New TVE3 plugin: AVM FritzBox / WLAN Repeater DVB-C channel scan helper (4 Viewers)

[morpheus_xx]

AVM FritzBox / WLAN Repeater DVB-C channel scan helper

This is a new plugin for the current "TV Engine 3", which is the version of both main products MP 1.16 and MP 2.1.

What is it about?

The Problem:

• The AVM FritzBox Router 6490 and the WLAN Repeater DVB-C provide a nice feature: they have inbuilt DVB-C tuners (2 / 4) that allow streaming of TV and radio channels. The AVM web configuration allows to scan channels and provide channel lists (.m3u) for HD, SD and Radio channels.
• By default, those playlists are not completely supported by TVE3. Some additonal comments and the kind of pid filtering in the URL prevent a successful channel scan.
• TVE3 also does not yet support the "Sat>IP" standard. And also AVM does not fully support it yet (at least on the WLAN Repeater).

The Solution:

• The plugin detects available FritzBox/Repeater devices in your local network using UPnP/SSDP
• The available .m3u channel lists will be downloaded from detected devices, then processed for proper scanning
• It does a channel scan using DVB-IP cards
• It automatically assigns found channels to all available DVB-IP cards (until the supported number of tuners by the AVM device)

Known Issues:

• Concurrent tuning of 2 channels from one single device is not working. This is a limitation of the AVM devices for which I could not yet find a workaround (concurrent streaming to multiple devices works, though)

How it looks like:

Requirements:

1. You need an AVM FritzBox device with DVB-C streaming support (FritzBox 6490, Fritz WLAN Repeater DVB-C)
2. You have to do a channel scan inside the AVM web interface first

Installation:

1. Extract the attached .zip archive to "C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MP2-Server\Plugins\SlimTv.Service3\Plugins" (MP2 folder)
2. Run "MediaPortal 2 TV Configuration"
3. Enter "Plugins" -> Enable "AVM Tuner Helper" plugin

Available options:

• "Auto map to available tuners": The found channels will be automatically mapped to the number of available tuners of the AVM device. If you did not increase the number of DVB-IP cards yet, enter the TV cards configuration and set the number of DVB-IP tuners.
• "Auto combine channels": If you have already another DVB-C card and channels available, you can add the new DVB-IP details to the existing channel. This saves the manual combination of channels. (new since v 0.2)
  
  
  
  
• "TV Channels SD / HD / Radio": The AVM devices are grouping the available channels into those categories. By enabling/disabling the checkboxes you can define which kind of channels you want to import. Note: the AVM devices only support FTA (Free-To-Air, non-scramled) channels.

Please try it out and post feedback! @Developers @Testers @Designers @DocumentationGroup

Release history:

• 2018-12-13 [v 0.4]:
  • Updated plugin to support FritzOS 7.0 and newer. It modifies the urls to remove "avm=1" argument so that multiple streams can be decoded.
• 2017-04-20 [v 0.3]:
  • Updated plugin for MP1.16 and MP2.1 final releases (not MP2.1 pre2!)
• 2017-03-28 [v 0.2]:
  • Fixed radio channels in TV groups
  • New feature to auto-combine channels with existing DVB-C ones
• 2017-03-27 [v 0.1]: Initial release

 

[catavolt]

Nice one

 

[Helios61]

Hi @morpheus_xx ,
Big thanks for this great improvement. Have made first, quick tests. The plugin is working great. Zapping times seems to be a little bit longer, than with TT DVB/c card, but it is just a first impression. One small glitch i've noticed. In TV-Guide TV- and Radio channels are listed ->

 

[morpheus_xx]

One small glitch i've noticed. In TV-Guide TV- and Radio channels are listed

Thanks for reporting! I checked the code, I have copied an existing bug from DVB-IP scan section
I will fix both, plugin and TVE3 code.

What device do you have? A FritzBox or WLAN Repeater? How much tuners are available?

 

[Helios61]

I will fix both, plugin and TVE3 code.

What device do you have?

Fritz!Box 6490 cable.

How much tuners are available?

1 tuner. Is it possible to add a second one?

 

[morpheus_xx]

My Repeater has 2 tuners, this information is detected from the UPnP service:

Then you can configure so many IPTV cards as the tuner number shows:

But at the moment you most probably won't be able to use them concurrently because of:

Known Issues:

• Concurrent tuning of 2 channels from one single device is not working. This is a limitation of the AVM devices for which I could not yet find a workaround (concurrent streaming to multiple devices works, though)

 

[Helios61]

My Repeater has 2 tuners, this information is detected from the UPnP service:

Did not notice the tuner info. I've also 2 tuner in my fritz!box.

 

[morpheus_xx]

An update was added to first post. Please check changelog for details. Bug with radio channel groups is fixed and a new feature for auto-combining channels was added

 

[Helios61]

Hi @morpheus_xx , all seems to work now fine and as exspected. Ther is one point i've noticed: TV/Plugin Configuration shows 2 tuners, however Fritz!Box GUI shows me 4 tuners ->

BTW, i think this topic should be moved to TV-Server Plugins.

 

[morpheus_xx]

TV/Plugin Configuration shows 2 tuners, however Fritz!Box GUI shows me 4 tuners

Strange, I call the UPnP service that returns the number of services. So I think this is a question I will ask the AVM support as next

Edit: Thread was also moved to TvServer plugins subforum, a reference is kept inside MP2 plugins.