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[glynor]

I've been having issues with recent builds on one of my machines (my HTPC) in Theater View.  I've only recently sorted out the exact specifics on the behavior, and I've been posting details on the Beta board.  Since this has turned out to be an ongoing issue that is affecting multiple public builds, I'm reproducing these old postings here in the public board.

A few other people are suffering a similar, though not identical issue.  I strongly suspect that these issues are related, but I have no strong evidence yet.

Hopefully someone else will have similar issues and we will be able to sort this out.

[glynor]

Build 12.0.247:

2. Changed: Theater View Lineup view right-aligns icons so that long titles get more room when necessary.

4. Changed: Theater View files menu contains a "Play All" item to play all visible items, starting with the selected item.

5. NEW: Added "Automatic" shuffle mode -- shuffles playback when playback is started without specifying a file. (like playing a genre grouping, etc.)

Thanks.  Theater View is suddenly SO much better than I had even hoped for previously.  Thank you!  I really like all the new stuff (especially the wrapping text and Status Bar).

...

That said... I am seeing some instability.  Tonight, while using MC and browsing around in Theater View for a little while, I had MC get "flaky" on me three different times.  Once, it crashed outright (though oddly the UI kept working until I dismissed the Windows crash dialog).  The other two times it stopped responding to keyboard and remote-control input.  The mouse kept working, but the keyboard arrow controls refused to move the highlight.  Other keyboard commands kept working (ESC for example)...  Odd.  It may have been related to stopping play on items as it seemed to happen mostly after stopping video playback and returning to Theater View.  Also, I am seeing a lot of general "sluggishness".  It would freeze fairly regularly when first opening a View Scheme (different ones -- even ones with no panes and only child schemes).  Most of these issues seem to be related to Theater View exclusively -- though I do still have Podcast Auto-Downloading enabled.

Build 12.0.248:

When I come out of ripped DVD playback back to Theater View (file view in my case) NONE of the navigations keys work (arrows/enter).

To fix it I have to move the mouse and click on something then I get navigation keys back.

This has happened sometime in the 2 or 3 of builds.

DVD navigtion is working fine.

Haven't tested with real DVD as I don't have a drive in the PC at the moment.

Richard

I'm seeing this too - havn't checked actual discs yet either however.

This happened to me a number of times with the past few night's worth of builds as well.  And, for me, it happened with regular video playback (AVIs and MKVs and whatnot), not with DVD playback.  I reported it in Tuesday's build thread as well.

An update:

I found I was getting the problem with dvr-ms files as well so I rebooted the PC and now the problem seems to have gone for the moment when playing dvr-ms files.

I'm not near the machine now so I can't test a DVD but maybe going to a DVD menu creates the problem which is then present for all video file types?

Cheers
Richard

Build 12.0.250:

I, and at least one other user, have previously reported issues with losing keyboard control in Theater View.  I believe I've tracked this issue down a little further, or it's gotten worse and more consistent...

If I play any video or audio track from inside Theater View and then shortly thereafter hit stop on the remote MC completely bogs down until I close Theater View.  One core on my CPU completely pegs, and Theater View becomes absurdly sluggish.  As soon as I exit Theater View (either via F11 or ESC or whatever) then MC "snaps back to life" and the CPU usage goes back to normal.

I tried un/re-installing, just in case, but there was no change.

Previously, I thought I was losing keyboard control.  I wasn't.  It was working, but VERY slowly.  For some reason, on my machine, the mouse remains relatively responsive and the highlighting continues to update.

This still isn't completely 100% repeatable, but it is happening nearly every time I do the simple steps listed above (I haven't yet had it not happen with video.  With audio it seems like it might go away if I've already played/stopped a song.)

I'm going to mail a log.

[glynor]

Update:  I completely disabled BTV and tested, but there was no change.  Disabled my A/V Software and tested, with no change.  And lastly, I updated my video card drivers to the same matching version as I have on the office machine, but that made no difference either.   Huh

(I switched the BeyondTV recording of the last two movies to the HBOP channel, so bought myself a few hours to mess with it.)

Glynor, I'm losing keyboard control with this build too.

I goto Theater View, start a movie (or something which causes MC to Jump to Display View). When I stop Playback, Theater View returns but the arrow keys have no effect. Mouse is fine and I have to click somewhere in Theater View to bring back focus.

I don't see any strangeness with the CPU maxing out though as you described above.

i also loose keyboard control in theaterview. and can reproduce it. when i listen to music with the screen detached on a second monitor and the song changes the detached display gets the focus. theater view does not react on keyboard commands but hitting the esc makes the detached display small.

and i think theaterview is really getting very nice (except playing now when using two monitors).

An update on the Theater View Endless Loop issue (please feel free to split the related comments from this thread out into a separate thread if you want)...

This morning I tried deleting my HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\JRiver registry key (and subkeys) on my HTPC, and completely replacing it with the same key exported from my working office machine.  This had no effect (other than forcing me to customize my font size again).

Some other additional notes I thought of that could be useful:

1. This is definitely related to the Stop function.  If I play a Video file and then F11 back to Theater View and browse around with the video still playing, everything is fine.  Pause, FF/RW, and Track FF/RW all continue to work without issue.  But, as soon as I hit Stop, it goes nuts.

2. It makes no difference if I'm in Display View or if I stayed in (or re-opened with it still playing) Theater View (I have the option set to "if has display")... If I hit Stop, it freaks.

3.  The mouse remains much more responsive than using a keyboard, though it is still sluggish.  I think this might be a different (or possibly related but different manifestation) than the other issue reported of the loss of keyboard control.  I've now experienced the loss of keyboard control on my Office machine exactly as described by raym and others.

4.  One difference hardware wise on this machine from my Office machine is that it is a dual core box.  I have no idea if this means anything...

Okay... Further oddness:

5.  I rolled one build at a time all the way back to 237 (way pre-Lineup), with no change at any step.  I gave up then.

6.  Interestingly... In addition to exiting Theater View, navigating to Theater View's Playing Now also seems to break the loop and MC resumes normal operation.  I can then go back to the rest of Theater View and browse around and everything's fine until I hit Stop again.

7. It doesn't matter if I hit stop with a keystroke, double-clicking the Pause button, or sending the MCC Command via Windows Message.  All cause it.

8.  It doesn't matter if I'm inside Theater View when I start the playback of the file, or when I stop it, as long as I very quickly enter Theater View after hitting Stop.  This is interesting.  I can reproduce it by:

    * Playing a file in standard view, regardless of whether I open Display View or stay in Standard Playing Now.
    * Hit Stop
    * This returns me to Standard View if I was in full-screen display (though I don't have to be to reproduce it).
    * Immediately hit F11 twice to open Theater View (F11 cycles through Display View first).
    * It "hangs" or "loops" or whatever you want to call it.
    * If I enter Theater View's Playing Now or Exit out of Theater View in any way, it immediately rights itself and resumes normal operation.
    * However, if after I hit Stop, I count to 3 or 5 or so, and then hit F11 twice to open Theater View, it's fine and keeps working as expected.  It's something about opening Theater View soon after stopping playback (but it doesn't have to be instantaneous).

9.  For giggles I went WAY back to build 212, and the problem did go away!  If requested, I'll put in the time to really track down what build starts it, but that's a pain so unless I get bored or someone asks...

I might get bored.  But I have some other stuff I want to do too...

For what it's worth I am experiencing this issue as well. This happens right after I hit stop on my MC while something is playing. Theater View comes up but then it seems completely unresponsive to further remote control commands.

Osho

I'll get in on that party with the PC that I just upgraded to Vista... I can get an unresponsive Black Screen after hitting STOP in TVeiw (it eventually comes back).  KB & Mouse is fine.

Referring to build 12.0.251:

Still happening with this build.

It's really actually making Theater View still somewhat unusable on my HTPC.  Any other ideas for me to try to track it down?  I'm willing to do whatever you ask (other than perhaps a complete nuke/pave).

Make sure the experimental theater view option for mixing in the video background is off.

Also, please send a full log my way.

I couldn't reproduce it, and the log snippet you sent didn't point to anything.

Thanks.

Thanks.  It was turned off, and I will do

[glynor]

Today the saga continues...

Now that I've finished bringing everyone up to date, here's what I've done today.

1. On my HTPC, I completely deleted:
C:\Documents and Settings\<user>\Application Data\J River
C:\Program Files\J River

2. I copied the contents of those same directories from my working PC (Office) over to the HTPC.  So, I essentially replace the entire contents of my MC12 install with the working one from another computer.

3. I manually cleared out the two cache locations:
C:\Documents and Settings\ri0n\Application Data\J River\Cache
\<library_data_folder>\Cache

I then attempted to reproduce the error, and was still able to cause it to "choke up" every single time I tried it.  I saved the log from this experiment and mailed it to Matt.

I'm now going to quickly try two other options on the HTPC and see what happens:

1. I'm going to try with a cloned library.

2. I'm going to try with a completely fresh library.

Wish me luck! 

[glynor]

I ended up trying the completely fresh library first.  I created a new blank library, then I imported 200 video files (or so) and tried it...

And it still happened.  Since it happened with a completely fresh library, I decided there was no point to trying with a cloned library so I didn't.

?

I should also mention... I tested more thoroughly and I can confirm that my mouse controls stay much more responsive than my keyboard controls, when MC is in this "choked" state.  Mouse highlighting, opening, and navigation is still slightly less responsive than normal when it's choked, but the difference is small and you might not notice it if you weren't looking for it.

Keyboard navigation and operation is horrifically slow, of course.  Also, opening and closing new pages slows to a crawl (the animation draws very slowly) and the background visualization "stutters".  In fact, on noticing this fact (the stuttering of the background animation seems timed to match the faint odd whirring noise my computer is making -- which I think is a RAM access noise or a CPU usage noise), I'm curious if the bug might have something to do with the background animation... Who knows though, really!

Either way... exiting Theater View or doing any of the above mentioned tasks quickly and completely "rights" MC until next time I stop playback.

[glynor]

Lastly, FWIW, the System Info from my HTPC:

Code: [Select]

Media Center Registered 12.0.251 -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center 12\

Microsoft Windows XP 5.1 Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
AMD Unknown 2520 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 2096 MB, Free - 1069 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2900.2180 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.82.2900 / Shlwapi.dll: 6.0.2900 / Shell32.dll: 6.0.2900 / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping /   Drive D: _NEC    DVD_RW ND-3520A   Mode:Normal  Type:Auto  Speed:Max
  Drive V:   Mode:Normal  Type:Auto  Speed:Max
  Digital playback: Yes /  Use YADB: Yes /  Get cover art: No /  Calc replay gain: Yes /  Copy volume: 32767
  Eject after ripping: Yes /  Play sound after ripping: No 

Burning /  Drive D: _NEC     DVD_RW ND-3520A    Addr: 2:1:0  Speed:48  MaxSpeed:48  BurnProof:Yes
  Test mode: No /  Eject after writing: Yes /  Direct decoding: Yes /  Write CD-Text: Yes
  Use playback settings: No /

Interface Plugins:
  Library Server (Active)
  TiVo Server (Active)
  UPnP Server (Active)


[JimH]

I should also mention... I tested more thoroughly and I can confirm that my mouse controls stay much more responsive than my keyboard controls, when MC is in this "choked" state.  Mouse highlighting, opening, and navigation is still slightly less responsive than normal when it's choked, but the difference is small and you might not notice it if you weren't looking for it.

Does moving the mouse "clear" the problem?

Matt thinks there is a Vista bug involved in a problem that is at least similar.  See one of his posts yesterday.

[glynor]

Does moving the mouse "clear" the problem?

Matt thinks there is a Vista bug involved in a problem that is at least similar.  See one of his posts yesterday.

I saw that.  No, moving the mouse works but it doesn't make MC come back to life.  Nor does clicking on the UI (to bring it back to the front) on this machine.  It immediately rights itself if:

1. I exit Theater View to Standard View.
2. I re-enter Display View (by playing something or via F11 or whatever).
3. I open Playing Now in Theater View.

I haven't yet tried opening the RSS Feed Reader or Weather Plugins.  Navigating around (via mouse or keyboard) in Theater View's menus doesn't seem to "fix" it, though I admittedly haven't tested this real thoroughly because it is so absurdly slow that it's painful to navigate very far.  I did wait a while yesterday and let it sit to see if it'd ever calm down.  It didn't after about 5 minutes (and I was a bit concerned about my CPU being pegged so I then wanted to exit).  I'm not positive that I made this clear before but when the CPU "pegs" when this happens, it is only one core of the CPU.  The other remains unused (so I go to flat 50% usage).

I tested today on my dual-core machine at work (Intel Pentium D in this case), and was not able to reproduce the error on it either.  I have seen the loss of keyboard control on it though (but no CPU usage spike).  One last thing I decided to try last night (but was too tired) was to downclock my CPU on the HTPC and try it again.  It is overclocked a bit but the CPU has been ROCK-SOLID with everything else.  I've tested it thoroughly with a wide variety of overclocking tools, and have had no issues in any other applications (including some games that are particularly sensitive to overclocking issues).  My CPU also has a lot more overhead for overclocking than I'm using -- I can get it to post, boot windows, and pass some torture tests at 2.7GHz but I'm running it at 2.5GHz.  Plus, the office machine that works fine is pushed a lot closer to it's "edge" and it's fine.  So basically.... I'm skeptical that this is it, but I'll give it a try tonight just in case.

[leezer3]

Are the two different keyboards connected via different ports?
Almost sounds like a bug with the specific keyboard on the main machine; If its a USB keyboard, try a PS/2 one.
Also, if there's any K/B specific software in there (Media buttons etc) I'd try removing it from the equation & using 100% standard Windows drivers.

I'd also update any codec packs & other drivers on the PC just to be on the safe side.

-Leezer-

[glynor]

No.  It's not anything keyboard specific.

There's only one keyboard attached (PS/2 wireless).  It's just using the Windows drivers (it's a Logitech but I don't have the drivers installed) and to be clear, it only messes up in this one specific circumstance.  Otherwise the keyboard works fine, and as soon as you exit Theater View (or do the other things listed in the above list) it resumes working fine.  I do also have a RF Remote Control (operated via Girder) but the issue occurs even if the remote is not attached and if Girder is closed.

One thing I didn't try is detaching my USB-UIRT, but that shouldn't really have anything to do with it (and isn't being used for any functions in MC at all).  The only reason I mention it is that the USB-UIRT is fairly new, so that could be part of the issue.  And, it's certainly odd that I didn't notice the issue until recently, when I rolled all the way back to build 237 and was still seeing the issue.  Could it be something weird with the USB-UIRT device?   I would think I would have noticed it before I did, but honestly until the recent changes were made to Theater View I wasn't using it on my HTPC a whole lot -- so it could have slipped through.  However, rolling back to build 212 made the problem go away, with the same hardware and software setup... So, even if it is the USB-UIRT (which is complete and utter untested speculation), something is happening that is broken with recent builds of MC that isn't with older ones.

Either way, MC is just pegging the CPU core, which is what's causing the slowness (and the process that is pegging it is MC).

[glynor]

Some interesting new news....

• beta 12.0.253 still exhibits this behavior.
• I disconnected my USB-UIRT and it made no difference.  Also tried it with basically every other concurrent app on the machine closed, and it made no difference.
• This is interesting though:  If I leave another application open while I do this (such as Process Explorer's window) and then once it's "choked" if I Alt-Tab and bring up PE in front of the choked Theater View UI, that fixes it immediately as well (and brings MC back to life without even leaving Theater View in any way).  Just Alt-Tabbing (but not bringing another app to the foreground) isn't enough.  I have to actually bring another app to the foreground (any app, I also tried Windows Explorer and Firefox).
  
• In fact, the keyboard responds to Alt-Tab immediately as though it weren't lagged at all!  It's only internal Theater View keyboard commands that react badly.  If I hit the Windows key the Start Menu pops up lightning-quick.  So, it's not the system itself that is bogged down (no surprise there since I have a dual core machine), but it is actually inside MC.
• Setting the affinity of MC's process to CPU Core #1 or #2 via Process Explorer made no difference.

[JimH]

We're on it.

[glynor]

We're on it.

I know.   

BTW... Not sure if you were in any way, but, please don't take any of these postings from me as "angry" or frustrated in any way.  I'm just trying to help, and satisfying my own curiosity.  It fascinates me a slight bit how two different machines (so similarly configured) will act so differently...

[JimH]

No offense taken.  At all.  But thanks for saying so.

[Matt]

A few questions:

1) Does it matter what view you looked at last in Standard View?  Try a simple view like "Start" to test.

2) Does it only happen with video playback, or can image or audio playback also cause it?

3) What's the easiest way to reproduce it?  I've been trying to play a video from Theater View, hit stop (Ctrl+S), and look at Theater View when it pops back. (and haven't seen anything strange)

4) Could you disable Podcasting and Auto-Import for testing.  Close split views. Unplug handhelds. (all longshots, but worth trying)

5) Could you start the app, reset logging, then do the simple steps from #3 and send the log again?  (the last log had so many plays and stops that it was hard to track)

Thanks Glynor.

[glynor]

1) Does it matter what view you looked at last in Standard View?  Try a simple view like "Start" to test.

Doesn't seem to.  I just tried with it in Start before I entered Theater View and it still happened.  Seemed just as bad as before.

2) Does it only happen with video playback, or can image or audio playback also cause it?

Interestingly enough... Audio does.  Image playback does not.  (I mentioned this above but I mentioned LOTS of stuff above so missing it is certainly understandable.)

3) What's the easiest way to reproduce it?  I've been trying to play a video from Theater View, hit stop (Ctrl+S), and look at Theater View when it pops back. (and haven't seen anything strange)

Exactly.  Same thing works equally well with Audio also.  I generally keep my audio playback plugin set to G-Force, but I just tested it (the log you'll get shortly) with it set to Cover Art and it still happens.

4) Could you disable Podcasting and Auto-Import for testing.  Close split views. Unplug handhelds. (all longshots, but worth trying)

Yep.  In the log I'm sending they are both turned off.  No split views (on my HTPC's TV screen?  Are you kidding?), and the Standard View is set to the Start page.

I don't use handhelds with my HTPC generally.  My wife syncs her Sansa on the office machine.

5) Could you start the app, reset logging, then do the simple steps from #3 and send the log again?  (the last log had so many plays and stops that it was hard to track)

Thanks Glynor.

Done.  On the way shortly.  And you're welcome (thank you)!

[glynor]

Log sent.    

[Matt]

One thing I've seen at work that I can't explain is:

Have audio playing: 0% CPU
View Theater View with audio paused: 0% CPU
View Theater View with audio unpaused: 10-15% CPU

It doesn't make any sense.  I can't find anything in the program that's doing anything different in the playing vs paused states.

Possibly the FPU state is getting flipped back and forth to service the 32-bit playback, causing a big slowdown.

It's also possible that Task Manager isn't reliable for CPU usage.

I'm not sure if this is in any way related.

[Osho]

I am watching this topic very intently I am having similar issues and I hope it is resolved soon.

thanks,
Osho

[Matt]

Log sent.    

The log hasn't made it through yet.  It may just take a while, but maybe try a ZIP if you didn't.

[glynor]

K... Hold on.

EDIT: Sent again... Zipped this time.

EDIT AGAIN:  I don't know why but I don't really trust Task Manager for much.  Process Explorer has completely replaced it for me.  It's far more useful.  If you happen to not have it (which seems unlikely) then I'd highly recommend you grab it.

[glynor]

I think I might have fixed it.  I did a full uninstall, including killing the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\JRiver key (which I had not removed before) and all other Registry files and MC related folders.  Rebooted.  Reinstalled and re-licensed.  It seems (after only brief testing) to be much improved.

It's still choking up when you stop, but it only lasts for a few seconds now.  So, the animation "chugs" a bit when I re-enter Theater View, but it seems to fix itself now...  I'll post more after I further confirm.

[glynor]

Update:

It's still choking somewhat.  Maybe the same as before, maybe not quite so bad (I'll have to test further to be sure).  However... I've now found that if I'm patient enough, it does eventually calm down and resume normal responsiveness.

That's good news because it's possible that whatever is happening will show up in the log with a long, long finish time if I'm patient and don't force MC to "right itself" and then send that log.

[Osho]

Glynor, if I do not want to remove the registry entries, can I get this "somewhat" improvement with uninstall/reinstall? I would really hate to lose all my settings.

thanks,
Osho

[JimH]

Glynor, if I do not want to remove the registry entries, can I get this "somewhat" improvement with uninstall/reinstall? I would really hate to lose all my settings.

thanks,
Osho

What do you have in common?

Visualizations?

Third party plug-ins?

Video card?

Unusual settings?

[glynor]

I ended up restoring my settings (the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\JRiver keys) after I did the full reinstall.  I did NOT restore the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\JRiver key though, which doesn't contain user settings but which contains system-wide settings and the registration data -- so you'll use up a restore.  So, you could use the settings backup script I made and then do the full uninstall/reinstall and then restore your settings.

As I said... This didn't completely fix the issue, but it does seem improved somewhat.  I might actually make a little videotape of how it's working, and post it along with a full log...

To answer Jim's questions:

System Hardware:
Gigabyte K8NS-Ultra939 Motherboard (nForce 3 Ultra socket 939 board)
2x 1GB mushkin enhanced DDR500 RAM
ATI AIW X800XT Video Card (512MB GDDR3 RAM, AGP)
Sapphire Theatrix ATI 550 Pro TV Tuner Card
Promise S150-SX4 SATA RAID5 PCI Card (128MB RAM)
Creative Audigy 2 Standard

Software:
Windows XP Pro SP2
ATI Catalyst 7.4 (April)
Creative Drivers (not sure which exact versions -- if anyone thinks it might be this I can check, but they're such a pain to get working I don't like to mess with them)
nForce 5.10 Unified Platform Drivers

(And this stuff is usually running, but I've tried it with all these things turned off)
BeyondTV 4.6.0
TightVNC Server 1.3dev7
Girder 4.0.14 (370)
Process Explorer 10.21
Free Download Manager 2.1.494

Plugins (I tested with both of these uninstalled):
Scthom's FLAC plugins (current version, encoder and decoder)
G-Force (current "stable" version)

[Osho]

To answer what is common between glynor's and my systems:

To answer Jim's questions:

System Hardware:
Gigabyte K8NS-Ultra939 Motherboard (nForce 3 Ultra socket 939 board)
2x 1GB mushkin enhanced DDR500 RAM
ATI AIW X800XT Video Card (512MB GDDR3 RAM, AGP)
Sapphire Theatrix ATI 550 Pro TV Tuner Card
Promise S150-SX4 SATA RAID5 PCI Card (128MB RAM)
Creative Audigy 2 Standard

I have ATI AIW 9700PRO 128MB RAM , AGP card

Software:
Windows XP Pro SP2

XP Pro SP2 here too.

ATI Catalyst 7.4 (April)

I have ATI Catalyst drivers installed too but I don't know which version.. it is fairly recent (2-3 months old at the most).

Creative Drivers (not sure which exact versions -- if anyone thinks it might be this I can check, but they're such a pain to get working I don't like to mess with them)
nForce 5.10 Unified Platform Drivers

(And this stuff is usually running, but I've tried it with all these things turned off)
BeyondTV 4.6.0
TightVNC Server 1.3dev7
Girder 4.0.14 (370)
Process Explorer 10.21
Free Download Manager 2.1.494

I have a VNC server running as well. RealVNC latest stable version. Nothing else (I don't have Girder).

Plugins (I tested with both of these uninstalled):
Scthom's FLAC plugins (current version, encoder and decoder)
G-Force (current "stable" version)

I have both of these. but I don't use G-Force.

Osho

[glynor]

This seemed bad again with last night's build.  I'm going to try to take some time this evening and do some more testing, and see if I can't figure out exactly which build it started with...

[Osho]

FWIW, a friend of mine just built his HTPC and I was helping him set up his MC12 and we noticed that he experienced this issue as well. Going to standard view and back to Theater view fixed it in this case too.

Osho

[JimH]

FWIW, a friend of mine just built his HTPC and I was helping him set up his MC12 and we noticed that he experienced this issue as well. Going to standard view and back to Theater view fixed it in this case too.

Anything he had in common with your systems?