View Full Version : Recommending Gigablue to others?
Hi
I am a member of another forum which is dedicated to the my previous PVR. This PVR is slowly becoming obsolete and many/most users are looking for replacements (as I did prior to buying a Gigablue Quad Plus)
I am now at the point where I intend to post on that other forum my feelings and experience with the Gigablue.
I am sorry to say that I will be recommending others NOT to buy a Gigablue.
The main reason is that the main and primary function of a PVR is to record and replay TV programmes fails with this machine. I have NOT YET managed to watch a single programme all the way through without blocking/freezing/skipping forward by several minutes, and some are just plain unwatchable. The very same recordings can be watched all the way through if copied over to my PC or, streamed to my PC.
This may or may not be down to the software (I am using VIX 041 at the moment), but in any case, failing to fulfill its main function makes it impossible to recommend this box.
There are many issues discussed on this forum, and it *seems* to me that there may be driver issues that could be the root cause of this - whatever the cause, the manufacturer needs to wake up if they want to make any success of this box.
BTW, the issues I have are not limited to the above alone, there are a few other issues of lesser but annoying importance.
I will post a copy of this post on the other forum also.
It's up to you to post whatever you feel are your experiences with the box. For what it's worth, I've had the Quad Plus since it was released in April and I've found it faultless from a hardware perspective. It's got the two standard DVB-S2 tuners installed plus two plug-in DVB-T (not T2) tuners. There is a 1TB 2.5" HDD installed by the vendor. I've not taken the cover off it.
I used OpenMIPS images (it's the "factory" default) to begin with and had a lot of green screens initially. Gradually improved over the weeks as I loaded the nightly images regularly. Then switched to OpenATV which I found more configureable and better EPG and selection of skins. Also tried OpenRSI which was also very good. Beta tested the initial ViX images and did some config work on the LCD screen layout. No problems with standard recording/playback until ViX 024/025 when the new bootloader, kernel and drivers were released for any images based on OE 2.3 (as ViX 025 was and also OpenATV 4.2). After that I got pausing/skipping/pixellation when playing back programmes I had recorded. Sometimes the box would work for hours after a reboot without an issue, sometimes only minutes, but it was always during playback of a recorded programme. The proof that it was not a recording problem was that I could play back a section perfectly which had suffered severe glitches during a previous play. I tried several images after 025, up to and including 32 but always had issues afterwards. I did a lot of research on ATV and MIPS forums and found that the symptoms were common across the images on the Quad Plus and that there were also other issues with Quads including re-booting etc. The issue, on the Quad Plus, certainly, seems to be associated with memory over use and fragmentation. The resolution seems to be with Gigalbue to resolve with either driver or kernel code changes or both. I found that if I called up the information and memory screen from the menu while playing back a recording I could see the system gradually using all the RAM on the system to cache reads from the HDD until the free memory got down to a couple of megabytes at which point the playback started to glitch. I decided I'd switch back to my last image backup prior to the switch to the new kernel/drivers which was 023.
I stayed on ViX 023 for the past 4-6 weeks without any playback issues. However, being on 023 meant that I couldn't access the plug-in server any more so I was kind of "stuck" with a stable, but un-updateable system.
I downloaded 041 on Thursday and also installed the cacheflush plug-in and set the minimum free memory on my system to 20480 kB using the plug-in settings. I did this based on info I had seen on the ATV forum. After setting the minimum free memory I disabled the plug-in, but left it loaded on the system in case I had to use the actual cache flush facility. The box has been running since then without any issues. I've watched all the F1 recordings I made over the weekend while other recordings were in progress. The free memory figure has never dropped below about 28MB and I've not seen a single glitch.
This MAY be a potential workaround for you until Gigablue sort their s**t out. I think it's a great box but let down by slow response from the manufacturers. My 2 cents!
Hi
I do have a 65332 swap file set up, and I downloaded the CacheFlush plug in but where has it gone? It still isn't showing in the plug in list! Where do you go to adjust its settings?
I have the latest image on my VU+DU2, but I have still a old image on my Quad. Everything seem to work Okay except the SNR is crap, and it is poor on scanning unless I add the file, also the fast fwd and play is poor . I would not recommend anyone to buy it for a motorised system for that reason.
Hi
I do have a 65332 swap file set up, and I downloaded the CacheFlush plug in but where has it gone? It still isn't showing in the plug in list! Where do you go to adjust its settings?
Why have you a swap file set up? The Quad Plus has almost 500MB of RAM available after the image is loaded. Swap files are for boxes with limited RAM and too many plug-ins running. Theoretically, cacheflush plug-in is also for boxes with limited RAM needing very strict memory management. The Quad Plus shouldn't need cacheflush ordinarily, but the current issue with video file playback seems to need it.
It's entirely possible that whatever issue is present in the GB drivers is consuming all your RAM and then going to swap file which will be really slow.
I don't know what your problem is with the cacheflush plug-in not showing? Have you re-booted since you downloaded it? It's in my plug-in menu. Your box is haunted :eek:
Rob van der Does
06-10-14, 08:11
If 'CacheFlush' helps for this problem, a swap-file might as well.
CacheFlush is especially (and even only?) useful in case of memory fragmentation and/or errors in memory management that cause unused memory can't be reclaimed. And although a swapfile doesn't 'fix' those problems, it will allow a longer period of trouble free running.
Or in other words: if you say CacheFlush helps, that would be a clear indication of such memory problems.
In the past we've seen such errors caused by GStreamer in combination with specific kernels. But of course it can also be a driver issue.
Why have you a swap file set up? The Quad Plus has almost 500MB of RAM available after the image is loaded. Swap files are for boxes with limited RAM and too many plug-ins running. Theoretically, cacheflush plug-in is also for boxes with limited RAM needing very strict memory management. The Quad Plus shouldn't need cacheflush ordinarily, but the current issue with video file playback seems to need it.
It's entirely possible that whatever issue is present in the GB drivers is consuming all your RAM and then going to swap file which will be really slow.
I don't know what your problem is with the cacheflush plug-in not showing? Have you re-booted since you downloaded it? It's in my plug-in menu. Your box is haunted :eek:
Hi
Swap File? Well, I am trying anything I can to improve things. As it happens, I don't think the Swap File has actually been used yet - it remains at 65532 free.
I have now found the CacheFlush - you are right, it needed a reboot. It is now in the PlugIn list.
As far as 'plenty of RAM' is concerned, I am looking at the Memory screen as I type, and there is 572548 total and 1755 free - that seems to suggest the RAM is far from 'plenty' to me.
Now I will need to set up Cacheflush - any help with best use of those settings would be appreciated.
Is the 1755 (kB) free indication there when you are playing back a recording? If so, it's indicative of the memory munching going on. If you are just watching live TV, try the memory info menu and you should see over 300 - 400,000 kB free.
All I did with cacheflush was to set the minimum memory free allocation to the maximum allowed in the menu - 20480kB. Then I saved the setting. If you do nothing else, the plug-in will run every 30 minutes (default) and flush the caches. By default this action displays a little icon on the screen for a configurable number of seconds. But I didn't let it do that. After I checked my memory utilisation at intervals while playing back a recording I could see that the memory free figure never dropped below about 28,000 kB. After that I went back into the cacheflush plug-in menu and disabled it and saved the setting. So, no further actual cache flushing going on but the minimum free memory never drops below about 28MB. The setting seems to "stick" even through reboots (or else the plug-in is setting it at boot time even though it doesn't run subsequently?). Either way, I'm happy with it the way it is. I may check again after installing 042.
Hi
Yes I was watching a recording at the time. I am in the process of a Software Update right now, and it would appear that the box may have frozen - have had the waterfall on screen for about 15 min now.
I did also download the 043 zip so I may have to re-flash. This is the first time I have tried the update via the Software Update menu - so far it appears to not work.
Thanks for the indications of settings for CacheFlush.
I will disable anyway to try out the 043 update to see if any improvements there.
If 'CacheFlush' helps for this problem, a swap-file might as well.
CacheFlush is especially (and even only?) useful in case of memory fragmentation and/or errors in memory management that cause unused memory can't be reclaimed. And although a swapfile doesn't 'fix' those problems, it will allow a longer period of trouble free running.
Or in other words: if you say CacheFlush helps, that would be a clear indication of such memory problems.
In the past we've seen such errors caused by GStreamer in combination with specific kernels. But of course it can also be a driver issue.
I had thought about using a swap file but I figured that whatever error was causing all the RAM to be used would then extend into the swap area and make the system completely bogged down and slow, perhaps? The problem with the RAM utilisation is that it happens very quickly. In some cases all the RAM was being used for file cache within about 10 minutes. I had seen some very insightful discussion on the ATV forum about this problem and one of the contributors had developed some scripts to set minimum free memory to 60MB and to flush the cache at intervals. The consensus was that cache flushing was probably not the best way to tackle the problem as it could lead to the system being slow in other areas. But I seem to have been able to avoid the actual cache flushing by using the plug-in to just set the minimum free memory at 20MB and it has been trouble free so far. Obviously, the solution awaits some action from Gigablue to fix properly :)
Hi
Yes I was watching a recording at the time. I am in the process of a Software Update right now, and it would appear that the box may have frozen - have had the waterfall on screen for about 15 min now.
I did also download the 043 zip so I may have to re-flash. This is the first time I have tried the update via the Software Update menu - so far it appears to not work.
Thanks for the indications of settings for CacheFlush.
I will disable anyway to try out the 043 update to see if any improvements there.
I got the software update prompt last night, but was watching other stuff so I didn't bother. I couldn't actually see the 042/043 image in the ViX image manager, but I'm assuming that there still some settling down issues with the new servers that have come on-line in the past week.
Rob van der Does
06-10-14, 13:21
Theoretically the actual use of swap would indeed slow down the system. But if you would really experience it?
Anyway: if CacheFlush saves you from reboots, you should be fine. And the amount of free mem shouldn't be set to high either, as that would also slow things.
Anyway: if you experience that is is working fine with your settings you must be a happy man.
As far as 'plenty of RAM' is concerned, I am looking at the Memory screen as I type, and there is 572548 total and 1755 free - that seems to suggest the RAM is far from 'plenty' to me.
Ordinarily the Linux operating system uses memory very differently to windows, it considers free memory as wasted and will always use as much as possible, freeing up portions as and when requested by the system. So it's not in any way unusual to see the figures you have quoted.
Sent from my iPad Air using Tapatalk HD
Ordinarily the Linux operating system uses memory very differently to windows, it considers free memory as wasted and will always use as much as possible, freeing up portions as and when requested by the system. So it's not in any way unusual to see the figures you have quoted.
Sent from my iPad Air using Tapatalk HD
Hi
I do appreciate that maximizing the use of available Ram may be expected, but if it does this in a way that leads to the symptoms I have had while replaying a recording then that may show bad memory management.
So far (early days yet), Fat-Tony's suggested use of CacheFlush has helped in my case (I have watched a couple of recordings with no glitches), and this further suggests that his ideas on the memory issues are correct.
Rob van der Does
06-10-14, 16:29
Normally Linux uses most of the available memory. Apparently things get out of control atm on several GB's, and that seems to be why Linux gets into trouble.
So in this case, and as has been more or less proven by several users, forcing Linux to keep some extra memory free (and in addition to that flash the cache regularly) seems to be the trick to let Linux and the application Enigma survive.
The debug system logs led me to believe there was some form of memory issue initially. Greater minds than mine (well, at least people more familiar than I with linux memory management :p) on the ATV forum seemed to be pointing to memory fragmentation issues so it was there that they were discussing the possibility of flushing cache to limit the problem.
I do understand that linux tries to keep as much as possible in memory - the strategy being that it's much faster to retrieve data from RAM than from a device I/O. Something in this particular situation with Gigablue seems to interfere with the normal memory management where a number of contiguous 128k blocks are needed for video handling and were not available due to the file reading process using up almost all the RAM. Forcing the system to keep more free seems to work around the problem. I'm not flushing the cache using the plug-in, though. Just reserving 20480 kB of free memory.
Hi
Just to say that I have watched several programmes, some that were previously completely unwatchable, and they all were absolutely glitch free.
All this just from using CacheFlush, in my case, Uncached memory size setting as 8192kB, and as fat-tony says, after setting up I then disabled CacheFlush and everything works fine.
I may need to adjust the Uncached memory size setting, but for now, it is doing its job well.
I have now had a few hours of pleasant watching instead of hair pulling :)
Glad to be of help. It's good to get feedback that the workaround is working on another Quad Plus. I saw on another thread that Impex (GB manufacturers) have responded to a Quad owner that new drivers will be released in the coming weeks. Hopefully, that will put the issue to bed and give back control over the LCD brightness also :)
Hi
I did post a copy of this thread on my other forum. I have now made a further update there in light of the recent workaround posted here. Here is a copy of that update from the other forum.
--------------------------------------
Hi
Further to this statement, I now need to add some good news. After posting on WoS forum, and a very helpful workaround posted in reply by 'fat-tony', I seem to have overcome the issues I mention above.
Since implementing the workaround, I have had a very smooth and pleasurable experience using the Gigablue.
Although this is only a workaround, the manufacturers are working on replacing the drivers thought to be the cause of those issues and will be implemented in future updates to the software.
These are still a few other less important problems, but in my case, those are mostly cosmetic and/or annoyances.
As things now stand with this box, I would now recommend this box to others who are prepared to do a little tinkering to get it up and running. These are not complicated tinkerings, but at the moment, some may find the box doesn't play smoothly 'out of the box'. Also, it seems that not all boxes suffer the same issues (why that would be the case beats me)
Providing the manufacturer does what they promise, then this can be a really good PVR replacement for the old faithful Toppy.
On the plus side: very good connectivity with LAN and/or wireless. Bookmarks, QuickJump like keys which can be set up to suit. Reasonable handling of timers and auto timers, though NO crid usage for series, only a text like search, but can avoid duplicates. Reasonable GUI for menus and EPG etc.
On the minus side: slightly odd treatment of overlapping timers on occasion, but allows reasonably easy means to edit/alter conflicts. In my opinion, needs to add in some (icons perhaps) to indicate across channels, where a timer has already been set.
Note: the software (in my case VIX) is an ever evolving entity, with updates being issued almost every other day, and work is steadily improving things.
@leshay - latest image from ViX contains new GB drivers which resolve the LCD brightness issue and apparently transcoding as well. The memory management settings in the GB range have also been amended which should mean that you no longer need the cacheflush plugin.
Picture quality on sd channels has improved dramatically since the new drivers.
@leshay - latest image from ViX contains new GB drivers which resolve the LCD brightness issue and apparently transcoding as well. The memory management settings in the GB range have also been amended which should mean that you no longer need the cacheflush plugin.
Hi
I did run the last couple of image updates without the CacheFlush - however, I am now having issues with remote keys being very very sluggish - to the point where when trying to navigate menus or EPG, there is a 10 sec pause for each key press with the VIX busy logo running. Anyway I reinstalled the CacheFlush to see if that helped - it didn't. I may have to post in the VIX section of the forum to highlight this new issue.
It sounds like either some plugin is causing an issue or you have a network or disk access issue. Debug log would be helpful - but in a new thread as you say.
BURNSY9999
23-10-14, 12:43
Best box on the market deffo have mine running sweet everything just as fast if not faster than my vu+ solo2
Deffo the box to get
I've had this Box for around a Month and it's a good all-rounder apart from the PVR facility which is absolutely awful.
I'm currently using the latest apollo.78 build and there has been no improvement with the PVR throughout.
Straight playback is ok, but the minute you want to fast forward or rewind it goes into a 'VIX dizzy Fit' with the icon revolving in the top left.
Is this really a gigablue driver issue? or is it better with another image like open PLi?
What cheeses me off is that cheaper clone boxes have a better PVR functionality with the same Apollo build version.
Rob van der Does
12-11-14, 11:02
All code is the same for all boxes, apart from drivers. So yes: this is definitely a driver issue.
Of course you're free to use any image you want to use or try. But they all use the same drivers (although possibly some images may still be using older drivers).
PLi doesn't support GB, so you'll have to look elsewhere.
divil_a_bit
12-11-14, 13:52
I've had the GB Quad+ for about 2 weeks - it's an excellent box!
Would I recommend it to others??? Well that depends: I wouldn't recommend it for my mother for sure. I'd recommend it to others who have a genuine interest in playing around with technology and getting their hands dirty. The GigaBlue (and most E2 receivers) don't just work out of the box.
My plan for the box was to replace Sky. To do that I need to convince the other half which I've done. She's happy to make the change from Sky to E2/OpenVix/Gigablue.
I've now "locked down" the box. No more updates, no more tweaking ... nothing!!! I know for some that will defeat the purpose but I want a PVR that I can rely on everyday to watch TV - not something I have to SSH into to get working all the time.
In the last 2 weeks I've been tweaking it - I've installed Blue-HD skin which is excellent. I've had to modify some of the font sizes for the BlueHD skin directly in the XML and FTP back to the box as some fonts used for the program info are much too small. I've also had to disable all fast-fwd and fast-rewind speeds of 32x and greater. They just don't work on my box. After using fast-fwd 32x, the video and audio would not be in sync. A max of 16x works PERFECT all the time which suits me fine. There is no reason to use 32x anyway since there are so many other better options for jumping to where you want in a PVR recording (using the 1/3, 4/6, 8/9 buttons ... etc).
I've also got no-ip working on the box so Remote Record works just like Sky. This was another important feature.
One of the other things I was hoping would work is streaming to an XBMC box and I'd get multi-room for free. The streaming works perfectly as does the EPG, but it take 3-5 seconds to change a channel. It's not the best user experience to be honest so I don't think it will work for frequent use. It's a great add-on for use with a laptop for very infrequent use and is kinda "cool". IMHO it's a proof of concept but I'm sure it will work eventually. For now, it's not going to be of use to my family. There is a quad LNB on my dish and the other room is cabled so I'm probably going to buy another Gigablue Quad + and set it up there. I'm not going to buy it just yet - I'll probably give the current box 4 or 5 weeks more to ensure there are no issues.
Going back to the original question: would I recommend it to others? If the image I'm using with all my tweaks turns out to be bullet proof, then yes, I'd recommend it for my mother. But I'd have to copy my exact config before giving the box to her.
I've had this Box for around a Month and it's a good all-rounder apart from the PVR facility which is absolutely awful.
I'm currently using the latest apollo.78 build and there has been no improvement with the PVR throughout.
Straight playback is ok, but the minute you want to fast forward or rewind it goes into a 'VIX dizzy Fit' with the icon revolving in the top left.
Is this really a gigablue driver issue? or is it better with another image like open PLi?
What cheeses me off is that cheaper clone boxes have a better PVR functionality with the same Apollo build version.
It appears to be a driver issue. I have the same problem. If you use the 3, 6, 9 keys to jump forward or the 1, 4, 7 keys to jump backwards, then no issues. If you FF at all, then when you press PLAY the image stalls and judders. The workaround is to press REW once, then press PLAY - normal service is resumed. It's been reported on other forums and is awaiting a fix from Gigablue.
divil_a_bit
12-11-14, 16:59
It appears to be a driver issue. I have the same problem. If you use the 3, 6, 9 keys to jump forward or the 1, 4, 7 keys to jump backwards, then no issues. If you FF at all, then when you press PLAY the image stalls and judders. The workaround is to press REW once, then press PLAY - normal service is resumed. It's been reported on other forums and is awaiting a fix from Gigablue.
I'm using Apollo.62. 32x and above forward and rewind do not work for me - I end up with horrible jitter and audio/video sync afterwards. I've disabled 32x and above and everything works perfectly.
I almost never use FF or REW - I find it so much quicker to skip forward in 15sec, 1 min or 5 min increments (or whatever you set) by using the number keys.
divil_a_bit
13-11-14, 16:50
I agree fat-tony, I almost never use FF or REW
But if this jitter happened when trying to convince the missus to give up Sky it would have been a deal breaker! :)
divil_a_bit
23-11-14, 12:38
I'm taking back some of what I said earlier. I've been using the Gigablue Quad Plus some more and I've found one problem that there is no workaround for and it's very annoying!
Pausing live TV does not work reliably!!!
More here:
http://www.world-of-satellite.com/showthread.php?42157-Pausing-live-TV-does-not-work-reliably
I would not recommend this box to others until Gigablue sort out the driver issues!
Andy_Hazza
23-11-14, 13:00
I've never rated Gigablue receivers, better receivers out there in my opinion.
I'm taking back some of what I said earlier. I've been using the Gigablue Quad Plus some more and I've found one problem that there is no workaround for and it's very annoying!
Pausing live TV does not work reliably!!!
More here:
http://www.world-of-satellite.com/showthread.php?42157-Pausing-live-TV-does-not-work-reliably
I would not recommend this box to others until Gigablue sort out the driver issues!
I have no problem whatsoever with this.
Sent from my U65GT using Tapatalk
I've never rated Gigablue receivers, better receivers out there in my opinion.
I've had many dreamboxes, and the Quad is by far the best receiver I've owned.
Very reliable, fast, a lot of memory...
Sent from my U65GT using Tapatalk
Andy_Hazza
23-11-14, 13:52
I've had many dreamboxes, and the Quad is by far the best receiver I've owned.
Very reliable, fast, a lot of memory...
Sent from my U65GT using Tapatalk
I've tried em all, Gigablue, Technomate, Miraclebox, Vu+ and Vu+ beats em all hands down, the reliability, quality build is second to none, It's like comparing a reliant robin to a rolls Royce. lol
divil_a_bit
24-11-14, 08:57
What version of openvix + kernel/drivers are you using?
I can reproduce the problem with various version of openvix and also the latest openmips 4.2
divil_a_bit
24-11-14, 21:18
I have no problem whatsoever with this.
Sent from my U65GT using Tapatalk
What version of openvix + kernel/drivers are you using?
I can reproduce the problem with various version of openvix and also the latest openmips 4.2
It's driving me crazy - I'm tempted to see the box and pay the premium price for a VU+
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