EDIT: That solution is discussed here:

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=26442.msg184015#msg184015