Topic: [POSSIBLE BUG]Recording fail (Read 8924 times)

muzicman0 · « **on:** January 04, 2016, 05:46:31 pm »

twice now recordings have just stopped happening. Live TV works, but I can go in and select something to record, but it won't...also anything scheduled won't record.

It may only happen on my HDHomeRun Primes (I have 2 of those, and 2 OTA HDHomeRuns).

Happened about 1-2 weeks apart. Also, if I look at the 'To Be Recorded' in Std view, it shows some things as still 'showing' even though they are from days ago, adn none of the clients are watching live TV. Is it possible that for some reason the tuners aren't being released internally somehow? By that, I mean that maybe MC thinks they are still busy, so it doesn't even try.

JimH · « **Reply #1 on:** January 05, 2016, 01:08:53 am »

Similar problem:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=102356.msg709815#msg709815

Is WMC disabled?

muzicman0 · « **Reply #2 on:** January 05, 2016, 10:22:00 am »

I have no PC's on my network with WMC installed (They are all Win 8.1 - without WMC, or Win 10).

Also, they aren't being cut short, they aren't even starting. No .jtv files or .ts files are ever created.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #3 on:** January 05, 2016, 03:13:58 pm »

If you look at the attached picture, it shows live TV as 'currently recording', even though it is/was not.

RoderickGI · « **Reply #4 on:** January 05, 2016, 03:59:26 pm »

Well it is easy to see why the recordings are failing. There are six shows "recording" in just that screen shot.

So the question probably is really; "Why aren't my tuners being released after [something]", where [something] is either a recording, or MC Clients watching a channel live, or, something.

What does your tuner status display show? Tools/Options/Television/Advanced/Show Status.
Also, if you go into Theatre View, Recorded TV, and sort by "All Recent", do those six program show up?

PS: A reboot of the MC Server will probably clear the tuners, but that won't help in identifying what has gone wrong, unless you can reproduce the problem with repeatable steps. Also I guess restarting the HDHomeRun Primes should clear their status and free them up.

PPS: If those 9:00am programs are ones you normally watch, do you press STOP when you finish watching them, or just turn off the TV/MC PC/etc. Good practice is to press STOP when you finish watching live TV.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #5 on:** January 05, 2016, 04:08:06 pm »

This screen shot is from an automated system that we use to put up TV on our video wall software, so at 9AM, I send a MCC command to tune to 1015, and at 5:30, I send another command to stop...that doesn't mean that it hasn't been stopped by network changes, etc...

However, as I said, even when it has gotten into a state where it stops recording TV, Live TV works just fine.

Tuner status shows all tuners clear.

You are correct, restarting MC on the server does fix the issue (this screen shot was actually from yesterday morning).

Yaobing · « **Reply #6 on:** January 05, 2016, 04:08:22 pm »

All shows that were marked " Currently recording" do not have show name in the name field. That is an indication that they were not scheduled recordings. The tuners were not released after watching the channels live, possibly from clients.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #7 on:** January 05, 2016, 04:20:41 pm »

That is correct, those were live TV sessions. Even if they end up being cut off because of network issues, etc, shouldn't they eventually clean up and release tuners? I mean some of these were days old.

Yaobing · « **Reply #8 on:** January 05, 2016, 05:31:03 pm »

Quote from: muzicman0 on January 05, 2016, 04:20:41 pm

That is correct, those were live TV sessions. Even if they end up being cut off because of network issues, etc, shouldn't they eventually clean up and release tuners? I mean some of these were days old.

We require that clients send "keep alive" messages to the server. If the client is alive, it does send these messages, and the server will not quit. The server can not second guess the intention of a user on a client. If the clients were properly shut off, and we are still seeing this, then I don't know.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #9 on:** January 05, 2016, 05:39:57 pm »

hmmm...in my scenario, probably what happened is the network connection was broken to the server. I would think that would break the keep alive as well.

Is all that is required to keep the server thinking that the tuner is still in use that the client is connected?

muzicman0 · « **Reply #10 on:** January 05, 2016, 06:18:31 pm »

I just stopped a live TV session on the client, and it still says Currently Recording' on the Server. It also says it after restarting the server.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #11 on:** January 05, 2016, 06:21:00 pm »

scratch that on the 'after restart' part...I think I didn't kill the tray server app...but before restarting the server completely, even with stopping the client live TV correctly it still showed it as currently recording.

Yaobing · « **Reply #12 on:** January 05, 2016, 11:26:06 pm »

The file may say it is currently recording, because it is a temporary item in the database for the purpose of serving a client, and it may not have been updated properly. I have seen some of these left in the database after the client closes. Can you check the tuner status?

If the tuner status on the server shows that the tuners are still serving clients after clients close, then we know where the problem is.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #13 on:** January 06, 2016, 09:27:01 am »

The tuner status showed all tuners available.

Yaobing · « **Reply #14 on:** January 06, 2016, 11:18:10 am »

OK then. It seems that those odd entries in your screenshot are just remnants of what were in the database for serving clients and were not cleaned up. They should not have direct bearing on tuners not recording.

Does your server ever go to sleep? We do have mechanism to wake up the computer for recording, but I have seen cases where my computer goes into a state that is neither asleep nor awake, and it would not wake up by a mouse move or keyboard activity. Recordings could not happen when a computer goes in such state. I have not understood why my computer does that. It is quite annoying. It may not be related to MC at all. Do you think your computer might be in such state once in a while?

Another possibility is that your tuners simply needed to be reset, for whatever cause. It may have been caused by MC, or may not. I don't know.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #15 on:** January 06, 2016, 11:56:22 am »

Server doesn't go to sleep, and seems to be stable...

However, I did come in this morning, and the client has crashed (with an error box stating that it has crashed). Could this be causing the issue?

I will eventually reinstall Windows to see if that clears up the crashing.

Yaobing · « **Reply #16 on:** January 06, 2016, 12:30:26 pm »

Quote from: muzicman0 on January 06, 2016, 11:56:22 am

Server doesn't go to sleep, and seems to be stable...

However, I did come in this morning, and the client has crashed (with an error box stating that it has crashed). Could this be causing the issue?

I will eventually reinstall Windows to see if that clears up the crashing.

Crashed clients should not cause problems like this. Part of the reason I added client keep-alive calls is to make sure crashed clients will not continue holding onto tuners (when a client has crashed, it will no longer send keep-alive messages). However, the grace period is long. Within one hour of the crash, the server will continue serving the client. After one hour, the tuner should be freed.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #17 on:** January 19, 2016, 08:06:05 pm »

I just noticed I have another issue on my home setup. Supergirl is listed as still recording from last night. All tuners show as being available in the status though.

I did watch the show as it was being recorded. I wonder if that could cause the issue where eventually all the tuners get used up and recordings stop. I don't watch things in timeshift mode very often, which would explain why this only happens once in a great while.

RoderickGI · « **Reply #18 on:** January 19, 2016, 08:31:46 pm »

I occasionally see a completed recording reported as still being recorded. I haven't found a consistent reason for it though, and it usually clears up by itself.

If all your tuners are available, it shouldn't matter. But it can be annoying, as it is hard to determine if the recording has overrun its time and filling up your hard drive, unless you check the tuner status.

muzicman0 · « **Reply #19 on:** January 19, 2016, 08:35:21 pm »

It does seem to matter though (at least that is my theory)...I have had issues where all my tuners show as available in the status (and I can in fact watch live TV), however, recording fail...they just don't work unless I restart MC.

My theory is that these 'currently recording' entries in the list of 'recordings' is what is causing that. Could be wrong. But they don't go away unless I restart MC on the server.

JimH · « **Reply #20 on:** January 20, 2016, 01:03:07 am »

Quote from: muzicman0 on January 19, 2016, 08:06:05 pm

I just noticed I have another issue on my home setup. Supergirl is listed as still recording from last night. All tuners show as being available in the status though.

I did watch the show as it was being recorded. I wonder if that could cause the issue where eventually all the tuners get used up and recordings stop. I don't watch things in timeshift mode very often, which would explain why this only happens once in a great while.

Maybe it was paused, not stopped?

muzicman0 · « **Reply #21 on:** January 20, 2016, 10:51:52 am »

I am confident that it was stopped. Plus there was no recording going on in my recorded TV folder.

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