"fuzzy" sound with PVR-250

[PaulyT]

I'm getting poor sound quality in SS recordings. Upon playback, the louder sounds get sorta fuzzy/staticy. I can avoid this by turning the SS volume level down to ~50, but then the volume level of SS is much lower on my system than regular live TV channels.

Is this a known issue, and if so, is there a way around it? I didn't see much in the way of sound settings in PVS, except the bitrate in the MPEG encoding, but I've left that at the default (48khz, 224kbps). But I don't see anything that relates to sound.

Maybe it has something to do with the NVDVD codec I'm using for MPEG playback? But I didn't see much there for sound settings, either.

Any hints?

[RobertH]

are you using composite/svideo and an audio cable? if so it might be that the device that is putting out the audio is not putting out at line level, the card is expecting line level output and will overload the encoder if the incoming signal is too high.

I have noticed this on cable before as well with jeapordy or other shows that have "applause" the noise from these scenes is garbled and gets rather quiet, I dont know but I think it is just a problem with the encoder on the card.

Since it is in the video stream coming from the encoder there isnt really anything we or snapstream can do about it.

[Swank]

I am also having sound issues with the PVR-250.

I bought my PVR-250 2 days ago and have been trying to get it configured in my Shuttle SN45G. I have an ATI 9600 AGP card with the DVI port connected to a Hitachi 51S500 51" RPTV and the SVGA port connected to a 15" LCD. The SN45G sound is output through SPDIF to a Yamaha receiver. I do not have any sound quality issues when I played DVDs on the SN45G and standard windows sounds are fine with no static or quality loss. (I did uninstall the DVD software when I installed the PVR-250 to avoid conflicts)

I have digital cable and I have tried both hooking up the cable box output to the PVF-250 (svid+audio and also just coax) and just hooking the PVR-250 to coax from the wall to get analog cable reception. I get some hissing either way.

Could it be interference with the PVR-250 card and the SN45G's power supply? Lowering the sound levels in snapstream as well as the sound control panel help, but it is still annoying.

I guess one thing I need to do is record a show, copy the mpg file over to my other computer and play it to see if the MPG is recorded with the poor sound quality or if something happens during playback on the SN45G.

[PaulyT]

Originally posted by Swank
I guess one thing I need to do is record a show, copy the mpg file over to my other computer and play it to see if the MPG is recorded with the poor sound quality or if something happens during playback on the SN45G.

I'm guessing it's during playback, because when I rebooted my system after posting this original message, the same part of the same video file played back with the sound quality just fine, even with the SS volume at 100. So I'm guessing somewhere there's some audio gain setting somewhere in the audio output pipeline that's too high, leading to this problem, maybe. Are you using audio output from your ATI? I also have an ATI, though it's only an 8500DV. And what sound card? My sound's built into my ASUS MB.

Anyway, so far I haven't been able to reproduce this problem on my system, but if it happens again I'll try to check any and all sound settings outside SS.

Swank, does this sound problem persist for you even after reboot?

[Swank]

Yes, the static/hissing persisted through a reboot.

I did find a semi-solution -- I clicked the 'Dolby Digital Encoding' in the nForce control panel. The static is much less pronounced with that option. Hey, it works. I'm using SPDIF out from the onboard sound on the SN45G board which goes to my Yamaha receiver.

The static is also present in the recorded .MPG files. I played one over my network on another machine and still got static, so it is introduced during the encoding process.

I also get some ugly interference patterns on cable channels 2-10 or so. I put a 10db signal booster in line before the coax hits the PVR-250 and it seemed to help. I'm in the middle of recording football games so I'll have to wait until later to see if that makes any difference with audio or just video.

My last option might be to try another PVR-250 card to see if my current one is defective.

[maqo]

I don't think your card is defective. I recently moved from a Hauppauge WinTV PCI card to the PVR-250 and do notice a big difference in sound (PVR-250 recordings are quieter and not always as clear). Since I've been using coax for both cards, I'll try switching to s-video and component inputs to see if it helps...

(I will say that audio quality on my digital cable is not equal on all channels, so I suppose it's possible that the PVR-250 is amplifying any shortcomings between channels)

[Puke]

I'm resurrecting this thread because it wasn't resolved and now I have the problem. Only I have a quirky twist

All audio on my HTPC works fine, no static. The only static I get is when I am playing a recorded or live tv show with BTV. Take a show that was recorded by BTV and play it with anything else and the sound is clear. Crystal.

Ready for the quirky twist? Running BTV in windowed mode = static. Minimize the window? Static is dramatically reduced, almost non-existent. Yeah, its weird.

Oh, I also have all audio inputs/ouputs muted or turned all the way down.

[ticklemeozmo]

Try this?

http://discuss2.snapstream.com/vb/s...&threadid=11825

[Puke]

Bad link? It shortened most of the link on ya.

[ticklemeozmo]

Originally posted by Puke
Bad link?

No, I'm just an aSS

http://discuss2.snapstream.com/vb/sh...threadid=11825