SkyLake + TechniSat SkyStar HD2 → Stuttering/Corruptions

[LoRd_MuldeR]

So, today I moved my TV card (TechniSat SkyStar HD2) to my "new" SkyLake machine. This card has been working perfectly fine for years in my "old" machine, using DVBViewer. However, on the new machine, also using DVBViewer, I get heavy stuttering and corruptions. Seems like I get "good" frames for about 1-2 seconds, then it breaks away for ~5 seconds. Then again 1-2 seconds "good" frames. And so on. Audio is also playing for 1-2 seconds, then noise/silence, then again 1-2 seconds okay. And so on. It cannot be a signal problem, as signal strength shows is 94%. Also it's the same antenna cable in the same room that I used before... Any ideas what could be wrong here? :confused:

System is Core-i7 6700K (SkyLake) on Asus Z170-A board with 32 GB of RAM (DDR4-2133). I'm running latest DVBViewer with latest LAV Filter on Windows 10 v1511. Latest drivers for the SkyStar HD2 are installed too.

Screenshot:
http://i.imgur.com/JfqO4cY.jpg

(Maybe the PCI-bridge on the Asus board doesn't work well with my card?)

[Atak_Snajpera]

I would first check how everything works on older win7/8. Win10 sometimes acts like woman with period.

[raffriff42]

Things to disable for troubleshooting purposes:
- intrusive background processes, like Windows Update (ahem).
- third-party bloatware (common on new machines)
- real-time antivirus.
- search indexing.
- "media library" indexing (esp. if tuner is generating media files)
- Explorer thumbnail generation (ditto)
- anything that "saves power" or "boosts performance" by varying
system clock frequencies, including (maybe) Windows power profile.
- you're not overclocking are you?

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Things to disable for troubleshooting purposes:
- intrusive background processes, like Windows Update (ahem).
- third-party bloatware (common on new machines)
- real-time antivirus.
- search indexing.
- "media library" indexing (esp. if tuner is generating media files)
- Explorer thumbnail generation (ditto)

Don't think any of those are the problem. I don't see any noteworthy disk activity and the CPU usage is around 5%. See screenshot I added.

Also, I put the machine together myself and did a "clean" Windows install directly from v1511 ISO, so there certainly is no bloatware - except for Windows itself :D

Anti-virus is standard Windows Defender that ships with Windows 10. Disabling "real-time" protection didn't change anything.

- anything that "saves power" or "boosts performance" by varying
- system clock frequencies, including (maybe) Windows power profile.

Everything is running at "stock" settings, yes. Windows power-profile is at "high performance" already. Switching to "balanced" doesn't make a difference.

I also looked in the UEFI setup, but couldn't find anything related. Actually there are no settings for the PCI bus at all...

- you're not overclocking are you?

Nope. Anyway, I tortured the new system with Linpack, Prime95 and Memtestx86. No errors, no BSODs and no freezes, thus far.

I would first check how everything works on older win7/8. Win10 sometimes acts like woman with period.

That would be interesting, just to check for driver issues. However I don't want to re-install my OS right now. And, getting it to work under Windows 7 wouldn't be helpful in the long term anyway (except I'd know whether it's a driver issue).

BTW: I read that TechniSat only sold re-branded Azurewave cards and now stopped selling TV cards completely. So, no driver updated to be expected. Latest driver is from ~2009 :rolleyes:

[Atak_Snajpera]

If you have space you can install win7/8 on second partition.

[LoRd_MuldeR]

If you have space you can install win7/8 on second partition.

Don't want to mess with the partitions right now. Also I don't feel like switching the SSD's. So, any way to test this on a "live" system?

I tried to boot Kodibuntu from my USB Stick today, but it didn't recognize my TV card. Actually, setting up a TV card for Kodi seems like a non-trivial. Not sure it's even possible on a "Live" system.

Also gave OpenELEC a try, but the boot procedure ended in a Kernel Panic and I had to switch off power...

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Just for notes: Turned out to be a problem with the CPU "C-States". If I set the limit to C3 (instead of C8), or disable C-States altogether, it's working. Anything above C3 reproducibly causes these distortions :rolleyes:

(Now the big question is whether spending money on a new card is worth it, especially since the new card might exhibit the same issue)

[Blue_MiSfit]

I'd be willing to bet this is a motherboard firmware issue. I've seen issues with power saving cause all kinds of weird issues - like CPUs going into their lowest clock speed and not throttling up when needed. All of these issues have eventually been resolved with firmware updates.

Have you checked to see if you firmware / BIOS on your board is new? I've heard reports of similar firmware issues with Skylake motharboards. Plus there's the CPU errata they discovered recently that will hopefully be fixed by a similar firmware update :)

[Blue_MiSfit]

To update - looks like the latest firmware for this board came out on Jan 18 2016
http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/LGA1151/Z170-A/Z170-A-ASUS-1602.zip