If we leave one of our two DHD4000s doing nothing, and check on the estimated free time now and then, it slowly reduces.

I've tried a cold boot, no difference. The other machine doesn't have this problem.



Any ideas?

To quote from the manual:
"When you are watching TV, the DVR automatically ‘buffers’ up to 30 minutes of the channel
you are currently watching. This provides for the ‘Live Pause’ features. As the DVR contains two
tuners, when there is no timer recording event set, the second tuner can be tuned to another
station and allow you to ‘buffer’ two channels at once."

This setting of 30 mins is adjustable in the latest firmware. So, as you 'just' watch programmes, the data is being written to hard drive and hence using up what you see as free space.

Pop

I've noticed the machine doesn't always buffer both channels, sometimes none at all. Most often it's when a recording has just finished on the channel you are watching. If you want to be sure it's buffering in that case, reselect the channel. This is important if you are expecting to be able to back-record from the buffer, or live rewind.
Last edited by PTD : 07-05-2007 at 21:50

Sorry, but that doesn't quite fit what I see. Both machines have 70 minute buffers. One machine leaks free space, the other doesn't. I like your reasoning though, so I'll double check.

The leak goes down from 2 hours to near zero, which is bigger than the buffer size, unless there are two buffers? Maybe it is a side effect of the dodgy machine having a nearly full record history? [We have his and hers machines, his (mine) is the one that works ]

I wouldn't expect to see the free space indicator including buffers anyway, if it does, that's bad UI design.

Thanks (to both of you) for replying.

Yes, both tuners are buffered, generally. And they are indeed accounted for in the free space indicator; I've just verified that by changing from 30mins to 120mins, which subtracted 3hours from the free space reading. That's 90+90mins for both channels. But that's not the full story.

Assuming both buffers full, and you change channels so each buffer is now empty, this is reflected in the free space calculation which will show extra space where the buffers had been, and they will gradually nibble away at the indicated free space.

But nothing is straightforward because of the actual amount of space a given channel takes up per hour. Some of the ITV channels for example take up half the space of BBC1 for the same amount of time, so the 'creep' for one channel will be slower than for another.

Co-incidentaIly, I did the sums.

I've got 14 hours free on mine , assuming BBC1 bitrates of about 6Mbit/s would fill the 40 Gbyte disk, yet on the other machine, wife and daughters have about 20 hours to watch, mostly episodes of Home and Away on five.

I think the problem is they've filled it up, and I was wrong to assume that the buffers weren't included. Thanks for doing the experiment to confirm that they are.

It's a fab machine. I just don't know why someone else hasn't licensed the design. Stick it in a fancy case and do some marketing and I'm sure it would sell well and do well against competition.