Topic: Channel Changes (Read 2379 times)

jachin99 · « **on:** September 23, 2019, 12:35:13 pm »

I'll add one more. It's not a big picture thing but it will make a big difference. I think you should consider speeding up channel changes and I know at least a few others agree. Most of your market seems focused on audio but maybe you could win some new customers if you improved live tv

jachin99 · « **Reply #1 on:** September 24, 2019, 10:23:36 pm »

Bump. I can't be the only one who would like this.

bigmuscles · « **Reply #2 on:** September 25, 2019, 01:29:56 am »

I Agree, especially on client server setup ups where client is another room channel load times are slow (they need to speed up this to get close to the likes of wmc (when using dvblink softare ,mediaportal 1 or 2 etc need to stop with the audio side of things where thats head and shoulders more advance then their tv part and there scrapping movies

Yaobing · « **Reply #3 on:** September 30, 2019, 10:14:19 am »

There is some intrinsic delay in client-server setup which is difficult to improve. So let's concentrate on the non-client case first. How bad is it? For me it takes 2 to 4 seconds. 2 is good, 4 is a bit slow but acceptable.

jachin99 · « **Reply #4 on:** September 30, 2019, 01:57:19 pm »

Testing on a PC with both the client, and server installed, and with RO Standard, channel changes take between 4 to 6 seconds. With ROHQ its about 10, and the last channel change I performed before posting this crashed MC. To compare it to the HDHR app, channel changes take about two or three seconds with that. The tuners, and all of my PCs are on the same switch, and I have actually swapped the switch out to eliminate that possibility but saw little improvement. Internet speed tests come back with about ninety some odd Mbps if that makes a difference. Hopefully we get a lot of activity out of this thread so we can see what others get.

Yaobing · « **Reply #5 on:** September 30, 2019, 02:57:28 pm »

On my laptop running Windows 10, it does not make any perceptible difference between RO Std and ROHQ.

If you are changing channel using a remote control (or the number pad on keyboard), make sure you press enter after you press all the numbers. There is a delay if you do not press enter/OK key because we need to wait and determine that you are not entering more digits.

jachin99 · « **Reply #6 on:** September 30, 2019, 05:15:45 pm »

I think I brought up that I got a windows loading circle while changing channels at one point using rohq. I have since uninstalled all of my games as well as steam and that issue has disappeared. Rohq channel changes also sped up by a few seconds afterwards. I almost always change channels from the guide or miniguide. It may be a good idea to rebuild this PC but before I do that, is it possible that channel changing speed is different across various video cards? I have an NVidea card I can try instead of the and I'm currently using

jachin99 · « **Reply #7 on:** September 30, 2019, 09:17:44 pm »

I changed the madvr to one of JRiver's presets, and then changed the color space in madvr to limited. This brought channel changes down to about 4 to 6 seconds but I noticed that when I changed to a channel that I was recording MC would quickly change to that channel (Down to around 2 seconds). I figured maybe decreasing whatever buffers I knew about might yield better performance so I lowered the MadVR CPU cue size to 8, and GPU cue size to 6, and this got me down to about four seconds consistently. I'll poke around some more tomorrow but maybe this is something you could look into if your trying to improve channel changing in the future?

RoderickGI · « **Reply #8 on:** September 30, 2019, 11:06:49 pm »

As I said in your previous thread:

Quote from: RoderickGI on September 17, 2019, 07:50:48 pm

It's buried in my previous post.

3 seconds to switch if any channel is already playing
8 seconds if MC needs to start playing a channel when none are playing

Starting TV playback is obviously slower than just changing the source.

I'm surprised reducing madVR Queue sizes reduced the channel change time at all. Reducing it 8 frames should correspond to less than a third of a second.

Steam has an IR Remote component I think, which could explain the improvement when Steam was uninstalled. I think that IR Remote component was a separate installation, so could be left out or uninstalled.

jachin99 · « **Reply #9 on:** October 01, 2019, 09:30:27 am »

Alright, I tried things out a little more this morning to confirm the changes I observed last night weren't just in my head. Roderick, changing the CPU, and GPU que size made no significant difference in channel changing as you suggested. I investigated this after your suggestion, and I observed it for myself by turning them almost all of the way up, and then back down which produced no noticeable changes. Changing the quality preset also didn't do much for me. I tried the strongest and weakest setting, and there wasn't much difference.

When I tested last night I strictly used the mini guide to change channels. MC took about four seconds to change channels, and I'm still getting about four seconds for each channel change today using the mini guide. Where there is still an issue is backing out to the guide in theater view, and changing channels from that. With both ROHQ and standard, channel changes are almost twice as long, and it seems to take an extra second or two with ROHQ. I still get the windows loading circle as well, even without steam (So that is debunked also). Roderick, in a different thread I believe you said you aren't experiencing any issues when changing channels from the guide. I think I'm the only person on this thread with an AMD card so I suppose I'll throw my NVidea card in here and see what happens.

About steam, etc. Steam wasn't the only application I removed as I also took off the xbox console companion, xbox smart glass, and a few other applications. When I'm done poking around with it steam will have to come back anyway but I wanted to remove as many applications as I could to narrow down any performance issues I might have to MC.

jachin99 · « **Reply #10 on:** October 01, 2019, 11:17:32 am »

I swapped GPUs from the AMD RX580 to a NVidea GT1030. I also uninstalled AMD settings, and removed the AMD external events utility service. I'm still observing the same behavior when changing channels in the theater view guide but now I also get a buffering message at the bottom of the screen when I tune a channel from the guide from time to time, and channel changes seem to be just a tad slower. I also removed .NET 3.5, and SMB V1 from windows but that made no difference. The only thing I can think of to change on my end is to reinstall windows.

RoderickGI · « **Reply #11 on:** October 01, 2019, 05:34:41 pm »

I hope you don't think I am disagreeing with your observations, because I am not.

I may have said I don't have trouble with changing channels in the guide, because I aren't, but I have also shared the time it takes on my Workstation system and said it could be better.

BTW, my Workstation which I tested on as per above uses a Sapphire HD5870 Vapor-X 1GB video card, which of course is an AMD Radeon. I haven't timed it on my main HTPC with nVidia card, as per my signature.

jachin99 · « **Reply #12 on:** October 01, 2019, 05:44:17 pm »

No worries. I would rather have someone tell me if I'm wrong about something because that brings me closer to a solution. Either way this project is might be on hold for a bit because my tv room is having power issues. I think I'll try rebuilding windows while no one can use the PC anyway.

jachin99 · « **Reply #13 on:** October 02, 2019, 10:35:07 am »

Alright, I just reinstalled windows on the PC. On my new install I'm using my AMD card again because its more powerful. I get the same behavior where with madvr enabled, backing out to the guide and changing channels from that takes almost ten seconds, and I get a windows loading circle. I'm using version .108 this time where before I was using .104, and channel changes seem just a little bit slower but that could be in my head.

A while back JimH suggested that I try removing emby. After rebuilding windows I performed my test without Emby installed. As a matter of fact I only installed EPG123 for my guide, HD Homerun Setup for my tuners, and MC. I also have media streaming off, SMBV1 disabled, .NET 3.5 disabled, and I haven't enabled public folder sharing, or any other type of sharing. I'm out of things to try with this. I even went as far as to remove the visual C packages I got from installing AMD settings, and HDHR setup.

Yaobing · « **Reply #14 on:** October 02, 2019, 01:36:42 pm »

It does appear that madVR has a large latency on channel change.

It takes about the normal amount of time (maybe even slightly longer than RO Std) for the tuner to tune, and display the first video frame of the new channel, but it takes a few extra seconds for the video to actually start moving.

Is this what you see (first frame, then audio, then video)?

jachin99 · « **Reply #15 on:** October 02, 2019, 01:52:11 pm »

It's very similar, yes. I also get occasional screen tearing and at times jrmc outright crashes

jachin99 · « **Reply #16 on:** October 03, 2019, 09:53:38 am »

One thing I forgot to do on my new installation is move the timeshifting folder directly to the C drive, where I had it on a separate internal hard drive before (I moved during my initial setup of MC on my new installation). That seems to have improved channel changing in general by just a little bit but backing out to the guide still takes up to ten for fifteen seconds for channel changes with madvr enabled.

Since my initial setup, I have installed Emby Server, enabled .NET 3.5 and older on this PC, and installed VideoRedo, and utility for VRD called VAP.

I also got a crash this morning, and I'm attaching a log. During this crash Emby was running a library scan, so it might not be perfect but I'm providing it anyway.

Yaobing · « **Reply #17 on:** October 03, 2019, 12:24:59 pm »

Something weird happened that triggered closing of the program. There was no crashing. It just closed. Also I see that audio video data come slowly after the channel change. Not sure what to make of it. Have you rebooted your HDHomeRun?

jachin99 · « **Reply #18 on:** October 03, 2019, 12:33:30 pm »

I'm going to leave logging enabled just in case it happens again. The Pc itself is on a switch that's is then attached to another switch that my primes are also connected to. The Ethernet run between the switches is about 200 feet. I can likely shorten that down to about seventy five if need be. I can also move the whole PC to my office and connect it with a six foot cable.

jachin99 · « **Reply #19 on:** October 08, 2019, 09:16:11 pm »

I had another crash but it looks like the log file is too big to attach to the forums. Can I email the instead?

jachin99 · « **Reply #20 on:** October 09, 2019, 09:46:09 am »

Quote from: Yaobing on October 02, 2019, 01:36:42 pm

It does appear that madVR has a large latency on channel change.

It takes about the normal amount of time (maybe even slightly longer than RO Std) for the tuner to tune, and display the first video frame of the new channel, but it takes a few extra seconds for the video to actually start moving.

Is this what you see (first frame, then audio, then video)?

I sent you an email with my crash log. Hopefully there is something useful in there. This log should include the crash, and another sudden close. The only thing I have to add is that there was a pending Windows update when this occured but windows wasn't downloading or installing the update. The PC was waiting on a restart to apply the update.

INTERACT FORUM

Author Topic: Channel Changes (Read 2379 times)