Permanent Timeshift with BH 3.0.3

[Lionel69]

VU+ DUO2 BH 3.0.3H

I have a couple of questions about Permanent Timeshift.

1. Should it be installed as a added plugin with BH 3.0.3 or is it built in to the image?
2. I find difficulty in fast reversing back further than the start of the current program. Is this normal behaviour for PTS? Or is it that I have not configured it correctly?

Any information would be most welcome.

Regards,

Lionel69

 

[AlexWilMac]

After some years as BH user, since the last six months or so I decided to stop using BH as the main image and I prefer OBH but I still have it installed in OMB (Open Multiboot). And since the very first days as BH and VU+ users I installed PTS. Actually, I think it was the first plugin I looked for as I was used to also rewind live tv with previous STBs. So I now don't remember if the latest BH versions have PTS already installed or not. But this not a problem: first of all you immediately see if it is installed browsing your menu (Settings/System/Timeshift configuration): if it exists, there you can enable or disable it.
But, above all, is not problematic to install again a plugin already installed (green/yellow and then "Addons and Plugin".
This is true for every other plugins.

 

[Lionel69]

Yes, I did actually install the plugin, but I have always wondered whether I needed to!

Do you have any thoughts about the winding back beyond the start of the program you are viewing?

Regards,

Lionel69

 

[AlexWilMac]

What do you mean "back beyond the start"? PTS starts buffering after the amount of seconds you set. If you set 5 secs, you'll be able to rewind till 5 seconds after you changed the channel. When you change channel, usually you loose this buffer. Surely you can't go before the moment you zapped! OBH has some features about it.

 

[Lionel69]

No, you misunderstand.

I'm not meaning before the recording starts - as you say 5 secs if you set it that way. What I mean is if I want to wind back, & since the machine has been zapped the program has changed (same channel), maybe for example I want to wind back before a half hour news broadcast, when I try to do this, I can only get to the beginning of the news, even though the box was zapped well before this.

It seems that although the timeshift is set for 180min max, the buffer is reset at the start of each program even though the channel is not changed.

Regards,

Lionel69

 

[AlexWilMac]

Ah, OK. But it's something I don't remember how worked when I was mainly a BH user. We need someone else to answer. Look also for any automatic saving of buffers and how many might be saved and long would they kept. There should be something about it. At least you'd be able to watch them as sort of recordings.
About that, I suggest also to create a folder specific for timeshifts and set it under the system preferences to easily locate those saved buffers.

 

[AlexWilMac]

Well, I had a quick look at my BH and I had no problem in rewinding up to the previous event as I remembered. But I have set the maximum events for PTS as 5.
What's your value there? If it's 1 try to increase it.

 

[Lionel69]

In my case there is no doubt that if I rewind, I can only proceed as far as the beginning of the program I was in. Even if the box was tuned to the same channel for a long time before that, the previous program footage cannot be accessed.

In case there was a problem I decided to try re-installing the Permanent Timeshift plugin from the BH addons in the menu. This was the Permanent Timeshift 1.0.0 Final (Blackhole E2).

Settings are all default with maximum events set as 5.

This has made no difference to the problem. I am wondering whether the problem is related to the EPG, which switches the display to read the current program & changes to the next after it has finished. The PTS plugin appears to follow that precisely & keeps the buffer for the current program, discarding it when the next starts. NOTE: This is all for consecutive programs on the same channel.

If the EPG was turned off would it still react the same way?

The present behaviour of the PTS is a nuisance for me, as I did not have this problem with my old Topfield. This allowed me to rewind through consecutive programs right back to the limit of the buffer, which was configurable via the menu, as with the DUO2.

Regards,

Lionel69