Buffer Problem?

[Spanky]

I am not sure what is causing this but it gets pretty annoying. Certain songs will pause for about half a second every 20 seconds or so. I am using a basic text and album artwork wps that I made and I have a custom equalizer that I made. I am not sure if this is a HD or CPU issue or what. The hard drive seems to spin for a while when I first play songs but I assume it is just loading the songs into the memory. I am using a iPod 4G Color. Here are some settings if it makes any difference:

Anti-Skip Buffer: 15 seconds
Disk Spindown: 6 seconds
Directory Cache: Yes

Any recommended settings or changes I should do first? I was thinking of uploading my wps and a song that it "skips" on. Thanks in advance.

[GodEater]

You don't say what format your songs are that are having this issue - but in any case, I suspect the issue is the equalizer. Don't forget that the CPU in the iPod is not very powerful, and trying to do lots of signal processing with it as WELL as playing back music often causes issues like this.

[Spanky]

It is MP3 format. I can say that it is a Johnny Cash album and most of my Johnny Cash I converted from VBR down to a slightly lower constant bitrate like if it was 210KBPS VBR I would make it 192KBPS using iTunes. I really don't know what is causing this, I am just trying to give out info. I will try with a flat or disabled equalizer and post my results.

*EDIT* The hard drive has spun the whole time during this song, about 3 minutes and it is still spinning while on the next song. I don't believe that is normal. I can get it to stop if I pause the song, go the main menu and wait about 10 seconds then it stops and I can resume the song.

*EDIT AGAIN* Ok after 4 minutes the hard drive finally stopped spinning during playback. Song still pauses about every 20-30 seconds.

*EDIT ONCE MORE* It is not the wps. I just tested other ones that are pretty plain and the music still skips.

*WHEN WILL I STOP UPDATING?* It is not the equalizer, I disabled it and I am using a basic wps and the song still skips. It is 320kbps mp3 so I doubt this is one of my vbr conversions. Any ideas?

[GodEater]

The next thing to try would be to reset all your configuration fiddling back to default (switch the hold switch to on as soon as you see the rockbox logo appear when you power on), and see if the problem appears then.

PS - I congratulate you on your use of the modify button - you appear to be one of the few users that knows that's what they're supposed to do

[Spanky]

It's insane when the most frustrating problems are solved so easily. I wiped the config files and playback is great and the hard drive stops spinning after like 30 seconds.

[NicolasP]

I really wonder what kind of config option could cause such behaviour though... maybe something related to dircache. Have you reenabled it?

[replicant]

spanky, i think i'm experiencing the same issues. i believe i'll wipe my config and start over too. funny how fiddling with configs could break things.

[Spanky]

I have all my things back and enabled except for crossfade and I have yet to hear another skip in my music. I have directory cache enabled as well.