recording quality problems: audio, video

[rakeshagrawal]

we want to research and study the audio video record problems we have been hearing about. some have told us that the video stutters, some have told us that the audio gets very tinny after a certain number of seconds.

to help us out with this, please follow these steps:
1- create a text file called yourname.txt and in it include:

*your e-mail address
*operating system
*version of PVS
*tuner card/video capture card
*processor speed
*disk space
*memory
*sound card
*text description of audio/video problem encountered (video stutters, audio gets tinny)

2- create a recording which exhibits the problem. be sure and create the recording while your system is relatively unloaded. target a clip that is about 30-45 seconds. name the file yourname.wmv

Upload both of these files (yourname.txt and yourname.wmv) with this FTP account:

host: discuss.snapstream.com
user: badvideo
password: badvideo

post a reply to this to let us know that you posted something on the FTP server.

thanks for your help with this!

[Rendus]

Done, uploaded a 54 second clip of some show on MTV at "Near VHS" quality. (flipped through the channels, found a show with a lot of panning to demonstrate the glitch better).

If you want any more details, file versions, etc or more sample clips, let me know.

-edit- My problem is the video freezing then recovering problem. I only experience this with wmv files generated by snapstream.

[This message has been edited by Rendus (edited 02-23-2001).]

[Magellan]

I uploaded the files this morning 2/23/01. It is recorded at DSL/Medium quality to save bandwidth, but the problem is definately noticeable. I can record at near DVD quality and it still occurs, but is barely perceptable.

Thanks;

Mark

[rakeshagrawal]

thanks, we grabbed both of your clips and info -- others: please contribute your troubled recordings as well! the more the data of problems we have, the quicker we'll, perhaps, be able to introduce fixes for them.

[djtipmothee]

Do you want examples of the people who get no audio at all?

[dootndo2]

I have been having a problem with my recordings. I have everything set up correctly, it records and works fine. However, after about 10 seconds into the clip, the audio goes to like a half speed. I'm not sure what is going on. I plan to look into it further. If you could look into this, and fix it, I would be a happy camper.

Dennis
dootndo2@aol.com

System Configuration
500 MHz AMD K6-2
Ali Aladdin 5 Chipset on Redfox Motherboard
256MB Memory
ATI Expert 2000 Video Card
Hauppauge WINTV USB adapter
Turtle Beach Montego 1 Audio Card
Windows 2000 Pro SP1

*I uploaded my latest to your FTP site.

[PBMax]

posted clip. I have an ATI TV Wonder USB and the video is out of sync with the audio. Recorded some headline news to exibit this problem.

[randyreed]

posted a file on sunday, forgot to post the notice.

[Magellan]

Any progress on this issue? Can't wait to get this up and running!!

[jayhogg]

Uploaded text file and sample .asf

Looking forward to a resolution because I love the concept but it is unusable in the current state.

Thanks,
Jay

[flemingl]

posted my clip today, 3/4 . im getting choppy video/frame dropout problems

[rakeshagrawal]

just grabbed the latest round of files uploaded -- thanks for helping us out on this. we're going to study them and get back (hopefuly) soon.

[mschoneman]

Posted clip. Problem is jumpy text on Near DVD quality

-Michael O. Schoneman

[CEaves]

Any update on this?

Between the jerky video and no audio on second+ recordings, is anyone able to record anything useful?

[Ron Laird]

I have been having soom success with the WDM drivers and Haupage pci wintv-go card. I don't get the lockups anymore, but what I get is out of sync video and audio. If you put up with it, and watch the entire video you notice that the audio and video do resync. This may be important, the audio is ahead of the video. When it gets out of sync, the audio slows down, thus droping the pitch of the voices, then resyncs for about 30 seconds, and the process starts over again. The worst that I have seen is out of sync by a bout 8 seconds.

Ron

[Magellan]

Has there been any progress on this? It has been over a month now.

Thanks

[rkuo]

From what we can tell, it's a problem consisting of the following factors:

1. Using DirectShow capture interface.
2. System is under extremely high load (100%).
3. WDM video capture drivers.

Instead of handling the lack of encoding power gracefully, the audio and video starts to drift out of sync. This appears to be a problem with the DirectShow ASF writer filter provided with DirectX 8.

The workarounds at the moment is to use a different capture card, select a different capture interface, or get a faster processor.

[shaunf]

are all of you using AMD processors and/or ATI capture cards? i was having problems with a duron 700 / AIW Radeon, DX 8 & DirectShow (100% CPU usage, freeze frames, skipping audio, etc). changed to voodoo3 3000 & hauppauge win-tv go & WME 7 capture & now i'm only at 70-80% CPU w/ only a few minor problems. i wonder if the DirectShow 100% CPU usage maybe only happens on certain chipsets / CPU's.

[that_kid]

I'm using a ati all in wonder 8MB agp card and if i try to record at 28.8 or 56K snapstream won't even stream the file. When I open it directly it's all scrambled. So far i've had fair suscess with daul cahnnlel isdn, near vhs and vhs quality. I'm running this on a dual PII 333 with 256 of ram

[CEaves]

I'm having the same symptoms. My config is PIII-700, 256M RAM, RADEON v3124, DX 8a.

During capture, the CPU goes to 100% and I then get video out of sync with audio, stuttering, etc.

Doesn't it seem like a PIII-700 and the latest ATI card ought to be enough to do this?

[stacey]

I have out of sync problems at near DVD quality. No load on my system at time of recording. Posting files now

[Magellan]

The vid I posted back in February was done with a PIII 700, 256 meg ram, 80 gig 7200RPM ATA hd. The system was under very little load when I did it. The sound is fine, but the video pauses very briefly every 4 0r 5 seconds. Is the posted workaround regarding this issue as well? I am locked in on my vid card (ATI All-in-wonder 128 pro),and I can't seem to get the other capture interfaces to work.

[bdcottle]

Just posted a sample to the ftp.
I have a amd 1200 so I don't think processor power is the problem.

Hope you can get this fixed

[dootndo2]

Now that we have an idea of what's wrong, what kind of fix are we going to implement? The only time that I have a problem is when I use Snapstream to record. There is obviously something wrong in the code. Is there a timeline set for a fix? I am really looking forward to using this software to it's full potential. I don't feel that I need to purchase any new hardware to make this work. I already am on my second tv-tuner card, and a 500Mhz machine with 256MB of memory should do just fine.

http://discuss.snapstream.com/ubb/confused.gif

Please advise.
dootndo2@aol.com

[jayhogg]

As a thought I downloaded Windows Media Encoder 7 so I could "play" with the options to see if I could get my system to work.

Dual PII-350, 128meg, WinTV-PCI, ATA-100 Disk, ISA SB16, PCI 10/100 Network, W2K, older 4meg STB video card.

The net result was my CPU was 60-70% utilized and WME7 reported it could only encode 6-7 frames/second when set at a 128k or 768k rate. Looked just like the results from SnapStream even with video output disabled so my older card didn't create problems.

I went through the BIOS for options, reset it completely, tried everything except going to a single CPU. Looks like the problem is unfortunately my hardware.

[stacey]

has there been any progress on this. I just recorded a show and the video and audio are completely out of sync again. Anxiously awaiting an update on this.

[ebonair]

I am now experiencing Audio Video sync problems since upgrading to Version 1.5. I have several .ASF files that recorded just fine under version 1.2. I then upgraded to 1.5 and noticed the extensions switched to .WMV and the Audio is now not in time with the Video. Any suggestions? Can I use other encoding formats directly?

-joe-

[amit]

What are your system specs ? What Tuner card are you using ? Do you notice if the CPU usage during a recording is extremely high ?

[jfoley]

I also have just upgraded to 1.5 and have terrible Audio/Video sync. The video also seems to be jerky.

AMD Duron 700
256MB RAM
ATI All-In-Wonder
Win2K Professional

[ebonair]

System is a AMD K6/6 500 with 128 megs and a Haupague WinTV card. I just switched it to an Athlon Thunderbird 900 so I will see if the problem is CPU related. My other question is: Can I use other encoding like Quicktime or Real directly?

Thanks,
-joe-

Originally posted by amit:
What are your system specs ? What Tuner card are you using ? Do you notice if the CPU usage during a recording is extremely high ?

[rakeshagrawal]

audio/video synchronization issues (that mostly affected WDM cards -- most USB tuners, most newer tuner card drivers) have been addressed (and eliminated, we hope) in the latest release of SnapStream PVS (version 2.0).

download SnapStream PVS 2.0 http://www.snapstream.com/download_free.htm

release notes for SnapStream PVS 2.0 http://www.snapstream.com/products/sspvs/releasenotes.htm

[netruner]

Hi - Just got the Version 2.0
I too am having audio synch problems
System has been tested multiple times running under low load conditions using near dvd settings
Processor is a AMD 750 256 mg RAM and ATI All in wonder agp card

So the fix in the last post thought 2.0 fixed the problem - sorry no joy.
Brad