[mythtv-users] FireWire: Comcast removing 5C, channel changing now 100%

[Steven Adeff]

On 4/2/07, Yeechang Lee <ylee at pobox.com> wrote:
> Steven Adeff <adeffs.mythtv at gmail.com> wrote in mythtv-dev:
> > Recently Comcast where I live has removed all signs of 5C over
> > firewire for my box
>
> !!!

tell me about it, I just listened to "Myth Takes", great album....
(sorry, obscure band reference...)
But yes, very cool, just don't spread this, I don't want them "fixing" anything!


> With all due respect to Jim and Daniel, talk about missing the lede!
> Steve, remind me where in the San Francisco Bay area are you?

I'm in a somewhat large city in the North Eastern US.

> Any
> other reports of Comcast or other cable providers recently pulling 5C
> elsewhere in the Bay area or the US (as opposed to the few
> areas/providers, like mine, that never had it)? Perhaps customer
> complaints really are making a difference after all.

I'm hoping it wasn't just a mistake on the part of their engineers,
but I confirmed it on both of my DCT6200's.


> And speaking of FireWire, and while I have Jim Westfall on the line:
> Since upgrading to Fedora Core 6 back in November, *I have not had a
> single malformed channel change with FireWire*, contrary to my
> previous experience for the previous 12 months
> (<URL:http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/237307#237307>).
> As can be imagined, it took a few weeks to notice the sudden lack of
> trouble in this regard, and then I waited additional months to see if
> the behavior would ever recur; in thousands of subsequent recordings
> it has not. Since everything else (cable boxes, database, FireWire
> configuration in mythtv-setup, use of firewire_tester, 0.20-fixes)
> remained the same, I can only conclude that some FireWire-related
> system library or kernel module that got upgraded between Fedora Core
> 4 and Core 6, turned out to be the cause of the trouble all along.

Since using single packet method in 6200ch I've had one bad channel
change on the cumulative use of both my DCT6200's in the last 127+
days. Thats an average of about 10-15 recordings total per day. One on
a 2.6.16 kernel, the other on a 2.6.19 kernel.

I've installed SVN (to get the firewire features that were in the
mythtv-firewire branch but had since been merged) and if all goes well
will switch to using firewire for my currently PVR-150 connected
DCT6200 box (after a kernel upgrade on my master backend). In my
limited tests Sunday it seems to work a good deal better than
0.20-fixes for firewire recordings for me (I had lots of problems
before), making my firewire HDTV recordings as good as my ATSC tuner
cards (I have signal issues that Comcast refuses to fix that cause bad
packets every so often, worse during prime time...). I don't know what
method SVN head uses for channel changes, but hopefully it continues
to work properly for me.

That said, I love being able to record InHD and MTV-HD, I'm recording
as much live concerts as I can in case Comcast decides to take this
all away from me...
oh and being able to record sports on ESPNHD and ESPN2HD and
basketball on TNTHD is awesome as well, especially with the start of
MLS only 5 days away.
oh, and Planet Earth in 1080i on DiscoveryHD is amazing, highly recommended!


-- 
Steve
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