By Richard Payne - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
You can find our support policy here: http://support.psquared.net/softsupport.htm
Although it doesn't explicitly mention any of the server OSes it does give a general rule of MS end of support + 6 months. Since MS stopped support for Windows 2000 server and the end of June last year we do not support it any more.
Of course, since you don't generally run our software on the file server the question is really a case of are you comfortable maintaining the OS side of things on your own?
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By Richard Payne - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
If you ignore other factors like domains, sql or web servers and the like, the decision to use Pro or Server largely comes down to how many machines need to access it.
Windows uses a client access license system. All versions of Windows support 5 concurrent connections. The big difference is that Server allows you to purchase additional client licenses but this is impossible with Pro.
Technically Pro is also not optimised to be a server, but with 5 or less connections it doesn't really matter too much anyway (unless you're doing something really heavy like video rendering).
So in short 0-5 clients = Pro, >5 Clients = Server (ignoring other circumstances).
As for NAS, I don't have much experience of it but I have heard people express similar concerns regarding access speed. Sata drives are capable of 150MB/sec which would need a network capable of 1200kbps to make maximum use of. Ie you'd need a fibre channel network to get the best speeds but a gigabit ethernet network would be pretty good. The standard 100mbps network would be a serious bottle neck. Of course, this limit will also apply to accessing files on SAS too so it probably won't affect what you're doing.
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By Richard Payne - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
In that case there's really no harm in staying with 2000 Server. The only thing to watch is when MS extended support expires as at that point you stop getting critical security updates. That's not until 2010 though so you have some breathing space yet!
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By Richard Payne - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
True, but we've always found performance to a little hit and miss above 5.
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By chris.hoch - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Just an idea but when you use windows XP there is a compatibilty option to run software as if you are in windows 2k mode, has this been tested!?
Just thought this might be a bit of a work around?
Another thought is that if you are moving up from Microsoft XYZ to their .NET range there is normally an upgrade code function (I do not know how good this is) Has this been tried to see if .NET helps out??
Chris
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By Will - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
we have been running our playout on XP Pro for over a year now and never really had any huge problems, apart from Myriad closing for no apparant reason, though I have come to the conclusion that the problem lies with our database.
XP Pro has been very stable and very reliable with Myriad if you disable all the fancy features that MS added!
With XP SP2 on the horizon, has Myriad been tested with SP2, which contains a lot of changes (mainly security related)?
I havent been able to test SP2 yet as our test machine is all but dead.
Will
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By Will - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
I have a copy of SP2 as I am on the beta test. they have just released RC2.
I could provide a copy, if you want to test it :-)
Will
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By mattmansfield - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:39 PM
To throw something else into the mix... at Phoenix HR in Burton on Trent we've been using a Linux server running Samba as our Myriad audio and data server with no negative side effects for over 12 months now.
I'm guessing that this would be equivilent to some of the external disks with network connections (as discussed somewhere else on the forums already, I think), as many of these run an on-board variation of Linux.
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By Craig Arthur - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Joining the thread a bit late...
Radio Royal have been using Myriad & Win XP on air since last summer.
So far no unexplainable problems (ALL our PC's are XP pro).
Craig
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By Matt Wade - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
What should be done with Myriad Audio Servers?
We have a server running Windows 2000 pro and we are now in the process of upgrading our PC's to XP Pro. What is the suggested OS for the server. What is supported by psquared?
Matt
HR Chelmsford
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By Matt Wade - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
thanks for the responses. Checking back to the old documents we did actually get Windows 2000 Server as the OS on our machine. It really does just sit there serving the audio to the other workstations. Which I believe may be best for it.
I suppose windows 2000 server was cutting edge in feb 2002 when we got the kit.
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
I've now got access to a machine that is doing nothing so can just set it going to test it for you - would a pad with a couple of hours of music, set to repeat, be a OK test? I can leave it and see what happens. . . the actual PC is stable (not been rebooted for 3 weeks, since the last batch of MS patches).
Alex
[quote:2fd98a030e=\"Peter Jarrett\"]The bad news continues I'm afraid - so far we haven't been able to keep our XP test rig here going for much longer than a fortnight on continuous playback (no stops, reboots or even Q-NXT mode changes)
This is regardless of whether we are in WDM mode or PureWave mode.
Does anyone else have any experience of running playback for this long without rebooting or even pausing at any point?[/quote]
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
I've set up just over 14 hours of stuff on a pad. longest cart is just over an hour, there are about 10 that are between 20-40 mins and then a lot of >5mins tracks, or recorded things. There are also sweepers/jngles every couple of tracks, sweepers vary from 4 seconds to 15 seconds. I have some short jingles as well as a few 1min ones.
I just set it going now and have put it on repeat. I will check it every couple of days and let you know when it crashes!
The PC is a windows XP box, 1.6GHz celeron with 256mb of RAM. It has a Soundblaster Audigy card in it (which is routing line in --> line out, without monitoring it because this PC runs our streaming at the same time as being our SCOOP readout and editing machine. SCOOP edit is not currently running, though).
Alex
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
[quote:536346743b=\"Peter Jarrett\"]It will be very usefull for us to hear how the various tests come back. so thanks all for helping us with this :-)[/quote]
I go back on Sunday so will be able to check on the status of the PC I left going then and will let you know if it is still going. . . or, more likely, what has crashed it!
Alex
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
I am afraid that the machine that I left running had for some reason just ceased - the pad was there, the loop icon was depressed, it was half way thriugh a pad but the carts were empty. When I clicked stop and start on the pad it says \"do you want to play after the item currently in cart 1\" (which was interesting because there was nothing in cart 1). However, when playing it had no problems using cart 1.
I have reset it and will monitor it every couple of days. Wierd!
As for the .net code I would be very suprised if it can cope with converting the sort of code you are using. I think it is designed to convert simple applications written in VB, not some of the most complicated applications written in VB (if not the most complicated). However, I would be interested to know if/whey psqured are going to start using .net - because it will involve presumably a fairly major rewrite and might be a good opportuntiy to make some changes!
Alex
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Just a quick update: My Windows XP box is still playing now, 8 days later. Will update you when it crashes!
Alex
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
[quote:46e197bad6=\"David Boulton\"]Alex - I think our record so far without a crash is 13 days, so let's see if you can beat it :-)[/quote]
Hope so! Mind you, it failed to make that long last time so I am not optimistic!
Alex
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Fraid it crashed this afternoon, 4:56 into a track. I had to move it forward, recue it, play it, recue it then play it when it played for 30 sec or so. It then crashed and took a few minutes to \"recover\", when I ejected the cart and it carried on.
So lets start that timer again!
Alex
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By alex.davies - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
[quote:efbeab3c49=\"Craig Arthur\"]
So far no unexplainable problems (ALL our PC's are XP pro).
[/quote]
My understanding is that is fine as long as there is manual operation for at least some parts of it: the problems arise using weeks of automatic scheduling (which we dont normally do, but are doing to test it). What worries me, though, is that these problems indicate that there are problems with the software on XP.
How long have you been using XP? I have run SCOOP, for example, in a live enviroment with no problems.
Best wishes,
Alex Davies
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By Chris Weaving - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
I have a strange problem using Myriad under Windows XP. A cart can be playing, say in Cart 1. You pre-load a song into, say Cart 2.
When you fire Cart 2 using either the keyboard or mouse, the highlighted play button becomes unhighlighted, but nothing plays ! The cart becomes \"stuck\".
It requires you to load another cart, for example by double-clicking an item on the audio wall, before the \"stuck\" cart fires, as well as the audio you have just double-clicked on.
This has been quite embarrasing whilst recording a programme, when firing a cart produces no audio.
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By Chris Weaving - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
Im running a Mia soundcard, but I'll give the above a try !
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By Chris Weaving - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
I have happily run Myriad under XP Home Edition for a while now, although there are a few glitches every now and again (things like opening another program causes the audio to run at double speed).
I use Myriad in a home studio, so it's not a mission-critical setup, but I suppose I should really be running it under XP Professional ?
What's anybody else's thoughts, as I'm contemplating purchasing an upgrade to XP Professional - is it worth it ?
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By Chris Weaving - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Just read the post in the \"P-Squared Announcements\" forum from Peter Jarrett regarding XP Professional support from the 1st March this year - and yes, it looks like I should really be using XP Professional !
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By Chris Weaving - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Following on from the above, is there actually any problem running Myriad on XP Home (security or otherwise) ?
Like I've said, I've ran it for a while now on this OS with no real problems, and being located in a home studio, it's obviously not mission critical.
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By philedmonds - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
[quote:6514045228=\"Richard Payne\"]If you ignore other factors like domains, sql or web servers and the like, the decision to use Pro or Server largely comes down to how many machines need to access it.
Windows uses a client access license system. All versions of Windows support 5 concurrent connections. The big difference is that Server allows you to purchase additional client licenses but this is impossible with Pro.
[/quote]
In actual fact Windows 2000 Professional allows 10 concurrent connections. See:
http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=kb;EN-US;122920
I am unsure if this is also the case on Win XP Pro.
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By Tim Sargent - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
I gave up within half an hour.... Ran xp pro.... installed myriad - crash, jitter, stall, lock, freeze-yuck!!
Windows 2k sp4 is the way forward people!!
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By Iain Shortreed - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Im gonna be running XP SP2 with Myriad for 30 days test license. It should be on 24/7 doing jingles, sweepers and songs. It will be automated some of the time and used live some of the time.
If i find any problems i'll let y'all know and update you all on how long it can stay up for.
Before i test it might be an idea to downgrade to 2k sp4 though as preferably i dont want it to crash at all.
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By David Boulton - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Will,
although we get pre release versions of operating systems, unfortunatly we have to wait along with everyone else before we can get our hands on the service packs.
We are pretty keen to get our hands on SP2, to see if it resolves some of the ongoing problems.
Back to your database - if you want to get in contact with the support team we can try to get to the bottom of the exits.
When we have any news on XP Service Packs, we'll announce it here.
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By David Boulton - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Thanks guys.
Will - don't worry about sending it to us - it maybe that the development team have received it and are evaluating it already. (I don't like disturbing them - when they are in their darkened office they can be quite intimidating :shock: ).
In our quest to support XP, if you feel you would like to try and upgrade to SP2 and see how it performs - we would be very interested.
Alex - I think our record so far without a crash is 13 days, so let's see if you can beat it :-)
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By Peter Jarrett - Saturday, May 27, 2006 11:16:16 PM
Edit: Please note that this post is from the old forum and the date shown is incorrect. This was originally mainly active during 2004/5. At the time of this edit (Summer 2006) Windows XP Pro SP2 is the only Operating System we currently support.No, don't get all excited, we haven't suddenly decided to support XP - sorry!
However, what I do want to do is bring you all up to date on the latest windows XP tests that we have been running.
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
If you are running a Gina or a Darla, this may be that Sync Wave Devices is turned on on the soundcard - have a look at Topic424-22-1.aspx which contains details on how to turn it off.
It would also be worth downloading the latest drivers from the manufacturers website too - if it is Echo Audio, then check out www.echoaudio.com - the latest version (6.08) also has a \"PureWave\" option that might be worth turning on. You will have to have a trawl of the driver documentation for the full details on how to do this though.
Let us all know how you get on,
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
In that case, definitely download and install the 6.08 driver and try both WDM and Purewave mode - we found significant issues with 6.07 and earlier.
Our XP test rig here had been running in Purewave mode up until recently (becuase under Windows2000 WDM was useless with Mia's) but I have recently switched back to WDM and so far haven't really noticed any reliability improvements - I think XP is letting the side down 
Becuase we work very closely with Echo, they use Myriad as part of their testing procedure and we were able to get to the bottom of the driver issues which directly led to 6.08 being released.
Anyway, post here what you find.
Cheers,
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
I've moved Alex's Scoop on Windows XP to a new topic - Topic1487-30-1.aspx
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
The bad news continues I'm afraid - so far we haven't been able to keep our XP test rig here going for much longer than a fortnight on continuous playback (no stops, reboots or even Q-NXT mode changes)
This is regardless of whether we are in WDM mode or PureWave mode.
Does anyone else have any experience of running playback for this long without rebooting or even pausing at any point?
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
That would be great yes - if you can intersperse some of the songs with jingles etc. that gives an even better test becuase its a mix of longer and very short pieces of audio.
Can you post here the spec of the machine as well as the details of the soundcard so we can keep track of who's using what to test?
Thanks Alex,
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
We've heard of users running xp home having problems with using File Selector boxes (like when you import an audio file, or load/save a pad run) and quite a few problems with slow networking - which makes sense becuase that's not what xp home is designed for :-)
Overall though, if you aren't using it on-air (or at least don't mind the odd stutter) then you may be ok - I wouldn't like to give it an official seal of approval, but if it works for you then I shouldn't worry
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:39 PM
Well spotted :-)
Lets say that was a test!
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314882/ shows the details for XP - 10 for Pro, 5 for home.
To anyone reading this and thinking \"ooh cheap way round having to buy a server\" please bear in mind that Windows 2000 and XP Pro are optimised to run applications not network access. Even a screen saver can seriously impact the performance on the computer :-)
Server OS's on the other hand are designed to self-tune to meet conditions - and by default they lean towards to network first, local applications second.
Thats why a \"Peer to Peer\" is never as nippy as a server based system :-)
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:37 PM
As announced in the Announcements area, we now fully support XP however I am keen to keep this thread going as at present we still can't recommend XP for mission critical stuff.
It will be very usefull for us to hear how the various tests come back. so thanks all for helping us with this :-)
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
That sounds like exactly the kind of thing we are seeing here too- we tend to see audio just either never loading properly, or just stopping during playback.
If you re-cue the audio it then plays fine, but unless you reboot it seems to stop again relatively quickly. After a reboot it will then run pretty well for a week or so, then stop again.
Can you have a look in the cart play logs in Myriad Manager and see for how long it ran for?
.NET wise, it is something we spent quite a while looking at but at the moment we definitely don't have any plans to start migration any time soon.
The main problems are lack of low level audio support (as .NET wants everything to go via DirectX) which means that we couldn't rewrite SmoothStream to easily run, and also a significant speed impact due to the .NET environment.
Just like most developers, our newer products are getting very graphically heay (i.e. AutoTrack 3 and the new Powerlog v4 Client) and these are only possible becuase CPU's have gotten very fast in recent years. If we moved to .NET then these suddenly get very slow again.
Now personally, I remain unconvinced that a pretty program is better than exactly the same program with a standard windows front end, but if you put those two products side by side for a comparison, guess which one get's bought?
The final clincher is that wherever possible we re-use code modules between programs so that if a problem is found while using 1 product, fixing it also fixes it in our other products.
We can't reuse the existing code in .NET as it has to be upgraded to the .NET language which then means updates have to be manually copied across each time we do something - and that is a sure way to introduce problems!
Very long term....who knows...but not just yet ;-)
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
We played with SP2 a couple of months ago when it first started doing the rounds of developers and had a few problems with it - like the PC then needing a complete reinstall
The Latest release candidate is pretty good though and once they release the full edition we'll upgrade our test rig here to see if anything gets better (or of course worse!) and let you all know how we go
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Hi All,
Slight change of plan - we've been running the RC2 (Release Candidate 2) version of the XP Service Pack 2 for a little while on a couple of machines and it seems to be going well.
Therefore we have just upgraded our \"big\" test rig to XP SP2 RC2 (Alphabetti Spagetti anyone?) and will keep you all posted on how it performss.
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Just a quick Update on our tests here running SP2 - so far, so good!
The last reboot of the machine was the 19/07/2004 and since then hasn't needed to be rebooted at all - a far cry from having to do it once a week!
Unfortunately we will have to reboot today to update to the full release version of SP2 so the test will have to be restarted, but we will of course keep you posted.
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By Peter Jarrett - Wednesday, June 21, 2006 4:09:38 PM
Well the time has finally come to reboot the Windows XP SP2 test box.
The sad thing is that it's not becuase the box itself is having any problems - it's actually running like a total dream - and has been since August 16th.... which I make 121 days....
Its actually becuase an update (from WindowsUpdate) to the server (running Windows2003) that it's running from needs a reboot and has knocked out part of the domain that it's running on.
We've left it for a week or so just to see, but sadly we have to now reboot the server and therefore the test machines running from it :-(
Ah well, I guess we'll have to restart the test and see how much over 121 days it can go for - certainly I have no reason to suspect it was going to fall over any time soon.. So All in all a pretty good thumbs up with Windows XP SP2 on the hardware spec listed (way) above.
At present the recommendation is still that 2000 is the best platform for mission critical but that XP/SP2 is fine for everywhere else. Give the above test though it is likely that this will change in the new year and of course we will post here as soon as we've made final decisions.
PS - If/when we do change to XP being fully recommended for mission critical machines then at the same time we will change to preinstalling Windows XP installed instead of 2000 on all PC's that we supply . If you need 2000 for other reasons then please let Sales know when you place any orders.
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