[mythtv-users] Bad PVR-350--how to test?

steve networks1 at cox.net
Sat Sep 5 22:18:11 UTC 2009


Greg,

Thanks for the help.  Yeah, I did try power down and hard reboot.  

It passes all your tests, at least I don't see anything in lsmod or dmesg
that looks like an error.  I can't get the cat dump to play in media player
because it says I don't have the right decoders installed, but the file
contains binary data.

So here's the deal:  Stuff I have recorded on MythTV will play fine when I
have the xorg.conf configured to play back through the built in VGA card.
But when I have it configured to use the PVR-350 as the playback device
(thru the S-video output to my TV monitor) it doesn't work (black screen).
Under that config I also get some odd goings-on at boot up, namely in
/var/log/messages I also 

localhost kernel: ivtv0-osd warning: ivtvfb_check_var
localhost kernel: ivtv0-osd warning: ivtvfb_check_var
localhost kernel: ivtv0-osd warning: ivtvfb_set_par
localhost kernel: ivtv0-osd warning: ivtvfb_check_var
localhost kernel: ivtv0-osd warning: ivtvfb_set_par

Which I do not get when xorg.conf is set up for built-in VGA output.


> On Sat, 05 Sep 2009 13:27:34 -0600, Greg wrote:

>On Sat, 2009-09-05 at 11:46 -0700, steve wrote:
>> Hello.  After a recent thunderstorm, it appears that my Hauppauge
>> PVR-350 has crapped out.  Does anyone know of a test I can do to
>> verify that it?s dead and there is not some other problem?
>
># lsmod | grep ivtv
>
>Is the module loaded? If not, try "modprobe ivtv" to load it.
>
># dmesg | grep -i ivtv
>
>See if the kernel is seeing the card and the module is loading.
>
>Then try:
>
># cat /dev/video0 > pvr350.tst
>
>(Wait a few seconds, then interrupt)
>
>See if you get anything in the output file, and if any video players
>(such as "mplayer"). 
>
>If you see the modules being loaded, the card detected, and it passes
>the "cat" test, it's not the card.
>
>I presume that you have tried the brute force hardware repair method of
>shutting down, completely turning off the power and rebooting? It's not
>impossible that a power surge could corrupt some hardware registers
>without actually blowing the card, and that MIGHT be fixed with a hard
>reset. Worth a try anyway.
>
>--Greg





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