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More => Old Versions => Media Center 17 => Topic started by: JustinChase on November 08, 2011, 06:47:21 pm

Title: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: JustinChase on November 08, 2011, 06:47:21 pm
I only ask because Windows MC can't.  They say it can't be reliably done, so they don't try.  I'm assuming that's not the whole story, but thought it would be easier to ask, than to test a half dozen times to confirm reliability.

I'm not asking for guarantees, but a Gigabit network connection wired directly to the unRAID box should be pretty stable, for it's part.

Can anyone comment?
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: JimH on November 08, 2011, 07:41:51 pm
It's worth trying.  I think it will work.
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: JustinChase on November 08, 2011, 08:10:05 pm
I will, but I was hoping someone could comment if they have ever done it/are doing it currently.  If it's reliable, I can skip the conversion of the .ts file in the commercial skipping tutorial, by just putting the recording directly into the converted folder, saving the 'conversion' and the moving onto the network, and launch comskip as soon as it's done recording.  But if it's not reliable, it's not worth it :)

I'll test, but would like some feedback if anyone has experience/knows about this.

Thanks
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: imugli on November 08, 2011, 09:44:51 pm
Works seamlessly.

Am currently recording to a mapped network drive on an Ubuntu server over ethernet no problems.
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: JustinChase on November 08, 2011, 10:14:42 pm
Thanks.  That means I can record directly to the network share, skip converting and moving, and launch comskip as soon as it's done recording (which I just tested on the HTPC connected via gigabit and it took 1 1/2 minutes to convert and comskip a 30 minute SD show!)
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: imugli on November 08, 2011, 10:21:08 pm
Can I just ask what sort of system resources this uses? I'm loathe to run the process from my Win7 HTPC (Atom 330 / ION) as it's light on resources, thus I'm trying to get it running in WINE directly on the server. 
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: JustinChase on November 09, 2011, 09:43:25 am
Can I just ask what sort of system resources this uses? 

I'm not sure I understand the question.  Are you referring to the actual recording process, the process of scanning for commercials, or something else?

I'm looking into adding a script (that someone else already created) to my unRAID server that pings a series if IP addresses, and when it gets any response, it will spin up my drives in the array, to be ready for the device that it just saw on the network.  I need to figure out how to modify that script so that when it receives NO replies to the pings, it spins them down.

This way, it's only spinning if somoene is connected.  The HTPC needs to come out of sleep to record the show anyway, so another few minutes to process the recording and get me the commercial files seems not worth worrying about.

Im probably missing your question, sorry :(
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: CountryBumkin on November 09, 2011, 10:45:55 am
What's wrong with letting the drive(s) wake when there is activity and sleep when there is none? Are you just trying to eliminate the 2 second wait while the drives start up?
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: JustinChase on November 09, 2011, 01:36:00 pm
What's wrong with letting the drive(s) wake when there is activity and sleep when there is none? Are you just trying to eliminate the 2 second wait while the drives start up?

I'm guessing this is directed at me, so I'll answer :)

For me, when the drives spin up, it takes a bit of time 10-20 seconds maybe, and during this time, everything is on HOLD, and nothing will respond.  I don't like this.

ALL of my files are on the server.  If I start a computer, there's a 90%+ chance that it will want to access a file at some point, so this would be a good indicator to just spin up the drives right away, before I request a file, and prevent the delay above.

When all computers have shut down, there is nothing that will try to access the drive, so it makes sense to use that as an indicator to spin them down right away, vs. waiting 15 or 30 minutes to spin them down.

In the end, not a big deal to spin them down, but I think I can change the script very minimally to accomplish this in addition to the spinning up, so why not?
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: glynor on November 09, 2011, 08:29:12 pm
Can I just ask what sort of system resources this uses? I'm loathe to run the process from my Win7 HTPC (Atom 330 / ION) as it's light on resources, thus I'm trying to get it running in WINE directly on the server. 

I'm not sure I understand the question.  Are you referring to the actual recording process, the process of scanning for commercials, or something else?

I think he means comskip, but I'm also not sure.
Title: Re: Can MC reliably record TV directly to a mapped network drive?
Post by: imugli on November 09, 2011, 11:37:21 pm
Hi Guys,

Yes, am talking about comskip and it's cpu usage. Is the process of comskip scanning a file cpu intensive?