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[Yaobing]

I checked Hauppauge web site, and their drivers have a much higher version number than what Microsoft Windows installs, so I updated the TV tuners drivers to the 2013 ones on the Hauppauge site.

I will see if I can get PC2 to crash with the updated drivers - if not, we can then assume that the problem is that Hauppauge needs to submit new drivers to Microsoft.

Meanwhile, I did email you the log for other problem I am having, which is actually a bigger problem...

The log you sent shows that MC failed to open a network URL internally (connecting to the server).  Since the same TV recording is playable from other clients, I'd suggest you look into networking problems with this computer.  Is the connection reliable?

[kstuart]

Sorry, I never use Theater View at all on those two Vista PCs.

Have you had a chance to look at the log I sent you, complete with problem description, and debugging efforts ?

"Failed to open or parse file.  (hr=0x80004005)"

That one is actually a much bigger problem, as it prevents me from using the TV function in JRiver, and causing me to try out other programs...

[Yaobing]

Have you had a chance to look at the log I sent you, complete with problem description, and debugging efforts ?

I answered that question already (reply #22 above).

[kstuart]

I answered that question already (reply #22 above).

Aha - I missed that answer, in between Jim's questions.

The network connection is wired ethernet cable 100mbs.

I tried copying a folder to the client, and importing it, and it will play the recording if it is on the local disk and library.

The pattern is that recordings under 4gb will play over the network, and those over 4gb will not.  But all drives are NTFS, and since it is .jtv, the files are much smaller.

[kstuart]

The log you sent shows that MC failed to open a network URL internally (connecting to the server).  Since the same TV recording is playable from other clients, I'd suggest you look into networking problems with this computer.  Is the connection reliable?

The connection will play .jtv files (folders) over the network connection every time when they are below 4 gb.

And the connection will play the same TV shows, over the same network connection, when they are in the format of a single .ts file that is over 4gb.

Only when the are in the form of .jtv files in a folder of total over 4gb, will they not play, and then only with that one client.

[Yaobing]

Only when the are in the form of .jtv files in a folder of total over 4gb, will they not play,

Thanks for the clarification.  I will have some more testing.  But this is still hard to understand...

and then only with that one client.

especially this, and harder to reproduce.

[Yaobing]

So far I am still not able to reproduce it.  I tried this morning to record two very long programs.  One has 7.8GB of total data in the folder, the other has more than 20GB.  I can still play them from a client. 

Not sure if OS plays any roles, my computers are Windows 7 at both ends.

[kstuart]

So far I am still not able to reproduce it.  I tried this morning to record two very long programs.  One has 7.8GB of total data in the folder, the other has more than 20GB.  I can still play them from a client.  

Not sure if OS plays any roles, my computers are Windows 7 at both ends.

That's not surprising because my Windows 7 client and Windows XP client can play them (as mentioned in the email).

Here is the email contents for reference:

This is in playback of a recorded TV show over home LAN.

Some clients will play the file, one won't.  It happens with many of the files, but not all.

The client that won't play the file(s), will play other files just fine, that are recorded from the same station, so the file format should be the same (.jtv container).

I think this is a "Playback of Video over Network" issue, since the recording is long over, but I could be wrong.

Things I tried which don't fix the issue:

* Unchecking hardware acceleration of video files
* Unchecking Play Files From Memory
* Using a different audio output
* Converted all the paths to UNC network paths in the Library from the Server, and then re-added the Library

Here is further data:

.jtv of less than 4gb play fine, only above 4gb have a problem, but all disks are NTFS.

If I change to .ts format, everything works fine - but then there is no playback of currently recording shows.

[Yaobing]

That's not surprising because my Windows 7 client and Windows XP client can play them (as mentioned in the email).

I understand that you did make it very clear what worked and what did not.  It is possible that there is something special about Vista, but I do not know what it can be.

.jtv of less than 4gb play fine, only above 4gb have a problem, but all disks are NTFS.

4 GB sounds like the limitation of 32 bit integers.  But I am not able to identify anything.  Your previous log indicates that the failure occurred immediately when the client asked the server for the jts file.  The jts file is actually very small, even if the recording totals over 4 GB.

I will continue looking into this.

If I change to .ts format, everything works fine - but then there is no playback of currently recording shows.

This is not true.  You can watch currently recording shows since MC keeps time-shifting even if recording is in ts format.  On the server itself, the current time-shifting session will be shown when you try to watch the channel that is currently being recorded.  Watching the recording file itself (.ts file) is a bit problematic because MC could not figure out that the recording is growing.  But you can always watch the channel directly, either on the server or on a client.

[kstuart]

Yaobing wrote: "This is not true.  You can watch currently recording shows since MC keeps time-shifting even if recording is in ts format.  On the server itself, the current time-shifting session will be shown when you try to watch the channel that is currently being recorded.  Watching the recording file itself (.ts file) is a bit problematic because MC could not figure out that the recording is growing.  But you can always watch the channel directly, either on the server or on a client."

For example, I always have a timer set for the local news at 10pm.   With a commercial DVR, you can start viewing at 10:10pm, but start at the beginning of the program, and watch whatever you want through the end of the half hour program, while it is recording.   If you catchup, then it just shows the rest live, but otherwise, you can go back and forth within the file, while it is also recording.

From other threads, apparently you can do this with JTF format, but not with TS.  Even with JTF format, it is "glitchy" - it doesn't work smoothly (even on the client that does not have the problem in the thread).

By the way, I have heard the MP can do this with TS files.  This is the preferred solution, since TS is one file, and is much more portable and "archivable" if you decide you might want to watch the program again in the future.

[Yaobing]

Yaobing wrote: "This is not true.  You can watch currently recording shows since MC keeps time-shifting even if recording is in ts format.  On the server itself, the current time-shifting session will be shown when you try to watch the channel that is currently being recorded.  Watching the recording file itself (.ts file) is a bit problematic because MC could not figure out that the recording is growing.  But you can always watch the channel directly, either on the server or on a client."

For example, I always have a timer set for the local news at 10pm.   With a commercial DVR, you can start viewing at 10:10pm, but start at the beginning of the program, and watch whatever you want through the end of the half hour program, while it is recording.   If you catchup, then it just shows the rest live, but otherwise, you can go back and forth within the file, while it is also recording.

From other threads, apparently you can do this with JTF format, but not with TS.  Even with JTF format, it is "glitchy" - it doesn't work smoothly (even on the client that does not have the problem in the thread).

Here is the most current accurate status of this for MC18.

If you play a channel (using EPG guide, or simply double-click the channel), MC will take you to the tuner that currently record the show.  It may take you to the most current time, or the beginning of the recording, depending on how you arrived there.  When play from the program in EPG grid, you get to play it from the beginning of the program (or previous bookmark if you already watched it previously).  If you double-click the channel on the channels list, you play from the live time.  This sounds a bit complicated, but is what some other users wanted.

The above is true for both jtv recording and ts recording.

However, with ts recording, if you try to play the recording itself (i.e. the ts file), either from TV view's Recordings list, or from Video view, MC will play the actual ts file, and will only play the duration of the file when it is loaded.  This is actually a bug that I have just fixed today. With the fix, MC will bring you to the tuner and let you watch from the beginning of the recording, and continue for as long as you want to.

By the way, I have heard the MP can do this with TS files.  This is the preferred solution, since TS is one file, and is much more portable and "archivable" if you decide you might want to watch the program again in the future.

This could be something we will do in the future.  We are not moving in that direction right now because we are still supporting analog tuners that do not produce video in ts format.

[kstuart]

Thanks for your reply.

For the following, let us assume digital broadcast and using TS file (instead of JTF).

IF it is 10:15 pm, and you tune to a channel, you obviously cannot view from the start of the program at  10:00pm, since the tuner did not know to tune to that channel (it cannot read our mind).

So, if a viewer usually wants to see a program, and the viewer is often late in tuning to that channel "live", then they are advised to setup a timer at 10pm.   This is true even if they never want to archive the program (they never want to watch it again).

Okay, since the viewer knows they are often late to tune, they setup a timer in MC18 for 10pm.

So, currently in MC18, when they sit down at 10:15pm to watch the whole program, is there a way to do this (when using TS file) ?   You are implying above that you have made a change to allow this ?

Generally, I look in "Recordings" or "To Be Recorded" and click "Watch" button, but I can learn to do it a different way if it would be better to do so.

[Yaobing]

So, currently in MC18, when they sit down at 10:15pm to watch the whole program, is there a way to do this (when using TS file) ?  

Yes.  You will get to see the program from 10:00.  But see the distinction I made about starting from a program and start from a channel.  If you start by double-clicking the channel, you are brought to live time (10:15), but you can seek back if you want.

You are implying above that you have made a change to allow this ?

It has been working like this for a long time.

Generally, I look in "Recordings" or "To Be Recorded" and click "Watch" button, but I can learn to do it a different way if it would be better to do so.

Please see the "bug" part of my answer above.  So playing from Recordings is a bit problematic until a bug fixed new build is out.

Additionally, all of the above is assuming you are not playing from a client machine.  If you play from a client machine, the best way is to play from EPG program, or channels list, not from Recordings (even for bug fixed new version).

Why not just change recording format to ts and try it for a couple of days.  Personally I do not like to use ts format, but I tested it yesterday before replying your posts.

[kstuart]

Yaobing wrote: "If you play from a client machine, the best way is to play from EPG program, or channels list, not from Recordings (even for bug fixed new version)."

It is very mysterious that there is a difference in playback of the same file, simply due to where in the GUI you click to start the playback of that file.

(In my case, I am always playing from a client machine, because the TV server is on a machine whose video chip is broken in some way. )

[Yaobing]

Yaobing wrote: "If you play from a client machine, the best way is to play from EPG program, or channels list, not from Recordings (even for bug fixed new version)."

It is very mysterious that there is a difference in playback of the same file, simply due to where in the GUI you click to start the playback of that file.

(In my case, I am always playing from a client machine, because the TV server is on a machine whose video chip is broken in some way. )

There is a logic difference between playing a file and playing a program.  So for playing on a client, the behavior is better when you play a program or a channel, than when you play a recording that has not completed yet, due to ts duration not being extended dynamically.

It may still be possible for me to figure out a way of switching over from the file to the tuner, so we can handle it better.

[kstuart]

By the way, I have confirmed that the original problem being discussed in this thread, does not occur when MC18 uses TS files for TV.   It only occurs with JTV format.

[kstuart]

If someone plays the currently-recording TS file by using Windows Explorer and then selecting "Play with MediaCenter" (or similarly by using "Files" explorer inside MC18), will that work properly with the next version ?

[Yaobing]

If someone plays the currently-recording TS file by using Windows Explorer and then selecting "Play with MediaCenter" (or similarly by using "Files" explorer inside MC18), will that work properly with the next version ?

Yes this will work.  This would not be on a client because you are directly accessing the file in explorer.  In this situation MC directly switches to the TV tuner and actually plays the jtv file that it has created during recording.

[Yaobing]

Now back to the original issue of some jtv recordings not playing on some clients.

The log file you emailed me on July 15th contained the following lines:

Code: [Select]

29479602: 1932: Reader: CWinINetReader::Open: Opening http://192.168.0.2:52199/MCWS/v1/File/GetFile?File=799663&Helper=jts
29479602: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::Thread: Start
29479602: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::Connect: Start
29479602: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::Connect: Finish (0 ms)
29479602: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::DownloadFromHTTPURL: Start
29479618: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::DownloadFromHTTPURL: HttpSendRequest error: 12019
29479618: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::DownloadFromHTTPURL: Failed (header status code: -1)
29479618: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::DownloadFromHTTPURL: Finish (16 ms)
29479618: 4016: Reader: CWinINetReader::Thread: Finish (16 ms)
29479618: 1932: Reader: CWinINetReader::Open: ConnectToURL failed, m_bConnectError=true, URL=http://192.168.0.2:52199/MCWS/v1/File/GetFile?File=799663&Helper=jts
which indicate that the failure occurred when MC client tried to open the video data file over the network.

Do you still have the same JTV recording on the server?  If yes, and you still have trouble playing it from a client, please try opening the URL "http://192.168.0.2:52199/MCWS/v1/File/GetFile?File=799663&Helper=jts" in a browser on the client machine?  This might give us some clue on why it failed.

If you already deleted that particular recording, you can try another recording that can not be played from a client.  In this case you will have a different URL (the "File=79966" part will be different) which you can find in the log file.

[kstuart]

I tested and verified that I still had the same error message from the OP.

Then I tried that URL and it asked if I wanted to Open or Save "Get File" which is an application octet stream of size 4.3 gb.  It then started to downloaded it as if it were a downloadable link.

By the way, I did copy the folder to the client PC and imported it as a local TV show on the client PC, and it plays fine that way.

[Matt]

Why would a JTS file ever be 4.3 GB?  They're supposed to be small segments of a file.

Does this happen with CableCard or something?

[Yaobing]

JTS is a wrapper file.  It represents the entire data (i.e. all of those cnk files together). The actual physical file on disk is small, only 24 bytes, but when requesting the file over the network, it is considered as the entire video data.

[kstuart]

Another data point - I had been using the router built into the AT&T Gateway, but I now am starting to have situations where Gigabit Ethernet connections would be nice.   So, I finally got around to installing a router that I had with Gigabit Ethernet and 2.4/5mhz two channel N wifi (although the laptops all still have G only).

After connecting everything up in the new router, the OP problem still exists (even though the Server and the Client are both connected now by Gigabit ethernet).

Since the problem occurred, I had also rolled back the Client's ethernet port driver from the "latest" which was a Microsoft Windows Update driver to the "previous" which is a Realtek driver, and that also did not solve the problem.

And again, the problem does not exist with TS files of the same size or larger.

So I am guessing a Vista bug that only happens with JTV format and not with TS format.