UNHAPPY - HD HomeRun Prime major issues with Intel DH67CF & DH67GD motherboard NICs - Page 2

Perhaps, but I'm not sure how well gigabit USB NICs perform. I think I'd rather leave my integrated NIC at 100Mbps before doing that.

I agree, or the only one who knows the symptoms they are seeing are related to packet loss. I was PMing with others who had pixelization issues a while back before narrowing the problem down but most were considering returning their Primes. I have not seen them post recently so my guess is that they did.

..or they've simply found a working configuration and are living with it. Things are extremely solid over here at 100Mbps and exclusive tuners. It's tempting to just live with it.

Unfortunately there are other tasks I do, moving records, etc., that would really benefit from gigabit speeds. Also, simulataneous recordings and network Blu-Ray playback.


Unfortunately there's nothing really unique - if you read my original post, assuming they're being honest, SiliconDust claims to have duplicated my issue easily on their end using my same motherboard & NIC.

Thanks. I've been through so many settings I don't recall if I've tried that exact combination, but will give it a shot when I have some time and report back.

That last statement is key. When I first noticed the pixelization I thought it was normal cable signal-type pixelization. After I got my tuner reliability improved and ditched all my cable boxes I started optimizing my signal strength in hopes of reducing or eliminating it.

After getting my signal strength where it should be and still seeing pixelization I started looking elsewhere and found the packet loss. Now that I have my PCs fixed at 100Mbps I see basically ZERO pixelization, much better than with my cable boxes. To some the pixelization I was seeing might seem normal if you're used to a sub-par cable signal.


No, that's OK. I'd love confirmation of the BIOS & driver versions he's using, plus the results of a packet loss test, but I know what a busy life is like and I appreciate the input you did provide.

Thanks

Just wanted to follow up on this. I ended up getting a call from the CEO of SiliconDust on this issue, which I appreciated. He basically let me rant a bit and then he explained it from their side, expressing that they did spend a significant amount of time on my issue and admitting that communication is not their strong point. He indicated that their resources are limited and that they needed their CTO to be focusing on other things now that they believe the issue is on Intel's end.

While I appreciated the call, nothing about it really made me feel any better about the issue and certainly didn't make me feel like they were planning on working with Intel on the problem as they had previously indicated.

One thing I can say about SiliconDust is that they are a frustrating company to work with. If everything works for you, great, but if you have an issue their lack of communication and vagueness when they do respond is extremely frustrating. There are several threads on their forums going on now where other users with other issues are at wit's end as well.

One thing I tried to express is that although they claim they beta tested this product, it sure didn't feel like it was anything more than a very small, closed beta test. In all my years in the IT field I have never purchased a product so flawed out of the box, and I purchase a lot.

On the other hand, with the November firmware it has been rock solid running with no tuner sharing between PCs, at 100Mbps, on FIOS in my home. Unfortunately no tuner sharing and 100Mbps is just not acceptable to me.

On a side note, I did get a response from Intel indicating that they have potentially found a driver issue that may or may not be related to this problem. I'm waiting a response from them to see if they have something I can test. Fingers crossed.

I also have a Ceton tuner card on order, hope to get it on Monday.

If nothing else, if SiliconDust is right and it is an issue with my NIC and not on their end, and that they are able to easily reproduce the issue as they said (indicating everyone with my model Intel motherboard or perhaps even everyone with my model NIC would see the same issue), then I would think it would be in their best interest to work with Intel.

I mean, I did all the leg work and created a case with Intel and have exchanged emails with an Intel tech and even cc:ed SiliconDust. You'd think it would be in their best interest to ship Intel a Prime so they could test, a Prime which probably costs them $50 to manufacturer.

But, oh well, we'll see what happens.

Got the Ceton in yesterday, but just realized I need Windows Server 2008 R2 on my server to use the network host feature. My current server has 2008 (not R2). Not a big deal because I've been meaning to swing my media server over to slightly better spare hardware I have kicking around, so that would be a good time to switch to R2.

With any luck I might be tackling it tonight.

No word from SiliconDust - they've been pretty quiet on their forums about any outstanding issues actually.

No word from Intel yet either.

Hmmm, the downloaded installation just did not run - said it was an unsupported version of Windows. I didn't bother trying to extract the driver and manually install since everything I could find explicitly stated that R2 was required.

No biggie since a hardware upgrade and reinstall of R2 was in my plans anyway - this just kicked it to the top of my queue.

Sorry for the lack of updates. Actually, I'm not sure yet. I have the Ceton installed and working on my file server, and I'm streaming it to my main HTPC and it's working very reliably. However I left my HTPC NIC at 100 Mbps - I wanted to run it for a few days to establish a baseline as far as reliability, pixelization, etc., before upping it to gigabit.

I can say that Ceton support was awesome. I had a couple of questions/issues during setup and their response to support requests was very prompt - which impressed me.

With all the holidays and crazy family stuff I haven't had time to test further. Perhaps in the next week. Will report back.

OK, finally had some time to spend on this.

I can confirm that at gigabit speeds, using the latest BIOS and driver for my Intel motherboard, I do get occasional pixelization streaming over the LAN from my Ceton. There doesn't seem to be nearly as much pixelization as I get streaming from the Prime, but it is there. If I lock my NIC down to 100Mbps the pixelization is gone. So, I have to conclude that SiliconDust is correct and that there is some kind of issue with this NIC and/or driver that will noticeably affect this kind of traffic. Nonetheless, I am still upset that SiliconDust did not follow through with Intel as they said they would.

At this point I've decided to keep both my Ceton and my Prime. I plan on moving my Ceton directly into my primary HTPC which does all my recordings and has a standard size case. This will reduce my network traffic and free up tuners for use elsewhere in my home.

I will dedicate my HDHomeRun Prime to the other small form factor HTPCs in my home and my office PC which I occasionally watch TV from.

I checked with Intel on the issue recently, and the rep I am working with indicated that he is still waiting on a driver that he can release to me for testing. I'm eagerly awaiting that, it seems that may be my only hope of resolving this issue.