[Stildawn]

Hi All

The last couple of weeks I have run into this issue in my TV shows, they are all on a local HDD on the XBMC HTPC. I don't exactly know if its buffering but the show will pause for a few seconds (nothing else coming up on screen) and then resume after anything from 1 to 5 seconds.

Here are my specs:

Windows 7 64bit
AMD PII 955 x4
Asus M4A79T Deluxe
Patriot 2x4gb DDR3 1600 (8gb total)
Sapphire HD4890

120gb Samsung SSD - OS (including XBMC)
1tb WD HDD 7200 - Movies/Downloads drive
3tb WD HDD 7200 - Music/TV Shows

Output via HDMI into HDMI splitter going to lounge and bedroom 1080 TV's.

Any ideas on the cause, I have just run error checking on the drives and defragged but the TV HDD wasn't fragmented to begin with.

Thanks

[SimonC]

I had the same problems a few months back, turns out one of my drives was starting to fail. In order to determine I needed to check the SMART status of the drives using a program such as HDD Guardian, normal error checking in windows was coming up clean.

If everything looks good in SMART try testing with Windows resource monitor open (looking at Disk access), maybe some program/service running is causing delays during playback.

[Stildawn]

I hope not.

Just downloaded HDD Guardian and the drive has:





So there is an error but SMART is ok??

[SimonC]

I would keep an eye on that, my 3TB Seagate started with ATA error then started getting sector errors, eventually it just died. Of course this was just about 1 month AFTER the warranty on the drive was up. Seagate also has a tool to check the state of the drive which you may want to get.

http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/seatools/

I am not saying your drive is defiantly failing, just sharing my own experience. Are you getting these buffering problems when you playback on your other drives?

[helta]

I'm not a hard drive expert, but I would first try and re-seat your sata cable from the motherboard and hard drive. ATA errors to my understanding are basically a failure to communicate. If that doesn't work, try swapping out the cable with another one.

I can't vouch for "HDD Guardian", but I can vouch for CrystalDiscInfo to see if your hard drive is dying. If you try it out, download the standard edition without ads.

[Stildawn]

I would keep an eye on that, my 3TB Seagate started with ATA error then started getting sector errors, eventually it just died. Of course this was just about 1 month AFTER the warranty on the drive was up. Seagate also has a tool to check the state of the drive which you may want to get.

http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/seatools/

I am not saying your drive is defiantly failing, just sharing my own experience. Are you getting these buffering problems when you playback on your other drives?

Yeah tried Seatools, getting mixed results, it passes all the smart tests and the short test, but it failed the extended fix all test.

I'm not a hard drive expert, but I would first try and re-seat your sata cable from the motherboard and hard drive. ATA errors to my understanding are basically a failure to communicate. If that doesn't work, try swapping out the cable with another one.

I can't vouch for "HDD Guardian", but I can vouch for CrystalDiscInfo to see if your hard drive is dying. If you try it out, download the standard edition without ads.

I've reseated them a few times recently, including swapping out SATA cables.

Anyone had any experience with motherboard sata controllers dying or something?

[helta]

I would say if it can't pass all the tests, your hard drive is dying. Backup as soon as possible.

[Stildawn]

Yeah sucks its the newest one.

Might overhaul the whole HTPC. Time for a new thread I think

[helta]

see if its still under warranty, you might be able to replace it.