[mythtv-users] PVR-150 users - how did you do it?

[Mark Knecht]

On 5/28/05, Ryan Steffes <rbsteffes at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/22/05, Mark Knecht <markknecht at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Childe,
> >    Thanks very much. I think this is helping. After many problems
> > today I'm back to having at least the test method for the PVR-150
> > correctly storing files using cat and then playing them back using
> > mplayer.
> >
> >    Now I'm trying to get mythsetup done correctly. I'm guessing a bit
> > here. Can you tell me how you set yours up in the backend?
> >
> > 1) Since the PVR-150 is supposed to be a cost reduced version of the
> > 250 I've chosen my capture card type to be a PVR-250/350. Is this what
> > you did?
> >
> > 2) I've set the video device as /dev/v4l/video0 and the tuner as
> > Tuner0. (Do you also have 'Tuner1' as an option?)
> >
> > 3) Under input connections I've set Tuner0->Adelphia (The name of my
> > cable TV service at this location.
> >
> >    This all makes basic sense, but when I try to watch TV I only get a
> > black screen, no audio, and I have to Ctrl-C out of the terminal to
> > get back. I cannot hit escape to exit the watch TV screen.
> >
> >    Help! I think I'm pretty close!
> >
> 
> 
> 
> What exactly did you do to go from here to working?  I think I'm
> getting close to that same point but don't know what to do from here.
> This PVR150 is giving me a run for my money.  I finally got pictures
> and sound from cat /dev/video but got a blackscreen and had to kill X
> when I tried to set mythtv to watch it.
> 
> Any help would be appreciated!
> 

Ryan,
   OK, this is from memory but the following is what I believe I did:

1) Downloaded the development tarball for ivtv from their site:

http://ivtv.writeme.ch/tiki-index.php?page=DownloadIvyTv

Please get the tarball on this page - called ivtv-0.3.3k.tgz

2) Built and installed this using the doc/QuickSetup instructions.
Follow them carefully.

3) Placed the following in my /etc/modules.d/ivtv file:

alias char-major-61 lirc_i2c
alias char-major-81 videodev
alias char-major-81-0 ivtv

options cx25840 no_black_magic=1
options ivtv ivtv_std=0 tuner=50 tda9887=0 ivtv_debug=1
options cx25840 i2c_enable=1
options saa7127 i2c_enable=-1
install ivtv /sbin/modprobe tuner; /sbin/modprobe msp3400;
/sbin/modprobe saa7115; /sbin/modprobe --ignore-install ivtv
remove ivtv /sbin/modprobe -r --ignore-remove ivtv && /sbin/modprobe
-r saa7115 && /sbin/modprobe -r msp3400 && /sbin/modprobe -r tuner

#options ivtv ivtv-debug=0 mpg_buffers=90
#options tuner type=2
#options msp3400 once=1 simple=1 debug=0
#add below ivtv msp3400 saa7115 tuner
#add above ivtv lirc_dev lirc_i2c

Note that the above is distro dependent and might go elsewhere on your
machine. I'm using Gentoo. Basically it's a modprobe.conf entry
somewhere.

4) Updated everything Myth to 18.1. I'm sure that's not necessary but I did.

5) Ensured that the kernel was v4l compatible.

6) Converted the machine to udev from devfs. This is most likely not required.

At this point when I modprobed ivtv I got v4l devices under
/dev/v4l/videoX. With that in place Myth pretty much worked right away
using /dev/v4l/video. Until I had the v4l devices I was able to do the
test capture using /dev/video but I wasn't able to use Myth.

Hope this helps,
Mark