Hello all,
I had previously given up with mythtv and have been using Beyondtv, (great, installed, everything just worked). But I do like the many features of mythtv and thought I'd try the new release.
I wiped Beyondtv and installed Mythtv, sorted out xorg.conf etc and grabbed the tv listings. I have a PVR350 and an old Wintv pvr card installed.

I can watch tv, even manually record tv while watching (the channel and program information is all wrong though), but all scheduled recordings fail. The tv signal is supplied to the svideo input of the 350, so why does it not record?
I've tried to locate error messages (I used to get messages stating that the channel couldn't be set or selected in previous versions) but I can't find them in R5F1. Why should it have to select a channel when the tuner isn't being used? How can I force it to default to svideo input?

In case it needs channel information, here is my channel information for sky one, which is channel 106 on my sky box in the UK:
sourceid 1
xmltvid sky-one.sky.com
channum Sky One
callsign SKYON
name Sky One
freqid blank
finetune 0
videofilters blank
brightness 32768
contrast 32768
colour 32768
hue 32768
recpriority 0
comfree blank
visible ticked
useonairguide blank

Should I change any of this information to reflect that sky is channel 106?
I've never been able to schedule a recording in mythtv, which kind of defeats the purpose of having it!
Can anyone suggest any other tips/hints? Anyone had similar problems, searches seem to show I'm the only one.
Also, how can I change cards while watching tv? I remember there is a key press for this but can't remember where to find it. Also I can't select a specific card as a recording source even though both cards are installed and configured. Any advice?

Thanks in advance

EDIT: I have found the change card and change input keys.

_________________
P4 2.8Ghz
512Mb
R5F1
PVR350, S-Video in from SKY STB
Tuner not used
nvidia MX4000, S-Video to TV

Your problem is most likely that MythTV can't tune successfully. If it's using the s-video input it needs an external channel changer script since it's not using the internal tuner. If there isn't one, or if the one it finds doesn't return "success" (meaning an exit code of 0) then it assumes that tuning has failed and doesn't attempt to record.

At the very least you need to use a dummy tuner command which always returns success (try "/bin/true"), and ideally you'll set up a script which can actually control your external cable or sattelite box.

Many thanks.

I haven't seen any mention of this before, and I can't believe I'm the only one using a hauppauge card to only record a satellite box from the svideo or composite inputs! I've been trying to get this to work since R5C7 (really!).

So, how do I go about setting up an external channel changer script? I have a UIRT which I used with Beyondtv to change channels for unattended recordings, but I didn't automatically assume that would work under linux. I have discovered a forum, so will see if I can get it going in Mythtv.

Can you also say if the following controller will fit the bill? http://www.dusky-control.com/
This claims to be compatible with Mythtv and UK sky boxes but I can't see if it will provide the script you mention. It does say all it needs is a program which calls for a channel change command, which I don't seem to have(?) at the moment.

Thanks for the clues, I'm off to search and google.

_________________
P4 2.8Ghz
512Mb
R5F1
PVR350, S-Video in from SKY STB
Tuner not used
nvidia MX4000, S-Video to TV

Search for "irblaster", while this is a specific type of solution it will get you started on the trail of the general information.

Thanks again.

I've been searching the USB-UIRT forum http://www.usbuirt.com/phpBB2/
There is some useful info on there, but it either refers to gentoo or fedora installs!

Further searches say that lirc 0.81 now has support for USB-UIRT but that this must be compiled in using the setup script.

Can you say if the following has a chance of succeeding?:

remove lirc.
download latest version lirc (0.81) and run setup script
include USB-UIRT
include my remote in /etc/lircd.conf

now, I also understand I need 'irw tool', but I don't know what this is. It was one of those 'simply start irw' lines that had no reference before or since! Don't ya just love 'em? Any clues for me?

Now run mythtv-setup and include a call to the remote button presses in channel change command in the input associations page:

irsend List Sky Box ""
irsend SEND_ONCE Sky Box 101 (for channel 101? -BBC1 for me)
-will these two commands be able to be sent on one line?

Will this, do you think, tell knoppmyth that a channel change has been achieved and to start a scheduled recording, that was the original problem I'm looking for a solution to.

Does it sound feasible? I'm going to do a fresh install of R5F1 to give it a shot.
A cheeky request, any chance USB-UIRT support can be built-in?

Thanks again

_________________
P4 2.8Ghz
512Mb
R5F1
PVR350, S-Video in from SKY STB
Tuner not used
nvidia MX4000, S-Video to TV

I'm getting into the usual re-install and up half the night trying to get Myth to work cenarios, so I'm going back to Beyond TV.

Thank you for your help.

Maybe the next release...

_________________
P4 2.8Ghz
512Mb
R5F1
PVR350, S-Video in from SKY STB
Tuner not used
nvidia MX4000, S-Video to TV

That's because you didn't followup this thread. Unless you followup a problem, with an update, we don't know whether the solution worked or not.



It depends on the device, but one thing you need to know is that what is sent to the channel change script is what is the in the Channel or Frequency" field in the second screen for each channel, the one where all the sliders for brightness etc are.



This page describes the protocol for the RS232 version. Off hand I don't know if there is an existing script to send serial commands, but depending on the set up, you may need a "wrapper script" whose name you put in the "Channel Change Script" field. The script would be something like: Where ircommand is whatever the ir command you need and %1 is the channel number parameter which contains the value passed from the backend.

Bruce S.

_________________
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