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More => Old Versions => JRiver Media Center 18 for Windows => Topic started by: nycmtber on March 06, 2013, 02:15:18 pm

Title: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: nycmtber on March 06, 2013, 02:15:18 pm
I run windows 7 on a asrock visionHT computer (thats an i5 with hd4000, ssd, 16gb memory)

mc18 has slowly been getting worse and worse.  it lags and daily almost always has to be ctrl-alt-del closed.

i've about 300 movies and 30000 songs in a variety of formats.  most all of it was there before upgrading to mc18

any suggestions?  does simply removing and reinstalling do anything?

mc17 never really had any issues on the same system.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: Matt on March 06, 2013, 02:29:17 pm
What are you doing when it lags?

Try turning off Media Network (Options > Media Network) and Auto-Import (Options > Library & Folders).  Does that help?
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: JimH on March 06, 2013, 02:54:42 pm
That could also be a hardware problem.  Take a look at the thread called "Weird Problems" is in my signature.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: nycmtber on March 06, 2013, 04:00:54 pm
What are you doing when it lags?

Try turning off Media Network (Options > Media Network) and Auto-Import (Options > Library & Folders).  Does that help?

I use auto-import and don't want to remove that feature so will try that last. 

As for what lags, it's simply when I move into the program.  I usually leave chrome, media center master for initial file management, and utorrent running along with jriver, and that's it.  It does it in both audio and video but I notice it in video more often although that may simply be because that is what I use the most.  sometimes it will be totally frozen or other times it will stutter and eventually freeze, or it may recover but usually I have to restart the program.  It then runs fine for a while.

I don't seem to have any problems with the other programs or windows besides JRiver.

I have
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: Matt on March 06, 2013, 04:06:15 pm
My guess is your audio driver is bad.

But you need to remove features until it works.  Then add them back one at a time to find the cause.

Do Auto-Import first.  If it still lags, run the program but never play anything.  Does it work then?
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: kstuart on March 06, 2013, 07:03:34 pm
Just a wild guess - I had a problem with MC18 hanging, that went away when I switched the internal MC18 setting from Chromium to Internet Explorer...
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: fitbrit on March 06, 2013, 09:20:21 pm
How much memory usage is going on when it freezes?
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: nycmtber on March 07, 2013, 09:11:47 am
My guess is your audio driver is bad.

But you need to remove features until it works.  Then add them back one at a time to find the cause.

Do Auto-Import first.  If it still lags, run the program but never play anything.  Does it work then?

how do i remedy my audio drive?  I use USB to my peachtree NOVA.  wasapi is the output mode used.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: Matt on March 07, 2013, 09:18:13 am
how do i remedy my audio drive?  I use USB to my peachtree NOVA.  wasapi is the output mode used.

You need to try the suggestions above and reply in detail.

We'll help troubleshoot, but you have to be willing to try things and report.

Thanks.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: nycmtber on March 07, 2013, 10:13:29 am
You need to try the suggestions above and reply in detail.

We'll help troubleshoot, but you have to be willing to try things and report.

Thanks.

Sorry I did do everything suggested just have not been typing out my experiences besides the memory check as I havent looked how to check that yet.  everything still lags.

Tonight I will install the most recent release as I see there have been a number of updates since I downloaded.  I assume jriver does not auto check for updates?  I've grown sort of used to that with the phones and computers these days and never really check myself.

i understand it's difficult to assess these problems remotely.  if it wasn't such a PITA I'd just start over with a fresh install of everything since I've learned a lot since the initial setup of my HTPC.  I would not be surprised if the problem is windows simply sucking as it's wont to do.

Frankly I'm sick of windows 7 so may just give up and move back to my OS X environment I'm much more comfortable with and hope some day JRiver will be fully functional on the MAC.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: fitbrit on March 07, 2013, 11:01:08 am
To check memory usage, use Task Manager; you'll see the figure in the lower right hand side. You have lots of RAM, but I have noticed that the MC/uTorrent/Chrome (especially if you are on silent updates to the latest Beta version of Chrome) combination can sometimes eat up memory rapidly, resulting in stuttering and freezes during MC playback, and HUGE lags in general system response. Are you seeing lots of hard drive access during the slow period?

I often have to force-quit MC or Chrome to rectify these problems. There's a memory leak somewhere, and I haven't determined where it is (Chrome/MC?). The chromium engine solution posted above might be a clue.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: nycmtber on March 07, 2013, 01:57:00 pm
thanks for the ideas.

I think Chrome may be part of the problem.  It cripples older computers I have at work and it has crashed a few times, now that I think about it, on my HTPC at home.

It's on auto updates so I'll try turning that off and leaving chrome closed most the time as well as the chromium setting in MC.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: Shmoo17 on March 09, 2013, 12:24:27 am
I consider myself an amateur MC user, but found lately the video playback has been 'choppy' or not playing at a seemless pace that I was accustomed to since install.  And to compare against other options, WM Classic or VLC play just fine, so I assume its in the MC settings in conflict with something.

I do not run Chrome and use Internet Explorer as my browser, uTorrent, and McAfee.  Auto update as mentioned above is the preferred setting.

Just wanted to add a second voice, knowing a friend of mine has noticed it as well in his setup too.  He suggested to just use other playback software until an auto-update has been sent along LOL
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: Shmoo17 on March 09, 2013, 12:29:13 am
I see 18.0.144 is available, going to refresh my install and will comment any changes
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: Shmoo17 on March 09, 2013, 12:42:31 am
The update to 18.0.144 has help me with the playback issues.  I ran a couple large movies with HD Audio and ran perfectly.

Hopefully that helps the other users and it is an easy fix too.  Best of luck
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: nycmtber on April 05, 2013, 09:41:26 am
Just wanted to update this as I have everything working fine now. 

The lag appears to be completely because of the fact I had the settings set to high quality red october.

I thought my pc was capable but apparently it's not.  i5 processor, hd4000, 16gb ram, SSD.

i put it back to the default regular setting and MC no longer lags and the dialogue is also back on time instead of never syncing with the video...
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse
Post by: glynor on April 05, 2013, 10:01:51 am
I thought my pc was capable but apparently it's not.  i5 processor, hd4000, 16gb ram, SSD.

That's borderline.  It would depend on the specific model of CPU, what else the PC is doing at the same time (background processes, etc), and what kind of file you're trying to play.

Sometimes the "difficulty" of playback under ROHQ can be counter-intuitive.  A higher quality source is not always more difficult to play back with those settings, because ROHQ (LAV and, in particular, madvr) has to do a lot of "work" to "clean up" lower-quality and oddball sources.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: marko on April 06, 2013, 03:29:49 am
For comparison:
Our htpc runs on an i3, M370 @ 2.4 GHz, 4 Gb RAM and an GeForce GT 425M. No SSD.

It only runs MC, and is getting away with ROHQ. Also runs Aeon from Soundspectrum without a problem.

-marko
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: glynor on April 06, 2013, 08:05:11 am
For comparison:
Our htpc runs on an i3, M370 @ 2.4 GHz

The problem is that i3, i5, i7 are marketing terms, not really products.  Throughout different generations and types of processors, what "i5" means can have wildly different performance characteristics.  If he has an HD4000 GPU, that means he has an Ivy, but is it a dual-core mobile CPU at a low clockspeed (a ULV version), or a quad-core desktop one with a decent clockspeed?
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: 6233638 on April 06, 2013, 10:13:45 am
If you configure madVR and LAV Video correctly, I don't see any reason why a system with an HD4000 wouldn't be able to use ROHQ. (QuickSync decoding and less demanding scaling algorithms)
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: Hendrik on April 06, 2013, 10:43:00 am
QuickSync can actually tax the GPU, so at least on a (desktop) i5 i would stick with software decoding.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: 6233638 on April 06, 2013, 10:56:26 am
QuickSync can actually tax the GPU, so at least on a (desktop) i5 i would stick with software decoding.
Good to know - I'm not able to use QuickSync in my system (can't use the iGPU with a P67 motherboard) but I thought it was a dedicated circuit rather than using GPU resources.

Still, any system with an HD4000 shouldn't have any trouble playing back video with madVR - but you may have to move away from the MC18 defaults. (whatever they are)
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: Hendrik on April 06, 2013, 11:15:30 am
but I thought it was a dedicated circuit rather than using GPU resources.

The decoding is, but my guess is that the general memory bandwidth is a problem here, considering its running in "normal" RAM and not GDDR5 like a "real" GPU.

But yeah, madVR is no fire-and-forget thing, you need to look into its settings. Too bad the settings can't be opened without playing a video, that would be truely beneficial here.
Title: Re: MC18 lagging and crashing and slowly getting worse [Solved]
Post by: nycmtber on April 07, 2013, 11:21:29 am
I've an asrock vision ht.  http://www.asrock.com/nettop/Intel/Vision%20HT%20Series/#Specifications

The i5 is mobile and 2.5ghz and dual-core. I usually run nothing but MC, utorrent, and chrome.

I'd like to use HQ October but its probably not going to happen with this pc?