SOLVED: HDR-FOX T2 Unstable with 2TB HDD

Using my spare FoxT2 HDR I get the same behaviour: with the 500GB HDD, the unit is stable and it passes the iPlayer test, whereas the 2TB HDD will not stream from iPlayer and then causes the unit to freeze. So I have now tested both HDDs with 2 FoxT2 HDR power supplies, and, because others successfully run 1TB and 2TB drives, it makes me think the power supplies are ok. I will have to monitor the voltages on a ‘scope and force the unit to freeze to prove it, though. Then, if the power supply is good, it would suggest the fault is in the HDD - well, the 2 HDDs: the 1TB Pipeline HDD and the 2TB Video HDD.

Whatever the outcome, I may well stick with the 500GB drive and possibly use the 2TB drive in a caddy with its dedicated power supply.
 
martinr said:
That’s quite a difference. I never considered the power requirements might be bigger for a larger HDD and certainly not so much bigger.
Click to expand...
While it is larger many users have upgraded their boxes with much 2Tb and much larger disks without problem.
2Tb models were shipped by Humax and, AFAIK, they had the same power supplies as the 500Mb
So there really shouldn't be a problem
martinr said:
For example, it will freeze and become unresponsive to the remote or to the buttons on the front of the unit if I select iPlayer through the portal and try and select o programme. Selecting a film, for example,, I get all the way to agreeing that I am 16 or over, then I see the swirling circle, which eventually times out and tells me to check the network connection because there seems to be a problem. The HDR is then frozen and I have to power down with the mains switch to reboot; it will not respond to the remote or the front panel. This is totally repeatable, and yet if I put my original HDD back in place, iPlayer will stream the film every time.
Click to expand...
The Portal is a known problem area with the Humax regardless of disk size, and is liable to cause crashes without provocation,
It is best avoided, use the youtube-dl and qtube packages to download programmes for viewing later or a Smart TV or one of the many add on sticks that provides a far better range of catchup service apps than the Portal

A more reliable test of disk reliability would be to record two HD programmes simultaneously whilst watching a recording of a third HD programme
 
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martinr said:
with the 500GB HDD, the unit is stable and it passes the iPlayer test, whereas the 2TB HDD will not stream from iPlayer and then causes the unit to freeze.
Click to expand...
That's weird. I really wouldn't expect there to be a systematic difference.
 
MymsMan said:
While it is larger many users have upgraded their boxes with much 2Tb and much larger disks without problem.
2Tb models were shipped by Humax and, AFAIK, they had the same power supplies as the 500Mb
So there really shouldn't be a problem

The Portal is a known problem area with the Humax regardless of disk size, and is liable to cause crashes without provocation,
It is best avoided, use the youtube-dl and qtube packages to download programmes for viewing later or a Smart TV or one of the many add on sticks that provides a far better range of catchup service apps than the Portal

A more reliable test of disk reliability would be to record two HD programmes simultaneously whilst watching a recording of a third HD programme
Click to expand...


Thanks. The Portal is no problem with my 500GB drive. On the other hand, the 2TB drive makes the HDR temperamental, but the one thing that consistently causes it to freeze is the final swirling circle as the selected iPlayer programme begins to stream. So I use that as the acid test.

I’m glad you mentioned the youtube-dl package (and qtube): I thought they were in the list of available packages but they aren’t there for me. I’m sure I once installed the youtube-dl package (but found it difficult to get my head round and as iPlayer is the catchup of interest, I never pursued it).

So could I record onto the Fox T2 HDR from a catchup service (eg iPlayer) on an add-on usb stick?
 
martinr said:
I’m glad you mentioned the youtube-dl package (and qtube): I thought they were in the list of available packages but they aren’t there for me.
Click to expand...
You probably need to enable "Advanced" packages then.
I’m sure I once installed the youtube-dl package (but found it difficult to get my head round and as iPlayer is the catchup of interest, I never pursued it).
Click to expand...
youtube-dl does do iPlayer.
Go to a command prompt and do something like this:
youtube https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b045fz8r/peaky-blinders?seriesId=m0007z3v
or install qtube and copy/paste the link(s) using the WebIf. Then sit back and wait for it to happen.
 
prpr said:
You probably need to enable "Advanced" packages then.

youtube-dl does do iPlayer.
Go to a command prompt and do something like this:
youtube https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b045fz8r/peaky-blinders?seriesId=m0007z3v
or install qtube and copy/paste the link(s) using the WebIf. Then sit back and wait for it to happen.
Click to expand...
Advanced Packages! Of course; now installed. I’d forgotten all about that. When the HDR runs smoothly ie when I don’t mess with it, I tend to slide back down the learning curve. Then when I get the impulse to dig out the 2TB drive and have another look at the problem, it’s back up the learning curve again.

Many thanks for that simple tutorial on youtube-dl; it doesn’t look at all difficult now. I don’t think qtube existed when I first looked at youtube-dl I shall give it a go.
 
martinr said:
The Portal is no problem with my 500GB drive.
Click to expand...
The portal is a major problem on all my units, all of which have the original 500GB drives... but it is not helped by my flaky Internet and home network. We are pretty clear the HDR crashes in proportion to network faults, because (we believe) the code was not adequately debugged in fault scenarios (if at all). The portal is also subject to problems at Humax's end, where their servers are an intermediary to the Beeb's servers.
 
Black Hole said:
The portal is a major problem on all my units, all of which have the original 500GB drives... but it is not helped by my flaky Internet and home network. We are pretty clear the HDR crashes in proportion to network faults, because (we believe) the code was not adequately debugged in fault scenarios (if at all). The portal is also subject to problems at Humax's end, where their servers are an intermediary to the Beeb's servers.
Click to expand...
So all that time my Portal’s been working perfectly, I took it for granted and never realised how well off I was.

I remember your telling me during previous troubleshooting how sensitive the HDR is network problems as well the problems with the unsupported buggy code.

Meanwhile, qtube has made downloading from iPlayer a piece of cake; my first qtube download is on its way. So, when iPlayer in the Portal finally gives out for me, I shalln’t bat an eye. In the meantime, I’ll just count my blessings.
 
martinr said:
So all that time my Portal’s been working perfectly, I took it for granted and never realised how well off I was.

I remember your telling me during previous troubleshooting how sensitive the HDR is network problems as well the problems with the unsupported buggy code.

Meanwhile, qtube has made downloading from iPlayer a piece of cake; my first qtube download is on its way. So, when iPlayer in the Portal finally gives out for me, I shalln’t bat an eye. In the meantime, I’ll just count my blessings.
Click to expand...
It would still be worth doing a stress test with multiple normal recordings to confirm that the 2TB drive is working properly when used as a normal PVR.
 
MymsMan said:
It would still be worth doing a stress test with multiple normal recordings to confirm that the 2TB drive is working properly when used as a normal PVR.
Click to expand...
Stress test done with the 2TB Seagate Video drive fitted.. Whilst HDR was recording 2 HD programmes, I was able to watch a recorded HD programme on Media. I repeated this a couple of times. No problems at all. It was rock stable; I was able to open the Media menu at the same time to browse available recordings. No freezes, perfectly stable.

To recap: with the 2TB drive, the unit is a little temperamental and will freeze every time if I go to the Portal, select an iPlayer programme for streaming; all is well until the point of streaming, a pop-up box occurs after timing out stating there’s a problem and to check the network connection. At that point the unit is unresponsive to the remote (webui remote, too) as well as the front panel. On the other hand, the 500GB drive works perfectly with the Portal’s iPlayer every time and the HDR very rarely freezes (once every few weeks)/months)

This stress test, together with the disk diagnostic, possibly indicates that the drive itself is not the problem. It inclines me all the more to monitor the power supply with a ‘scope whilst forcing the unit to freeze by attempting to stream from iPlayer. I hope to do that some time over the weekend, although I’m not expecting any Damascene revelations.
 
Some progress.

I decided to re-format the 2TB drive and see how that behaved in the Portal’s iPlayer. I ran into the same message I got before when doing this (via the Humax Settings Menu): drive is too big to format. So I set the box to RMA, installed the Humax stock firmware, successfully reformatted the drive through the Humax menu and then went to iPlayer in the Portal still in stock firmware.

I managed to stream a film in iPlayer jwithout causing the HDR to freeze - a major breakthrough.

Before going any further, I will do this a few times to be fully confident. If all’s good, I’ll then install the CFW and packages, and test again, though I’m certain it’s not the CFW. I’ll then run fixdisk and test again. And if it then passes the portal test I have a feeling I know where the problem was but I don’t want to cloud things right now.
 
MymsMan said:
I wonder whether just deleting the iplayer streaming buffer file would have achieved the same results with less disruption
Click to expand...
If it happens again, that’s a troubleshooting step I’ll include for sure. Meanwhile, I’m running fixdisk in the CFW and will report back.

By the way, how does one delete that buffer file?
 
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martinr said:
By the way, how does one delete that buffer file?
Click to expand...
If you click on Save last streamed output on Webif Browse page it will give you info about the file including the name then you can delete it via a command prompt
Code: 
rm '/mnt/hd3/Streamer_down_file'
 
MymsMan said:
If you click on Save last streamed output on Webif Browse page it will give you info about the file including the name then you can delete it via a command prompt
Code: 
rm '/mnt/hd3/Streamer_down_file'
Click to expand...
Many thanks. Things are looking good on the 2TB disk so far. I have run fixdisk twice: once so it can sort out its objections to what it claims are dodgy inodes and the second to prove it’s now happy, and the 2TB disk passes the iplayer test without freezing the HDR.

And I remembered I have the 1TB Seagate Pipeline HDD, which similarly freezes the HDR at the iPlayer test. So when I’ve done reinstalling all the CFW packages on the 2TB, I will revisit the Pipeline HDR and see if simply deleting the iPlayer streaming buffer does the trick.

Many thanks.
 
MartinLiddle said:
You might want to consider formatting the drive manually using the commands given in the af123 blog https://wiki.hummy.tv/wiki/2TB_Disk_Installation_Blog This reduces the number of inodes and has various other tweaks for the Humax.
Click to expand...
Many thanks; I did in fact read that but shied away from it because I didn’t fully understand it and if I followed it, it’d be monkey-see, monkey-do fashion. However, I have that 1TB Pipeline HDD to play around with and, then with a better understanding, I could then set about the 2TB Video HDD. So thanks for the prompt: I will revisit that page with more patience.
 
Since re-formatting the 2TB HDD, the HDR-FoxT2 is working perfectly: it passes the Portal iPlayer streaming test every time and is very stable - no more random freezes.

I refitted the 1 TB Pipeline HDD hoping it would freeze the HDR in iPlayer so I could test whether or not deleting the streaming buffer file (streamer_down_file) would fix it, but Sod’s Law intervened: just when you want it to crash, it works perfectly. Others can’t get their Portal to work or iPlayer to stream, and I can’t get it to fail. I can now swap over hard drives nearly as quickly as the Formula 1 teams can swap 4 wheels.

The cause of my problem may well have been a corrupt media file. There is one file which is only 177MB and which should be 4GB. The HDR crashes if I try to play it, and I remember seeing it permanently listed as playing (underneath Watching...) on the gui even though that was not the case. It would have been interesting to see if deleting the streamer_down_file would have solved the problem instead of the more drastic reformat. (I’ll bear it in mind if it ever happens again,) Nevertheless, the HDR seems now to be working better than ever. So a big “thank you” to everyone for their help and advice and especially to Black Hole, whose reference resources keep proving so helpful, and, of course, the developers of this superb CFW.
 
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