CableCARD tuner support for MediaPortal 1 (8 Viewers)

[mm1352000]

Is the patch needed with 1.5?

No, but I would recommend this patch on top of MP 1.5 PR:
https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...for-mediaportal-1.112585/page-55#post-1023526

...for stability.

 

[elliottmc]

Is the patch needed with 1.5?

Shouldn't be, but 1.5 isn't out yet.

This isn't in the 1.5 Pre Release.

 

[Sigpi007]

@mm1352000 ... providing update on usage experience. Unfortunately I thought things were good, but it turns out MP is just dying a slow death on my HTPC and I can't isolate the cause.

I've running the 1.5PR with the extra patch to stabilize things... and have disabled HTPCInfo and also recently disabled FanartHandler due to some recent comments of it having issues with 1.5PR. Anywho... I've been seeing the TVservice run fairly stable (around 50 - 80 MB in memory) but I'm now seeing the MediaPortal process consume a lot more memory than is typical (with typical = 100MB... but more recently seeing 300MB usage in memory). Generally, when the MediaPortal process mem usage is this high, this is when I'm encountering really slow response times to anything in the MP GUI... to the point of locking up completely. This includes channel changing and menu navigation. While I encountered this, I noticed some issues detecting the Ceton Eth 6 tuners, but not sure if this is related or if this is a symptom of me rebooting the PC after MP locked up on me.

Reason I'm writing is because I'm not sure if this is related to the CableCard tuner functionality with the TVservice, or if this is more related to 1.5PR in general and perhaps some incompatibility with some plugins. Figured I'd post some logs and see if you (or anyone else) would have advice for what might be causing the lockups.

Thanks!

 

[Sigpi007]

Follow-up to above... I'm attaching a file that doesn't seem to get included in the export of logs... and I noticed it indicated difficulties with "RTSP" protocol (calling it "unsupported"). I read up on this briefly, but I'm still not really familiar with this. Is there any chance RTSP could be part of the problem?

 

[twemperor]

Is the patch needed with 1.5?

Shouldn't be, but 1.5 isn't out yet.

This isn't in the 1.5 Pre Release.

Just to confirm the obvious- no patches are necessary with 1.5 final that came out today?

Congratulations on getting this amazing feature out there!

 

[Sigpi007]

No, but I would recommend this patch on top of MP 1.5 PR:
https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/t...for-mediaportal-1.112585/page-55#post-1023526

Did we ever confirm if this extra patch is included in 1.5 final? I'm still running the PR version and would like to upgrade.

 

[twemperor]

I've been running 1.5 Final for a couple of weeks, and it runs just fine (no patch). I'm surprised that the thread has been so quiet, so it must be working for everyone else too.

The only issue I'm still having is when starting a new stream (recording or live tv) on a tuner with the same channel. It happens rare enough, and easy enough to work around, that I can still use 1.5 Final on my production machine.

 

[mediacowboy]

Mm,

First i want today think you so much for this path. I am still using 1.4. My question is, is there anyway to detects if a program is copy once or copy freely an then display a message when running to that program?

 

[mm1352000]

Hello everyone

Long time no news - sorry. Please take it as a sign that I've been really busy with stuff coming down the pipeline.

Did we ever confirm if this extra patch is included in 1.5 final? I'm still running the PR version and would like to upgrade.

No, we didn't manage to get the patch included. I still consider the patch work-in-progress/incomplete. Unfortunately the communication channels with both Silicondust and Ceton have gone quiet. Admittedly that is just as much my fault as anybody else's - I haven't had a lot of time to chase up questions. I know I need to follow up but have a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes just at the moment. I'll see what I can do about a patch for 1.5... though I note that I don't want to be in a position where I need to provide a patch for each new version of MP. That quickly multiplies into a lot of work even if it is technically not difficult.

I've been running 1.5 Final for a couple of weeks, and it runs just fine (no patch). I'm surprised that the thread has been so quiet, so it must be working for everyone else too.

The quiet has been nice from my perspective - I'm taking it as a good sign.
I note that the download count in the first post continues to creep up even though the patches are obsolete. Not sure if that is a sign that people are confused or haven't yet upgraded.
Are you back to using PBDA?

The only issue I'm still having is when starting a new stream (recording or live tv) on a tuner with the same channel. It happens rare enough, and easy enough to work around, that I can still use 1.5 Final on my production machine.

Yeah, and that's the thing I have to follow up with Silicondust and Ceton. Appreciate your patience.

First i want today think you so much for this path.

No problem.

I am still using 1.4. My question is, is there anyway to detects if a program is copy once or copy freely an then display a message when running to that program?

When you say "program" do you really mean it in the sense of a show or movie... or do you mean for a channel?
Short answer: I could be wrong but I think we're pretty much in a position of "tune and hope".

Long answer:
The ways that we can interact with the "tuner" are strictly limited. The most interesting thing we can do is to ask it to tune channels. Yes, there is a DRM "handshaking" interface which would enable us to authenticate and get access to protected content. However, we don't use that at all. We simply say "tune channel X" and start timeshifting/recording the stream if it arrives.

This is a weird system compared with what I'm used to. We talk to the tuner and the tuner talks to the CableCARD; we never talk directly to the CableCARD. That's awkward because the CableCARD is the element of the system with access to the information about what we can and can't do. The tuner interface restricts our ability to ask the sorts of questions that we're all interested in like: "hey, what is the CCI status on channel X?" or "can you tell us if we can record show A?". It acts as a weird go-between/slave/enforcer-of-DRM.

If you look at the specifications (OC-SP-DRI and OC-SP-CCIF) and search for "copy freely", "copy once" etc. you won't find any references... and that is the thing that confused me a bit to begin with. As I understand it, the incoming streams are encrypted and tagged with this information. When WMC or other software authenticates with a CableCARD, the CableCARD doesn't actually decrypt and spit out the stream - decrypts and re-encrypts into a compatible DRM system which will enforce equivalent restrictions. This is distinctly different to what the CableCARD does when we interact with it. For us, the CableCARD simply decrypts when the flags are "copy freely" and doesn't decrypt when the flags are not "copy freely". That's a roundabout way of saying that from a MediaPortal perspective there is no such thing as "copy freely", "copy once", "copy never" etc. We either get the stream or we don't.

As far as I know the best we can do to determine whether we would be allowed to decrypt a channel is to call the GetEntitlement() function from the CAS service. The result from that function gives an indicator whether we'd be allowed access to a channel at the time the request is made (ie. we can't ask about a movie that starts in 2 hours time). The indicator (DescramblingStatus) values are:

• unknown
• possible
• possible (purchase dialogue)
• possible (technical dialogue)
• not possible (no entitlement)
• not possible (technical reason)

My understanding is that the result comes in a roundabout way from the CableCARD. We never actually say whether we intend to record or timeshift. The CableCARD looks at the channel; if we're not authenticated (which we're not) then it only returns "possible" if the channel stream is currently marked "copy freely".

Does that make any sense?

mm

 

[mediacowboy]

mm,

Thank you for the reply. Yes that all makes sense. I did some more research after i asked here and what i found out is the type restriction/encryption i was seeing is normally a analog protection method called CGMS. Why that is affecting the cable card but not my digital tv card (Clear QAM) is probably a issue with my tv provider or silicon dust for even checking for that type encryption. But i do appreciate the answer and i like the idea if being notified if a channel is still encrypt or not when i tune but i am not going to ask for that. I have been reading other threads and i know work is on going with TV Engine 3.5 so that fact that everything is working as should be right now is awesome. Plus I'm still trying to get the waf factor.