[mythtv-users] Mythtv DVD changer integration

Fri Mar 25 02:26:05 UTC 2005

Any information you could forward regarding the 985v
upgrade would be greatly appreciated.  I have the same
model.  That would make for some more reliable
integration.  In the meantime, I think that the
irblaster/lirc solution would be easier to manage (at
least for me). 
So, I'm a little unclear.. Are you using the mythvideo
interface to keep the list of movies for your dvd
changer?  And if so, what happens when you select a
movie?

As for the switching of video inputs, that's what I
would prefer to do as running it through the myth
system would affect the quality and I will be
connecting the dvd player to the tv with component
cables, eventually.  

Thanks for the input!

 -Ben Norling
--- Scott Kirkpatrick <skirkpatrick at charter.net>
wrote:

---------------------------------
    This is the original reason I started looking at
MythTV.  I have a SonyDVP-CX985V 400 disc changer
(I've still got my old 200 disc model thatI grew out
of) and I hate the UI.  I wanted a better method
ofcateloging and finding my DVD's.  The higher end
Sony 700ES has aserial port that you can use to
control it and supposedly, you getinstantaneous
control, not this stupid thing where when you select
aDVD, it plays all the nonsense at the beginning not
allowing you tostop it and go to the menu.  I was
reading another list somewhere wherethey found that
the internals of the 700ES was the same as the 985,
infact they upgraded the 985's firmware with the
version that went in the700ES and got almost all of
the 700ES features.  I cracked my case andI think I
see where the serial port would interface to but I
haven'tbeen able to Google any hardware hacks for it. 
When I get a chance,I'll trace the signals on that
connector and see if it is the serialport.

With my current setup, the DVD changer and the
digitial cable receiverfeed into an A/V receiver.  The
problem is that I don't want to have toswitch the A/V
receiver's inputs to select a DVD.  I'd like to run
theDVD into a PVR-150's SVIDEO input and the digital
receiver into anotherSVIDEO input and let MythTV be
the A/V receiver.  Not only will thisallow me to not
have to mess with the feeds but also allows a
2ndfront-end to access the DVD changer, making the DVD
changer not a lotdifferent than the video library in
MythTV (although only one FE cancontrol it at a time).

I was thinking more along the lines of modifying the
video database tostore the DVD location (multiple
changers also?) and modify MythVideofor the new
capability.  This is, of course, what I'd like to do,
I'mjust not sure how long it will take me to get there
:)

Scott

Ben Norling wrote:  
--- kedlm at charter.net wrote:  

   I am planning to use the video section of mythtv   

to    

manage my dvd collection in my 400 disc dvd      

changer.     

I also want the myth system to control the dvdchanger.

Sounds neat; what DVD changer do you have? I'vethought
about this myself.    

I have a 400 disc sony dvd changer.  

  What I planned was this: Put text files in the video
section of the hard      

drive    

on the myth system containing the disc number of      

the    

movie.  When the movie is selected instead of      

running    

mplayer, a program will launch which sends ir      

codes to    

the dvd player if it's a DVD movie.        

I do something similar.  For mythvideo and mythdvd
Ihave a small bash script that runs instead
ofxine/mplayer directly.  It looks at the extention
ofthe file it was passed to do different things: playa
file in mplayer or xine, play a list of files,play an
entire dir.You could easily do something like that and
have itdo "something" if it sees "some cool
movie.changer"for instance.    

Otherwise it willlaunch mplayer with the name of the
file.  I'd      

also    

like a program that would intercept IR codes from     

the    

remote and translate them and re-send them to the     

DVD    

player so I can use the myth remote for the
dvdchanger.      

I'm not sure what codes you need to intercept/send:
pause/rew/ff/left/right/up/down/select/menu/stop?    

Those are pretty much the codes I would want
tointercept.  The goal here being that you use the
mythremote to control the dvd player much the same way
asyou would the movies played from files.   All a
partof the wife-proofing effort of my system.  

I'm sure you can do this pretty easily from whatI've
done with LIRC.  My system includes a receiver and
blaster and youcould hook them together with a shell
script or Cprogram.But this brings up another
question: where does thevideo/audio from this thing
go?  into avideo/audio-in in the computer? (not really
worth itunless you want to record it; it won't look as
good)or directly into the tv and you need to have the
tvswitch inputs when the changer plays? (sounds
morelikely; but are you going to IR blast the TV
toswitch back and forth?)    

Yes, the blaster would be switching the input on a
AVreceiver when switching to a DVD movie versus a
filemovie.  When you're done watching the movie, you
hitthe exit button on the remote (Or whatever) and
their-blaster stops the dvd player and switches
thereceiver back to the myth input and exits from
the"special" program.  The whole goal of all of this
isto have as seamless an integration as possible. 
Bythe way, what IR blaster are you using?  

Sounds interesting; I may want to setup the samething.

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