Artec T1 DVB USB2 box out of sync and freezing

[paparazi]

I just bought an Artec T1 DVB terestrial USB2 (Freeview) box.
Downloaded and installed the latest drivers.
Everything initially works fine, good picture and sound for about a minutes viewing, then lipsync starts to go out followed shortly after by momentary freezing.
Weired thing is change channels and you get another 20 seconds grace before it all starts going again.

The machine is an Nforce2 with an XP3.0+, 512mb DDR400, 120gig samsung, Radeon 9700Pro USB2 ports, so exceeds minimum requirements by some margin.

It is connected to a good rooftop aerial (not portable) and besides, the reception is very good for the short time it does work.
I have recently clean installed, defragged, and all the drivers are the very latest.
If I had to take a guess I would say it feels as though it runs out of resources then starts lagging but everything is disabled in the background and 512 should do it.

I'm looking for anyone who has specific knowledge or experience of this or any similar USB2 device.
I have read of others with similar issues, have I just bought a pup?
THe previous owner swears it ran properly for him.
I should probably install it on another machine but the aerial wire is nowhere near my main PC (it's was bought for my daughters)
I've been told to adjust video card memory settings but has anyone got any other suggestions.
Martin


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[rvnguy]

Martin I do not have any experience with the Artec setup you refered to.

I am having similar issues, Lagging, dropping for periods, with an MCE2005 unit converted from a P4 2.2, 512 RAM. No help from MS with MCE, direct cable connection etc.

Sounds like a similar "root cause" but haven't isolated what this is as of yet.

We can both possibly use this to share learnings.

Intend to move to 1GB RAM to see if this is at fault...

Will post results.

rvnguy
"I know everything..I just can't remember it all

 

[paparazi]

Much appreciated, yes I was thinking about more ram, possible seperate USB2 card.
Cheers
Martin

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[rvnguy]

Well, a Gig of mem has helped, but not a complete solution. There are still delays, skipping and the like just at a lesser rate....

I am using an eVga TV card that supposedly has it's own dedicated MPEG2 encoder and thought that this would offload the majority of work from the CPU and that 512 RAM woujld suffice....

Appears that there are some functions that are RAM intensive.

Will have to dig deeper to dicern what these are...

How is your setup behaving??

rvnguy
"I know everything..I just can't remember it all

 

[paparazi]

Update**

Well I pretty much followed rvnguy's lead.

Now up to a full gig
Seperate USB2 card (although this is a NF2 so has USB2 natively)
Exactly the same! perfect for approx 1 minute before lipsync problems followed bt constant stuttering.

Oh dear!
Martin

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[rvnguy]

Isn't this supposed to be easy ???

Especially for us veterans...

rvnguy
"I know everything..I just can't remember it all

 

[roddi]

Hi

Try running task manager and change the run priority for the application to "High". I always start mine with a batch file to run in High Priority. Has not cured the problem completely as the box/and or our aerial(I assume the box as our Sony digi box is perfect) seems very sensitive to external power interference - dishwasher, washing machine which causes a losss of sync. As you say, though, switching channels and switching back sorts it out.

Regards

Rod