OMT Media Touch ongoing problems - lag between audio cuts

[Bill Wolfenbarger]

It's been a while since we've asked for help with a recurring problem.  This is an OMT-built system, configured by them.

A stopset always has several audio cuts.  OMT had told us before that we had a problem with lag between cuts because we were making the file length exact, and they advised that the lag problem would go away if we made the file slightly long and then used EOM to make the audio exact.  Well folks, this doesn't solve the lag problem.  Each cut is EOM'd per OMT specs, exact length.  OMT also told us to do refrag often.  So we're doing defrag every night, and on a stopset we sometimes get a lag of a half second between cuts, which of course is additive, and can result in coming out of a stopset as much as 3 seconds late.  This doesn't work with a network rejoin.

Any tips?  Anyone?  Anyone?

[HowardMBurgers]

Bill,

A couple quick questions:

What does your countdown timer do at the end of the sound file when playing?  Does it keep counting after the audio ends?  Does the timer stop counting when the audio stops, or does it 'gray' out and after the pause the next file starts playing?

The reason I ask is I've had the exact same problem, but in my case the clock went to gray right at the audio ending yet continued counting for one or two seconds.  In my case after troubleshooting (and some dumb luck), I managed to isolate the problem to a bad sound card.  I replaced the existing Audioscience sound card with a good ol' Soundblaster card, balanced up the audio using a Henry Matchbox and had not seen the problem after.

[ChiefEngineer]

Do you use this in a server configuration?  Is the player playing it from another computer?

Simian and Wave Station have lag time as well if your on air is pulling from another computer as a server.  A defrag helped.  Ultimately we were able to change properties in file sharing which helped. Having files ON the play computer would resolve the problem.

Had an OMT that used the internet to transfer files.  This was a train wreck because local news can't take that long to transfer to the local folder. Record and expect it to play on station 2 in 5 minutes?  No.

[ChiefOperator]

Bill-

We're running iMediatouch 3.1.9, the latest version.  We're configured so that the on-air machine holds the database and is networked with production, logger, and a traffic machine (for the log tools program).  We do NOT use a separate server.  We have no such problem.  Are you running a server?  

Typically, we cut a spot and then use the "time" feature to stretch or compress.  Our spots typically look like this after doing so:

:30 spot:     EOM: :30.000, Stop: :30.003, Length: :30.003
:60 spot:     EOM: 1.00.000, Stop: :1.00.005, Length: 1.00.005

The length rarely is exactly :30 or :60.  As I said, there is absolutely no lag.  

If you're running a server, have you tried creating a test category on the LOCAL on-air machine, bypassing the server.  You could run your stopsets off that category, and if the lag disappears, this would certainly point to a networking problem.  

If you're using a server, I'm wondering about your switch.  Is it a cheaper SOHO switch?  We're using a HP Procurve 1400 (unmanaged) and it's throughput and latency are excellent.  On some of our office computers using the cheaper switches, we've had problems with "lag."    



  




 


 

[aberdeenman]

ChiefEngineer:
We've setup the computers to defrag every morning, the server computer defrags twice a day, and we still have issues with frequently replaced files (hourly news that's saved as cut 1000, 1001, 1002, etc) fragmenting often.



ChiefOperator:
There is an OMT-supplied server, but each system is configured to copy the audio to it's own backup drive. We have one system that isn't on the air yet, i can try the local vs. networked category idea. but if that's the case how do you copy the categories from machine to machine?
Our network is isolated with static IP's and custom host files (previously discussed).

HowardMBurgers

From home I don't recall what it does when it plays but i do seem to remember it counting to it's entirety even if the tone moves the system to the next cut, I'll check this later today. - If it was a bad card I would question how we managed to get three bad Delta's in OMT-built systems though.




I had setup each machine with the record function connected to the 3/4 input side of the Delta 44's. I disabled this 'feature' since no one used it and I'm watching for the latency issue.

Does anyone use this feature?

do most people have more than one Delta 44 card?

What version of DirectX do most people run on their OMT machines?

[aberdeenman]

Also a question on Delayed cue;

Does anyone use this? We had a problem with spots needing to get replaced the day they were scheduled to air - plus we re-use some cut number per day, and would run into the issue of 'open for read' (error -9988 if i remember correctly) to resolve this we added our COM category to the delayed cue list per OMT.

Does delayed cue == delayed audio for anyone?

[ChiefOperator]

I should have been clearer.  I was trying to determine whether the stopset carts are actually stored on each individual on-air machine and aired from the particular machine or whether the stopsets are stored on a server and then streamed across the network.  The local vs. network idea was merely a test to isolate the problem.

We use only one Delta 44 in our logger and one in our production machine. I believe that we do NOT use the feature.    

[ChiefOperator]

Hmmmm.   We do NOT use delayed cue.  I *believe* that iMediatouch buffers the audio so that the carts  start immediately.  I wonder whether delayed cue prevents it from buffering.....

[Rob Stutson]

Doesn't matter which automation system it is - if you're playing from a server, you're gonna get lag. Simple as that.

Plus in 2010 it's downright foolish to run automation without primary playback from a local hard drive.  If your vendor says "we don't support that" then its time to get a system that does.

[Bill Wolfenbarger]

We're not playing from the server.  Everything copies from the server to the individual on-air sytem.  We have 4 stations on the system.  All production first hits the server then propagates to the individual drives.  Playback is from the local drive.