At wits end with computer going to sleep while watching DVR

Channels DVR Server
#1

This is driving us nuts since it happens every night when we watch the DVR on the living room AppleTV or (try) to watch a show on the bedroom AppleTV! Please note this is not an issue with recordings, all get recorded, this is a problem while watching. I am quite puzzled since I don't see other people having this problem.

Since January Channels DVR has been fine until about 2 months ago, then, after a channels update the problem started.

Problem: While watching anything, the computer will go to sleep and the DVR drive will spin down. Must go to computer and press mouse or KB to wake up.

Hardware:
Channels DVR is on a 2012 iMac 27. Drive is an external 6TB, problem occurs if external is on firewire or USB 3. Tuner is SD Quatro.

Software:
This occurred on macOS 10.13.6 and now on 10.14.1, so the OS level made no difference.
Sleep is set after 10-15 minutes, power down disk drive when possible. I don't want sleep off or drive on all the time, besides, it's been fine for the first 8 months with power save set this way. I waited this long before reporting to see if Mojave or Channels updates would fix it. The Channels wake function is installed, otherwise DVR would not work.

Observations
Never a problem recording anything, nothing is missed recording when scheduled.
Most often, the problem occurs while watching a show and we paused it for a couple of minutes.
Also occurs while watching a show, the show will freeze.
Also occurs (but less often) when we start AppleTV and DVR is not shown.

In all cases all that needs to be done is to press the mouse or anything on the Mac to start AppleTV Channels again.

Finally, I think this started when Channels was changed to buffer much more before starting. I noticed after a Channels update it takes way longer to start a show and assumed it's buffering more. This is about the time the problem started.

#2

Hmm that's strange. If you load up the Channels DVR web ui, on the Settings tab does it show "Watching xxx" in the activity section?

#3

I will try that but I don't see how it will help. As soon as I touch the Mac the show starts to play so I think by the time I get to the web GUI it will show activity. But I will give it a go and let you know.

#4

You can check it from another tablet or phone, using the IP of your Mac. Or just check it while it's working to make sure it shows up when you first start watching

#5

I viewed the activity as you asked, however, I may have not been clear, as I stated, if you do anything to the computer the show starts immediately. So just hitting the mouse, which brings up the password screen, starts the show, long before I bring up the Channels web GUI which shows the activity on the AppleTV's IPV6 address as I expected. BTW, there is no way to get to the web Gui from iPad since there is no web server on the Mac. I ran many tests over the weeks before posting here and could not find anything that affects this other than what I mentioned in Observations.

I will keep trying things since this really needs resolution. Please keep in mind this started around the last updates, although I am not sure if it's related to the DVR or AppleTV channels.

#6

The DVR web UI is accessible from any device as the DVR itself has a webserver. You can load http://x.x.x.x:8089 using the IP of your Mac.

#7

Still trying to nail the exact sequence, but wanted to mention the last time this happened I was NOT able to get into DVR settings from iPad to DVR server until I woke up computer. Next time I will try to test screen sharing at the time of the problem.

1 Like