You might try using azap outside of myth. This might tell you stuff like if it loaded the firmware etc. You'll need to create a channels.conf file from info on antennaweb maybe just include your pbs channel.

nxt2002 firmware file is for the rev 2.0 air2pc, bcm3510 is for the rev0.2 air2pc firmware file.

The problem was the firmware.

I used wget to download the file straight to the backend. However, it wasn't really getting the firmware. The file didn't show up as green in putty. I don't know if it was the wrong file or it wasn't transferring the binary or what. I dowloaded the firmware again with firefox and saved it to a samba shared directory. Then I mounted that directory on my myth and copied it to the directory mentioned above. I repeated the instructions and the scan was much faster around 5 minutes rather than 1 hour.

Remaining issue -- duplicate channels with different callsigns.

It found PBS and locked in at broadcast channel 59 with subchannels 41-45. I followed the instructions about renaming the callsigns that were found by scanning from UNC-ED (channel 41) to callsign WUNCDT-1 (channel 41) and added the XMLTVID from the channels fetched from datadirect zap2itlabs to those found through the channel scan.

Then i reran mythfilldatabase. Now I have duplicate channels in the guide. How do I delete them?


Side issue:
The PBS SD channels are tuning but the sound studders or picture sometimes goes in slow motion. I have XvMC enabled in the frontend settings. However, the PBS HD channel looks and sounds wonderful on my crt monitor. I assume XvMC activates itself only on higher definition streams. I will search this in the forum.


Air2PC advanced settings:
Should I enable hardware decoding from the advanced settings of the air2pc rev 0.2 (broadcom) dvb card settings in mythtv-setup?
Thanks for the help.

This is from one of my previous posts:

Let me know if this doesn't work, or you don't understand what I'm talking about

Hey I just got this card and i've been tryin to get the firmware from the link you posted but it has an error that says it's not there... Where is it at?
Also, when i try to load the bcm3510 module nothing shows up in the dmesg, is that the right one for my card or it it because I dont have the firmware?
Thanks!

_________________
Backend: HP NetServer LT 6000r U3; 6 700Mhz Xeon CPUs; 3GB PC133 ECC; LSI Ultra160 SCSI 4 18GB 10kRPM striped system; 7200RPM 160GB recordings; Ubuntu-server 7.04; HDHomeRun box.
Frontend: A64 3000+; 512MB DDR; Hauppauge grey; knoppmyth PXE/NFS.

Hey WattoToydarian

Sorry, the linke is broken right now. The V4L and DVB projects merged. The firmware seems to have completely dissapeared from the linuxtv.org site. It used to be in several places. If I can find another link I will update it. No luck looking tonight.

hey vtdstein95, could you maybe upload it somewhere for me to download or serve it on a ftp or something? Meanwhile I think i'm gunna try the new R5B7!
Thanks.

_________________
Backend: HP NetServer LT 6000r U3; 6 700Mhz Xeon CPUs; 3GB PC133 ECC; LSI Ultra160 SCSI 4 18GB 10kRPM striped system; 7200RPM 160GB recordings; Ubuntu-server 7.04; HDHomeRun box.
Frontend: A64 3000+; 512MB DDR; Hauppauge grey; knoppmyth PXE/NFS.

PM me if you want the firmware file. I'll e-mail it to you or give you a link to download it from my server. (sorry, don't really want to make it public at this point.)
...but I'll be happy to provide links on an individual basis!

P.S. The name of the file I have is:
dvb-fe-bcm3510-01.fw

yeah the firmware isnt in the CVS like it used to be. It’s still publicly accessible though.

http://www.linuxtv.org/download/firmware/

I also picked up one of the Ebay Air2PC rev 0.2 cards a few weeks ago. I recently had a chance to install it. The only thing that I had to do (other than standard HD setup) was the firmware install. I couldn't get it to load the file listed above (it kept loading some other firmware for the card that didn't work). I know it's an ugly solution, but I had to over write the firmware that was actually loading with the 3510 firmware. I'm going to clean up and install with the newest release (using 30.2 right now).

One thing that I don't like is that the Air2PC doesn't pull the channels in as well as my HD3000 did. Have any of you tried a preamp on the antenna line or just a regular amp to increase the strength going to the card?

My setup:
Athlon XP3200+
Asus A7N8X Deluxe
2x Corsair XMS256
80 GB WD (/, /cache, swap, with some leftover space) PATA
200 GH Hitachi (/myth) PATA
Nvidia 6600 GT AGP 256mb (upgraded from MX440 but having other issues with that that need to be resolved)
PVR-500
PVR-250
Air2PC Rev 0.2 (also had an HD3000 in there but I can't get them to work together right now)

Hmm

There is no firmware install... all you have to do is copy the file to the the directory /lib/firmware/ and reboot. And it will work. I tested this on 30.2 and R5b7 and it works fine.

As for the sensitivity issue. I guess the way to approach that one is to look at what controls the signal. It's your antenna.

First, consider if you can put the antenna on the roof to get a stronger signal.

Second, go to antenna web and get the precise location of the signals from your house. That will alllow you to point it more accurately and thus get a stronger signal with a compass. A better quality signal is the
best solution.

Third, you can go the option of a amp but that adds complexity

From my experience signal tuning is tedious and takes a lot of patience...

I had considered getting an amp for my setup, but was talked out of it.

In my town we have the 5 standard broadcast stations, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS and FOX. The first 4 are broadcasting digital HD and SD content no problem, however the company that owns our FOX station is 'no where near stellar' (to put it politely) and so they have a digital signal, but it's a VERY low signal until the HD upgrade in 2007.
Because of the low signal, I can't even get a lock at all.

I have e-mailed them about this situation because I was quite unhappy and asked if getting an amp or pre-amp would help. He responded NO and said that it would only amplify the signal that I was (or wasn't) getting and would end up only amplifying static instead.

That said, I've read that this antenna is VERY good for receiving HD and I'm considering purchasing it. (Watching '24' and Prison Break through the snow is taxing on the eyes)
ChannelMaster 4228

When I said firmware install I probably should have said load (when it actually loads the file). Even with the firmware in the right place it was loading another file so I ended up having to overwrite the file that was loading. I think it may have something to do with the install being an old 30.2 (installed when 30.2 first came out) and since the install I've made lots of changes and broke/fixed the box many times. I'm going to try with a fresh install and see what happens.

I was considering putting an antenna up but it's against the covenants in my neighborhood (or at least requires several pages of paperwork to receive approval). I did pick up an RCA 4 way 8-10db amp that I'm going to install this weekend when I get time to play with it. I have the Terk HD desktop antenna and it's worked very well for me so far. Most channels have a strong enough signal to watch live without any glitches.

Like I said though, with the HD3000 and the antenna in exactly the same place I get 95% signal and then the Air2PC only gets about 75% signal.

I'm also debating if the signal strength thing can be attributed to the weird issue (above) with the firmware loading. I may just need to stick a spare hdd in the box and install the latest version and see what happens.

Update on the amp. The one I bought said 8-10db on the box, however, when you get it open and read the instructions it's max 3db per each of the 4 outputs. So, it was a little misleading.

Before the install I scanned the local channels to see what their signal level. I was having an issue with UPN being about 75% for the signal and Fox was about 85%. I installed it where my splitter was and plugged it into the power source. After installing the amp I was at 70% for UPN and 75% for Fox. I unplugged it and scanned again with no amp and got the previous numbers (better without amp). I even tried to realign the antenna without any improvement to the signal.

Once I put it back the way it was before I started things were back to normal. I guess the moral of the story is that the amplifier didn't help at all in my case. It may help for you, but it didn't work for me.

My advice is give it a try in the attic and see if that helps

Hello,

Forgive me as I didn't read every message in this thread. A long time ago I tried to get the 0.2 card working and it was a real hassle. I just downloaded the latest version R5C7 and everything worked right out of the box! I am now going to return to trying to implement this thing in my living room.

When I say it worked out of the box, I mean it. No tweaking, no working with firmware files or anything. I have two Air2PC R0.2 cards running (can't find my third card - shucks!) and things work well. I reused the powered amplifier that the cable company left at my house and have a 10' or 12' antenna about 35' off the ground. I get roughly 29 digital channels here in flat Central Florida.

If anyone needs more info on install selections or anything, let me know and I will post them.

Good luck!

Shawn

_________________
Aopen AX4C Max II
Intel Celeron 3.06GHz / 512MB DDR
Seagate 300GB HDD
MSI G-Force FX 5200 / Air2PC R0.2
Silverstone LC04 case