[mythtv-users] HD Hiomerun works better in HDHomeRun viewer than MythTV

[John Pilkington]

On 02/01/2019 15:50, Don Brett wrote:
> On 12/31/2018 4:57 PM, John Pilkington wrote:
>> On 31/12/2018 20:07, Don Brett wrote:
>>> On 12/31/2018 2:50 PM, James Abernathy wrote:
>>>>
>>>> On 12/31/18 2:36 PM, Don Brett wrote:
>>>>> On 12/30/2018 9:36 PM, Stephen Worthington wrote:
>>>>>> On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 15:32:07 -0500, you wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On 12/30/2018 2:40 PM, Don Brett wrote:
>>>>>>>> I have a roof mounted antenna and my house is within 3-5 miles 
>>>>>>>> of all
>>>>>>>> the local channels.  Signal strengths are very good. Shows are 
>>>>>>>> always
>>>>>>>> pixelated in MythTV, some worse than others, but it happens on 
>>>>>>>> pretty
>>>>>>>> much every show.   On a whim, I tried the HDHomeRun viewer, 
>>>>>>>> which is
>>>>>>>> supplied by Silicon Dust, everything looks perfect. Is there a 
>>>>>>>> mythtv
>>>>>>>> update or setting I should be looking at?  Any suggestions on 
>>>>>>>> how to
>>>>>>>> diagnose?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Don
>>>>>> Is it a recording problem or a playback problem?  Find one of the
>>>>>> recordings that gives pixellation in MythTV and use the I key to show
>>>>>> the "Recorded File", then find that file in your storage groups. Then
>>>>>> use other player software to play the file (eg VLC, mplayer). If
>>>>>> possible, use the HDHomerun software to play the file.  Is it
>>>>>> pixellated when played by other software?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> What version of MythTV are you running?  What is your video hardware?
>>>>>> What drivers are you using?  What settings are you using for playback
>>>>>> in mythfrontend?  What sort of recordings are you making - are they
>>>>>> MPEG2 video, H.264, ...?  Are these DVB-T, ATSC, or something else?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> When the pixellation happens, do you also get audio blips around the
>>>>>> same time?  Is the pixellation just occasional, or frequent? Is it
>>>>>> regular (eg every 15 seconds)?  Does it vary in how long it lasts for
>>>>>> before normal picture is restored?
>>
>>>>>>
>>>>> HDHomeRun doesn't allow playback unless I buy their DVR license, so 
>>>>> I can't try it that way. 
>>>>
>>>> The HDHR view that you download from their site will work for OTA 
>>>> channels without cost. You only pay if you sign up for their DVR or 
>>>> Premium service
>>>>
>>> Yes, that's where I started, using the  HDHR viewer to see live OTA 
>>> channels.  It looks great in their viewer, but not in MythTv.  As a 
>>> test, I was trying to playback a MythTV recorded show (from file) in 
>>> the HDHR viewer, but can't without the license.
>>>
>>
>> It's my understanding that myth records and plays back the datastream 
>> from the tuner without attempting to correct anything out-of-spec. VLC 
>> playback is probably the same.  Your story suggests that the HDHR 
>> player might be massaging a corrupt stream before display.  If your 
>> recordings are in mpeg2 format, mythtranscode (for example) might be 
>> worth a try.
>>
>> John P
>>

>> MythTV Forums: https://forum.mythtv.org
> Yes, that's what I was wondering, maybe the HDHR viewer has something 
> that does fix-ups on bad packets; or, maybe just drops them under some 
> set of rules.  I posted a question on the SiliconDust forum, maybe they 
> will come up with something.
> 
> Don
> 
I made that suggestion of a corrupt stream because long ago I used to 
get unexplained failures when creating DVDs with mytharchive. When I 
used Project-X as a demuxer the failures stopped, and loss of lipsync 
stopped too.  I never knew exactly what the original problem was.

I still use Project-X in my mythDVBcut script to post-process most of my 
mpeg2 recordings, but I believe that its re-multiplexer fails with 
higher-than-DVD bitrates;  it has an option to create mkv files, but 
that has probably bitrotted by now.   And I doubt that you really want a 
solution that involves post-processing.

John