Newbie trying to sort the TV channels (1 Viewer)

[PhilipJ451]

Hi All,
I have been using nextPVR for a while but was getting increasingly annoyed with it so I decided to change to something else, which led me to finding MediaPortal. I've installed MediaPortal1 as it says it has more plugins etc. My TV card may be quite old so I thought it might handle it better, anyway installation has gone smoothly without any problems and it looks great - BUT...
One of the truly annoying problems with nextPVR that drove me to look for a change was "Why can't you get the TV channels in the right order?!!".
I am in the UK and there is a clearly defined order such that BB1 is 1, BBC2 is 2 etc. I believe these are called LCN's and every TV, PVR etc that I have ever owned gets them into this order without fuss or problems, but nextPVR had them all over the place and you have to laboriuosly edit them into the correct order only for this order to be thrown away the next time you do a re-tune. Re-tuning is happening quite often in the UK as the government tries to free up more bandwidth for other services.
Imagine my disappointment when I find that MediaPortal has the same problem!! initially I couldn't even find BBC1, when I looked there were a whole bunch of channels given the number 1000.
Why is it so difficult for programs like nextPVR and MediaPortal to get the channels and put them in the LCN order that everyone knows when all the TVs and PVRs do it?
I have searched forums and websites and tried all the options suggested but none of them seem to work.

Please forgive me for starting off as a newbie with apparent criticism but I really don't understand why it can't be simple...

PhilipJ

 

[CyberSimian]

when I looked there were a whole bunch of channels given the number 1000.

It is easy-peasy to get the channels in the "right" order for Freeview (terrestrial) TV. But your mention of channels with the number 1000 suggests that you are using satellite TV, which I have never used.

This page in the Wiki says this:

The Logical Channel Number (LCN) is only set when a channel is created during scanning. It will not be updated on subsequent scans. When no LCN is found on the network the value 10000 will be used.​

​

Perhaps satellite users in the UK can offer some advice?

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[PhilipJ451]

Hi CyberSimian,
thanks for your reply, no I'm not using Satellite this is plain old FreeView terrestrial broadcast, I mistyped in my last post, the odd number was 10000 so your snip of the Wiki explains the number.
Does make me wonder why on a first scan no LCN was found, these were significant channels like BBC1

anyway, thanks for your comments
PhilipJ

 

[CyberSimian]

no I'm not using Satellite this is plain old FreeView terrestrial broadcast

I have never ever seen an LCN of 10000 (or 1000) for Freeview channels . The quote from the Wiki relates specifically to Freesat channels. Once you are familiar with the procedure, scanning for channels is simple and quick (I rescanned my system yesterday).

What state is your channel list in? Do you have all of the channels that you were expecting, or are some missing?

You can arrange channels into groups if you wish. I have three groups:

• All channels
• Film channels
• News channels

The panel for doing this in "TV Server Config" is the TV Channels panel. The first tab "Channels" lists everything that was found during the scan. But typically you will want to omit certain channels, which you do by deselecting the square box.

There should also be a tab called "All Channels" which lists all of those channels not deselected. You can sort this list by name, or by channel number. This is the order in which the channels will appear in the EPG (TV guide).

The other channel groups (if any) can be ordered differently if you wish. I have "All Channels" ordered by channel number, and "Film Channels" and "News Channels" ordered by name.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[joecrow]

Just a comment that for me in Germany with DVBT2 all channels display a LCN of 10000 and after a scan are arranged in alphabetical order and I need to rearrange them to put my favourites (more important ones) first, given that I don't do the encrypted ones that means just 24 channels so no big deal but I guess in the UK it is a pain. Also note there is the same problem with TV Mosaic at least here in Germany.

 

[CyberSimian]

for me in Germany with DVBT2 all channels display a LCN of 10000 and after a scan are arranged in alphabetical order

Interesting; I did not know that.

In the UK, all of the DVB-T and DVB-T2 channels have channel numbers associated with them (as far as I know), and TV Server extracts these channel numbers from the data stream and can display them in the EPG and use them for sorting.

In locations where it is possible to receive broadcasts from two or more transmitters, it is possible for some channels to have duplicates (i.e. the same channel is received from more than one transmitter). These duplicates will appear in the list of channels, but you end up with two or more channels having the same channel number.

My Sony TV and Humax DVR behave differently, and if they receive duplicate channels, they place the duplicates in the 800-899 range of channel numbers.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[PhilipJ451]

Hi again,
thanks for the comments.
I thought I would try again but the same happens. I specify that I am in the UK and my provider is Sandy Heath, the attached picture shows something of what is happening. I first thought it was all the channels were weirdly numbered but now I understand a bit more it seems everything from Sky Arts (11) to Adult Section (699) is as expected but 31 of them have all been numbered as 10000, not so much of a chore to edit them.
Perhaps it's something wrong with the Sandy Heath transmitter ?, although like you I also have a Sony TV and a Humax PVR and they scan fine, did it the other day because BBC3 came back on air...

regards
PhilipJ

 

[joecrow]

did it the other day because BBC3 came back on air...

Many thanks for that info. I will try and get BBC3 included again in Online Videos Live section.

 

[PhilipJ451]

Hey joecrow,
You're welcome, I didn't know it was coming back either, I just saw something on BBC Breakfast.

PhilipJ

 

[PhilipJ451]

Hey CyberSimian,
I don't know if this is related but:
I mentioned having the same problem in nextPVR, well I went back to that program and found someone saying to change a setting called "ScanDropTime" to give the program more time to capture the LCN numbers. I followed their advice and set it to 6000 (mS I think) and nextPVR got all the channel numbers correctly.
Is it possible that MediaPortal is also scanning the MUX frequencies too quickly and missing LCN numbers for some of them ?
Does MediaPortal also have a setting to tell it how long to stay on any one frequency before scanning on to the next?

PhilipJ