Question on resume function for movies

Hi,

I have a question on the resume function.  When I stop viewing a movie, and go back to it later, sometimes it will ask me whether I want to Resume or Restart.

My question is, why only sometimes?  I can’t see any pattern to it, whether it’s from one drive or another drive, whether it’s same day or a day later, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t (more often it doesn’t).

I’m using the Windows network share method, no media library.

Is there some fix for this?

Thanks for any tips.

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You need to use the media library, because that’s where Resume Points are saved (except for DVD ISOs.)

If you don’t, it won’t remember the resume points after you reboot.

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Thanks Tony.

Any idea why it sometimes works?  If I understand your response, it shouldn’t work at all… yet it appears to work if I exit and re-enter within a short period of time, but if I re-enter after a day or so, it doesn’t work.

These are not .iso files, just your basic .avi or .mkv files.

Thanks.

As I said, it’ll work at most until you reboot the box.

Otherwise, it’ll only work within the timeframe during which the resume point is cached in memory (which is lost during a reboot or until something else needs the memory.)

To: fred9999

I dicussed this problem in another post.

Before firmware 2.01.86 it was possible to turn the power off to both the WDTV Live SMP unit as well as a connected external hard drive and still retain memory of a previously watched video so resume was possible.

With firmware 2.01.86 the above is no longer possible. Turning the WDTV Live SMP unit completely off (requiring a longer bootup time) will no longer retain the resume memory.

However, if you turn off the WDTV Live SMP unit off normally with the on/off button on the WDTV Live SMP remote control the unit will go into STANDBY mode (even though the unit looks off) and it will retain all memory so resume is still possible.

I only turned off the power completely to both the WDTV Live SMP unit and the connected external hard drive to save wear and tear of the units as well as saving electricity. The advantage of standby mode is that it will bootup faster. I still turn off the power completely to the external hard drive. I use macros on my URC MX-450 remote control to control all of my devices.

As soon as Western Digital figures out a solution to the firmware 2.01.86 problem we should not turn off the WDTV Live SMP unit completely or else the resume memory will be lost.

Hope this explanation helps.

flash, you’re of course correct with your assessment, but the OP isn’t using media library.   So resume won’t work for him even if WD fixes this new issue.

I see.  

I tried yesterday to check 5 movies, starting and stopping and starting, with power-off and -on in between (just the sleep mode power-off), and it managed to keep the resume function, but like you said, I guess at some point the memory will be needed for other functions.

Disappointing, but thanks for clearing that up.

To throw in my $.02 worth - I was under the impression that resume points are saved in .bmk files.  This is confirmed by info in this post.  It’s also stated that .bmk files have resume points for DVD .iso files, and resume points for all other file types are saved in the WDTV database.

As far as whether resume points are only saved when the Media Library is enabled, in my own setup, I have movies of .ISO and .MKV types on an external hard drive connected to the WDTV SMP, with My Library enabled and pointing there.  I also have movies on a NAS box in .ISO, .MKV, .MP4, and other file types.  My Library DOES NOT include the NAS share.  I have .bmk files in BOTH locations.  The NAS share DOES NOT have a .wd_tv folder.

My conclusion would be that resume points for .ISO movies are saved in .bmk files, whether the Media Library is enabled or not, and that resume points for any other file type are saved in the WDTV database, but ONLY if the Media Library is enabled and includes the location where the movies files are.

Does this seem accurate?

Yep.

New question - Why store resume info (and whatever else is tracked) in a .bmk file for .iso files?  Why not store info in the WDTV database for ALL file types?  Would give faster access to the info and would make things tidier.

Don’t know for certain because I’m not the programmer, but:

The SQLITE database used for the media library stores the resume point as a simple number.

Since all videos other than DVDs are simple linear tracks, the resume point (a 4-byte integer) is probably just a simple position offset (like “I left off at byte 40,000,000” or something).

However, DVDs are not linear.   They’re random access data structures all to themselves.   One just can’t hop back into the same place one left because all the DVD program registers and settings that are part of the navigation system would be lost.   That additional data is stored in the BMK file.

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I know next to nothing about video files, encoding, structure, etc. (if Handbrake didn’t have pre-defined presets, I’d be completely lost using it.)  So the resume tracking is, of course, more complicated than it would seem.  I wonder if it couldn’t be done by simply saving the position by the time elapsed in the movie…

WHICH movie? DVDs have up to 99 movies inside. :slight_smile:

There ya go gettin’ complicated again! :smileyvery-happy:

Thanks for the comments, Tony