[mythtv-users] HD3000 recording problem in Mythtv- MOSTLY SOLVED

Brad Fuller bradallenfuller at yahoo.com
Mon Dec 5 15:26:12 EST 2005


An update since these series of messages.
* I can now view hdtv OTA programs in Myth using the HD3000.
* I can now load the cx88-dvb drivers from boot.

I had two main problems for these symptoms: I didn' know which drivers 
to use for the HD3000 and when I could load them manually, I still had 
problems viewing them in MythTV and mplayer (using the 
~.azap/channels.conf file.). mplayer worked much better, though, then 
MythTv. This complicated matters.

======================
The first problem was solved by reading:
http://pchdtv.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1041&highlight=dtvsignal+build

The key for me was to reorder cx88-dvb to come before cx88-blackbird in 
/lib/modules/<kernel ver>/modules.pcimap.
After I reorderd and commented out ALL cx88... lines in modprobe, dvb 
drivers loaded fine.

Note that before I also found a thread (don't have the reference) that 
indicated to:
cp -r /dev/dvb/* /etc/udev/devices/
so that the adapter0 directory and it's files would exist at startup. 
Don't know if this makes a difference, but I did copy them.

======================
The second problem was actually several problems.

---
1. Channels and Scanning -
I created another Zap2It profile for OTA ATSC channels in my area (in 
addition to my analog cable one.) I just picked all of the ATSC channels 
in my area and no others.

In mythtv-setup I asked it to clear the channels database which went 
fine. I then scanned channels for the PVR-250 (which is connected to 
analog cable - comcast) - no problem. I then scanned for OTA ATSC for 
the HD3000 which also went fine.

After exiting mythtv-setup, I ran mythfilldatabase. It completed both 
the cable NTSC dB and the OTA ATSC dB fine. However, it created a 
completely separate ATSC listings than the scanned channels (the cable 
NTSC filled fine.) So, I was left with duplicate channels: the scanned 
channels from the channel scan in mythtv-setup and the downloaded 
listings from Zap2It. To be more precise, most of the channels were 
duplicated, but some were not. This is because some of the channels that 
I checked off in Zap2It were not found when scanning in mythtv-setup.

How to resolve this? I found this thread:
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/149939?search_string=tune%20atsc%20OTA;#149939
where jason beck has a recipe for filling the correct freqid, mplexid 
and serviceid in the channel table in mysql dB.
This gave me a clue on where to look and how to resolve the two listings.
Instead of running mysql command line, I instead used:
MySQL Query Browser
from :
http://www.mysql.com/products/tools/
 This is much handier than the command line. You can easily copy and 
paste between tables.
In a nutshell, I took the content of the "frequency" record from the 
dtv_multiplex table and using the mplexid as key copied it to "freq_id" 
in the channel table. The channels that were scanned in mythtv-setup had 
mplexid, serviceid and atscid filled in already. But, the freq_id was not.
I then made sure that these same records were filled in for the channels 
that were downloaded from Zap2It.

That left me with duplicate ATSC channels in the mythtv database with 
freq_id, serviceid, atscid identical. I also copied the xmltvid from the 
dnl'd Zap2It channels to the scanned channels.  I tried to fill in as 
much as I could for the duplicate channels (renaming one set of channles 
so I could tell them apart in the channel guide.) I ran mythfilldatabase 
and the scanned channels (which didn't have any listings) were filled 
with data.

However, I do not know if there is more to do in the mysql database or 
not.  LiveTV does work and I can flip between channels (except for a 
problem that I note below.) If there are other records that I need to 
copy, please let me know.

One thing that I SHOULDN'T have done was to select ALL of the ATSC 
channels in Zap2It. Instead, I should have checked off only the channels 
that I was able to receive at my home when checking channels with 
mplayer and the ~/.azap/channels.conf. However, I didn't know which ones 
because of the next problem below. I would suggest that if you are at 
this point, try to obtain each of your channels clearly in mplayer 
first. Then, check the ones that you can receive (and want to receive) 
online at Zap2It before you run mythfilldatabase.

---
2. Antenna amp: When checking channels with mplayer, some worked some of 
the time and some were a mess... basically it seemed to be a crap shoot.
Well... my Antenna amplifier has an FM Trap that was not engaged. When I 
switched it on, BINGO, channels popped in and it made the debugging a 
bit easier... to say the least. I was then able to go thru each channel 
using:

mplayer dvb://<channel_name>

to check for reception. (just cp ~/.azap/channels.conf 
~/.mplayer/channels.conf to make this handy feature work)

=======================
Continued Problems:

--
Duplicate channels:
Yeah.. I have duplicate channels in the EPG, but I don't which ones I 
should delete. I don't know if I filled in all the necessary records in 
the channel table and don't know how this table relates to dtv_signal 
table. The way I figured I find out is to actually flip thru the 
channels in LiveTV to see what works.

--
LiveTV Channel Scanning:
But, when I switch channels it seems that MythTV randomly picks the next 
channel. For instance I have these channels in the program listing:
2_1#
2_2#
2-1
4_1#
4_2#
4-1
4-2
5_1#
5-1
7_1#
7_2#
7-1
7-2
etc...

switching up from 2_1# sometimes I get 4_1#, sometimes I get 4-1 and 
sometimes 4-2. There doesn't seem to be any reasoning behind it.

Since there doesn't seem to be any reason, I don't know which ones to 
delete.

--
Sub-channels:
How do you switch from something like 4-1 to 4-2?

--
Segfault
Seems that if I tune to a atsc channel that doesn't come in well, 
mythfrontend will segfault and the backend crashes too.

All in all, I'm now doing pretty well. I still have to load lircd in 
rc.local like this:

/sbin/service lircd stop
usleep 1000000
/sbin/depmod -a
usleep 1000000
/sbin/modprobe lirc_i2c
usleep 1000000
/sbin/service lircd start

I don't know why it doesn't start up at boot. But, HD3000 is working 
pretty well.  Yeah!

brad

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