[ggrr]

Hi,

I am using KodiBuntu 16.0 to play my movies from my NAS (Synology), which is is connected over gigabit ethernet. I am experiencing a problem where the playback freezes (video and audio stop) for 1 to 2 minutes, then it continues but after it has fast-forwarded through the "missed" last 1 to 2 minutes. This happens quite randomly, the other night I watched a complete movie without any problems, this day I am watching a movie and it already happened three times in just 20 minutes. I originally began experiencing this issue in Kodi 14.0, so I upgraded to 16.0 but the issue remains.

In the log I found this:

WARNING: CDVDMessageQueue(audio)::Get - asked for new data packet, with nothing available

The debug log of the playback freezing can be found here: http://pastebin.com/uMRm3HKQ

I found several people having the same problem, like here http://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=203365, but that has not yet helped me solve my problem.

My observations so far:

• The file type of the movie played (iso, mkv, avi) does not seem to matter.
  
• When the playback freezes, my network still works fine (I can access or play videos over the network from my laptop for instance without any problems)
  
• When the playback freezes, the debug information on screen shows that one of my 2 cores is 100% used
  

I am out of ideas here. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

[DaVu]

This issue is mostly related to network problems, as mentioned in the other thread because the user there bought a new router and his problems are gone.

I don't say "go buy a new router" ....but I would take a look at cablings. Change them if necessary. If you are using WiFi, then try with a wired connection.

[ggrr]

Hi, thanks for your reply. Is there any way to make sure that my network is indeed the problem? I am using a wired connection and the rest of my network seems to respond fine during the freezes. Also, the freezes happen quite randomly so that makes it difficult to test with other network equipment.

[bilgepump]

Have you tried updating your network card drivers? I had some issues on one of my computers and an updated nic driver fixed it.

[ggrr]

Hi, thanks for the suggestion. I went ahead and updated the driver, let's see how that works out.

[fritsch]

Update the kernel 3.13 has a gpu Hang issue with intel gpus. See dmesg after such a freeze.

[ggrr]

I have looked around the system logs some more and noticed the following lines in the syslog that are repeated around the time that I experienced the problem:

Jul 20 20:24:52 HTPC kernel: [ 562.592130] e1000e: eth0 NIC Link is Down
Jul 20 20:24:54 HTPC NetworkManager[935]: <info> (eth0): carrier now ON (device state 100)
Jul 20 20:24:54 HTPC kernel: [ 564.825396] e1000e: eth0 NIC Link is Up 1000 Mbps Full Duplex, Flow Control: Rx/Tx
Jul 20 20:24:55 HTPC NetworkManager[935]: <info> (eth0): carrier now OFF (device state 100, deferring action for 4 seconds)
Jul 20 20:24:55 HTPC kernel: [ 566.332128] e1000e: eth0 NIC Link is Down

This looks to me there is a problem with the network after all, or could the gpu hang issue cause this? In any case, this was before I upgraded my network drivers, so I am going to try with the upgraded drivers first.

update
Just tested with the new network driver, problem persists and the log entries are the same as above. Also, ifconfig reports tx and frame errors on my network device, so I am going to need to replace wiring and/or hardware.

If I need to update the kernel, should I update it to 3.19 or another version? I found this howto which I think I can use for that: http://ubuntuhandbook.org/index.php/2015...ntu-14-04/

[fritsch]

Post complete dmesg | pastebinit after such a lengthy freeze, please.