SAA7130 analog card doesnt work with MP (1 Viewer)

[misterd]

First of all I believe that this card is hardware encoding card, according to the pin names of the graph. Also it seems that the card doesn't provide uncompressed audio and video signals. So the idea of switching to SW-encoding mode won't help.

I think that TvServer has problems with the card is because the connection between TvTuner and the crossbar for audio is missing. One reason why other applications don't have the problems could be that they don't do the connections manually and just let the DriectShow system connect the filters. For several reasons we are not using this approach.

So the problem doesn't have anything if the card is sw- or hw-encoding. There are just many more kinds of possible graphs for analog cards and unfortunately not all are supported by TvServer and also some other cards are failling even if they are normally supported like yours.

MisterD

 

[bendtsen]

I am surprised if this is a hardware encoding card. I will find out by asking the manufacturer. The chip itself is according to official documentation from Philips Semiconductors not capable of that (see previous reply), but the system can be extended to feature hardware encoding. If that is the case with this system/card it's a bargain for less than 30 euros.

What is the crossbar for audio? What functionality does it provide?

Your theory about the comprehensive DirectShow sounds plausible.

Is there anything I can do to create the graph for my card? If I interpret you correctly, we need to add support for this particular card in MediaPortal's TV Server?

Thanks and best regards,

- Mikael

 

[bendtsen]

Hello,

i-loop and misterd: It seems likely that misterd is correct that this is a hardware encoding card although the re-seller couldn't tell. They simply didn't know. I tried to record a TV show from one of the analog channels using honestTech TVR, an application that came with the card. Almost no CPU load (see beginning of thread for my system specs), and result was a .mpg file. So, I guess we are dealing with a cheap hardware encoding MPEG-2 card after all. So most likely the manfacturer of my card (Konig Computer) have added MPEG2 encoding to this card/system as the Philips chip itself is not capable of that.

misterd: I tried to build the graph manually in Microsoft's DirectShow GraphEdit. When attempting to connect the audio pin from the TV tuner to the crossbar the following error was thrown:

These filters cannot agree on a connection. Verify type compatibility of input pin and output pin.

[TRANSLATED SWEDISH TEXT] No combination of intermediate filters could be found to make the connection (Return code: 0x80040217)

I've attached the error message as a JPEG image.

Looking forward to your next reply.

Thanks.

- Mikael

 

[misterd]

Sorry for the late response, but I was quite busy those days.

First of all it is good to know that the card is really a hardware encoding card.

The Crossbar is something like a mixer. As you can see in GraphEdit it has multiple inputs for audio and video. The purpose of this filter is now to select the correct inputs for audio/video depending on your choice. This means it routes the audio and video signal from the tuner to the capture filter or the audio and video input from your CVBS input on the card.

From your picture and your log showed that TvServer isn't able to create a connection for the audio part between the tuner and the crossbar. As you now already found out it doesn't work either in GraphEdit.

You can try only one thing now in GraphEdit: Put all filters into the Graph without connecting them. Then please open the context menu (right-click) of the output pins on the tuner and choose "Render Pin" It would be very interesting to see what happens. So please post a screenshot of the result.

The second thing that you try is to watch TV with the bundled software and than start GraphEdit. Now you could try to "Connect to RemoteGraph" with GraphEdit. This is an option in the Menu of GraphEdit.

MisterD

 

[bendtsen]

Hello again,

Never mind the delay. It is appreciated that you do answer.

I've tried your two suggestions.

Render Pin from the audio output pin on the TV Tuner gave the following error message:

Sorry, the Filter Graph cannot render this pin.

[TRANSLATED FROM SWEDISH]No combination of filters could be found to render the stream. (Return code: 0x80040218)

A screenshot of the error message is attached for reference.

Connect to Remote Graph from the File menu in GraphEdit yielded an empty dialog box titled "Select a remote filter graph to view...". See attached screenshot.

I noticed that C:\Program\honestech\honestech TVR contains the files listed below among other text and executable files. I guess it is the bundled software filters etc.

htAudioTransFilter.ax
htdeinterlacer.ax
HTFileAsync.ax
htmpeg2enc.ax
HTMpegTimeshift.ax
htmpg2video.ax
HTStillCap.ax
HT_Asyncflt.ax
ht_invert.ax

convert.dll
htdmpeg2.dll
htFrequencyTable.dll
HT_DVGet.dll
ht_dvTN.dll
mplex.dll

Looking forward to your next reply.

Thanks and best regards,

- Mikael

 

[misterd]

Can you please look in GraphEdit if there is a TvAudio filter in the desired category within GraphEdit? I expect somehow that there is a filter with a quite strange name. If there is a filter please post the name of it and than I will check the code.

MisterD

 

[bendtsen]

Hello,

I was unsure where to look so I captured screenshots of each category expanded. The filenames are category names, some of them are my own translations if terms are weird or unknown.

Is the filter htAudioTransFilter under the DirectShow category the one we are looking for perhaps?

Please let me know of your findings.

Best regards,

- Mikael

 

[bendtsen]

Eventually I will have the chance to acquire a Hauppauge card instead. Does it matter which one I buy or is every single Hauppauge card with MPEG encoding support in hardware supported by TV Server?

The last thing I heard was that TV Server supported every card, then I've been writing in this thread the last quarter or so.

 

[misterd]

Unfortunately you missed the right category. The right category is called "WDM Streaming Tv Audio" or something similar I guess somehow that the filter name is empty or contains some invalid characters.

Normally the Hauppauge analog Tv cards with a hardware or software encoder work in TvServer. The HD Pvr should work, but some people have problems with it.
I have a HVR-900 and HVR-1300 here and both are working in TvServer. But when Hauppauge released the HVR-2200 we also had to modify TvServer to get it working and broke analog part of the HVR-4000 in the first version So I can't guarantee you that all are working. One of our developers had last week also problems with the HVR-1300 and latest drivers which were related in his case to general problems with the driver and not TvServer.

MisterD

 

[bendtsen]

Ok. I only captured screenshots of non-empty categories. Likely the category you ask for was empty or non-existent. I will check again tomorrow. The cards you have, do they handle analog TV properly? Support encoding in hardware? Are other brands better for analog? If so, which one do you recommend?

I noticed in the documentation for the card that system requirements list a specific processor speed. Thats a bit odd. Why would that matter other than it is needed for software encoding to MPEG? Is the fact I get an .mpg file when recording with the bundled software proof enough? What is the purpose of the .ax files in the bundled software directory? One of the filenames sounds like an abbreviation of MPEG encoder.