Getting a Skystar 2 PCI to work on a Windows 8 machine (1 Viewer)

[ears]

Hi,

Does anyone have any tips on getting a Skystar S2 PCI card recognised in MediaPortal TV Server?

I'm trying to use the WDM drivers as the BDA drivers cause lots of discontinuities - not an MP thing, it's exactly the same in DVBViewer. The WDM drivers work with DVBViewer though.

The problem manifests itself in MP TV server as the card simply not showing up in the TV cards listed in MP Server when the WDM drivers are installed. If the BDA drivers are installed, the card is visible, but suffers the discontinuity error.

Is there a version of the driver that's known to work? Are there any extra steps I can take to force MP to see the card when WDM drivers are installed? When they're installed it shows up as a network device in device manager.

Thanks in advance for any help.

I've attached a TV Service log file that shows an interesting exception. Surely I'm not that far from having it working?!

 

[mm1352000]

Hello again

I'm trying to use the WDM drivers as the BDA drivers cause lots of discontinuities - not an MP thing, it's exactly the same in DVBViewer. The WDM drivers work with DVBViewer though.

Yep, and the WDM drivers are the right ones to use for MediaPortal.

The problem manifests itself in MP TV server as the card simply not showing up in the TV cards listed in MP Server when the WDM drivers are installed.

Expect it to show as "B2C2 Source".

Is there a version of the driver that's known to work? Are there any extra steps I can take to force MP to see the card when WDM drivers are installed? When they're installed it shows up as a network device in device manager.

I have an old Skystar 2 somewhere and I also remember it was a pain to get it working with the WDM driver. Sorry, it has been awhile since I've used it and I can't remember the steps. However, if it is working in DVBViewer then it should also work in MP... though of course you can only use it in one or other application at any given time. Also, make sure there is no TechniSat software (satellite data/internet) type application running in the background/system-tray.

I've attached a TV Service log file that shows an interesting exception. Surely I'm not that far from having it working?!

Indeed, you're not far.
The problem is this:

[2013-09-09 23:42:53,608] [Log ] [TVService] [ERROR] - ss2: Tuner Type failed:0x91000001

It means TV Server can't detect what type of tuner it is. I'm not sure why the tuner type can't be detected, but as above: make sure the tuner is not being used in other software while you're trying to use it in MP.

mm

 

[ears]

Thanks - I think I've actually had it working at one point ant not realised. There was a B2C2 Mpeg Source tuner available at one point but I mistakenly assumed it was an MP tuner, like the IP and radio ones, decided it still wasn't working then went in and started installing / uninstalling / rolling back and goodness knows what else.

This has helped a lot though - thanks for all your advice. I now know where I need to be, I just have to work out how to get there!

 

[ears]

Me again!

Quick update on this - I installed 4.6 WDM drivers and software and did get the card recognised again. In the server section of TV Setup I had to remove the old instance of the Mpeg 2 source card and restart the server before it would recognise the new instance.

Unfortunately though, it's still delivering a massive number of discontinuities to MP. DVBViewer is now working fine and all other tuners (a Hauppauge PCI DVB-S2 card and a BlackGold 2xDVB-S2/2xDVB-T card) are working very well in MP.

To be honest it's not a big deal, the SkyStar is plugged into a separate LNB, pointed at 19.2, that I just use when there's a Grand Prix on RTL that the BBC don't show. As it's not used regularly and not part of the core set of tuners I'm happy to leave it in DVBViewer and just watch it in there for 2 hours once a month. MP is now happily delivering everything from 28.2.

If anyone does know where I could look to resolve this then please post, but I'm happy with how things are now. Thanks for all your help!

 

[ears]

Quick update - this appears to be resolved and the SkyStar 2 seems to be working in MP.

I read in another thread someone resolved an issue with their DVB-S card by ticking the 'Allow card to be preloaded' option in the card settings so I thought I'd have a go and it appears to have worked, although I have no idea what it's done and why,

Did a quick scan of 19.2e and timeshift works in MP TV server with no discontinuities - better than DVBViewer which always generated 4 or 5 discontinuities when opening a stream on that card.