[mythtv-users] MythTV Newbie observations / questions

[Tony Howard]

A couple of experiences setting up my first MythTV system.  I'm using
mythtv-backend-0.16-82.2 andmythtv-frontend-0.16-82.2 from AtRPMS on
Fedora Core 3.  Hopefully, it can help others...

No Sound
I'm using alsa (snd_intel8x0), and I couldn't get LiveTV sound to work
through MythTV, though it was working through xmms, tvtime, and the
MythTV sound modules.  I made sure that line in was muted, and was set
as the capture source.  Still no luck.  It turns out that I also needed
to create a .asoundrc file and reboot my machine.  Perhaps it would have
been enough to just reload my alsa modules, but rebooting was easier.  I
used the simplest one for my sound card from the alsa web site.  I don't
know why I needed it - other sound seemed to work without it, but not
MythTV.

Green Video
I started out with 480x480 video, then tried to decrease the resolution
in the recording profiles (for a wireless frontend).  Anything I tried
got me green rectangles in the video.  I read in the Recording (10.5)
section of the howto that "the video4linux subsystem may not like some
height and width parameters".  It took me awhile to find section 21.3 in
(in Miscellaneous) that says what image sizes usually work.  The first
place I looked was troubleshooting, and it wasn't there.  It would be
nice if there was a link to section 21.3 from 10.5.  Or if the MythTV UI
only allowed supported resolutions to be selected, unless there are
valid cases when people would want other sizes.

Purple Video
When I would change some of the video compression settings of the LiveTV
recording profile (the bottom four checkboxes for mpeg4, or recording
quality for rtjpeg), the video would become purple.  To get this to go
away, I had to restart the frontend.  Then, the video would display
correctly with the new settings.  Not that bad, but annoying until I
figured out the need to restart.  I don't know if this is documented
anywhere, but I didn't see it.

Live TV, information
If a program description is too long, only the first few lines are shown
and the rest is cut off.  My cable box (Scientific Atlanta Explorer
2000) has this same issue, but the remote has a button that lets you
scroll the text.  Is there a similar feature in MythTV?

Live TV, browse mode
I can't tell what time or channel number I'm looking at.  I see the
station call letters and the running time of the program, but that's it.
If I move to the left or right, I lose track of what time I'm looking at
pretty quickly.  I know about the EPG, but I'd like to be able to see
this info on screen without bringing up the guide.  Is there a way to
show the time and channel number on the OSD?

In the setting screens, the explanations are cut off
This is similar to the Live TV, information issue above.  I've seen it,
among other places, when I highlight the Enable 4MV encoding checkbox in
the Video Compression screen for MPEG-4.  Is there a way to scroll this
text?

Next, Back and Cancel buttons are cut off
In some windows, the next, back, and cancel buttons are cut off.  Only
the top half of the button is visisble, the bottom half is off the
bottom of the screen.  I only see this on some windows - From the TV
Settings menu, I see it on Program Guide and when looking at individual
Recording Profiles, but not in General or Recording Priorities.  I know
I've seen this on the frontend on my master backend, I don't know that
I've seen it on my remote frontend.


Most other things have gone pretty well, and I must say that the
developers have done a great job with MythTV and as soon as I get a
remote working, I may be replacing my cable box...


Tony