Having Trouble Getting It Up (frame capture rate)

[Riddek]

Hi,
I have a PIII 850 on a P3BF mobo (with 1006 BIOS) with a 30GB Maxtor DM 40+ primary HD with a Promise FastTrak 100 RAID "0" 2x 30GB Maxtor DM 40+ HD array.

I'm pretty disappointed with my frame capture rate- I'm dropping frames left, right and center in both RGB and Mjpeg capture modes from cable(just a test). On my primary HD I'm getting a 13.18 MB/sec transfer rate and my RAID array (used primarily for capture) 20.18 MB/sec. (as per the latest Matrox Vid Tools HD bench test utility)

I downloaded the Maxtor utility to turn off write verification and ran it. It confirmed write verification is turned off for drive 0, but said drive 1 could not be found.(?)

Do these capture rates seem a little low? Should I be dropping approx. 100-150 frames per 2GB file? Can anyone suggest possible courses of action?
Thanks,
Riddek.
ps- I'm using a Marvel G400 and capturing highest quality at 640 x 480.

[This message has been edited by Riddek (edited 21 November 2000).]

[Dr Mordrid]

Hmmmm....does seem considerably low on both.

Have you done the "usual" OS optimizations? Here's a Maxtor FAQ page discribing them;

http://www.matrox.com/mga/support/fa.../video4.cfm#33

With much of this list implemented on a quite similar system (except for drive sizes etc.) I can capture uncompressed YUY2 for 100,000+ frames without a drop using AVI_IO. On another similar system and using the RT-2000 I've captured over 2.5 HOURS of DV from an analog S-Video source without a drop.

Also;

Why capture RGB at 640x480? Capturing YUY2 is much better. To capture 640x480 RGB the native 704x480 YUY2 has to be sized and interpeted on the fly and then saved or further encoded (if using HuffYUV or MPEG). There's lots of monkey motion involved in this that eats CPU cycles like a dinosaur.

Also YUY2 gives you 704x480 and can be HuffYUV encoded on the fly, with very little CPU loading, to only require 10 mb/s. Your system should be able to do that in realtime....mine can.

Dr. Mordrid


[This message has been edited by Dr Mordrid (edited 21 November 2000).]

[Riddek]

Hi Doc.
I've followed your suggestions and did everything listed for standard optimization but nothing's changed. What kind of file tranfer rates are you getting? (what should I be striving for?) I'm currently do a defrag as per the Matrox Power Tools suggestion. After that I've run out of options. I guess I should wipe everything and start over, just in case something got messed up somewhere along the line.

The reason I was using RGB to capture is because I haven't had a chance(yet) to install AVIO or any other great programs I've heard about on this forum. I want to get this capture rate problem fixed first.
Thanks,
Riddek.

[Dr Mordrid]

A single Maxtor DMAX Plus40 ATA100 delivers 24 mb/s sequential writes on a Promise ATA100 controller.

The Fasttrak100 RAID0 + two DiamondMax Plus40 numbers from SANDRA are as follows;

Buffered Read: 82 mb/s
Sequential Read: 31 mb/s
Random Read: 7 mb/s
Buffered Write: 73 mb/s
Sequential Write: 41 mb/s
Random Write: 14 mb/s
Access Speed: 6 ms (single drive = 9ms)

The RT-2000 system has four 60g IBM 75GXP ATA100's mounted in two 120 gig arrays. This one scores 64-68 mb/s sequential writes on both arrays.

Dr. Mordrid


[This message has been edited by Dr Mordrid (edited 21 November 2000).]

[Riddek]

Well, the defrag did nada. I thought I'd send one last distress call for any suggestions before I reformat everything and start over from scratch. If I do have to start over, can anyone tell me if there is a certain sequence to installing software, drivers, os, setting up RAID array etc.?

Also, URLs to any web sites that have information about NLE, cinematography, lighting, videography etc. would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers,
Riddek.

[Pertti]

Riddek,

What is the complete list of your hardware, and are you using any "not_so_standard" solutions ?

[Riddek]

Pertti,
I have:
PIII 850E processor
Asus P3BF motherboard(with latest bios)
256MB PC100 RAM
30GB Maxtor Diamond Max +40(primary HD)
2 x 30GB Maxtor Diamond Max +40 HDs(in a RAID "0" array)
Promise FastTrak ATA 100 RAID controller card
Apex Super Case (ATX full tower)
Matrox Marvel G400 video card
Soundblaster AWE 64 ISA sound card
Pioneer 16x slot DVD-ROM
Panasonic CD-ROM & floppy
Linksys Etherfast LNE100TX ethernet card

I have the latest Matrox Power Tools and drivers, etc. For NLE I will probably be using Adobe Premiere 5.1. I use my primary HD for my OS and programs and my RAID array for capture.

From what Dr Mordrid says, I should be getting double the 20MB/second I'm currently experiencing with my capture drive(s). My primary HD is in a "Mobile Rack" removable bay, which may or may not affect it's performance somewhat, but both HDs in my RAID array are mounted internally.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers,
Riddek.

[Pertti]

I wouldn't worry about the figures, which the Matrox HD benchmark reports.

The Matrox HD benchmark must be run because it writes the results in the registry, and PC-VCR uses those values to determine the maximum allowed datarates.
When the values have been written to the registry, nothing prevents you from changing them to higher values (as long as you know your drives can handle the datarates).

Have you tried SiSoft Sandra for benchmarking the drives ?

Didn't you use wireless keyboard and mouse ?
Have you tried with standard ones ?

Have you tried disabling the NIC for testing ?

Every now and then, I have written about configuring the OS, tweaking it etc...
Search the forum, and you should find the necessary info.

[Riddek]

Pertti,
I was wondering what this "Sandra" everyone was talking about was.... I did a search, downloaded it and ran a benchtest. Nice program! Here's the results for my RAID array:
Buffered Read: 284 mb/s
Sequential Read: 19 mb/s
Random Read: 1909 kb/s
Buffered Write: 209 mb/s
Sequential Write: 25 mb/s
Random Write: 19 mb/s
Access Speed: 30 ms (estimated)

All this tells me is that my head hurts. Does it give you any insight as to what the problem could be?

You had also suggested disabling the NIC for testing... errrr... what exactly is that? Neural Interface Connector? (sounds painful)

Thanks,
Riddek.

[Dr Mordrid]

Ok, I'm assuming you have the Fasttrak's FastCheck utility installed. If not, install it.

Now open it's control panel and go to the Options page. Now UN-check the S.M.A.R.T. function. Leave the CACHE checked. Now reboot and re-do the benchmarks.

Dr. Mordrid


[This message has been edited by Dr Mordrid (edited 24 November 2000).]

[Pertti]

Riddek,

In FastCheck monitoring utility, go to the Options page.

The Notification group, un-check all the check boxes, and choose to ignore errors.

Disable the Schedule Array Synchronization

Disable Hot Spare/Auto rebuild, and set the rebuild rate to "Low"

Enable Write Cache, and un-check the S.M.A.R.T Check.

You should be able to keep the PCI utilization slider at High with the P3B-F, but if you are still having problems, you could take it down a bit.

NIC = Network Interface Controller.

[Riddek]

Hi guys,
I followed your instructions and here's my updated benchmarks:
Buffered Read: 382 mb/s
Sequential Read: 20 mb/s
Random Read: 1881 kb/s
Buffered Write: 326 mb/s
Sequential Write: 25 mb/s
Random Write: 19 mb/s
Access Speed: 31 ms (estimated)

I ran Performance Tune-Up Wizard and it said gave me three warnings under Mainboard Information:
Warning W2521 AGP bus speed is too high
Warning W2520 PCI bus speed is too high
Warning W2521 ISA/DMA bus speed is too high

I checked my bios and I have my CPU speed set at 850MHz & CPU core bus freq. multiple set at 8.5x. My CPU Vcore is set at 1.65v and I have CPU cache level 1 & 2 enabled. I checked my FastTrak setup utility and I have both HDs in the array set as master(each on it's own channel.(is this correct?)
I'm not sure what other info may be needed.
Any more suggestions?
Thanks,
Riddek.

[Pertti]

Riddek,

There is still something wrong with your windows configuration.

Check the settings below (No you don't have to make a fresh installation...Yet ):

----------------------
Doing a ground up installation of W98SE.

Before proceeding, check that you have disabled all power saving, monitoring, checking...whatever in Bios, and that the hardware configuration is the way you want it (Card placement in PCI slots, IRQ assignments, Bios settings...)

Boot with a clean (empty Autoexec.bat and Config.sys) W95B/W98/W98SE boot disk, where you have copied Format.com and Fdisk.exe.

If the drive is brand new, run FDISK to prepare the partition(s), you will need at least one partition, but on normal systems you should not have more than two per physical HD (you can have lots of logical drives on it though)

Format the system drive with Format c:/u

Start the W98SE installation with "Setup /ie /is /p i" (the "/p i" removes ACPI)

Select "Custom Setup"

Selected options:
- Quick View
- WordPad
- Audio Compression
- Video Compression
- Volume Control
- Character Map

Change keyboard layout to one you are using
Leave Regional Settings at "English (US)" to keep W98SE from adding yet more unnecessary and unwanted junk during installation.

Location "None"

Set Timezone to your local one.

If you are running with a newer Intel chipset, Install the Intel Inf Update (which is btw the only update/driver needed from the motherboard CD). VIA, AMD etc... chipsets require some more updating and figuring out the correct order for installing the updates.

Go to Power Saving options in Control Panel, and turn everything off.

In Network options,
- Use NetBEUI (my favorite) or TCP/IP for local networks.
- Choose Primary Network Logon "Windows Logon"
- Add File and printer sharing
- In Client for Microsoft Networks, choose "Quick Logon"

In Device Manager:
- check Disable "Advanced Power Management Support"
- check "Disable power status polling"
- Disable the SMBus Controller
- Remove "Auto Insert Notification" for all CD:s
- Enable DMA transfers for all HD:s

In File System Properties:
- Select Typical role "Network server"
- Choose "Read ahead optimization = Full" (opinions vary on this)
- Uncheck "Search for floppy..."
- Check "Disable write-behind caching for all drives"

Recycle Bin Properties:
- Configure all the drives independently for 0% and "Do not move files..."
- Check "Use one setting..." and selected 0% and "Do not move files..."

In Explorer:
- Share all the drives
- Uncheck "Automatic Disk Cleanup" of all drives if low on space

Desktop:
- Remove unnecessary shortcuts
- Remove "Quick Launch" from the taskbar
- Check "Auto Hide" and "Show small icons..."

Display Properties:
- uncheck "Show Icons using all..." and "Animate windows..."
- Select "Apply the new color settings without restarting"

Registry - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\
- Remove LoadPowerProfile from ...\Run
- Remove ScanRegistry from ...\Run
- Remove TaskMonitor from ...\Run
- Remove LoadPowerProfile from ...\RunServices
- Remove SchedulingAgent from ...\RunServices

Install TweakUI and configure as follows:
- Menu speed "Fastest"
- Uncheck "Menu underlines"
- Uncheck "Mouse hot tracking"
- Light arrow on shortcuts
- uncheck Animated "Click Here"
- uncheck "Tip of the day"
- uncheck prefix "Shortcut..."
- remove all the checks in "IE4 tab"
- uncheck "Splash screen"
- set ScanDisk to "Never"
- check all but "clear last User at logon" to clear at logon
- uncheck playing of audio and data CD:s

Add the following lines to MSDOS.SYS:
DBLSpace=0
DRVSpace=0

Add the following to System.ini:

[386Enh]
ConservativeSwapfileUsage=1

[vcache]
MinFileCache=64
MaxFileCache=10240
ChunkSize=2048

After installing the Matrox display drivers, Go to Display Properties:
- uncheck "Start Matrox QuickDesk..."
- uncheck "Show Matrox QuickDesk..."

[Pertti]

Riddek,

That sure does tell a lot.

You have to configure your FT utility options for minimal checking, verification etc...

I'll check the settings when I get back home.

[Riddek]

Thanks Pertti.
I tried following your instructions, but this is a little over my head. I'm going to have to get someone a little more qualified to make all these changes for me.

One thing I forgot to mention is that I'm running Win98 ver.1, not SE. I have a WinME upgrade but haven't installed it because I was waiting for my ISP to release an SW upgrade for WinME. They have recently released it, so I can use ME if it offers me any advantages with NLE. I understand I can use VT 1.52 with PD 6.10 to do YUV capture so technically everything should work under WinME, but I'd like to get an expert opinion.
Thanks,
Riddek.