Kaleidescape Server Performance During Imports

[LegendOfTheSea]

Hi Everyone! Loving the forum!! Hope you guys can help! I have recently been given the task of uploading approximately 100 movies and 150 music albums to our two servers and experienced some wierd faults which I can only put down to the processors in the Kaleidescape struggling to maintain during imports. We have a fully integrated crestron HD AV system with 12 KPlayers and 2 KServers which I believe has an import limit of 8 cds/dvds at a time (4 per server). Here are my faults:

1. During imports when at the accept a new import legal screen, hitting the play or hard "select" button on our crestron controllers doesnt function. We have a very well programmed system so its definately not crestron but almost as if the Kaleidescape is tending to other things which it is?

2. During imports there seems to be a priority level for certain players almost. I know import times vary cosiderably depending upon disc content but one of my players (that anoyingly is behind a false panel) imports content at like turbo speed whilst other players seem like they are on a beach in Mexico soaking up the sun.

3. This is more general but could be related in that we have one Kplayer that seems like it had/has a faulty connection with the server. Saying that it might have been the processor loading i dont know. The symptoms flicker between no connection at all i.e. no movies/ music to display to a working but real fuzzy picture to perfect working order. Kinda strange.

Anyway so thats it! If you have an opinion please share it! I would love to hear what you have to say!! All the best

 

[Mr.Poindexter]

Well, during imports when I have multiple streams at the same time, I notice the server doesn't respond as quickly or drops its connection to my web interface for a few seconds when it is approaching the end of an import.

1. With 8 streams going at once and CD's, you are going to have that "end of import" type of situation pop up more often although I didn't notice it when I was importing music as much as when I was importing films although I am spending more time loading and unloading discs when importing music and have less time to stare at a screen. I suspect your Crestron runs into the same thing I do with my web browser.

2. Perhaps you have a reader with a faster drive in it - especially if it is newer than the other readers. I seriously doubt they used the exact same model of DVD drive in their players/readers for 7 years.

3. If your video is fuzzy, that would absolutely not be a server connection issue. If I would suspect any part of the chain, it would be the player as it is one of the parts of the server-network-switch-network-player chain and is also part of the video chain.

 

[Mr.Poindexter]

One other question - are you sure each server is receiving 4 streams? I know when I was running a server cluster, I could not choose which server to load to if they both had room unless I ungrouped them and then put each loader into the appropriate group. While that works well for bulk loading, it doesn't let a player play off the entire collection but just the server it is grouped to.

 

[TomBarnett]

Hello LegendOfTheSea,

I'm sorry to hear you're having this experience during imports.

The first thing I would investigate would be network performance, and then you should communicate with our support team to see what the problem is with the player you mention in #3. That ought to be investigated.

Any problems with a network cable can lead to a variety of issues, of course, so testing each of them would be a good first step.

1. For best results, the servers should be connected via 1000Base-T. Is this the case?
2. Are you importing Blu-ray movies or only DVDs?
3. Can you describe your network topology (what types of switches, routers, etc, and how they are interconnected and connected to players and servers?)

There is guidance on networking best practices in the following:
http://www.kaleidescape.com/files/d...e-Installation-Guide-Network-Requirements.pdf
(Pages 4 and 5 are the most topical)

We can also help you run a speed test. (The document above indicates that the results will appear in the system dashboard on the Extranet, which isn't quite finished yet, but if you run a speed test with the instructions provided and send me a PM I can help you interpret the results.)

To clarify a question that MrPoindexter raised, if there are two or more servers in the group the Kaleidescape System prioritized the imports automatically. Provided there is adequate space on two servers and no fault conditions, the imports will be balanced between the available servers. So if 8 discs are being imported at once to two servers, I expect that each server would receive four imports.

Tom Barnett
Kaleidescape, Inc.

 

[brodricj]

To clarify a question that MrPoindexter raised, if there are two or more servers in the group the Kaleidescape System prioritized the imports automatically.

Tom, can you just elaborate on this aspect? So if you have 2 servers in a group, do those servers become a "married" pair similar to disc cartridges in a single server? What I'm getting at, once 2 servers are put in a group, can they be separated later and operated independently as separate systems?

 

[Mr.Poindexter]

Yes, they can be seperated and content is imported to only one server - not across two of them.

What Tom is saying is the system will automatically choose which server to place content on when there are multiple servers in a group. Assuming each server has room, the system will try and split the imports up so that each server with room is receiving a roughly equal portion or as equal as can be made of the import streams.

In other words, if you have 3 servers with room and are importing 7 albums, it would stand to reason to expect one server to have 3 albums being loaded to it with each of the other servers getting 2.

 

[LegendOfTheSea]

Hi Guys! OK so.....

Mr. PoinDexter >>

Yea i too drop connection with the server through my browser randomly but im ok with this at it just requires a page refresh and im back i the game. I will monitor it to see if it occurs at the end of import stage but unaware of this timing. To report back on the fuzzy screen and kplayer i has gone away but i am getting some stage server type faults i.e. when scrolling through the music albums the server takes over and just keeps on running (on cover art screen) and i now the search functionality for music and movies has stopped working. Going to do a power cycle today to see if it clears but hate to have to do this regularly especially if people are watching movies listening to music. To answer your group question the system has one group and both servers and all kplayers are in that group.

TomBarnett>>

Tom i will get all the network configurational settings and post them and see what you have to say. I know at the moment we are running cisco switches and routers and controlling the system via crestron connected through a wireless controller network.

 

[Transepoch]

3. This is more general but could be related in that we have one Kplayer that seems like it had/has a faulty connection with the server. Saying that it might have been the processor loading i dont know. The symptoms flicker between no connection at all i.e. no movies/ music to display to a working but real fuzzy picture to perfect working order. Kinda strange.

How is this one connected? I know sometimes with mine the change in resolution doesn't go over smoothly, leading to blocky/inverted/green-all-over until after switching inputs and allowing the HDMI to re-handshake.

 

[LegendOfTheSea]

Hi Transepoch! The connection is just via HDMI. Since playing around with the cabling and the connections in the back of our Crestron matrix it seems to have sorted it self out. Monitoring it closel but will try your method if i get stuck again. Thanks for the help guys!! Really appreciate your interest!

 

[Mr.Poindexter]

Using HDMI is always a potential for issues, unfortunately.

 

[Transepoch]

Using HDMI is always a potential for issues, unfortunately.

True, but little excuse for it when the materials available for play on a sub-M-class player are not encoded with HDCP.

 

[Mr.Poindexter]

If it is scaled, then it will have HDCP, so DVD will have it per the rules set by the DVD CCA.