Error loading media file

pellajl · Post by **pellajl** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 14:47

I have tried using the search function on the forum for any references to "error loading media file" but it returns too many threads to be useful.

I get this message when trying to replay a program I recorded earlier. I have the latest firmware (Dec 2007).

Can someone please direct me to thread that helps me with this issue OR provide me with a solution.

Thanks.......

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 15:23

The solution is not pretty, it involves using WizFX to transfer as a TS file to your PC, and watch there (or maybe once you transfer as a TS, it can play it from a network share?)
Were you using the editing functions? The first time I tried to edit, I caused a file to be unplayable also... but this was mainly because I didn't understand exactly how to get the A and B markers where I wanted them (I was trying to move backwards to highlight from "now" to the beginning of the file and this didn't do what I expected, then tried the popup delete anyway).
Regards

IanSav · Post by **IanSav** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 15:31

Hi Pellajl,

pellajl wrote:I have tried using the search function on the forum for any references to "error loading media file" but it returns too many threads to be useful.

I get this message when trying to replay a program I recorded earlier. I have the latest firmware (Dec 2007).

Can someone please direct me to thread that helps me with this issue OR provide me with a solution.

This error sometimes occurs if the media player module becomes confused. As a first effort I suggest that you turn off the Beyonwiz for a minute or two then power up and then try to play the file. The restart may make the file playable again.

Regards,
Ian.

craigh · Post by **craigh** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 15:46

Hi Pellajl,

Try Ian's suggestion first.....

...... and if it still will not play go into setup and under The SYSTEM menu
HDD>>>>>Check HDD

This should check the drive fro any errors and hopefully let U play it.

sub3R · Post by **sub3R** » Fri Dec 28, 2007 15:49

Hi Pellajl,

After trying Ian?s, Craig?s & Tony?s suggestion I would be interested if you had any luck or if you had the same outcome as I had here using the previous 01.04.144 f/w. Providing you can get them onto your PC that is.

pellajl · Post by **pellajl** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 00:17

Tried all suggestions - power down unit by unplugging from the wall, copying to a shared drive on my laptop and lastly checking the HD; same error message.

It appears the file is corrupted in some way. The file starts with an asterisk "*". Anyone know what is the significance of the asterisk is?

Regards

John

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 00:40

Asterix just means it picked up the name from the epg.
In what form is it on your PC? You can use projectX on it if it is a TS and do perhaps a "toTS" manipulation with it with projectX which will clean up the headers etc and make it playable. Also videoRedo gets a lot of mentions on this and the Topfield forums, many swear by it, so give that a go.
Regards

netmask · Post by **netmask** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 14:34

pellajl wrote:Tried all suggestions - power down unit by unplugging from the wall, copying to a shared drive on my laptop and lastly checking the HD; same error message.

It appears the file is corrupted in some way. The file starts with an asterisk "*". Anyone know what is the significance of the asterisk is?

Regards

John

What format is the file after you transfer it to your PC , TS or TVWIZ. If it is TS and it won't play over the network run it through the free program MPEGStreamclip and use "convert to TS"
It will write a different header to the one from WizFX and I have no problems now playing TS files this way. This is a bit of the header from a BW TS file

00000000 8763 CFAE 50B8 24EA 1A2A 0000 012D 1B40 5030 F3A4 A171 0C95 CD3E 01D8 0DB8 8A10
00000020 D6C1 981F 61F0 1501 B39B 00C4 06DE 617E 5D11 333A 0F83 4644 D191 D75F 4DD5 0681

After processing the same file with MPEGStreamclip it looks like this.

00000000 4740 0010 0000 B00D 0001 C100 0000 01E1 00E8 F95E 7DFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF
00000020 FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF

and plays quite succesfully over the network.

And again running it through ProjectX produces this header (and the file won't play over the network although all 3 versions play ok on the computer)

00000000 4740 0010 0000 B00D 0001 0100 0001 02E1 008F A526 CFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF
00000020 FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF FFFF

What does this all means? I haven't a clue but I like to experiment - So with the current firmware I can play MPEG, AVI's and if I process TS derived via WizFX using MPEGStreamclip I can play TS files as well. The only downside is subtitles are no longer accessible from the processed file. BTW the file was from ABC HDTV

Ultrasmart · Post by **Ultrasmart** » Mon May 12, 2008 20:32

Sorry to bring up an old thread, but I had this 'error loading media file' cause havoc tonight. Was attempting to play back 9HD news recorded earlier tonight, but when I pressed OK to commence playback, this message appeared. Powered down, left for a few minutes - no change. Performed HDD check, all OK, but didn't help. Ended up deleting file and performed HDD format. I am not networked, just using BW as a PVR. Any ideas as to what may have caused this guys ?

RubberChicken · Post by **RubberChicken** » Tue May 13, 2008 00:21

3 out of 4 recordings did this to me on Sunday night. About the same ratio as when I first bought it last year. I'm not about to reformat the drive to test if that fixes it - seemed to initially. Monday's recordings look OK so far. I just gave up on the failed ones, easier to source them elsewhere. Interestingly, one of the files was playing fine, I stopped watching while it was still recording, then it gave the error when I came back to it later.

diesel · Post by **diesel** » Tue May 13, 2008 08:46

Since upgrading to .235on Saturday, I have had 1 file display this error (strangely on 9HD as well). I transferred to PC as a single .TS file using WizFX and was able to successfully play it back no issues. From a response I got from an earlier post, it seems it is an issue with one of the files that the BW needs and didn't create properly when it did the recording.

prl · Post by **prl** » Tue May 13, 2008 10:03

Ultrasmart wrote:Sorry to bring up an old thread, but I had this 'error loading media file' cause havoc tonight. Was attempting to play back 9HD news recorded earlier tonight, but when I pressed OK to commence playback, this message appeared. Powered down, left for a few minutes - no change. Performed HDD check, all OK, but didn't help. Ended up deleting file and performed HDD format. I am not networked, just using BW as a PVR. Any ideas as to what may have caused this guys ?

I've started a topic about this problem almost two weeks ago in the beta forum. I don't know whether what I found is the only reason that recordings become unplayable, but it certainly is one. Here's what I recently posted about the problem in the beta forum:

prl wrote:I wouldn't expect fsck to fix this problem. The "Error loading media file" problem that I'm describing is not due to the sort of error in the filesystem that fsck normally tries to fix. The file system itself is OK; the problem is the convention that a file called stat must exist in a recording folder for it to playable, and the file has somehow ended up being lost or (in the two cases I've looked at) being called something else.

The involvement of fsck that I thought the name (fsck000.ren) suggested was that perhaps the file had been recovered from a damaged file system by fsck, not that fsck might fix the problem.

As far as I know, there are three workarounds to make a file playable when the stat file has been lost or has the wrong name:
Copy the recording to a PC (or whatever) using WizFX or getWizPnP as a .ts file. Neither WizFX nor getWizPnP access the stat file when they create a .ts file as output. Then play the recording over the net.

Copy the recording to a PC (or whatever) using WizFX or getWizPnP as a normal BW recording, then copy the stat file from another recording into the recording folder of the "broken" recording. Then play the recording over the net.

Use the telnet hack to log into the BW, cd to the recording directory and look for a 96-byte file. If one exists, rename it to stat. If it doesn't, then copy a stat file from another recording.
The last approach has the advantage that it might contribute a little to understanding the underlying cause of the problem, because it's then possible to report the names that the file has been found under, and hopefully give the BW engineers a clue about what the cause is.
...
This is a quite annoying problem, first in that exists at all (and seems to have got worse in the 1.05.215+ firmware versions), and second that recording playback fails when the file is missing when it appears that the contents of the file are fairly unimportant to replay, because experience so far has been that pretty much any stat file will do. Given that, surely the BW could create its own stat file for replay if it is missing?

I've had this problem twice in the last two weeks; once the stat file was called at, and once (the case I was talking about in the quote) it was called fsck000.ren. As you can probably gather from the post, all I have is some more detailed information about the symptoms - why the file is unplayable - and not about the root cause of the problem - why the file ends up with the wrong name.

Ultrasmart · Post by **Ultrasmart** » Tue May 13, 2008 10:49

Thanks for the replies guys.
Unfortunately I'm not technically-minded enough to understand all that Peter (

), but am just hoping it doesn't happen again. There's obviously no straight out fix for the problem then... (I'm speaking for those of us that are techno-challenged of course...

).

IanSav · Post by **IanSav** » Tue May 13, 2008 10:59

Hi Guys,

Either Peter or Tony have reported seeing an issue with a missing or damaged "stat" file on the Beyonwiz that causes recordings to be unplayable. This issue has been reported to Beyonwiz and they are investigating.

In the interim it appears that the recording is transferred to a PC as a .TVWIZ structure then the missing or damaged "stat" file can be replaced with a "stat" file from any other Beyonwiz recording. This usually make the file playable again.

An alternative is to transfer the file as a .TS file that does not need the "stat" file. This new file should also be playable.

Regards,
Ian.

RubberChicken · Post by **RubberChicken** » Tue May 13, 2008 11:07

Beyonwiz don't supply a Mac version of WizFX (do they?), so I cannot copy the files off or check what has or has not been created properly.

IanSav · Post by **IanSav** » Tue May 13, 2008 11:45

Hi RubberChicken,

RubberChicken wrote:Beyonwiz don't supply a Mac version of WizFX (do they?), so I cannot copy the files off or check what has or has not been created properly.

You can use the Beyonwiz File Player area POP-UP menu options to copy or move files onto a shared directory on your MAC.

Regards,
Ian.

prl · Post by **prl** » Tue May 13, 2008 11:50

IanSav wrote:Hi RubberChicken,
RubberChicken wrote:Beyonwiz don't supply a Mac version of WizFX (do they?), so I cannot copy the files off or check what has or has not been created properly.
You can use the Beyonwiz File Player area POP-UP menu options to copy or move files onto a shared directory on your MAC.

Regards,
Ian.

There is also a command-line program getWizPnP written in perl that does most (all? more?) of what WizFX does. It runs on Windows, OS X and Linux, but you need to me happy with using the command-line interface (Terminal on OS X) to use it.

Two other forumites are working on non-Windows GUIs. One is a OS X work-alike of WizFX, and the other is a GUI for getWizPnP.

RubberChicken · Post by **RubberChicken** » Tue May 13, 2008 12:17

prl wrote:
IanSav wrote:Hi RubberChicken,
RubberChicken wrote:Beyonwiz don't supply a Mac version of WizFX (do they?), so I cannot copy the files off or check what has or has not been created properly.
You can use the Beyonwiz File Player area POP-UP menu options to copy or move files onto a shared directory on your MAC.

Regards,
Ian.
There is also a command-line program getWizPnP written in perl that does most (all? more?) of what WizFX does. It runs on Windows, OS X and Linux, but you need to me happy with using the command-line interface (Terminal on OS X) to use it.

Two other forumites are working on non-Windows GUIs. One is a OS X work-alike of WizFX, and the other is a GUI for getWizPnP.

Sorry, I should have clarified... the popup menu copy option failed to do anything. No error, no copy. Other playable files copy fine. I just assumed whatever is breaking them from playing broke that as well. I don't want to resort to Terminal.

prl · Post by **prl** » Tue May 13, 2008 12:34

RubberChicken wrote:... Sorry, I should have clarified... the popup menu copy option failed to do anything. No error, no copy. Other playable files copy fine. I just assumed whatever is breaking them from playing broke that as well. I don't want to resort to Terminal.

It's quite possible that the BW will refuse to copy what it sees as a "broken" recording.

Unfortunately, at the moment, if you really want to play the recording, getWizPnP and Terminal, or worse, hacking into the BW firmware and telnetting to it to fix the problem are the only ways I know to get a playable recording.

Otherwise, you may have to hold on until there's a GUI WizFX workalike for the Mac.

IanSav · Post by **IanSav** » Tue May 13, 2008 12:40

Hi Peter & RubberChicken,

prl wrote:Otherwise, you may have to hold on until there's a GUI WizFX workalike for the Mac.

Or hope that Beyonwiz finds and fixes the issue quickly (to stop it happening in the future) and provides a work around or fix to correct any existing (and damaged) recordings.

A work around that I could imagine would be a file integrity check that is performed whenever the Beyonwiz does a HDD check. If a recording is found with a damaged file structure, like a missing "stat" file then this process could correct the issue. Yes, this may add time to the disk check process but at least it will ensure that all recordings that can be fixed will be fixed.

Regards,
Ian.

peteru · Post by **peteru** » Tue May 13, 2008 13:55

RubberChicken wrote:I don't want to resort to Terminal.

Then delete the file and stop complaining.

Darrylp · Post by **Darrylp** » Tue May 13, 2008 19:33

I don't know if this is a clue but as per my topic http://www.beyonwiz.com.au/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=2117

I reinstalled 215 in both my machines but to my horror I discovered they will not play anything recorded with 235 and they produce the same error message: 'error loading media file'.

I've now reinstalled 235 on one machine so I can watch the material, I have 215 on the second one and will backup record on the Toshiba in case the 235 machine causes 'error loading media file' problems.

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Tue May 13, 2008 19:36

OK, I just got this now.
Scenario:
manual recording of ABC News SD
watching ABC2 in timeshift
A warning for a timer about to start on Ten
(I rushed to try and kill the ABC recording as I was only doing this to test if the wiz has issues playing back an SD stream with multiple audio streams).
I failed, the Ten timer kicked in before I could popup etc to cancel (I actually attempted to record the ABC2 timeshift buffer but got booted out with "manual timer cancelled due to programmed timer" or some such messsage), the timeshift buffer was killed and I missed out on scrapheap challenge.. but at least the behaviour here is predictable.
I changed channels to ABC, and did a "REC" "STOP" to stop the recording.

Result:
ABC News wouldn't play, the recording has a 0byte stat file when transferred with WizFX... but guess what Peter/PRL... when telnetting, I have a perfect 96byte file but called "at" rather than stat!

Renamed it to stat and of course the file is playable again.

So from other reports, it seems this problem occurs when dual recording, possibly one of those recordings being a manual recording?? Time for others to try to quantify this 100%.

Regards

prl · Post by **prl** » Tue May 13, 2008 20:39

Thanks Tony. I've put a post in the beta topic about this problem to link to your post.

IanSav · Post by **IanSav** » Tue May 13, 2008 20:55

Hi,

With this sort of quality feedback hopefully this will help Beyonwiz to identify the issue quickly. Thanks Tony.

Regards,
Ian.

rorford · Post by **rorford** » Tue May 13, 2008 22:18

I have encountered the same issue - but in a far simpler scenario than Tony's.
Timer Recording of ABCHD - whilst watching playpack of previously recorded content off the BW HDD.

The recording comes up with the error message. First time I have ever had this issue across all the versions.

I will try to recreate the issue.

And I thought 235 was a clean one.....

Neon Kitten · Post by **Neon Kitten** » Tue May 13, 2008 22:31

tonymy01 wrote: So from other reports, it seems this problem occurs when dual recording, possibly one of those recordings being a manual recording?? Time for others to try to quantify this 100%.

I've had no errors of this type since 232, thankfully (and now I've said that I just bet I get one from tonight's recordings

) but while I'd suspected dual recording as the culprit too - and possibly dual recordings which finish at the same time as each other - one of the last errors I got before upgrading was when I manually stopped a single timer recording with nothing else going on at all - and I got the error when I tried to play it back.

Darrylp · Post by **Darrylp** » Tue May 13, 2008 22:50

As my problems appear to be with ABCHD too, I wonder if this could be where the problem lies?

Neon Kitten · Post by **Neon Kitten** » Wed May 14, 2008 02:31

Neon Kitten wrote: I've had no errors of this type since 232, thankfully (and now I've said that I just bet I get one from tonight's recordings )

And guess what - I did!

A recording on Seven SD that I stopped manually produced the error.

If I could telnet in to rename the file I would have, but my firmware doesn't seem to have the telnet function enabled.

ackbar33 · Post by **ackbar33** » Wed May 14, 2008 09:43

I had this once with 232 and now the other night , once again with 235, the latest one was recording 9HD,

Tried all the fixes listed , in the end transferred file to PC, converted to MPG with video redo and was able then to stream it to the DPP1..

prl · Post by **prl** » Wed May 14, 2008 09:43

Neon Kitten wrote:
Neon Kitten wrote: I've had no errors of this type since 232, thankfully (and now I've said that I just bet I get one from tonight's recordings )
And guess what - I did!

A recording on Seven SD that I stopped manually produced the error.

If I could telnet in to rename the file I would have, but my firmware doesn't seem to have the telnet function enabled.

Not even beta releases have telnet enabled. You have to make a hacked version of the firmware download that starts telnetd at startup time. It can be done (without a great amount of difficulty) using BWFWTools and some judicious editing of the system startup script (/etc/rc.sysinit). I've had a plan to add a tool to allow the application of hacks to the BW firmware for a while, but I haven't had time recently to do it - I was going to get onto it last weekend, but then I released a version of getWizPnP with a bug that in one of its new functions (sound familiar anyone

), and didn't get to work on the autohacker.

I have written up detailed instructions in the beta forum for enabling telent and repairing the stat file problem in situ on the BW. After I've had feedback from folk there about the usability of the instructions, I'll post them on OpenWiz.

martymonster · Post by **martymonster** » Wed May 14, 2008 21:41

IanSav wrote:Hi Guys,

Either Peter or Tony have reported seeing an issue with a missing or damaged "stat" file on the Beyonwiz that causes recordings to be unplayable. This issue has been reported to Beyonwiz and they are investigating.

In the interim it appears that the recording is transferred to a PC as a .TVWIZ structure then the missing or damaged "stat" file can be replaced with a "stat" file from any other Beyonwiz recording. This usually make the file playable again.

An alternative is to transfer the file as a .TS file that does not need the "stat" file. This new file should also be playable.

Regards,
Ian.

FYI

I had this last Monday with Desperate Housewives
Boston Legal recorded straight after was OK and Sea Patrol recorded at same time was OK as well.

I xfer to PC as .TS, when trying to play it back, audio was choppy.
I used Video Redo to delete ads and save as .mpg and it played back perfect

Forgot, using 215 firmware.
We went to watch them last night and noticed the problem.
The BW had a strange damaged file name at the top of the list when we went to the file menu.
The show could not be loaded.
Turned off BW and back on, the strange file was no longer there.
Show would still not play.
Ran HDD disk, no errors found.
Show would still not play.
Xfer using WizFX

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Wed May 14, 2008 21:57

Strange filename files at the top of the list is just the timeshift buffer. It would have likely been something like the channel name and date, so not *that* weird

The Wiz guys have managed to eventually code that bug out of existance I think (where the buffer file becomes visible).
Regards

Mantorok · Post by **Mantorok** » Thu May 15, 2008 13:00

I got one of these "Error loading media file" messages when trying to playback a recording too. I manually set the BW to record a show on 9HD on Tuesday night. Nothing else was recording at the time and the unit was in standby at the time the show started. The length of the file looks correct. I'm guessing its the misnamed "stat" file that's the issue. Any word from BW on this bug...can we expect a new firmware soon?

If I get another one of these it looks like its back to 197 for me. I'm currently on firmware 235 btw. Its a shame as I really love bookmarks and Ice Interactive but I really need a reliable PVR first.

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Thu May 15, 2008 13:07

Just remember that downgrading will result in your files that were recorded by 23x to be unplayable (any file which shows the EPG info in it when you press the "i" key on the file or popup- information).

If people are still keen to stick with 235, I can knock up quick utility to fix all files, but it will require upgrading with a "hacked" f/w (the util can be part of the hacked f/w actually). I was thinking to avoid you having to telnet to initiate the fix, instead integrate it with the disk checking routine in the setup menu. I will give this a go tonight (although my Wiz is going to be busy recording about 4 things tonight, testing will have to be after Lost has finished recording).
I am not 100% I will be able to achieve the simplicity of initiating a disk check to fix them, as the disk check may not actually call the unix utilities at all. If it does, it will be a piece of cake.... stay tuned to this thread. Of course if Beyonwiz Korea are willing to accept this bug and churn out another quick fix, this would be even better

Regards

Mantorok · Post by **Mantorok** » Thu May 15, 2008 13:30

Thanks tonymy01,

I'll hold of any firmware downgrade for the time being. Please keep us posted on your progress.

Darrylp · Post by **Darrylp** » Thu May 15, 2008 13:34

tonymy01 wrote:Just remember that downgrading will result in your files that were recorded by 23x to be unplayable (any file which shows the EPG info in it when you press the "i" key on the file or popup- information).

If people are still keen to stick with 235, I can knock up quick utility to fix all files, but it will require upgrading with a "hacked" f/w (the util can be part of the hacked f/w actually). I was thinking to avoid you having to telnet to initiate the fix, instead integrate it with the disk checking routine in the setup menu. I will give this a go tonight (although my Wiz is going to be busy recording about 4 things tonight, testing will have to be after Lost has finished recording).
I am not 100% I will be able to achieve the simplicity of initiating a disk check to fix them, as the disk check may not actually call the unix utilities at all. If it does, it will be a piece of cake.... stay tuned to this thread. Of course if Beyonwiz Korea are willing to accept this bug and churn out another quick fix, this would be even better

Regards

Tony, I for one will be eternally grateful.

Darryl

prl · Post by **prl** » Thu May 15, 2008 15:50

tonymy01 wrote:Just remember that downgrading will result in your files that were recorded by 23x to be unplayable (any file which shows the EPG info in it when you press the "i" key on the file or popup- information).

If people are still keen to stick with 235, I can knock up quick utility to fix all files, but it will require upgrading with a "hacked" f/w (the util can be part of the hacked f/w actually). I was thinking to avoid you having to telnet to initiate the fix, instead integrate it with the disk checking routine in the setup menu. I will give this a go tonight (although my Wiz is going to be busy recording about 4 things tonight, testing will have to be after Lost has finished recording).
I am not 100% I will be able to achieve the simplicity of initiating a disk check to fix them, as the disk check may not actually call the unix utilities at all. If it does, it will be a piece of cake.... stay tuned to this thread. Of course if Beyonwiz Korea are willing to accept this bug and churn out another quick fix, this would be even better

Regards

Good luck with this; it's a good idea. Unfortunately, because the current busybox doesn't have a "grep" it'll be hard to to a general search for the 96-byte file, but at least you should be able to do the mv at stat, which might fix a lot of the recordings. If, in the end, that's all it can fix, it would be good to ask people to report success/failure of the fix so that we can get an idea of how often it's the "at" version of the problem, and whether my "fsck000.ren" peoblem happens often.

Cheers,

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Thu May 15, 2008 16:15

I have written a very basic shell script which looks for the file "stat" by recusively checking directories in the recording directory. If it doesn't exist, it simply copies a new one in, rather than attempt to find the bogus file and rename it. I may even make it simply copy another one that it finds.. but this relies on that you have at least one good recording, but saves 96bytes flash space LOL.
Now all I need to do is get home and power up the wiz and see what I can achieve with the check/scandisk hook.
Regards

Neon Kitten · Post by **Neon Kitten** » Thu May 15, 2008 17:02

tonymy01 wrote:Just remember that downgrading will result in your files that were recorded by 23x to be unplayable (any file which shows the EPG info in it when you press the "i" key on the file or popup- information).

Just on the subject of that EPG info stored with the file, has anyone yet mentioned the fact that it is NOT stored when the Wiz fires up from standby to do a timer recording?

This is using the over-the-air EPG. Presumably it doesn't happen with Ice's EPG since it's cached, but it shouldn't happen with the FTA EPG either. Any timer recording that fires while either the Beyonwiz is already powered up (even if doing another timer recording) or if it powers up for a timer recording and happens to be set to the correct channel already will save the info.

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Thu May 15, 2008 17:10

232 or 235 Neon? Because 232 had a bug where the info wasn't included in some timer and recording situations, but 235 fixed that.
Regards

Neon Kitten · Post by **Neon Kitten** » Thu May 15, 2008 17:16

tonymy01 wrote:232 or 235 Neon? Because 232 had a bug where the info wasn't included in some timer and recording situations, but 235 fixed that.
Regards

It definitely happens with 235 as well - from my testing, it only happens with timer recordings from standby.

My educated guess is that it's not switching the tuner to the desired channel until recording starts, rather than at the 3-minutes-before-timer power-up, and the EPG doesn't come through in time for the info to be grabbed and written.

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Sun May 18, 2008 19:01

Ok, I have a fix now.
It uses an idea from PeterU to make tweaks etc load from the USB stick (or USB HDD), and gives the possibility to load anything. The format can be FAT (perhaps FAT32 too) and NTFS. The idea is that if you don't want any tweaks run at bootup, remove the stick and/or tweak files on the stick.

So I have made a f/w that will load files from the USB stick. Actually, once you install this f/w, then all future f/w upgrades will also support this tweak. If you don't want any "tweaking" or other options in future, then I can give you a script that will remove the whole thing, all run from USB (only supported after upgrade to stock f/w).

Here is the readme:

Initial support for running unlimited "tweaks" from a USB stick, with the ability to bootup without the stick and thus have no tweaks applied.

Upgrade the firmware per normal means (network, USB, DVD etc) using the attached firmware image.

The firmware will then load on power up from standby and install the necessary file in /tmp/config (called rc.local) which runs on every bootup, and will survive a firmware upgrade to stock firmwares to maintain this tweaking application.

The script will then check for a USB stick in either the back or front USB port, and see if it has the folder /etc/init.d/ in it. If it does, it will load the "tweaks" from that folder.

Current tweaks are the telnet hack, and of course the recording fixer script which scans your recording directory to find a good "stat" file, and then searches for recordings with this file missing and copies the good one across. This fixes the "Error Loading Media File" that is plaguing some recordings on the Wiz with the newer firmwares.

Remove the stick at any time after bootup (or leave it in indefinitely if you wish). You don't need to go to the file player menu to detach the stick after bootup, unless you have viewed the stick in the fileplayer. Of course the stick can also be removed in standby.
Logs are saved in /tmp/tweakbootlog (use the telnet tweak to read this file) and also copied to the /etc folder on the USB stick called: tweakbootlog.txt

Installation to the USB stick:
unzip the "etc.zip" folder and it will create an /etc/init.d folder with 3 files in it. Put that /etc folder chain onto a FAT or NTFS formatted USB stick (FAT is better as then you will see the logfile).

Tweaks provided here (these are all editable shell scripts, but don't edit in windows unless you save the files as unix format, which has different line end/carriage return chars to some windows editors):
S01telnet- enables telnet access
S02recfixer- fixes recordings missing the "stat" file that creates the "Error Loading Media File" issue
S03wizremote- launches wizremote, but only if installed in /tmp/config (the best place to have it installed at the moment, or possibly installed on the USB stick!, as installed on the HDD will mean a HDD check will fail as the Wiz can't unmount the HDD with Wizremote running and you will get a HDD failed message when checking the HDD from the menu or after a power fail bootup or a bad shutdown).

So, who needs it right this minute?
Unfortunately it is a f/w image, as I can't provide a patch for you due to needing to copy a file into a particular part of the wrp f/w that I don't believe the patcher will mod.
As such, I don't believe I can host it publicly, as it would be pushing copyright grounds more than likely.
Regards

prl · Post by **prl** » Sun May 18, 2008 19:57

tonymy01 wrote:...
Unfortunately it is a f/w image, as I can't provide a patch for you due to needing to copy a file into a particular part of the wrp f/w that I don't believe the patcher will mod.
As such, I don't believe I can host it publicly, as it would be pushing copyright grounds more than likely.
Regards

So that's what you were playing around with (un)pack_wrp for

Sounds great!

I have been thinking of making a patch framework for BWFWTools; give it an input and output wrp file, and a list of scripts to apply, and it unpacks, runs the scripts to apply the patches and repacks to the new .wrp. That would make it easier to distribute patches, just a plugin perl fragment to apply the patch to an unpacked firimware.

alpha993 · Post by **alpha993** » Mon May 19, 2008 23:00

tonymy01 wrote: So from other reports, it seems this problem occurs when dual recording, possibly one of those recordings being a manual recording?? Time for others to try to quantify this 100%.

Received my first instance of this error tonight. Hope I can repair file by d/l to PC and editing TS file...

Circumstance - dual recordings, 1 programmed (ABC1), 1 manually initiated (WIN TV Canberra) and then extended to record immediate next show on same channel. Power down and HDD check have had no effect...

Phil000 · Post by **Phil000** » Mon May 19, 2008 23:24

alpha993 wrote:
tonymy01 wrote: So from other reports, it seems this problem occurs when dual recording, possibly one of those recordings being a manual recording?? Time for others to try to quantify this 100%.

We have received two instances of the error in the last two days, both with dual recording. In both instances we manually stopped one of the recordings early, is this a potential trigger for the problem ? I need to find a solution soon, or at least understand the circumstances of when it happens as my wife is NOT HAPPY JAN......she lost two shows in two days ! Does anyone know more about when it occurs ?

tonymy01 · Post by **tonymy01** » Mon May 19, 2008 23:34

The shows aren't lost. There is a few ways of watching them by transferring etc, and they are relatively easy to fix too, with a modded f/w that can load scripts off a USB stick, I have set this up on the weekend and one person has used it successfully to fix a dud recording.
Regards

peteru · Post by **peteru** » Tue May 20, 2008 02:05

Well, it looks like I too have been bitten by this bug for the first time. It happened when two IceTV generated timers were due to start at the same time, but finish at different times. The recording that finished last is corrupted.

Tony,

Where can I download your recfixer hack(s) from? I looked at OpenWiz, but could not see anything?

IanSav · Post by **IanSav** » Tue May 20, 2008 07:26

Hi Peter,

peteru wrote:Well, it looks like I too have been bitten by this bug for the first time. It happened when two IceTV generated timers were due to start at the same time, but finish at different times. The recording that finished last is corrupted.

I don't think this relates to IceTV as I too have seen the issue but I do not use IceTV at all.

Regards,
Ian.