Marc2405
Happy New Year to all of you out there,
I experienced a problem two times last week and actually on New Years Eve/New Years Day. Let me tell about my setup first.
I use a Samsung Laptop running Windows Vista and an ATI 2400M graphics card, Virtual DJ 5 Console edition, the Hercules Console RMX. I also have a Toshiba DLP for my second graphics output.
So everything has been working fine, but I had the first problem on Christmas Day. While mixing audio and video for about ten hours, the videos weren't played anymore. The audio track was still audible, but there was only a white screen or maybe a single video frame. VirtualDJ still worked fine with audio files. The same thing happened to me New Years Day. The party was really awesome and people didn't wanna go to sleep, but the video playback didn't work.
So I tried to reboot the machine, but no effect. The first time, on Christmas Day, the computer responded with some sort of error message: Windows tried to restart the graphics cards driver after a serious error. So according to this it doesn't necessarily have to be a VirtualDJ software bug/problem. But I'm not sure since this error message didn't come up last time.
I reckon that it's hard to tell whether it's a hardware or software problem because Virtual DJ accesses DirectX components and this is true also for the graphics engine.
However, long story short: Maybe somebody has been through this before and can give me some advice how to avoid this video playback error.
Your help is appreciated, thanks in advance!
GreetinX Marc
I experienced a problem two times last week and actually on New Years Eve/New Years Day. Let me tell about my setup first.
I use a Samsung Laptop running Windows Vista and an ATI 2400M graphics card, Virtual DJ 5 Console edition, the Hercules Console RMX. I also have a Toshiba DLP for my second graphics output.
So everything has been working fine, but I had the first problem on Christmas Day. While mixing audio and video for about ten hours, the videos weren't played anymore. The audio track was still audible, but there was only a white screen or maybe a single video frame. VirtualDJ still worked fine with audio files. The same thing happened to me New Years Day. The party was really awesome and people didn't wanna go to sleep, but the video playback didn't work.
So I tried to reboot the machine, but no effect. The first time, on Christmas Day, the computer responded with some sort of error message: Windows tried to restart the graphics cards driver after a serious error. So according to this it doesn't necessarily have to be a VirtualDJ software bug/problem. But I'm not sure since this error message didn't come up last time.
I reckon that it's hard to tell whether it's a hardware or software problem because Virtual DJ accesses DirectX components and this is true also for the graphics engine.
However, long story short: Maybe somebody has been through this before and can give me some advice how to avoid this video playback error.
Your help is appreciated, thanks in advance!
GreetinX Marc
Posté Fri 02 Jan 09 @ 4:22 am
tayla
sounds a bit like a heat problem going on, but the techies will let you know better i would imagine...
Posté Fri 02 Jan 09 @ 6:06 am
SBDJ
If a reboot didn't clear the issue, then I'd be inclined to suggest it's not a VDJ problem, but an issue with the graphics card. After 10 hours it could well be a heat issue.
Might be worth looking into a program to monitor the various temperature probes and see if it's an issue... :)
Might be worth looking into a program to monitor the various temperature probes and see if it's an issue... :)
Posté Fri 02 Jan 09 @ 6:21 am
Marc2405
Hi, thanks for your replies. I haven't thought about the heat problem though. Makes kind of sense, but I didn't expect a heat problem causing the graphics card to malfunction. Does anyone of you know if there is a temperature monitoring program for checking the graphic card processor? It's an ATI 2400 Mobility series processor. I don't think that ATI provides such a program for protable computers.
Thanks in advance,
Marc
Thanks in advance,
Marc
Posté Fri 02 Jan 09 @ 8:30 am
funkmasterfrank
I've had a similar problem a few times. Video plays fine and at a random time during the evening the video freezes and the audio plays on, no problem. My on the fly remedy is to open configuration and turn off the second monitor , close configuration, re-open it and turn the second output back on and it works the rest of the night. Only once I had to repeat what I explained as it happened 2 times in 1 night. I haven't figured out what causes the problem but as long as VDJ doesn't crash I deal with it. it has never happened using karaoke files, only with vobs and mpg files. i have gotten a white blank screen in the past but it happened when I changed the resolution on my 2nd screen while VDJ was playing a video. I did the exact same thing to get it back...
Funkmasterfrank
Funkmasterfrank
Posté Fri 02 Jan 09 @ 9:24 am
Marc2405
Thanks again for your advice. I'm gonna play at a party tonight and if the problem comes up I'll follow funkmaster's troubleshooting steps. Maybe I can restore video playback with disabling and enabling the second video output. I haven't played karaoke files yet, only mpg,divx and vob.
I'll let you know if the problem still persists.
GreetinX Marc
I'll let you know if the problem still persists.
GreetinX Marc
Posté Sat 03 Jan 09 @ 3:56 am
Marc2405
Hi there again,
so I had this gig on Saturday. Everything was working fine, but this time the white screen problem came up already after seven hours. The crowd did not mind to much, but they were expecting videos and animations/visualizations. Audio was still available.
So I haven't really found a quick way to get rid of this problem. I'm not sure but I guess there was an error message from the ATI graphics card driver. Apparently it had to be restarted after malfunctioning. Didn't make any difference though.
I didn't change anything considering the computer setup and virtualdj worked smoothly until the Christmas Party about two weeks ago.
So if you may have any more ideas how to deal with this problem, let me know.
GreetinX Marc
so I had this gig on Saturday. Everything was working fine, but this time the white screen problem came up already after seven hours. The crowd did not mind to much, but they were expecting videos and animations/visualizations. Audio was still available.
So I haven't really found a quick way to get rid of this problem. I'm not sure but I guess there was an error message from the ATI graphics card driver. Apparently it had to be restarted after malfunctioning. Didn't make any difference though.
I didn't change anything considering the computer setup and virtualdj worked smoothly until the Christmas Party about two weeks ago.
So if you may have any more ideas how to deal with this problem, let me know.
GreetinX Marc
Posté Mon 05 Jan 09 @ 4:02 am
tayla
Marc you may want to check this out, some similarities...
http://www.virtualdj.com/forums/101270/General_Discussion/Freezing_Video_-_Continuing_my_detective_work.html
http://www.virtualdj.com/forums/101270/General_Discussion/Freezing_Video_-_Continuing_my_detective_work.html
Posté Mon 05 Jan 09 @ 4:30 am
Marc2405
Hi Tayla, thanks for providing the link, but this message comes up when I click on it:
Sorry, you don't have the necessary accreditations to view this page.
Marc you may want to check this out, some similarities...
http://www.virtualdj.com/forums/101270/General_Discussion/Freezing_Video_-_Continuing_my_detective_work.html
Sorry, you don't have the necessary accreditations to view this page.
Marc you may want to check this out, some similarities...
http://www.virtualdj.com/forums/101270/General_Discussion/Freezing_Video_-_Continuing_my_detective_work.html
Posté Tue 06 Jan 09 @ 4:23 am
tayla
sorry marc, i didn't notice they were levelled up to pro user, i'll see if anything can be done to help you.
Posté Tue 06 Jan 09 @ 5:22 am
tayla
Marc you can now view that link, see if it helps and thanks to Terry for lowering it... cheers
Posté Tue 06 Jan 09 @ 7:58 am
discobrian24
Funk next time that happens, load a song in the other deck and let me know if it forces the video to start playing again, if it does it is exactly what I am encountering.
This has never happened until recently, I wonder if this is a Windows thing??? A Driver thing??? A Codec thing??
This has never happened until recently, I wonder if this is a Windows thing??? A Driver thing??? A Codec thing??
Posté Tue 06 Jan 09 @ 10:29 pm
Groove D
10 hours?
holy cow maybe it was hungry LOL
just kiddin
I would look at heat also man
thats a long time to be beatin up a laptop
put a lap cooler under it (4 fan)
holy cow maybe it was hungry LOL
just kiddin
I would look at heat also man
thats a long time to be beatin up a laptop
put a lap cooler under it (4 fan)
Posté Wed 07 Jan 09 @ 4:09 am
Marc2405
Hi there, thanks for all your support and especially Tayla. It seems to be the heat problem and I'm gonna get this laptop cooler thing you put underneath it. It is USB-powered and uses up to four fans to cool the computer.
I might also run another skin with a lower resolution than the MixVibe-Skin. Maybe that might change things for the better.
I'll keep you posted. However, if you do have other ideas, let me (all of us here) know.
GreetinX Marc
I might also run another skin with a lower resolution than the MixVibe-Skin. Maybe that might change things for the better.
I'll keep you posted. However, if you do have other ideas, let me (all of us here) know.
GreetinX Marc
Posté Wed 07 Jan 09 @ 7:52 am
Marc2405
Hi there,
sorry for writing that late. I've been kind of busy, but who isn't.
I just wanted to let you know that my problem with the video output was heat-related.
I ordered two cooling pads for partable computers and used one for my Laptop and the other one for
my DLP. The Laptop did work properly without any problems and the DLP malfunctioned after 10 hours.
It didn't shut down completely, only the colors were screwed up.
So the cooling pads help a lot, indeed and should also protect your computer.
VirtualDJ worked fine until the very end of the party.
So thanks a lot for your input and ideas. Maybe other users have experienced the same kind of problem and
know now how to deal with it. Just make sure you get yourself a rather good quality product.
So practice and enjoy!
GreetinX Marc
sorry for writing that late. I've been kind of busy, but who isn't.
I just wanted to let you know that my problem with the video output was heat-related.
I ordered two cooling pads for partable computers and used one for my Laptop and the other one for
my DLP. The Laptop did work properly without any problems and the DLP malfunctioned after 10 hours.
It didn't shut down completely, only the colors were screwed up.
So the cooling pads help a lot, indeed and should also protect your computer.
VirtualDJ worked fine until the very end of the party.
So thanks a lot for your input and ideas. Maybe other users have experienced the same kind of problem and
know now how to deal with it. Just make sure you get yourself a rather good quality product.
So practice and enjoy!
GreetinX Marc
Posté Mon 26 Jan 09 @ 6:56 am
tayla
glad your sorted Marc...
Posté Mon 26 Jan 09 @ 7:07 pm