[mythtv-users] no channel lock - live TV

[Krzysztof Adamski]

I have the same problem with Myth locking onto some channels, yet when I
run the Windows program HDHomeRun Config GUI it has no problem tuning
and showing the same channels using VLC.
It seems that Myth isn't as good at extracting the signal from the HDHR
as it could be.

K

On Thu, 2008-01-05 at 10:02 -0400, Jay Summet wrote:
> I'm going to assume you are using a HTDV tuner, with an Over the Air
> (OTA) antenna.  (Because that's what I have...)
> 
> I ran into this problem with weak signals. MythTv has a setting (I think
> it's in the backend, and you have to use mythtv-setup to access it) for
> how many MS/seconds to wait before giving you the error message. By
> default it is around 2 or 3 seconds. I upped mine to 5 seconds and for
> those hard-to-tune channels it would allow my Silicon Dust HDTV tuner to
> lock onto the channels before Myth gave the error message. So try making
> that timeout longer and see if it helps.
> 
> Bigger picture, if a weak signal is indeed your problem, you need to
> improve the signal. (I live close to transmitters, but had the problem
> when trying to use an indoor antenna. As soon as I mounted the antenna
> outdoors, the Silicon Dust box locked onto signals much faster.)
> 
> Side Note: You can get a signal that is TOO STRONG! If you live near a
> transmitter and have a good outdoor antenna, you can get a signal with
> 100% signal strength, but that suffers from noise (due partially to
> multi-path reflections, and partially to the fact that the signal is
> overpowering the tuner).  This will exhibit itself as a channel that
> tunes in quickly, but sometimes has "glitches" when the SNR drops to
> 20-30% range (while the signal strength remains at 100%).  So, if
> anybody has great reception (100% signal strength on all channels) but
> is suffering from glitches on one or two of the channels, you may
> actually want to weaken your signal!  I did this with a 16db attenuator.
> (I bought various attenuators: 3, 6, 10, and 16db and it turns out that
> the 16db attenuator worked the best! I wasn't expecting to have to
> attenuate the signal that much!) I can still receive all of the channels
> I had before, and the glitches have disappeared from the one that was
> causing me problems.
> 
> Jay
> 
> 
> 
> Nick Petrik wrote:
> > Hi All,
> > 
> > I have seen many posts about this issue but no answers that would help me to get this issue solved. 
> > 
> > I have successfully scanned the channels using MYTHTV. I also know that the card works because it works with other progs such as kaffeine.
> > 
> > But everytime I want to watch live TV in Mythtv I get the message telling me that I should have got a channel lock by now. Nothing more. Is there anything I might have missed? Thanks for your help / Nick
> 
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