Yeah, looking for "good signal" is going to take forever on this forum, so forgive the search.
I think my reception is fine but we had some issues last night during Brady's windstorm that supposedly made the recording not work very well. Coincidentally, the RAID array I use for recording is apparently failing, but I'm at a loss as to how that would manifest as "weak signal".
So, just as a sanity check, what would be a good signal level/STN ratio? Generally my channels seem to be about -3.6 dB with STN around 35-37. I earlier saw ESPN drop to -5.5 but then shortly after that was when the recording array vaporized.
I'm using this with an Echo FWIW.
What constitutes "good signal" for the iTV 4?
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Cutriss
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HTPC Specs:
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Cutriss
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Well, must not have seen this thread right away: http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... =68&t=6344
Looks like I'm within normal parameters.
To make this a worthwhile thread - will channel tuning speed increase if I can get the STN higher? I know there's going to be some lag in channel changing but just wondering if this is something I can manipulate.
Looks like I'm within normal parameters.
To make this a worthwhile thread - will channel tuning speed increase if I can get the STN higher? I know there's going to be some lag in channel changing but just wondering if this is something I can manipulate.
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JohnW248
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There can be issues with Raid 5 if you have multiple tuners since there are lots of write/reads for live tv and each extender has its own buffer even if tuned to the same station, etc. Some windows errors messages are a bit like the old "magic 8 ball" fortune teller, reply hazy try again, weak signal, no signal, etc can be triggered by buffer errors.
I've had best luck with JBOD for recording towers and use RAID 5 for storage devices.
I prefer signal levels between +/- 7dBmV and a SN of 35 dB. The cable company will usually tell you +/- 10 dBmV but if you have reception errors or problems TWC at least will provide an amp. Signal level is also not constant across the spectrum and will vary over time of day as well.
I've had best luck with JBOD for recording towers and use RAID 5 for storage devices.
I prefer signal levels between +/- 7dBmV and a SN of 35 dB. The cable company will usually tell you +/- 10 dBmV but if you have reception errors or problems TWC at least will provide an amp. Signal level is also not constant across the spectrum and will vary over time of day as well.
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erkotz
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Officially, the spec states that we must handle:
QAM256: -12dBmV through +15dBmV
QAM64: -15dBmV through +15dBmV
The InfiniTV will work outside of those parameters (I want to say we tested something like -23dBmV - +30dBmV), within reason, but if you have signal related issues and are outside of that, our support will ask you to get the signal in-spec to start off with.
Obviously the SNR needs to be sufficient (33dB is typical, but lower may work in some instances).
WMC uses the Weak Signal error as a "generic low transport stream bitrate" error, so a failing disk could trigger this.
Regarding RAID5, it depends on what you use for a controller card. The Areca controller card I have in my home server can manage around 150MB/sec continuous, and also has a 256MB write cache, but that's not a consumer controler card. If you're using onboard RAID, I wouldn't be surprised to see an issue.
QAM256: -12dBmV through +15dBmV
QAM64: -15dBmV through +15dBmV
The InfiniTV will work outside of those parameters (I want to say we tested something like -23dBmV - +30dBmV), within reason, but if you have signal related issues and are outside of that, our support will ask you to get the signal in-spec to start off with.
Obviously the SNR needs to be sufficient (33dB is typical, but lower may work in some instances).
WMC uses the Weak Signal error as a "generic low transport stream bitrate" error, so a failing disk could trigger this.
Regarding RAID5, it depends on what you use for a controller card. The Areca controller card I have in my home server can manage around 150MB/sec continuous, and also has a 256MB write cache, but that's not a consumer controler card. If you're using onboard RAID, I wouldn't be surprised to see an issue.
Quality Assurance Manager, Ceton Corporation
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Cutriss
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Well, I'm only using striping, not RAID5, so when I said it was failing, I meant "suddenly the array failed". I haven't had any problems that (AFAIK) are related to the RAID. In fact, just to get the system back online, I hooked up a USB2 HDD and set that as my new recording volume, and I haven't had any performance issue with multiple recordings (that I'm aware of, I'm actually about to start watching one of a few things that was recorded simultaneously). So maybe with one display and 4 tuners, the array is overkill. I was eventually planning to have 2 (computer with a network tuner) or possibly 3 (TV in a guest room) so I was just trying to do forward planning.