ZoneMinder Forums

First and foremost, thanks to Phil for such a wonderful software.

Before I continue on with the problem, I've been able to solve every issue I've had so far getting ZM to work using the forum search but alas I could not find an adequate solution to this issue.

The problem:
From time to time my images will be recorded as fully black in the events area which of course because of previously recorded valid images will result in an alarm being triggered. I've tried both of these settings with similar results:

echo 834217728 > /proc/sys/kernel/shmmax
echo 834217728 > /proc/sys/kernel/shmall

echo 134217728 > /proc/sys/kernel/shmmax
echo 134217728 > /proc/sys/kernel/shmall

I'm using a single DCS-900W on Linux Centos 4.1 (RedHat Enterprise 4.1) connected through a Linksys wireless 802.11b router. Any recommendations on how I can go about diagnosing and repairing this issue would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

I would check zmdc.log and /var/log/messages (possibly also zmwatch.log) and see if your capture are being restarted, perhaps due to network timeouts. This may cause the effects you are seeing.

Phil

I found this in /var/log/messages:

Jul 29 11:27:19 server zmc_m1[16907]: ERR [Found unsupported content type '*ªÜ·€ªÜ·ÍªÜ·%«Ü·5«Ü·¬Ü·C¬Ü·k­Ü·=¯Ü·q¯Ü·°Ü·Z°Ü·Þ±Ü·d³Ü·2´]
Jul 29 11:27:21 server zmc_m1[16907]: WAR [Buffer overrun at index 0 ]
Jul 29 11:27:23 server zmc_m1[16907]: ERR [Found unsupported content type 'ÁñÝ·óÝ·ôÝ·>ôÝ·HôÝ·QôÝ·köÝ·´÷Ý·øÝ·øÝ·ÞøÝ·zùÝ·MúÝ·øúÝ·üÝ·ü]
Jul 29 11:27:25 server zma_m1[665]: WAR [Approaching buffer overrun, consider increasing ring buffer size]
Jul 29 11:28:02 server zma_m1[665]: WAR [Approaching buffer overrun, consider increasing ring buffer size]

The zm logs didn't show any errors.

My settings are as follows:
Image Buffer Size: 40
Warmup Frames: 25
Pre Event Image Buffer: 5
Post Event Image Buffer: 5
Alarm Frame Count: 1

I had my camera sending at 15 fps but set the max fps in ZM to 20 so I changed zm to 15 as well. I did some research on this error and I think the ring size is the image buffer size but it seems large enough - should I increase it?

Check this thread which may be referring to the same issue you have.

Phil

I tried that with no positive results - I still get the black screen captures from time to time. Here's some more information that may help. The time stamp on *all* the black images are 16:00:00 and the time delta on all of them is -999,999.99.

Anyone have any recommendations?

I did some more searches but it seems I've tried everything already discussed. I really think the time stamp and delta I posted above may have something to do with it. Anyone have any ideas on why I get this kind of behavior?