HTPC Powered on all the time?

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JaBZ

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#25048 10-Aug-2008 18:59

Everyone has different views on this, putting power savings aside. Who leaves their HTPC's powered on all the time?
I am thinking of leaving mine on all the time due to mainly using it for Freeview HD with Mediaportal.

I have run into countless issues by having it in Standby when not in use, the most extreme is Mediaportal crashing when a scheduled recording is about to start. HTPC not waking up when a Scheduled recording is about to start etc.. Yes I am using the power plugins etc but still not reliable.

My opinions and ideas expressed in posts are solely my own and do not reflect the views of my employer in any way..

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#155677 10-Aug-2008 19:44

One of the reasons I gave up on Media Portal was the fact I could never get S3 sleep & resume working. I know I'm certainly not alone in having problems.

I use GB-PVR and have no such troubles, my machine is only on when I'm watching TV and it spends the rest of the time in S3 suspend waking up automatically for recordings and then going back to sleep.

eXDee

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#155679 10-Aug-2008 19:49

Interesting, im hoping i don't get these problems with Mediaportal. I dont want to set everything up only to have to give up on it.
Quick question about GB-PVR, is there a feature similar to TV server and then standalone clients?

davidcole

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#155681 10-Aug-2008 19:52

I leave mine on.

Before I rebuilt I had real issues making it go down. Or it would hang on the way down.

Then i rebuilt and spent 2 weeks trying to get it to sleep, and wake up reliably and have the tuners come back up. But couldn't so i
gave up. So it's on permanently.

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mcraenz

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#155771 11-Aug-2008 07:51

Yeah I run mine 24x7.

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#155780 11-Aug-2008 08:27

eXDee: Quick question about GB-PVR, is there a feature similar to TV server and then standalone clients?

Yes.

askelon

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#155787 11-Aug-2008 08:44

I have mine set to hibernate. Works perfect every time. I used to just use suspend mode but for some strange reason with the replacement of the power supply it would turn itself back on straight away.

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Little

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#155789 11-Aug-2008 08:53

I have just finished configuring mine to sleep using S3. It now wakes up to record, then sleeps. I can use the mce remote to resume from s3 and put to sleep. I had big issues with waking it up. Basicly the pc would power up but stall with no output to the tv or respond to any keyboard/mouse inputs. Turns out it was the Gigabyte hardware monitoring software, once all that was removed it was fine. This is with Vista Ultimate Sp1 and Mediaportal RC2.

HTPC - CASE: Silverstone LC17 Black MOTHERBOARD: Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L VIDEO: Asus 430GT SOUND: Onboard Realtek SPDIF out CPU: Intel C2D 8400 RAM: G.Skill 4GB DDR800 HDD: WD 500GB TUNER: HVR-2200 + HVR-3000 O/S: Ubuntu 10.10, XBMC+PVR, TvHeadend

1gkar

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#156014 11-Aug-2008 20:33

For once I'm in the minority with something. My system works perfectly with going into & resuming from standby using PowerShceduler. I don't use hibernate as I can't use my MCE remote for resumption as my case is missing something which allows this. But standby is good, especially considering recent power increases.

Silverstone LC14 HTPC Case/Intel E4600 CPU/GA-EP35-DS3 MOBO/Asus EN9500GT graphics/2GB RAM/total 2TB HDD space/HVR-2200 & 2X 150MCE tuner cards/LG GGC-H20L BD Drive/MCE2005/Mediaportal/TVServer 1.1.0Final/LG 55"3D LED-TV/Denon AVR-1803 receiver/X1 projector

amanzi

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#156040 11-Aug-2008 21:08

Little: I have just finished configuring mine to sleep using S3. It now wakes up to record, then sleeps. I can use the mce remote to resume from s3 and put to sleep. I had big issues with waking it up. Basicly the pc would power up but stall with no output to the tv or respond to any keyboard/mouse inputs. Turns out it was the Gigabyte hardware monitoring software, once all that was removed it was fine. This is with Vista Ultimate Sp1 and Mediaportal RC2.

Can you give some more info on how you got this working? Did you have to change anything in the BIOS? I noticed a setting there that said you could choose between S1 or S3 sleep mode but not sure whether this is necessary. I have a new Gigabyte motherboard and running Vista SP1 32bit.

eXDee

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#156074 11-Aug-2008 21:53

S3 sleep must be set in the bios before windows install afaik, or it won't function properly.
S3 is the one you want.

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Snowflake

#156088 11-Aug-2008 22:06

mine runs 24x7 too. i like to be able to access it anywhere, anytime from my office or smartphone and its just easier to leave it running for this. (e.g. webguide). I know i can set up magic packets to get an auto wake-up over the wan, but it seems too much of a hassle (especially on a smartphone), not to mention the delay when you need-it-right-now!

besides, i'm planning on using an attached web cam to upload any motion-detect snapshots automatically to a web site in case someone tries to break in and steal it.... leaving a sign asking a thief to please switch on the machine and wait for a couple of minutes just doesnt sound feasible :)

my box is nice and quiet so leaving it running isnt a problem sound-wise

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#156091 11-Aug-2008 22:15

Speaking of WOL my Asus M3N-78 EMH HDMI motherboard doesn't seem to like it, i've set it up in the network config to wake up on magic packets + pattern, and the ethernet lights stay on after being powered off, but for some reason it just won't wake up. No mention of WOL in the latest bios...

Little

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#156154 12-Aug-2008 08:15

If I need to wake mine up remotely, I log into my router (custom firmware) and send a WOL packet to the htpc. Once it has resumed (< 5 seconds) I can then do whatever I like to it via hamachi.

amanzi, Set the bios to S3. I also use MST to configure which devices can wakeup the pc. BTW my motherboard is a GA-EP45-DS3L.

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#156159 12-Aug-2008 08:26

mine sits in s3 most of the time but is often left on all day when someone is at home.

amanzi

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#156162 12-Aug-2008 08:31

Little: If I need to wake mine up remotely, I log into my router (custom firmware) and send a WOL packet to the htpc. Once it has resumed (< 5 seconds) I can then do whatever I like to it via hamachi.

amanzi, Set the bios to S3. I also use MST to configure which devices can wakeup the pc. BTW my motherboard is a GA-EP45-DS3L.

I had already set the BIOS to S3 and I can get the computer to go to sleep, but once it's sleeping I can't it to wake up again with the remote. If I press the power button it returns instantly to where it was before, so I know the S3 part of it is working. Any other ideas?

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