Spinner every 30 seconds

[Helvetica]

Hi everyone
for the past couple of weeks my VU Duo + has been showing the spinner at the top left of my screen every 30 seconds. It is so annoying and is causing problems. Apart from massively slowing the box down, if I am in any kind of menu or channel list and the spinner starts, the VU freezes and I can't do anything except restart it using the switch at the back of the box or wait and hope it comes back on its own.
I can't log my box in to my XTreme account either because the spinner starts up and blocks everything.
I am using Black Hole 3.0.3.Q.
I tried downloading and installing the latest version for my box tonight, but of course the spinner came back and everything froze, so I finished up with "..:0 with 0 errors".
Does anyone know why this has started to happen and what I can do about it ?

 

[Helvetica]

PS I forgot to mention - I do not have Autotimer installed (I read somewhere that this can cause this problem). The white-> blue spinner thing rotates (expands from white to blue) three times then stops. The EPG updater is set to 04:00, but this spinner thing is happening all the time at 30 second intervals. When I use Menu and XTream, the spinner never stops and I cannot access that add-ons menu.
Everything worked fine until about 2 weeks ago, when this started.

 

[xrobertas]

I have this problem too. But slowly I get used to it. I received the answer that one of the plugins is possible. But even after a new clean install, without installing my favorite plugins, spiner returns. It's pretty annoying, it's still happening, and it's also happening when the programs are switched over from the satellite. My longest spiner blocked the ability to drive VU + for 50 seconds, which is quite nervous.

 

[AlexWilMac]

As always we say, if an image works fine without a plugin installed, the responsible is that plugin, not the image.
Every plugins get an image more complex and heavier, but some cause also bigger issues.
You must contact the plugin's author.

 

[Helvetica]

The thing is, it DID work fine until 2 weeks ago and I had not added anything or made any changes at that time. It suddenly started to do it. I have tried everything, restarting, unplugging the LAN cable from my router, unplugging and reattaching the plugs at the back, doing a full shutdown, checking the EPG update time. It truly started doing it out of the blue..

 

[bogdanm]

You have space in flash ?
Whot is this boxa " VU Duo + " ? He is orginal box ?

 

[Helvetica]

Yes, it is an official, original VU Duo +

 

[AlexWilMac]

There is no VU Duo + but probably you mean VU+ Duo. As it's an old model with limited resources, it has probably got its flash full or you installed too many plugins and saturated its RAM.
My advice is to use OBH instead of BH because it's a much lighter image.

 

[Helvetica]

Sorry, yes, VU+ Duo2.
When I start up the Vu, I think it does already say "Open Black Hole.." so that must be an OBH image.
I am a bit shy of putting on a new image because of all my satellite settings (I have 15 satellites set for our large motorized dish - it's not the Disq type but is the 36volt 3-wire type).

 

[Gold_66]

Sorry, yes, VU+ Duo2.

Vu+ Duo and Vu+ Duo2 are completely different boxes.
First one is old and as @Alexwilmac said, it may have low resource problems but memory shouldn't be an issue in Duo2.
This could be a long shot, but first thing I'd try would be to turn off "Display spinner when busy" option in settings.
Maybe "displaying the spinner" itself could be the problem, you know, every possibility should be considered with these devices.
Not sure which version of OBH you're using, but updating it to the latest release (online update, not new image) could also work miracles.

 

[nunigaia]

Vu+ Duo and Vu+ Duo2 are completely different boxes.
First one is old and as @Alexwilmac said, it may have low resource problems but memory shouldn't be an issue in Duo2.
This could be a long shot, but first thing I'd try would be to turn off "Display spinner when busy" option in settings.
Maybe "displaying the spinner" itself could be the problem, you know, every possibility should be considered with these devices.
Not sure which version of OBH you're using, but updating it to the latest release (online update, not new image) could also work miracles.

This can not be considered as it is, so slightly! When a spinner is displayed, we must look for logs:

at:

/home/root
/media/hdd ... root
/media/usb ... root

Note: It depends of the image you are using, or where you customise your logs should be!

Hi everyone
for the past couple of weeks my VU Duo + has been showing the spinner at the top left of my screen every 30 seconds. It is so annoying and is causing problems. Apart from massively slowing the box down, if I am in any kind of menu or channel list and the spinner starts, the VU freezes and I can't do anything except restart it using the switch at the back of the box or wait and hope it comes back on its own.
I can't log my box in to my XTreme account either because the spinner starts up and blocks everything.
I am using Black Hole 3.0.3.Q.
I tried downloading and installing the latest version for my box tonight, but of course the spinner came back and everything froze, so I finished up with "..:0 with 0 errors".
Does anyone know why this has started to happen and what I can do about it ?

Install a fresh image, and do not install xtream plugin ( for now ) ..., because i´m quite sure ( ) this third party plugin is the cause of your issues.

best regards
nunigaia

 

[Helvetica]

Hi everyone, thankyou all for your advice. I begged my son-in-law for hands-on-help. He is much more experienced with this than I am.
First he deleted the xtream plug-in and we restarted the box. (which is definitely a VU+ Duo2, by the way, with the two tuners). When it restarted we went into the menu and sure enough the spinner was back again. Just to make sure, we unplugged the LAN cable, waited a moment and plugged it back in again. Spinner was there again.
So we could say with some confidence that it was not being caused by the xtream plug-in.He also tried and looked at a number of settings, including using the VU+ Control Centre etc, but could not find anything weird.
Installing a newer OBH image version did not help either. As soon as we opened a menu, the white-to-blue thingy started to spin away merrily, usually three times, sometimes four.
Finally he downloaded an (may I mention it?) OpenVix image, installed that, re-installed the Xtream plug-in and there was no problem.
I had got used to my OBH image (and have a backup of all the files) so I will keep looking for a solution and use the openvix image in the meantime, because that is working fine.
Thankyou again to everyone for your suggestions.

 

[AlexWilMac]

What is connected by the LAN? Only the Internet or also a NAS?
If it is this last, maybe there is some wrong configuration or there is some automatic search (either in the NAS or in the VU+) for multimedia files).
If the VU+ is only connected to the Internet, first of all set a root password, just to exclude any external intrusion.
Then change some network settings (for instance use a static IP for your VU+ instead of DHCP or change DNS by opendns or google ones).

 

[Helvetica]

What is connected by the LAN? Only the Internet or also a NAS?

The VU+ is connected to my router by LAN cable and also has wifi enabled. I DO have a NAS, also connected to the router but there is no searching going on between the NAS and the VU+. To watch movies on my NAS, I use the TV functions only and as far as I am aware, there is no function that I have on the VU+ that needs to access the NAS.
Whatever it is/was, it seems to be something in the BlackHole 3.0.0.Q because it isn't doing it with the OpenVix image. Weird, because it started to do it all on its own. I hadn't changed anything, I hadn't added or removed anything.

 

[slowpasseur]

In the past I had the same problem in my Duo2. I discovered that this was due to LCD4linux that was set to show weather infos provided by Microsoft. These infos were no more available so it continued to ask for! As soon as I changed the settings everything was working fine again. May be it's a different issue but just for information. ....

 

[Thomas67]

Hi everyone
for the past couple of weeks my VU Duo + has been showing the spinner at the top left of my screen every 30 seconds. It is so annoying and is causing problems. Apart from massively slowing the box down, if I am in any kind of menu or channel list and the spinner starts, the VU freezes and I can't do anything except restart it using the switch at the back of the box or wait and hope it comes back on its own.
I can't log my box in to my XTreme account either because the spinner starts up and blocks everything.
I am using Black Hole 3.0.3.Q.
I tried downloading and installing the latest version for my box tonight, but of course the spinner came back and everything froze, so I finished up with "..:0 with 0 errors".
Does anyone know why this has started to happen and what I can do about it ?

Check temp its probably overheating and therfor slows everything down
Clean it up from dust inside so cooling is working proper people dont take care
of the STB just put it somewhere and leave it for many years so dust builds up
and cooling gets bad.

 

[Helvetica]

The temperature is not a problem and there is no overheating. I have not downloaded any plug-ins except xstream last July and as I say, that was not causing the problem, because the spinner was still there even when we removed it. I don't have anything running, like weather etc. which need constant updates. My EPG update was set to 4 a.m and no other EPG things were running either.

 

[AlexWilMac]

If you don't start from scratch, installing a clean image and testing it without any plugins for some days, you won't have any sure answer (if it's the hw or the sw).

 

[Matrix10]

Well, certainly one of those two HW or addon/plugin
because no one has such a box performance after the clean BH/OBH installation.

Spinner every 30 seconds
Or we have forgotten to test the image
before publishing

 

[AlexWilMac]

Yes, of course: by "SW" I meant some plugins, not the image in itself.