Topic: 10 second lag (Read 13321 times)

LisaRCT · « **on:** September 02, 2003, 06:40:56 am »

Has anyone noticed an approximately 10 second freeze/pause/lag occurring?
This seems to happen while I am editing tags, selecting songs, etc. It does not affect the audio which is playing at the time, but at first seemed like it was a keyboard/mouse failure of some sort.
For instance, I will be typing in track numbers for each of a group of files and suddenly notice nothing happening on my screen (the curser appears frozen). . . suddenly all the characters I typed in appear for the past several files.
This has been going on for some time now over several builds so I did not attribute it to MC, however I have not been able to locate any input device issues or had it occur elsewhere in other software.
I have not been able to tie it to any particular situations or functions within MC. I have turned off the option to save tags but that did not seem to have any effect.
I do have a mapped drive or two on my system but I not have any network drives with media on them.
?

Media Center Registered 9.1.242 -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center\

Microsoft Windows 2000 Workstation 5.0 Service Pack 4 (Build 2195)
AMD Athlon 1733 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 1048 MB, Free - 628 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2800.1106 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.81 / Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2800.1226 / Shell32.dll: 5.00.3700.6705 / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping / Drive D: Copy mode:ModeBurstBigBuffer CD Type:Auto Read speed:Max
Drive E: Copy mode:ModeBurstBigBuffer CD Type:Auto Read speed:Max
Digital playback: Yes / Use YADB: Yes / Get cover art: Yes / Calc replay gain: Yes / Copy volume: 32767
Eject after ripping: Yes / Play sound after ripping: No

Burning / Drive D: PLEXTOR CD-R PX-W4012A Addr: 1:1:0 Speed:40 MaxSpeed:40 BurnProof:Yes
Test mode: No / Eject after writing: Yes / Direct decoding: No / Write CD-Text: Yes
Use playback settings: Yes / Normalization: None

JimH · « **Reply #1 on:** September 02, 2003, 06:44:42 am »

One possible reason for a delay may be that some WMA files require licenses and this can be slow. Is this a possibility in your case?

DJ_Hazelwood · « **Reply #2 on:** September 02, 2003, 06:55:59 am »

I have exactly the same problem ( ... and i don't have any wma-files).

Media Center Registered 9.1.242 -- D:\Programme\J River\Media Center\

Microsoft Windows XP Workstation 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build 2600)
Intel Pentium III 801 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 261 MB, Free - 70 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2800.1106 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.82 (xpsp1.020828-1920) / Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2800.1226 / Shell32.dll: 6.00.2800.1233 (xpsp2.030604-1804) / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping / Drive F: Copy mode:ModeBurstBigBuffer CD Type:Auto Read speed:Max
Digital playback: Yes / Use YADB: Yes / Get cover art: No / Calc replay gain: No / Copy volume: 32767
Eject after ripping: No / Play sound after ripping: No

Burning / No burners found.
Test mode: No / Eject after writing: Yes / Direct decoding: Yes / Write CD-Text: No
Use playback settings: No / Normalization: None

LisaRCT · « **Reply #3 on:** September 02, 2003, 07:17:13 am »

Quote

One possible reason for a delay may be that some WMA files require licenses and this can be slow. Is this a possibility in your case?

Good thought Jim, but I have only mp3 and ape files in my library. I have no other audio formats presently on my media drive (or on any drive in my PC) and have not yet imported image or video files (they are tucked away on a seperate drive).

Thank you DJ, I am glad I am not alone . . . . I was not looking forward to a clean system reinstall :-/

courtofaudit · « **Reply #4 on:** September 02, 2003, 07:43:06 am »

I have the same problem since two or three builds. It doesn't happen regularly like every x minutes but it happens, especially when working in the library. I don't have any wma-file.
It doesn't stop playing mp3's or videos, but during playback all buttons are frozen.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #5 on:** September 02, 2003, 08:12:08 am »

Quote

It doesn't stop playing mp3's or videos, but during playback all buttons are frozen.

yup, yup . . . seems to freeze the entire program briefly, then suddenly all actions execute as if they had been held in cue or in a buffer.

JimH · « **Reply #6 on:** September 02, 2003, 09:35:02 am »

Please see if you can identify the conditions under which this happens.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #7 on:** September 02, 2003, 09:44:53 am »

Quote

Please see if you can identify the conditions under which this happens.

Will do Jim, but thusfar nothing has registered in my mind as a commonality that this possibly could be attributed to.
However, knowing now that this is not limited to my machine I will have another look-see trying to examine parameters I may have overlooked in presuming this was other than an MC issue.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #8 on:** September 03, 2003, 05:41:08 am »

Jim,
So far:
I have reproduced this:
1- while editing fields in the Media Library file list (whether individual track numbers or a group of files having album or artist name changed/added).
2- deleting a file(s) in the list
3- oddly enough, when I close MC 9 (or it closes to change Mega-Me skins) there seems to be about a 10 secong lag before the error message pops-up.

It seems to only occur while working in the media library file list window . . .

dunno if that is enough to be of any help yet, but I will update as I see other conditions seemingly related.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #9 on:** September 03, 2003, 10:55:15 am »

Also found to happen while:

1- Naming / renaming playlists or smartlists

2- Entering / editing search strings

3- Scrolling through right-click menus

all I see in common is keyboard entry, working in a naming/data typing situation. ?

DJ_Hazelwood, courtofaudit . . . either of you find anything on your machines?

courtofaudit · « **Reply #10 on:** September 04, 2003, 12:32:13 am »

Okay LisaRCT, its the same with me, no special situation, even when I'm working in or with the library MC frezes for about 10 seconds. Its very strange, because some builds ago this didn't happen.

I ave no idea, only hoping that in a future build it will work fine.

Matt · « **Reply #11 on:** September 05, 2003, 01:15:15 pm »

In Options > Device Settings try turning all the "Action to perform when media is inserted" to "Nothing" and restart.

We saw a really weird low-level driver bug today where asking the CD drive what media was in it would kill Windows for a few seconds. Could be the same thing here...

LisaRCT · « **Reply #12 on:** September 05, 2003, 07:58:35 pm »

Quote

In Options > Device Settings try turning all the "Action to perform when media is inserted" to "Nothing" and restart.

We saw a really weird low-level driver bug today where asking the CD drive what media was in it would kill Windows for a few seconds. Could be the same thing here...

Matt I already had it set as you described, so that is not the issue here.

courtofaudit · « **Reply #13 on:** September 08, 2003, 11:43:49 pm »

The only thing I recognized is, that during every lag a harddisc is "working". You can hear the sound of read/write on a HD.

DJ_Hazelwood · « **Reply #14 on:** September 15, 2003, 02:51:28 am »

I did some tests today and got the following results:

When MC starts to play and when it changes to the next song, the CPU-utilization rises up to 90/100 percent. Then it goes back to 20 percent.

After some seconds the CPU-utilization again rises up to 40/50 percent for about 10 seconds. Then it goes back to 20 percent again.

I don't know what happens during the times of higher CPU-utilization (updating tags ?), but during this times MC freezes.

Matt · « **Reply #15 on:** September 15, 2003, 05:49:20 am »

That sounds like a hard drive in PIO instead of DMA mode. Give that a check and let us know.

DJ_Hazelwood · « **Reply #16 on:** September 15, 2003, 08:51:40 am »

The hard drives are on a raid-controller; they are in DMA-mode. I think it is a network-problem. I've done the same tests with local MP3s and everything works fine.

courtofaudit · « **Reply #17 on:** September 15, 2003, 10:51:47 pm »

Using 250 it got worse. The lag comes more often. All my mp3's are on two local drives. All drives are in dma mode. During the lag the screen freezes, the mouse is not visible and you can hear harddisk in action.
I checked all the settings Matt told in this thread.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #18 on:** September 16, 2003, 09:44:23 am »

Same here 'cept I haven't noticed the hard drive thingie . . . but that's 'cause my CPU is remote.

had a thought though . . . Kx Project drivers . . . common factor here or just me?

It may be an unlikely possibility, but I don't recall if this lag was an issue with the Creative drivers and I logic has thusfar been ineffective.

----Hardware / Software configuration---------------
Driver Name:kX Audio Driver (Debug)
Driver Date: Aug 2 2003 22:07:58
Driver Version: 5.10.00.3534 - debug
DB Name:none
SB0222 10k1 [8800]
PCI Information:
Device: 21102 Subsys: 80651102 ChipRev: a
Card has MPU device
Card model is '5.1'
Card HAS AC97 codec
Codec name: SigmaTel STAC9708
3D Extension: SigmaTel 3D Enhancement
Codec is 2.0 compliant
Capabilities[6940] :
DAC resolutions : -16-bit- -18-bit-
ADC resolutions : -16-bit- -18-bit-
Ext Capabilities [80]: -PCM surround DAC-
Port: 8800 Irq: 9
Playback buffer: 20a0
Record buffer: 4000
Number of AC3 buffers: 4
Tank memory: 256 kb
GSIF buffer: 256 samples
OS version: [2 5 0 Service Pack 4; 2 5 0 Service Pack 4; 156 148]
----------------------------------------------------

JimH · « **Reply #19 on:** September 16, 2003, 10:19:36 am »

Are you running Norton antivirus or Nero?

LisaRCT · « **Reply #20 on:** September 16, 2003, 12:34:59 pm »

YES . . .
Running Norton AV 2003 Professional Edition as well as Nero 6.0.0.15 . . . .

need I fully uninstall both to prove this out or can I unload some background function?

JimH · « **Reply #21 on:** September 16, 2003, 01:12:57 pm »

Give us a few days to see if we can find a way around the problem. We think we know why the CPU is spiking now. It looks like other applications have inserted themselves in between MC and the CD and DVD drives, so when we check to see if there is a disk in the drive, they go nuts.

You might check the Nero site to see if there are any updates.

jcouch93 · « **Reply #22 on:** September 17, 2003, 03:56:56 pm »

THANKS JIM!!! I was having this same issue and going nutz trying to figure it out!!!! I am running the EXACT same progs (Norton AV and Nero) and each time I put songs into the burn list and THEN insert a blank CD MC would start accessing the HD continuously AND freeze up every few seconds. This only happened when I would put the blank Cd in (as far as I could tell anyway). I'll be looking on Nero's site later and will await an update from you guys. This little prob caused me too much grief the other day...

Thanks!!

phatrabt

ZRocker · « **Reply #23 on:** September 17, 2003, 07:10:25 pm »

JimH,

If you recall, I had this same problem months ago with Norton AntiVirus 2002 and MC. The solution was to disable removable device checking in NAV (don't check CD-Roms, basically). The option in NAV I disabled was called "Scan all removeable meida for boot viruses every time it is mounted". With this on, MC and NAV clash on registry reads forever and ever and eat up CPU cycles (check it out with RegMon).

LisaRCT · « **Reply #24 on:** September 17, 2003, 07:39:40 pm »

Thanks ZR, will try it and see if it helps here

LisaRCT · « **Reply #25 on:** September 18, 2003, 08:11:00 am »

1- removed 'unnecessary' hard drives from system
2- removed CD drives from system
3- disabled on-board Promise RAID controller
4- reconfigured NAV, disabling all auto-protect functions
5- disabled all non-essential auto-start software
6- disabled Zone Alarm Pro
7- disabled MC option for auto-tag update & auto-import
8- changed from Direct-Sound to Wave-Out

Lag STILL persists ?

?

I need an emoticon for SCREAMING & tearing out of hair . . . something BIG & BRIGHT

Media Center Registered 9.1.253 -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center\

Microsoft Windows 2000 5.0 Service Pack 4 (Build 2195)
AMD Athlon 1735 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 1048 MB, Free - 681 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2800.1106 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.81 / Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2800.1226 / Shell32.dll: 5.00.3700.6705 / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping / No CD drives found.
Digital playback: Yes / Use YADB: Yes / Get cover art: Yes / Calc replay gain: Yes / Copy volume: 32767
Eject after ripping: Yes / Play sound after ripping: No

Burning / No burners found.
Test mode: No / Eject after writing: Yes / Direct decoding: Yes / Write CD-Text: No
Use playback settings: No / Normalization: None

LisaRCT · « **Reply #26 on:** September 18, 2003, 08:38:50 am »

I isolated this using RegMon, the "NOT FOUND" events appear to be sync'ed to the lag as close as I can tell.
Dunno if it helps . . . . . ..

12:33:49 PM Media Jukebox.e:592 OpenKey HKCU\Software\JRiver\Media Jukebox\PlaybackEngine SUCCESS Key: 0xE2941020
12:33:49 PM Media Jukebox.e:592 QueryValue HKCU\Software\JRiver\Media Jukebox\PlaybackEngine\DisplayControlBarsMode NOTFOUND
12:33:49 PM Media Jukebox.e:592 QueryValue HKCU\Software\JRiver\Media Jukebox\PlaybackEngine\DisplayControlBarsMode NOTFOUND
12:33:49 PM Media Jukebox.e:592 CloseKey HKCU\Software\JRiver\Media Jukebox\PlaybackEngine SUCCESS Key: 0xE2941020

(Yes Jim I know you said "Give us a few days to see if we can find a way around the problem. " but I am impatient, obsessive, and just plain old stubborn)

LisaRCT · « **Reply #27 on:** September 22, 2003, 10:27:06 am »

BUMP

?

LisaRCT · « **Reply #28 on:** September 22, 2003, 08:57:12 pm »

Actually the lag:

. . . . continues to plague me
. . . . is precisely 11 seconds in duration
. . . . freezes elapsed time display
. . . . freezes audio analysis
. . . . freezes visualizations
. . . . freezes cursor
. . . . freezes tagging
. . . . does NOT freeze audio
(amazingly songs and streams continue uninterrupted)

I am not looking forward to it, but I am ALMOST at the point of resorting to:
FDISK / format / reinstall Windows / etc, etc, etc.
Somehow though I am not too sure this will be anything more than a waste of time and a source of frustration.
:-/ ? :-/

courtofaudit · « **Reply #29 on:** September 22, 2003, 11:07:15 pm »

LisaRCT describes the problem perfectly. It's the same with my MC. I have just a little work to do with tagging my classical MP3-Collection I've ripped from nearly 800 CD's. Every 2-3 minutes I'm stopped by this bug described above. We hardly need an idea if this bug could be identified or localized. PLEEEEEEAAAAAASSSSEE!

JimH · « **Reply #30 on:** September 23, 2003, 06:23:41 am »

About two years ago I had a similar freezing problem that turned out to be a Microsoft Windows bug. It was overly agressive about indexing the files for "findfast", I think. I found the solution on the Microsoft site.

Also, please report the version of MC you are using. We've done some optimization for speed that may affect this (if it is an MC problem).

LisaRCT · « **Reply #31 on:** September 23, 2003, 06:28:19 am »

I have been updating as each new built is put out . . . and no change in this problem has occured for a long time.

Windows ya say? I will do some poking and prodding there, BUT this delay/lag only occurs in MC, NOT in any of my other software (at least not that I have noticed).

Windows indexing service?

KingSparta · « **Reply #32 on:** September 23, 2003, 11:09:30 am »

Quote

Actually the lag:

. . . . continues to plague me
. . . . is precisely 11 seconds in duration
. . . . freezes elapsed time display
. . . . freezes audio analysis
. . . . freezes visualizations
. . . . freezes cursor
. . . . freezes tagging
. . . . does NOT freeze audio
(amazingly songs and streams continue uninterrupted)

I am not looking forward to it, but I am ALMOST at the point of resorting to:
FDISK / format / reinstall Windows / etc, etc, etc.
Somehow though I am not too sure this will be anything more than a waste of time and a source of frustration.
:-/ ? :-/

I have seen this also.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #33 on:** September 23, 2003, 11:22:26 am »

I turned off Windows Indexing Service, no change.

also tried removing all drive/folder shares,
still no change.

Matt · « **Reply #34 on:** September 23, 2003, 11:38:43 am »

Any more details about what triggers the freeze would be helpful. Where you are in the program and what you're doing for example.

Does it happen if you aren't playing? What if you play WAV or APE files instead of MP3 files? Does it matter what's in your CD drives?

Also, disable any visualizations inside of MC. Make sure Nero InCD is disabled. Also disable any other programs that could hook other programs like mouse utilities, skinning programs, etc.

Check your closets for gremlins.

Thanks for helping us with this.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #35 on:** September 23, 2003, 12:17:18 pm »

Matt,
I have disabled everything I can with no results.
Doesn't matter whether I am using mp3, ape, or mp3 streams or not playing anything at all.
It happens all the time, regardless of whether I am scrolling through the Media Library, importing media, editing tags, watching 3D vis, no vis, simply no rhyme or reason, no commonality I can see.
I have tried turning off tagging, changing from DirectSound to WavOut to ASIO, changing from KxProject drivers back to Creative drivers and back again.
Over the course of this problem EVERYTHING I can find has been updated, and/or turned off.

Before I tear the rest of my hair out, or do a complete system format and reinstall, I will remove the last of the questionable conflict software including NERO, EAC, CloneCD (if they aren't already or have been reinstalled) and get back to you.

JimH · « **Reply #36 on:** September 23, 2003, 12:43:10 pm »

and virus checker.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #37 on:** September 23, 2003, 12:49:32 pm »

I have had NAV disabled already with no improvement, but if I don't find some other conflict before I get there, it too will go.
Hopefully I find it before I get down to only MC and Win2K . . . at that point I head for FDISK (but maybe MJ8 as a desperate last ditch effort)

this computer will self destruct in . . . .

JimH · « **Reply #38 on:** September 23, 2003, 01:49:45 pm »

disable and uninstall may be different, especially with virus checkers.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #39 on:** September 23, 2003, 03:44:17 pm »

NAV uninstalled, Nero gone, etc, etc, problem still there.
What now?
I really hate to start from scratch and do a clean reinstall.

KingSparta · « **Reply #40 on:** September 23, 2003, 03:48:46 pm »

Quote

NAV uninstalled, Nero gone, etc, etc, problem still there.
What now?
I really hate to start from scratch and do a clean reinstall.

I Just did a few days ago i have not noiced the problem yet, but today is the only day I felt like playing music since i have been too pissed off.

I am using the latest build also

'The Breaks' Charted At 87 In 1980 On The Billboard Top Hits

Listening to: 'The Breaks' from 'The Best Of Kurtis Blow' by 'Kurtis Blow' on Media Center 9.1

LisaRCT · « **Reply #41 on:** September 23, 2003, 05:15:48 pm »

NAV as well as Zone Alarm are gone, problem still exists

Matt · « **Reply #42 on:** September 23, 2003, 06:56:28 pm »

My only other guess is to try removing your CD drives. It's possible MC is doing something bad when it's analyzing them.

Can anybody else weigh in on this?

LisaRCT · « **Reply #43 on:** September 23, 2003, 09:05:13 pm »

HI Matt,
scroll back a bit . . . already been there / done that, no change.

Matt · « **Reply #44 on:** September 24, 2003, 06:00:18 am »

Maybe it's a bad library. Backup your library and then clear it. Make sure you opt to clear the fields as well when it asks.

See if it still stalls then...

LisaRCT · « **Reply #45 on:** September 24, 2003, 07:04:15 am »

Cleared Library, reimported all files . . .

Lag is STILL there

Matt · « **Reply #46 on:** September 24, 2003, 07:37:58 am »

Don't import any files. Use the program empty to see if it still freezes.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #47 on:** September 24, 2003, 07:58:05 am »

that SEEMS to have done it!
I have been playing music, navigating, even edited some file tags (without importing any files) with no apparent lag.

OK, so . . . now what? Where do we go from here?
My library is all on a 200GB hard drive, it consists of 165GB of MP3 & APE files, totalling approximately 17,000+files and 59.6 days of music. It is arrainged in folders: Artist\Album\artist ~ album ~ track ~ title.*
There are currently NO image or video files included, only music. I am often playing streaming audio . . .www.RadioParadise.com 128kbs-mp3 stream.

Suggestions?
Can I reinstall my firewall & anti-virus?

::: keeping fingers crossed :::

Matt · « **Reply #48 on:** September 24, 2003, 08:03:59 am »

Email us a backup of your library. There must be something screwy about it. Hopefully we'll be able to find and fix the problem soon.

Also, you may want to try importing in batches to see if you can isolate certain files as the problem.

Thanks!

matt @ jriver.com (no spaces)

LisaRCT · « **Reply #49 on:** September 24, 2003, 09:38:14 am »

sent

I created 3 seperate libraries for test purposes:

Library 1- (Default) was left empty
Library 2- (APE) is only ape files (about 5000+ files)
Library 3- (MP3) is only mp3 files (about 12000+ files)

so far ONLY the mp3 library has a lag!
the others are LAG-FREE

Now how do I go about finding & culling out the bad mp3 files? The proverbial 'needle in a haystack' :-/

INTERACT FORUM

Author Topic: 10 second lag (Read 13321 times)

LisaRCT

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