I am having problems with certain channels, not all, pixelating. They are not in WMC but are in XBMC. I am a noob to XBMC. I followed the Lifehacker guide to building the ultimate HTPC. I installed a Ceton card and have been playing for the last month or so. Here is my sWMC log file
http://pastebin.com/U0s8xEFu
Any suggestions?
Your ServerWMC log doesnt seem to show any problems - it shows you start a live stream at 16:58:38 and then the log ends at 17:04:04 and in those 5 minutes there hasnt been any serverside issues reported such as trouble getting data from the tuner, issues writing to HDD or whatever else...
What version of XBMC are you running on the client?
What type of machine is the client?
How is it connected (network wise) to the server PC?
Have you set the de-interlacing settings on XBMC?
There have also been some other reports (depending on what device you have and what XBMC version you are running) that doing video decoding in software, rather than hardware, has provided better picture quality.
If you post an XBMC debug log we might be able to see whether any obvious errors are occuring there.
Also while ServerWMC is streaming a channel you can find the WTV and TS files for that stream in the "Recorded TV\TempSWMC" directory, you could copy them off somewhere and see if when you play them back in WMC or another media player, if the pixelation is present in them or not
Assuming this only happens on live-tv streams...
Another idea (so far): you have three different tuners to use for a live-tv streams, wmc uses the highest priority tuner for a channel, by default we actually choose the lowest priority tuner. As an experiment, you can make serverwmc use the highest priority tuner and see if that makes the problem go away (of course, then you are left with the problem that your tuners aren't all behaving the same, but lets ignore that for the moment). To try this experiment, go to the debug tab of serverwmc and choose 'edit settings file'. In the window that opens, search for Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel, when you find the line that contains it, change it to this:
<Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>0</Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>
then save and restart serverwmc. See if the problem persists.
What version of XBMC are you running on the client? 13.2, no client (possibly noob mistake)
What type of machine is the client? I followed the lifehacker guide exactly except I added a Ceton cable card tuner from ebay.
How is it connected (network wise) to the server PC? I am only running 1 instance of XBMC on the HTPC that I built. It is hooked directly to my TV.
Have you set the de-interlacing settings on XBMC? yes
There have also been some other reports (depending on what device you have and what XBMC version you are running) that doing video decoding in software, rather than hardware, has provided better picture quality. Can you point me to more info on that subject?
Thanks for the help. I will try to get a copy of the debug logs from XBMC and post. Is there a quick tutorial to tell me how to get the logs?
I made the changes suggested, no difference.
Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel, when you find the line that contains it, change it to this:
<Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>0</Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>
I am also trying to get a log file. I tried this method, "http://kodi.wiki/view/Log_file/Easy". There appears to be no file named "XBMC/Kodi Log Uploader".
I then tried this method "http://kodi.wiki/view/Log_file/File_manager_access". I created a file on the desk top named XBMC Log File but when I invoked the contextual menu that would have the copy command (as in the video) it was not present.
Grabbing a log file cannot be this hard. I must be making it harder than it should be. Anyone have a link on how to do it?
Since the change to the config file didn't help, don't forget to set it back.
You should try scarecrow's idea about turning off hardware acceleration. In xbmc go to
settings>video>acceleration and turn off 'allow hardware acceration...'. To see this option, you may need to enable 'settings level'>advanced (left side of screen on bottom).
If that doesn't do it... I don't have a lot of experience looking at xbmc log files, but in the last log you posted when you start the stream there are a lot of packet errors with the audio stream. I don't know what these are from, but as a total shot in the dark, try only sending a single language to the output instead of english and spanish. See the 'live tv' tab in serverwmc.
Also it would be useful to know if you have these problems with recordings made on these channels, or whether its just a live stream problem.
Regarding the XBMC log, it doesnt look like debug level was set first?
Inside of XBMC/Kodi go into Settings → System → Debugging and turn on Enable debug logging
Then once you produce the log, the file will be here: C:\Users\Kelly\AppData\Roaming\XBMC\xbmc.log
But yes, the log does seem to show it is having trouble getting packets which could be the cause of the pixelation. Id be interested to see the debug level info in the XBMC log just in case anything else stands out
http://chopapp.com/#7kxzwm2e
I seem to have some trouble w getting the epg data so I changed <Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>0</Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>
back to
<Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>1</Decoy_LiveStreamProtectLevel>
rebooted the entire system and that problem cleared up.
Does anything stand out?
Thx for your help.
I checked the box in server WMC for eng only. I then turned off hardware acceleration in XBMC.
It seemed to get a bit better but is still not watchable. It will not record the channels that are affected,
http://chopapp.com/#mey3gh6z
What do you mean by 'It will not record the channels that are affected'?
I have timed recordings set up on these channels and when I check they were not recorded. I just tried to record a show and I got an error about PVR back end error and to check the log. That message appeared in XBMC. I rebooted XBMC and tried again to record on the channel. it appears to be recording now.
XBMC log file
http://chopapp.com/#e33dbnmf
For some reason I can't read these log files you are posting, when I click them I just see an image. Can you maybe post them to pastebin.com instead?
You are getting a whole lot of errors in that log, I'm afraid I don't know what they are due to.
Sorry I wasn't clear, I wanted the swmc log after a 'fail to record' on one of your problem channels.