PS3 PlayTV Stutter/Pixelating

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51 posts

Master Geek

# 462741 26-Apr-2011 20:51

Jaxson:

Some PS3 versions and drive combos are fine and some give trouble.

Hi Jaxson,

What model is your PS3? I have a PS3 slim and the latest PlayTV hardware/software. I believe what you say might be true and you have certainly put more time and research into it than me.

So maybe I can find others with a successful combination and THEN try my luck!?

Jaxson

6990 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

# 462860 27-Apr-2011 08:36

I had the fat 40 Gb version. Swapped hard drive out for a WD 500 GB. Unfotunately I didn't try playTV on the original 40Gb drive so couldn't say how this was. The details will be in my older thread I'm sure. It was the base model, the 5400 rpm 'blue'?, not the fancier 7200 rpm black I think it was called.

Hobchild

604 posts

Ultimate Geek

# 463177 27-Apr-2011 23:27

My advice is hold your breath. As stupid as it sounds, I had major issues with stuttering for the first few months. In fact I was a major contributor to the thread Jaxson is referring to. I started with an original 60gb and upgraded to a 500gb, this did not help one bit and if anything it got worse. So do not think for one second that upgrading your HDD will help.
However I persisted and persisted, some recordings were good and some were unwatchable but I recorded anyway, then one day I noticed that I hadn't had anything stutter on me in quite a while, at first I thought that an update had fixed the problem but others were still having issues. I don't know why it's fixed but it is. My only theory now is that the HDD's have to be "worn in" before they can cope with the work load. Just a theory though.

Also If anyone has their live buffer switched on turn it off, my PlayTV will still stutter profusely if I have this switched on.

PlayTVuser

17 posts

Geek

# 463439 28-Apr-2011 17:10

Thanks Hobchild

Great to have someone with a positive outcome. I'll def turn off live buffer (even though I don't use it) and see if that improves things.

Hobchild

604 posts

Ultimate Geek

# 463447 28-Apr-2011 17:31

It doesn't matter if you don't use it, if it's on it is constantly recording the channel you are watching so you can use live rewind.

PlayTVuser

17 posts

Geek

# 463483 28-Apr-2011 19:19

Ok, I checked that and you can only set it to "Always on" or "During pause only". Mine was set to "Pause only" so I'm guessing I had it set right anyway. Has anybody tried it with out allowing DVD or Game playing during PlayTV recording? I'm loath to do this because I frequently do these things expecting PlayTV to do its thing while I'm busy watching a DVD or playing a a game.

Maybe Hobchild has changed something without knowing it? Or the strength of the signal has changed (degraded), too weak or too strong, causes some software/hardware to activate and slows down the transfer of data to the hard drive?

This is a poxy problem, which when you really need to hear/see what is happening during a recording really p.... me off. Not to mention the wife bitc.....g about it. haha

Jaxson says he gave up and I'm feeling the same way. Anybody got a great PVR out there with decent graphical interface? I don't mean one channel at a time and I mean set your recordings using the EPG and seeing they are set - simple really?

Jaxson

6990 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

# 464386 2-May-2011 09:44

The official boxes all have the same EPG.
You see one channel at a time, or lots of channels but only their now and next info.
You do see that you've scheduled it for recording by either a red 'R' or 'S' next to the show.
S is for series record.

skyhigh

51 posts

Master Geek

# 471069 19-May-2011 13:06

The problem with this problem is there does not seem to be one solution.

As with any tricky problem it is probably a combination of factors.

For me personally I had problems and looked into signal strength. As it turns out I had split my aerial into 2 at the PS3. This reduced my signal strength to 60%. It seemed fine at first just watching channels and not recording. When I tried to do 2 things at once I got stutter/pixelating especially when TV1,TV2 or TV3 was involved.

I removed the split and now reception is 90%. I no longer have problems. Simple as that. I have limitations still which could be linked to my HDD needing an upgrade but not worth testing a replacement just to find out it makes no difference.

I don't have any aerial signal amplifier. Have usually 40Gb free space on average.

My limitation is I can't do 2 things at once that involve 1080i channels. So if I am recording TV3 I can't watch TV1 or TV2 because it screws up my recording and what I am trying to watch.

I can record on TV1, TV2 or TV3 and watch only Ch 4-10. No problems.
I can also record on Ch 4-10 and watch any other channel.

Interesting but a limitation I can live with for now.

PlayTVuser

17 posts

Geek

# 471253 19-May-2011 18:59

Thanks SkyHigh.   Looking back at my experience I'd probably say that it mirrors yours. It is TV1,2 and 3 that cause issues when recording and watching simultaneously, although I seldom watch or record TV4.

Interestingly I looked into TBOX from TelstraClear and forums show some have the same problem.   Maybe this is not a PS3 problem at all.   Maybe issues arise if reception isn't strong enough (or too strong?)      Otherwise I'd expect heaps of people screaming bloody murder about PlayTV.

I remember when I went to Freeview the poor Prime reception (off the UHF aerial) was gone, presumably because Freeview can handle a weaker signal - but maybe recording needs a stronger signal.

Next step - get on the roof in summer and remove the old TV1,2,3 aerial and leave just the UHF aerial.

Hobchild

604 posts

Ultimate Geek

# 471320 19-May-2011 21:28

PlayTVuser: Thanks SkyHigh. Looking back at my experience I'd probably say that it mirrors yours. It is TV1,2 and 3 that cause issues when recording and watching simultaneously, although I seldom watch or record TV4.

I too found this, I wonder if it's got something to do with the resolution and sound format of the channels. TV4 doesn't take up nearly as much room on my HDD as TV1 and 2 and TV3 takes up the most I think.

JibbaJabba

1 post

Wannabe Geek

# 646114 25-Jun-2012 22:02

I've owned a 320gb PS3 with a playtv for the last year with no issues until about a month ago when it started to stutter when recording most of the channels. I tried different solutions from deleting all playtv data, uninstalling, and the reinstalling playtv, checking the strength of the tv signal on my tvs setup which showed 9 or 10 out of 10, running corruption checks on the file system, and formatting the hard drive. All of these made no difference. I also tried my PS3 at a neighbours house using their TV signal. Same issue but when I tried the playtv on their PS3 instead it worked fine indicating it was my PS3 not the tv signal in our neighbourhood. Also checked the write performance of the hard drive in a laptop which looked ok overall but did have some sectors slower than others.

Eventually I decided to change the original hard drive for a new model. I replaced the Hitachi 320gb 5800rpm drive with a Seagate 500gb momentus 5400rpm drive recommended by other forums on the net. So far so good no stuttering so it appears the hard drive was the issue. Fingers crossed it remains that way and it doesn't degrade again.

Hope this helps those looking for solution to this annoying problem. Now if we could just get the full EPG for the non TVNZ channels and series linking going it would almost be perfect!!!

bjorn

192 posts

Master Geek

# 646203 26-Jun-2012 09:20

I also had the stuttering issue with my 320GB PS3 and it got worse as the HDD got fuller.

I upgraded my HDD to a Seagate Momentus XT 750GB. It's a hybrid HDD with 8GB SLC nand flash.

Because it caches data that is loaded all the time in the nand flash I get fast load times, and because it writes to the nand flash I get no stuttering and can record one HD show and pause another without any issue.

http://www.seagate.com/internal-hard-drives/laptop-hard-drives/momentus-xt-hybrid/

skyhigh

51 posts

Master Geek

# 646657 26-Jun-2012 21:03

I have had a Western Digital Scorpio WD5000BEVT for 4 months now. VERY happy with it and it is much more resilient than my stock 120Gb HDD when it comes to PlayTV multitasking.

got a good price for it on ascent.co.nz

boldy

13 posts

Geek

# 655129 13-Jul-2012 15:18

hijacking this PlayTV thread, has anyone else noticed a time shift when viewing a recording then switching to live TV? I've noticed if I have been watching a recording for and hour or so, stopping, then going to live TV, the time jumps back around 7 or 8 mins. Really annoying, because often won't record the end of programs. Got so I would leave it on live TV if I had to record anything over night.

Appreciate any feedback, cheers guys.

Jaxson

6990 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

# 655140 13-Jul-2012 15:47

I don't like how negative I sound, but any issues you discover should be directed back to Sony NZ.

By all means raise the issue and maybe others can confirm if they are experiencing it too, but the PlayTV is not a customisable bit of software so Sony need to be made aware of any issue with the product.

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