1st, a big thanks for making KnoppMyth so that MythTV is easy!

After building two separate boxes (one with 1 PVR250, one with 2, all rev 1.2 cards) using the ECS K7S5A mainboard (XP CPU's), 512MB each, I've made some observations that some others seem to have found out as well.

When I was using my ATI PCI Wonder card, the box could run for weeks without problems.

But using the 250's with IvyTV (tried all versions), I rarely get a couple days or sometimes even hours before the tuner quality is quite poor on all channels (2 different houses/cable providers). Sometimes just going back to the front-end menu causes it, usually happens on its own though. Symptom is vertical zigzags/colors/dot crawls (changes with different IVTV levels). IVTV 0.1.9 even has "random" frame anomalies at times. Rebooting ALWAYS corrects the problem. (this resets the 250 firmware/IVTV??)

Tried clean KnoppMyth R4/R4V2 installs on SIS 735 and SIS 746 mainboards with all posible BIOS levels, settings, power saving, etc... Myth levels .12-.14. Same thing. I'm using SB Live 5.1 for optical (homemade, for Xine DVD) and analog out for TV. I have a VIA KT266A mainboard but was told to avoid using that, plus I'm thinking it's an IVTV problem as the SIS 735/746 boards are very good at heavy DMA traffic with the single chipset design.

How easy would it be to have (cron?) the box reboot itself after the nightly XMLTV update? I realize this is a rather poor workaround, but I'm growing tired of SUing to reboot the machine myself?

Thanks.

setting up a cron job to reboot the box is quite easy, but I would suggest you make it a user cron job for user root, so you can space it far enough from the filldatabase to make sure that gets done.

When it goes to crap try using test_ioctl to change the input to something else then change it back. If that works, you could set up a cron job to do that on a regular basis. You might could change it at 1 minute after each hour or half hour. I'm using DirecTV, so I've got an external channel change script, and I do this at the end of every channel change (I had problems with occasional vertical green bars). If you're using tuner input, maybe you can use the field for the external channel change script to just run this "reset the ivtv" script.

Example, if you are running on input 4 right now (use test_ioctl to read your current input), your script could be:

You probably wouldn't even notice the blip this causes, but it might reset the driver "enough".

Thanks for the info guys!

I made a script to cycle the input back to tuner (4) just like above. And with IVTV 0.1.9, it definately corrected the abnormal frames/audio glitches when I called it from the terminal. Have no idea how long it will stay good though, seems to be quite random.

But when adding my "fix.sh" script to the Myth setup "external change channel" area, Myth no longer changes the tuner channel since it obviously doesn't feel the need. So this doesn't really work with my standard cable system.

I'm back to IVTV 0.1.7 (no abnormal frames) now. And I think the "fix.sh" script is enough to correct the poor quality that develops over time (haven't completely verified this yet) without rebooting.

Now I guess I have to use cron to call my fix.sh script. Every 60 or 30 mins or so, to minimize botched recordings. This seems possible, but I'm not quite sure how to implement it??

BTW, I realize everyone's box is different, and I've looked at the Linux PVR database. 8x8 based capture boards are a no brainer, they work and need a good CPU. But the 250/350's IVTV doesn't seem ready for prime time (I realize it's beta, and I'm more than willing to wait). Just curious because there seems to be so many happy 250/350 users out there; how long do they stay happy before rebooting?? I suppose if they managed work-arounds, they'd be pretty happy.

well I never see any sort of artifacts or degradation of any sort with my pvr250. and I never reboot, but still get lockups every two to three weeks.

To create a cron job, use crontab -e. It drops you to a vi editor, so you have to know those commands. check the man page for crontab to find the format of the file. Most man pages can be found with google if you type "man crontab". This will set you up to run at 1 minute after each hour:

crontab -e
i
1 * * * * /path/to/fix.sh
hit the escape key
:wq!

To explain what that is above, crontab -e drops you to a vi editor for your crontab file. i puts you in insert mode. The next line tells cron to run your script at 1 minute after every hour of every day, etc. Escape gets you out of insert mode. :wq! does a write and quit, now.

Enter crontab -l to see your current crontab to make sure it worked ok.


Since updating to 1.9 ivtv and latest debs for myth, I've been running without any problems. My longest uptime since then is only 6 days, but I'm an incureable tinkerer.

Strange, this problem just started happening with my pvr 350. It was running for like a month with no problems and then all of a sudden the quality on all the channels was horrible. I rebooted the machine and everything look great, but the next day this problem occurred again.

So I checked out my box and one of the case fans had died and the 350 card got pretty hot since it was sitting next to my geforce2 card which eminates some heat. I think the problems started occurring after this. I replaced the fan, and the 350 ran for a couple days with no issues, but then it happened again

I am hoping that it is just a driver issue, and that my 350 card was not damaged by excessive heat (the card felt warm). I dont know what the normal operating temperatures are for this card. I might send it back for a replacement (I purchased it from amazon.com).

Davem, thank you for the cron help. I knew about crontab -e but it has never worked before I just tried it now, very strange. It always said no crontab for user "x" (mythtv, root, etc).

But I tried again as user mythtv (I believe this is the right one?) and this time I got the text editor, with an empty file. So I placed my script for every 1 minute after every hour like you had syntaxed for me. It finished saying new cron job added. Maybe I should've edited the /etc/crontab and made a /etc/cron.hourly directory?

Just lost a 30 min show (perfect picutre but sound like 4-bit audio) with IVTV 0.1.7 (without the script). Strange, when the show finished, watching/recording TV on that same channel was fine. Welll hopefully I can use 0.1.9 with this cron script.

BTW, I copied my script to /etc/cron.daily. This is the system cron right? And it should execute my 2-line script every day right?

Is there a log file to verify that my script is being run?

As far as heat and the PVR 250 goes, all 3 of mine act the same as they did new/cold as they do now old/warm. These problems seem IVTV related for me anyway. A BT848/878 would never do these things, but those drivers are very mature, and the 250 quality (especially tuner) is quite superior.

ECS K7S5A, XP 1600+ @ 1200Mhz(9x133)/1.53Vcore, 512MB, 200GB
GF4MX440 64MB, 128-bit, Svideo out (43.63 drivers) to Apex 51" TV
PVR 250, v1.2, IVTV 0.1.9 (input switch script), 720x480 @ 4200/5000
SBLive! 5.1, homemade optical cable to Sony 595 receiver (Xine DVD)
RadioShack 25-2116 JP-1 lighted remote controls everything
"Demon" black, windowed case lighted red, blue fans & 7V
Acoustic Research A/V and cable system coax cables
KnoppMyth R4 > Myth .14

Tuner quality still degrades over time... and my fix.sh (input switching) script still fixes it real-time. Obviously my cron job isn't working.

I used chmod +x on the fix.sh file and mythtv and root users can run it.

I logged in as mythtv user then used crontab -e to make the job 1 minute after every hour (like above). crontab -l shows that the job is in place. But it can't be, since successive recordings are botched. Did I need to be root instead?

Do I need to edit /etc/crontab and make and hourly entry there as well as a /etc/cron.hourly dir for my script to work?

Thanks.

ECS K7S5A, XP 1600+ @ 1200Mhz(9x133)/1.53Vcore, 512MB, 200GB
GF4MX440 64MB, 128-bit, Svideo out (43.63 drivers) to Apex 51" TV
PVR 250, v1.2, IVTV 0.1.9 (input switch script), 720x480 @ 4200/5000
SBLive! 5.1, homemade optical cable to Sony 595 receiver (Xine DVD)
RadioShack 25-2116 JP-1 lighted remote controls everything
"Demon" black, windowed case lighted red, blue fans & 7V
Acoustic Research A/V and cable system coax cables
KnoppMyth R4 > Myth .14

Hmm.

Try using crontab -l to list your cron file. Now type or copy/paste the last part of the line (/path/to/fix.sh) exactly as you see it from the output of crontab -l. Does it work when you do that or do you get an error message?

Also consider adding a debug line to fix.sh. Something like:
echo `date` >> /tmp/fix.sh.log

Now you could check the log file to see if/when the script is running.

It works as I type it from the output of crontab -l. I did add the date logging, thank you, and it works. Just for kicks I made a crontab -e for root as well as mythtv. If this doesn't work, I'm going to edit the /etc/crontab (system file I believe) and add an hourly section plus a /etc/cron.hourly directory. I suppose if any of this works, I'll have to change to 30 minute executions since the problem can rear it's ugly head when a channel is selected for recording (i.e. 30 min shows).

ECS K7S5A, XP 1600+ @ 1200Mhz(9x133)/1.53Vcore, 512MB, 200GB
GF4MX440 64MB, 128-bit, Svideo out (43.63 drivers) to Apex 51" TV
PVR 250, v1.2, IVTV 0.1.9 (input switch script), 720x480 @ 4200/5000
SBLive! 5.1, homemade optical cable to Sony 595 receiver (Xine DVD)
RadioShack 15-2116 JP-1 lighted remote controls everything
"Demon" black, windowed case lighted red, blue fans & 7V
Acoustic Research A/V and cable system coax cables
KnoppMyth R4 > Myth .14

Finally! It works... When I used crontab -e as root, both root&mythtv cron jobs started to work. For anyone who wants to auto reset their PVR 250/350 driver every 30 mins (to correct vertical anomalies/sound probs):

1) Log in as root
2) ex /usr/local/bin/fix.sh
type visual and hit enter, in the editor, press insert

#! /bin/sh

test_ioctl -p 2
test_ioctl -p 4
echo `date` >> /tmp/fix.sh.log #(optional, for debug)

press ESC followed by :, then type exit and hit enter (to save fix.sh)
3) chmod +X /usr/local/bin/fix.sh
4) crontab -e
editor will appear, in the editor, press insert

1 * * * * /usr/local/bin/fix.sh
31 * * * * /usr/local/bin/fix.sh

press ESC followed by :, then type exit and hit enter

This assumes tuner usage (-p 4). To find what input you're using type test_ioctl -o to find out.

** EDIT: Actually, you must repeat step 4 logged in as user mythtv password mythtv. Mythtv user MUST have this cron job in order for it to work. On my system the mythtv cron job wouldn't execute unless there was also a root user cron job.

ECS K7S5A, XP 1600+ @ 1200Mhz(9x133)/1.53Vcore, 512MB, 200GB
GF4MX440 64MB, 128-bit, Svideo out (43.63 drivers) to Apex 51" TV
PVR 250, v1.2, IVTV 0.1.9 (input switch script), 720x480 @ 4500/6000
SBLive! 5.1, homemade optical cable to Sony 595 receiver (Xine DVD)
RadioShack 15-2116 JP-1 lighted remote controls everything
"Demon" black, windowed case lighted red, blue fans & 7V
Acoustic Research A/V and cable system coax cables
KnoppMyth R4 > Myth .14

How would I go about doing this for my system that has duel PVR-250's?

It'll work for the first 250. For the 2nd one, add two more lines to the script

test_ioctl -d /dev/video1 -p 2
test_ioctl -d /dev/video1 -p 4

Again this is for Tuner input (the 4). -d /dev/video1 selects the 2nd PVR 250, otherwise the first is assumed. But resetting IVTV is required for both.

However I've found that even as this script runs as root and mythtv users (logs prove it), it doesn't fix the problem via a cron task. But when I run the script from the terminal, it resets and works every time, so now I just type it every couple days instead of rebooting. What a bother.

Perhaps someone with more Linux knowledge can say why this is.

I wonder if there are any error messages being generated by your cron script? As root, type
This will show the bottom of the messages file, and any new input will show up as well.

Now in another window, try running fix.sh by hand to see what the messages should look like (if any). If something shows up, compare that to any messages that show up via the cron call to fix.sh.

Hit ctrl-c to break the tail -f.