[AG-TECH] 'Yellow' flash in vic

[Allan Spale]

Randy,

Wow, the flashes come in different colors!  Mine is orange.  

After some testing, it seems to occur when the processor is overloaded.
EVL is running a single processor Pentium 4 with a lot of memory and
slightly less than the speed you are running at.  The best way to test
this theory is try to stress the processor...move a lot of video windows
around, create new web browsers, etc.  The more intense the process is,
the more you will see the flashes.

The problem is not too bad if there is not a lot of load on the processor.
However, EVL tried to add another capture card to this computer and one of
the video streams would have the periodic orange flash.  The way that I
found to reduce/eliminate the problem is to actually adjust priorities in
Windows (you can cringe now).  The VIC capture processes were set to High
or Real-Time (I would go for High instead of Real-Time so things do not
become weird) and set the VIC display process to Above Normal (just so
that it does not become neglected with lack of processor time).

This would probably work great except for the fact that the VIC processes
are started and stopped as one changes rooms, so it is necessary to change
the priority each time after moving to a new room.  If there was a way to
just tell Windows "always start VIC capture process at High", that would
probably solve the problem.  EVL made an attempt to try to use batch files
and to masquerade as "ddvic" when it was really a batch file that started
ddvic with High priority, but mysteriously then the Video Resource Manager
and Display Resource Manager failed to appear.  One would have to assume
they are "hard-wired" to look for something.

That's my theory on the orange,yellow,etc. flash.  Anyone have any ideas
to eliminate this problem?


Allan
EVL at UIC
Research Assistant


On Thu, 10 Jul 2003, Randy Groves wrote:

> I've noticed recently that some of my machines (I thought it was only on 
> one that has a single 2.4GHz Xeon, but now I'm seeing it on a dual), that 
> there is sometimes a yellow flash that occurs on some of the cameras.  I've 
> not done any tracking of type, graphics card, etc., but I'm wondering if 
> this is a known occurrence, and if there is any info as to whether it is 
> overloaded CPU, lack of memory, insufficient graphics card or none of the 
> above.
> 
> And if there's a FAQ that I can peruse - just whack me up-side the head 
> with it!
> 
> Thanks!!
> 
> -randy
> 
>