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Author Topic: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts  (Read 5188 times)

park

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5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« on: March 21, 2016, 09:20:08 am »

I think that the issue comes from the Auto-import process. I have got used to it and just wait it out, but for new users this could be confusing and clicking around on the interface to try and get it to work would cause Windows to issue the "program not responding" dialog.

Is there any way you could make MC less busy when starting up? Perhaps queue some of its tasks till it senses there is CPU, memory and network bandwidth to attempt them.
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glynor

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #1 on: March 21, 2016, 12:19:46 pm »

This does not happen for me.

I suspect it is Windows spinning up drives, for which (unfortunately) there is nothing JRiver can do, because the Windows API just works that way. See if you can set your media drive not to sleep, and see if it goes away.
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Vocalpoint

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #2 on: March 21, 2016, 01:12:36 pm »

I suspect it is Windows spinning up drives, for which (unfortunately) there is nothing JRiver can do, because the Windows API just works that way. See if you can set your media drive not to sleep, and see if it goes away.

This started happening to me when I switched our media share from Windows Server to Windows 7.

I can confirm the HTPC is on the "high performance plan" with no drive spin down ever. Yet - MC still sometimes takes 5-7-10 seconds to actually access media on some days.

VP
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glynor

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #3 on: March 21, 2016, 03:05:16 pm »

Park, do you have an optical disc in the drive? Spinning up an optical disc can also cause a full system hang for any application requesting it (which MC does) while it spins up.
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glynor

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #4 on: March 21, 2016, 03:07:53 pm »

This started happening to me when I switched our media share from Windows Server to Windows 7.

I can confirm the HTPC is on the "high performance plan" with no drive spin down ever. Yet - MC still sometimes takes 5-7-10 seconds to actually access media on some days.

Well, it would be the disks on the media server that mattered, not the HTPC (at least, not as much). If any application on windows requests a disk location that is sleeping or otherwise delayed, Windows blocks the application (hangs it) until the disk system responds.

This is not MC specific. It happens even to Windows components. As an example: If I delete a file off of my Users drive (which is allowed to sleep on my systems) and then wait a while for it to sleep again, and then lastly empty the Recycle Bin, then Windows Explorer hangs for a minute or so while the user's volume spins back up (and you can hear the drive spinning back up if you're close to the PC). It is fairly dumb, but that's just the way Windows works.

I don't know that a disk delay is what is causing Park's issue, but that's what it sounds like, for sure.
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DoubtingThomas

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #5 on: March 21, 2016, 04:51:00 pm »

I see this too sometimes, usually when I upgrade to a newer build.  I have MC autostart playback and playback starts and continues to play, but the pgm is totally unresponsive for up to 10 seconds.

So in my case.. it's not a disk spin up issue since the music is playing before the freeze and during the freeze.
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DJLegba

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #6 on: March 21, 2016, 05:23:34 pm »

Are you connecting to more than one library? Fire up Windows Resource Monitor, set it to overview mode, and then start MC. If MC is doing something for 10 seconds you're bound to see it in the Resource Monitor.
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Vocalpoint

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #7 on: March 21, 2016, 05:30:09 pm »

Are you connecting to more than one library? Fire up Windows Resource Monitor, set it to overview mode, and then start MC. If MC is doing something for 10 seconds you're bound to see it in the Resource Monitor.

I connect to a single local library. And that part seems to be fine. MC starts up fine and displays the UI fine - it when I select an album and hit play - sometimes it's 5-10 seconds before the library items appear or any song can actually start up.

When I had my media on the Windows Server - everything was instant. No delays in anything. Probably a combo of network and other downstream things with Windows 7.

VP
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JimH

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #8 on: March 21, 2016, 05:54:29 pm »

I connect to a single local library. And that part seems to be fine. MC starts up fine and displays the UI fine - it when I select an album and hit play - sometimes it's 5-10 seconds before the library items appear or any song can actually start up.

When I had my media on the Windows Server - everything was instant. No delays in anything. Probably a combo of network and other downstream things with Windows 7.
That could just be a drive spinning up.  Unless it happens every time you start playback.

Play from memory would also give a slight lag.
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Vocalpoint

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #9 on: March 21, 2016, 06:03:11 pm »

That could just be a drive spinning up.  Unless it happens every time you start playback.

Play from memory would also give a slight lag.

The HTPC is set to never let the drives spin down. I may want to check play from memory tho...

VP
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JimH

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #10 on: March 21, 2016, 06:12:04 pm »

Antivirus software is another possibility.
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park

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Re:
« Reply #11 on: April 02, 2016, 12:06:14 am »

Sorry for posting this and not following up sooner. Some more information. I have a pretty minimal system. Windows 10 with just media center, handbrake, and makemkv installed. No antivirus software. All storage directly attached.
Regarding the disk spin up, I guess that could be a factor except that if I close media center after playing something and then immediately open it again I get the same 10 second freeze. I will test toggling some settings and try to save some logs. I think it might be auto import related.
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JimH

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Re: 5-10 second freeze when MC starts
« Reply #12 on: April 02, 2016, 06:48:04 am »

Double check auto import settings.

Turn off podcast support.

Turn off auto import.

Look to see if anything refers to devices that are not available.

A delay like that could be a DNS timeout.

Make a backup of your library, then create a new one with a few files to see what happens.
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