[mythtv-users] Everything works on my rebuilt DVR except the tuner cards. Help?

[Jay Ashworth]

----- Original Message -----
> From: "Rajil Saraswat" <rajil.s at gmail.com>

> On 24 Sep 2013 21:54, "Jay Ashworth" <jra at baylink.com> wrote:
> >
> > > From: "Eric Sharkey" <eric at lisaneric.org>
> >
> > > It sounds like an ivtv problem to me. Since the problem is
> > > affecting
> > > both cards (right?) it is unlikely to be hardware, but both cards
> > > are
> > > using the same driver.
> >
> 
> This may or may not be of useful but ivtv beyond version 1.4.1 broke my
> pvr-500 cards. I am running gentoo too and had to downgrade to 2.6.35
> kernel which has the 1.4.1 ivtv version.
> Further details can be seen here
> http://ivtvdriver.org/pipermail/ivtv-users/2013-September/010462.html

Well, in fact the first thing I did when I got here was to confirm that
it was still broken.

And it's not.  Well, almost.

I checked a program which was recording, and it was actually synced
and chroma-locked, and had good audio.  So I checked the recordings
it was left to do overnight last night.  And most of *them* were also
ok, though a couple showed the impulse noise we get on some lower
channels -- which used to be visible on the TV set, but not on the
tuners; I'm going to tentatively attribute that part to the temporarily
unterminated port on the 4-port splitter.

So then I started 2 more recordings, to make sure that my fourth 
entry into LiveTV would bounce for lack of a tuner, and it did, and
I checked all three recordings.

The first one was again acceptable, the second one... locked up the
player for a few seconds, though I had audio; no control response.
The third one was also acceptable.  

I am seeing an unusual amount of MPEG artifacting in the shadows; I
need to check the encoding rate I have set, which is likely lower than
it used to be, since I deleted all the capture cards when I reset.

But this is looking more and more like it really is "Crappy Signal",
rather than a configuration or driver problem.  Damn.  I really need
to buy a calibrated CATV sweep meter, I guess.

It appears I can actually get one of those for under $200.  That's worth
it to me.

My thanks, and apologies, to those who have chimed in to help; it 
sorta looks like I was wasting your time.  :-}  I think I'm going to 
start by calling Bright House and arranging to meet the guy and show
me what he reads on his meter.

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                  Baylink                       jra at baylink.com
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