[mythtv-users] ADS Tech PTV-305--cx88-blackbird encoder not working in MythTV

[Michael Basus]

I recently got an ADS Tech Instant TV Deluxe PCI PTV-305 
(http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php/ADS_Tech_Instant_TV_Deluxe_-_PTV305), 
which uses the cx88-blackbird chip for hardware MPEG2 encoding.  
MythTV-setup recognizes the analog capture function of the card in 
/dev/video0, but switching to MPEG2 encoder cards it says "Failed to Open".  
I can manually type in /dev/video1, which is the blackbird chip's device 
number, and it correctly displays the card's name followed by 
"(cx88-blackbird)".

I set up channels and input devices as normal and run mythfilldatabase.  
When I try to "Watch TV", I get a black screen for about 15 seconds and I 
get returned to the menu.  I never get "1:Television" or any OSD stuff.  If 
this was a simple failure to tune, I'd expect to see the OSD channel display 
and lots of static.  It seems that the device is failing to open via MythTV.

I believe my drivers and firmware are correct because after running this 
command: "v4l2-ctl -d 1 -f 61.25 --set-ctrl=mute=0" to tune to channel 3, I 
can run mplayer /dev/video1 and see and hear a perfect video stream.  I read 
in some places that you need the IVTV firmware to use this card, but in 
other places I read that IVTV doesn't support the cx88-blackbird chip at 
all.  And I've also read that my OS, Ubuntu Feisty, automatically comes with 
IVTV drivers and firmware.

I'm running a fresh install of Ubuntu Feisty and the MythTV .20 
frontend/backend.  This same hardware setup recently had a different capture 
card and was working fine.

In my mythbackend.log file, I get the following:


TVRec(1): Changing from None to WatchingLiveTV
TVRec(1): HW Tuner 1->1
MPEGRec(/dev/video1) Error: Can't open video device.
eno: Device or resource busy (16)


This error is the exact same talked about in the AverMedia M150-D wiki entry 
(http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php/AVerMedia_M150-D):

"The card's most serious problem is its unreliability; in tests with 
2.6.19.1 and 2.6.19.2 kernels, the card is mostly reliable, but sometimes 
produces 0-length recordings. When this happens, the 
/var/log/mythtv/mythbackend.log file contains Can't open video device and 
Device or resource busy (16) errors. When using a 2.6.20 kernel or the 
latest (March 2, 2007) v4l drivers, MythTV always creates 0-length files."

If I fall under that category of always creating 0-length files, what can I 
do?

Thanks,

-Mike

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