[mythtv-users] Dutch digital cable (was Re: Problem with mythfilldatabase and home-brew grabber)

Chris Rouch chris.rouch at gmail.com
Tue Sep 12 12:43:47 UTC 2006


On 9/11/06, Ian Macdonald <ian at caliban.org> wrote:
> On Mon 11 Sep 2006 at 17:32:29 +0200, you wrote:
>
> > What hardware are you using to interface mythtv to Dutch digital
> > cable? Do you have a decoder card in your PC or are you using the
> > supplied settop box and feeding the analog output to a normal capture
> > card? I don't have (Casema) digital yet, because I didn't think I
> > could make it work with mythtv.
>
> I'm using the Thomson DCI-52UPC set-top box that UPC doles out to its
> digital customers.
>
> It has only SCART + 2 x RCA (tulp) output, so I have a switchable
> input/output SCART to S-Video connector that I use to feed S-Video into
> the Hauppauge PVR-350.
>
> The RCA outputs feed audio into a 3.5 mm stereo jack converter. From
> there, a 3.5 mm stereo cable connects to the PVR-350.
>
> This set-up is not ideal, but it works.

Thanks for the info. That sounds more or less the same as the standard
casema box. Do you use an irblaster or similar to change channels?

>
> If UPC really cared about their customers, the Thomson box would have an
> RS232 port that could be used to change its channel. They'd also allow
> you to have more than one set-top box per household and use higher
> bit-rates for all of their channels, some of which look like Internet
> clips intended for ISDN users.

I'm not suprised there's no rs232. Casema at least have gone for the
cheapest possible box, to make the package attractive. I didn't
realise there was a limit to the number of boxes you could have - I'd
have thought if you're prepared to pay for it there shouldn't be a
problem providing it. After all many (most even) households have two
or more analog TVs.

> In short, if the Casema box has a useable auxilliary line out and the
> ability to change channels, either via a serial connection or by IR, you
> can make it work with MythTV.
>
> At that point, you might find yourself in the same position as me,
> namely needing to write your own XMLTV grabber, because both the
> standard Dutch one and the popular drop-in replacement written in Python
> both use tvgids.nl as their source, and that has data for only a limited
> number of channels.

I think I'm going to hold off until I can either get a card for my PC
(this might be possible now, but I don't know which) or until they
switch off the analog signal. I have far more tv recorded than I will
ever watch, so it's not like I need the extra channels.

Chris


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