New HTPC up and running - just the one issue......

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smac

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#40032 24-Aug-2009 10:34

Well my spanky new (some of it) system is up and running - thanks to everyone who offered up advice and parts

Not quite finished (blu-ray, EPG and remote still to sort) but after a whole bunch of messing around I at least have a system that replaces my exisitng analog TV plus DVD recorder set up. TV quality is fantastic and the simplicity of the interface and ease of recording has wifie approval...yay.

Just the one issue I am very keen to get sorted - I would like to use the 'sleep' function at night rather than 'off' as in theory it will allow recording events to wake it. I have been having issues with it not sleeping and/or not waking properly, and after a lot of fuss have pinned this down to the Hauppage 2200 card. Without the card sleep works perfectly, both timed and user initiated. However of course without the card I have no HTPC. I found mention of 64 bit drivers (or lack thereof) causing issues so I've been hunting my way through the Hauppauge site - not overly friendly for non-current products is it?! Closest I can find is a listing for the 2250, but the driver is called 22XX so would that be the way to go? Anyone any other experiences with 64 bit and the 2200?

Oh one other point - the ASUS board is great in all but one aspect - what the hell were ASUS thinking shipping a 64 bit capable board with a driver DVD that won't run on a 64 bit OS??? Crazy....have to say these two points combined make me wonder whether the whole 64 thing is worth it....

System set up so far is:
Antec 2480 black case
ASUS P5N7A-VM MB, E5300 CPU, 2GB ram
Some old Seagate SATA drive
Some old Sony DVD ROM drive
Q-Technology 350W PSU
Windows 7 64 bit, WMC (might try MP, but want to get the hardware sorted first)
42" Viera - 1080i via HDMI
Integra 6.6 Amp via optical

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#250064 24-Aug-2009 12:49

Make sure you are looking on the Hauppage UK site.

http://www.hauppauge.co.uk/site/support/support_support.html

Edit: With 2 gig of ram I would have stuck with 32 bit. No advantage for you going with 64 unless you have more then 4 gig of ram.

Media centre PC - Case Silverstone LC16M with 2 X 80mm AcoustiFan DustPROOF, MOBO Gigabyte MA785GT-UD3H, CPU AMD X2 240 under volted, RAM 4 Gig DDR3 1033, HDD 120Gig System/512Gig data, Tuners 2 X Hauppauge HVR-3000, 1 X HVR-2200, Video Palit GT 220, Sound Realtek 886A HD (onboard), Optical LiteOn DH-401S Blue-ray using TotalMedia Theatre Power Corsair VX Series, 450W ATX PSU OS Windows 7 x64

smac

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#250079 24-Aug-2009 13:36

Huh....I was on the US site without even realising, and that's a nightmare. UK much better, so thanks for that.

However, the new drivers have not fixed the issue. Damn. Card out, sleep works. Card in, it doesn't.

You're right about the 32/64 thing - I just grabbed it cause the new board supported it....should have looked more into what the advantages were (ie. none).

Don't suppose anyone knows a non-virus-riddled source for the 32 bit ISO? My theory is since MS are still offering keys they fully expect people to share them around, they just don't want to host any more....

sbiddle

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#250090 24-Aug-2009 14:26

smac: Huh....I was on the US site without even realising, and that's a nightmare. UK much better, so thanks for that.

However, the new drivers have not fixed the issue. Damn. Card out, sleep works. Card in, it doesn't.

You're right about the 32/64 thing - I just grabbed it cause the new board supported it....should have looked more into what the advantages were (ie. none).

Don't suppose anyone knows a non-virus-riddled source for the 32 bit ISO? My theory is since MS are still offering keys they fully expect people to share them around, they just don't want to host any more....

I know a couple of the current Aussie PC magazines have the RC on the cover DVD.

browned

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#250097 24-Aug-2009 14:43

2GB of ram is fine for a x64 Windows Media Center. If it is running Windows MC and that is it the computer will be hard pressed to use more than 1.5GB of ram.

Now just don't ask if there are any advantages to running x64 over x86 when MC is only a x86 program and therefore any third party products are likely to be x86 as well.

Perhaps SP1 or SP2 will offer x64 MC.

cheers
db

Home Server: AMD Threadripper 1950X, 64GB, 56TB HDD, Define R6 Case, 10GbE, ESXi 6.7, UNRAID, NextPVR, Emby Server, Plex Server.
Lounge Media Center: NVIDIA Shield TV 16GB: Kodi18 with Titan MOD, Emby.
Kids Media Center: NVIDIA Shield TV 16GB: Kodi18 with Titan MOD, Emby.
Main PC: Ryzen 7 2700, 16GB RAM, RX 570, 2 x 24"

smac

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#250106 24-Aug-2009 15:04

Right...did some more reading (sorry boss....). I realised I was ignoring good trouble shooting practise leaping to the conclusion that it was the card at fault - could also be board, or PCI-e related.

So starting searching on the board rather than the 2200 and found a couple of other posts relating to S3 resume issues. Some had PCI-e cards but others had PCI, also some were running 32 bit systems....so I put 2 and 2 together, bumped up the voltage, pulled the 2nd case fan and it resumed....once - so too much load at resume time I think. Then failed again, but it's progress.

SO I'll do some reading on the max voltage for my CPU, might even underclock it, will look at my cooling efficiency etc, but at least it's progress.

However if it IS a load issue, I would think it's unlikely 32 bit will solve anything....

Nimma

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#250110 24-Aug-2009 15:14

Hey cool system, mine's just about identical (P5N7A-VM, e5200, 4gb ram, win7 64, HVR-1200 or 1300 i forget but PCIe)

Sleep has been very good for mine, even wakes up and goes back to sleep for recordings in Media Centre. The fix for me was the media centre standby tool (MST) - make sure you choose S3 (sleep) rather than the hybrid sleep. There are also options to time how components wake up.

Good luck!

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Nety

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#250122 24-Aug-2009 15:45

I take the card is not underwarranty? I should have mentioned that I had to replace my 2200 under warranty because it was causing issues although it was not sleep related.

sbiddle

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#250124 24-Aug-2009 15:52

Do you have another PC somewhere you can try the card in?

There were some bad batches of HVR2200's that did hit the market, I had one that I sold to Nety that was replaced under warranty.

smac

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#250139 24-Aug-2009 16:38

Card was purchased from a board member - I really wouldn't want to try and return it because my reading, plus the experiences I've had playing with voltages indicate it's an issue with the board, not the card. I could return the board either for replacement or a different kind, but don't think I'll bother....looks like I can sort it with some fiddling.

If/when I purchase win7 I'll go for 32 as well. Even if it doesn't change this, it'll mean less driver issues. Unless of course Linux sort blu-ray by then.....

Nety

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#250193 24-Aug-2009 19:44

smac: Card was purchased from a board member - I really wouldn't want to try and return it because my reading, plus the experiences I've had playing with voltages indicate it's an issue with the board, not the card. I could return the board either for replacement or a different kind, but don't think I'll bother....looks like I can sort it with some fiddling.

If/when I purchase win7 I'll go for 32 as well. Even if it doesn't change this, it'll mean less driver issues. Unless of course Linux sort blu-ray by then.....

Dont blame your MOBO so quickly. The issue I was having was that when the card was in then the two HRV3000's would sometimes/often fail to record (but not always). However the 2200 appeared to be working fine. So basically even though the 3000's were displaying the issues it was the 2200 that was causing them. Had that replaced and hey presto the issues were gone.

The fact that removing the card fixes the problem suggests to me that the issue with the card.

I seem to remember that Sbiddle also had some issues with the card which did involve sleep (Sbiddle can you confirm?). I am guessing that the new card would not have had the same issues.

rhysb

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#250282 25-Aug-2009 08:47

browned: 2GB of ram is fine for a x64 Windows Media Center. If it is running Windows MC and that is it the computer will be hard pressed to use more than 1.5GB of ram.

Now just don't ask if there are any advantages to running x64 over x86 when MC is only a x86 program and therefore any third party products are likely to be x86 as well.

Perhaps SP1 or SP2 will offer x64 MC.

cheers
db

MC is native x64 on both Vista/7 x64.

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rhysb

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#250287 25-Aug-2009 09:03

Try running "powercfg -energy" from an elevated command prompt. It will generate a detailed report that should help you pinpoint what drivers etc are giving you issues.

browned

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#250300 25-Aug-2009 09:48

rhysb: MC is native x64 on both Vista/7 x64.

Ahh yes on double checking you are correct. Media Center is x64. However, it is still interfacing with wmplayer (x86) by default. There is a x64 wmplayer in Windows 7 so now I just need to find out how to set that as the default.

Back to the main topic. looks like there is a whole thread on this mobo here http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1079923&page=15

34 pages to read through.

Edit found my own solution. in elevated cmd prompt run unregmp2 /SwapTo:64

cheers
db

sbiddle

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#250301 25-Aug-2009 09:48

Nety:
smac: Card was purchased from a board member - I really wouldn't want to try and return it because my reading, plus the experiences I've had playing with voltages indicate it's an issue with the board, not the card. I could return the board either for replacement or a different kind, but don't think I'll bother....looks like I can sort it with some fiddling.

If/when I purchase win7 I'll go for 32 as well. Even if it doesn't change this, it'll mean less driver issues. Unless of course Linux sort blu-ray by then.....

Dont blame your MOBO so quickly. The issue I was having was that when the card was in then the two HRV3000's would sometimes/often fail to record (but not always). However the 2200 appeared to be working fine. So basically even though the 3000's were displaying the issues it was the 2200 that was causing them. Had that replaced and hey presto the issues were gone.

The fact that removing the card fixes the problem suggests to me that the issue with the card.

I seem to remember that Sbiddle also had some issues with the card which did involve sleep (Sbiddle can you confirm?). I am guessing that the new card would not have had the same issues.

I can't remember the exact issue but from memory the HVR2200 would work fine until the PC went into S3 sleep. On resume from S3 it would randomly cause issues and sometimes would simply not work at all. I assumed this was a mobo issue but it turned out to be a dodgy card.

The only way to eliminate the card is to try it on another PC.

smac

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#250302 25-Aug-2009 09:53

Interesting tool, thanks for that. I don't claim to understand half of the output, but there was at least one mention of an error due to an ACPI problem - it suggests a new BIOS but I have the latest. Also a bunch of errors about USB devices not entering suspend, but I don't know why they should be as I was using the PC at the time.

No explicit mention of PCI-e, however other than the suspend function it works prefectly, so who knows.....could be MB, could be the 2200, could theoretically be the power supply I guess. The PSU is the only component I can swap out with stuff I already have, so I guess I'll try that. My only other MB has no PCI-e, and I have no other PCI-e cards to try.

Also looks like the voltage fiddling was a red herring - the couple of times I got it to resume seem to have been coincidence,

Bugger.

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