[mythtv-users] software tuner and pvr-150 in the same system

Brian Wood beww at beww.org
Mon Apr 17 20:56:37 UTC 2006


On Apr 17, 2006, at 2:19 PM, Raphael Pooser wrote:

> Howdy folks.  Haven't been around this list for a while.  Mythtv
> maintenance has been on the backburner for me now that things are  
> mostly
> working.
> However after searching it doesn't seem like anyone has discussed  
> this.
> I just upgraded to a pvr-150 and it works like a dream.  The general
> howto in the ivtv wiki is the definitive way to go for me; works in  
> any
> distro, and was the only howto that worked for me.  Ok I guess that  
> was
> some kind of plug for the ivtv wiki howto... sheesh.
> Anwyay, Now I have my old ATI TV Wonder pro just sitting there.
> I was wondering if I could get the two tuners to coexist.  So far,  
> it's
> trivial to have both working in linux; they do, nothing preventing
> that.  But having both tuners defined in mythtv causes some...  
> problems.
> Basically the way myth is set up it will select video0 to watch  
> live TV,
> or it will select the lower priority tuner to watch Live TV if another
> tuner has a higher priority to be reserved for recording and you've  
> got
> the option enabled in the myth settings.
> Problem is, I can watch live TV with either card, but can't record  
> with
> either of them.  Recordings basically confuse the hell out of the
> backend and it sits there doing nothing.  Tells me it's recording,  
> shows
> me a file in my recorded programs list.  But the file is zero bytes  
> big
> and trying to select it crashes mythtv.  Telling it to stop recording
> also has no effect, the backend goes on thinking it is recording  
> until I
> kill it.  Restart it and boom, it continues recording nothing.  Do
> mythtv-setup and remove one of the cards, and magically it can record
> and watch liveTV without problems, and I can delete the "fake"
> problematic recording without crashing.
>
> So, for now I obviously have the software tuner disabled and am using
> the pvr-150.  Anyone know if it's possible to have the software and
> hardware tuners working at the same time?
> Forgot to mention, the software tuner uses the cx88 driver, and I'm
> using 0.18.1.
> It's not a huge deal, but would be nice not to have the software  
> card go
> to waste now that it's deprecated.  Thanks all.
> Raphael


There is nothing inherently wrong with having a PVR and a "software"  
tuner in the same system. I used an HD-3000 and a PVR-350 together  
and it worked fine, but I was using the V4L drivers for the HD-3K.

You want to make sure that you have the recording profiles for the SW  
tuner set to something sane, if you are low on horsepower don't try  
MPEG-4, use rTJpeg.

If you can watch live TV with a card then you can record it, because  
that's what you are watching in LiveTV - a recording. You might want  
to check your "default" recording profile because that's what will be  
used for a recording.

Also have a look at your logs, might give you a clue as to what's  
happening.


More information about the mythtv-users mailing list