One channel not working. (1 Viewer)

[mores369]

Hey all,
I recently upgraded to "good" cable through Charter, and all of the channels are working except one - Disney Junior. It works fine through HDHomerun, which is weird. Attached are the log files showing what's going on. Disney Junior is the last thing I tried before the log files were created. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks!

 

[mm1352000]

Hi

First, I'm not sure if you're aware but MediaPortal is currently only using one of your tuners. That's because TV Server thinks the other one is being used by other software:
[2016-06-05 19:05:32,750] [Log ] [4 ] [ERROR] - Exception :TvLibrary.TvExceptionGraphBuildingFailed: DRI CC: tuner appears to be in use

If that's accurate, I suggest you disable (untick) tuner 5 in TV Server's tuner list.
If that's not accurate, you ought to reboot the tuner then restart MediaPortal's TV Server.
Either way, you'll save at least 2 seconds on each channel change.

Now to the problem at hand...
Is your cable provider Charter?
...and do you have a tuning adaptor/resolver (little black box) connected to the tuner?

 

[mores369]

Yes, Charter is my cable provider, and yes, we have a tuning adapter/resolver. It's a Motorola MTR700, if that matters.
I did notice only one was on on the HDHomeRun. It was working perfectly a while ago...maybe something weird happened.
Okay, tuning adapter restarted. Other channels are starting faster, for sure. No luck on channel 689, Disney Junior.

 

[mm1352000]

Yes, Charter is my cable provider, and yes, we have a tuning adapter/resolver.

Right, okay.

What's happening is that Charter is providing Disney Junior via switched digital video (SDV). That means it wouldn't be tunable without the tuning adaptor/resolver. As a result of SDV, the tuning parameters can (and do) change relatively frequently. Unfortunately TV Server isn't able to handle that very well at the moment. Each time the tuning parameters change, the channel will stop working. The only way to make the channel work again is to scan it in again.

Note that all the other working channels you tested are not provided via SDV. I can see this in the log files because SDV channels all have frequency 997250:
[2016-06-05 19:05:54,389] [Log ] [4 ] [INFO ] - atsc:Tune:ATSC:tv:Cable DISNEY JR HD EAST Freq:997250 ONID:23969 TSID:0 SID:2689 PMT:0x0 FTA:False LCN:158 phys:158 maj:689 min:0 mod:Mod256Qam

Non-SDV channels - which won't be affected as much by this problem - have various different frequencies:
[2016-06-05 19:05:16,573] [Log ] [13 ] [INFO ] - atsc:Tune:ATSC:tv:Cable DISNEY CHANNEL HD Freq:319250 ONID:16686 TSID:0 SID:2 PMT:0x0 FTA:False LCN:40 phys:40 maj:688 min:0 mod:Mod256Qam
[2016-06-05 19:05:04,811] [Log ] [13 ] [INFO ] - atsc:Tune:ATSC:tv:Cable ABC FAMILY HD Freq:277250 ONID:16692 TSID:0 SID:3 PMT:0x0 FTA:False LCN:33 phys:33 maj:692 min:0 mod:Mod256Qam

So again: to make Disney Junior start working again, you need to scan it in again.

 

[mores369]

Thanks again for your great help, MM. Some clarification, though:
If the frequency is changing often, how is HDHomerun able to view the channel? It seems to work fine every time I try and test it there and I've only scanned for programs once. Does it handle SDV without the need to keep scanning for channels? How often do the frequencies change? Like, minutes or days?

I've tried scanning for channels in MP and immediately tried watching Disney Junior with no luck. MP must really not like SDV channels...

Thanks again for your help.

 

[mm1352000]

If the frequency is changing often, how is HDHomerun able to view the channel? It seems to work fine every time I try and test it there and I've only scanned for programs once. Does it handle SDV without the need to keep scanning for channels?

Ultimately it comes down to the fact that TV Server really doesn't support SDV properly. Blame me. When I added support for CableCARD tuners, I didn't know enough about SDV.

How often do the frequencies change? Like, minutes or days?

Sorry, I can't answer. It entirely depends on your cable provider, which head-end you're connected to, which channel it is etc. The only way to find out is to fix it and then see how long it takes to break again.

I've tried scanning for channels in MP and immediately tried watching Disney Junior with no luck. MP must really not like SDV channels...

Yeah, as above: we don't handle SDV well. Sorry. Let's try a different route.

1. Open HDHR View.
2. Tune Disney Junior with one of the tuners.
   
3. Open your preferred Internet browser.
4. Navigate to the home page for the HDHR tuner (typically 192.168.1.<something>).
5. Navigate into the status menu (...I think).
6. Navigate into the menu for the tuner which was used to tune Disney Junior.
7. Hopefully within that menu the "program number" should be shown, something like -->this<--. If it isn't in that menu it'll be available somewhere within either the other menus or HDHR Config. Sorry if I'm wrong. Unfortunately I don't have an HDHR and Silicondust doesn't seem to provide any documentation for me to use to assist you.
   
8. Open TV Server Configuration.
9. Go to the "TV Channels" section.
10. Find and select Disney Junior, then click "edit".
11. In the new channel edit dialog, select the tuning detail in the bottom list (there should only be one entry) and click edit.
12. Set the "service ID" value to the value of the program number found in steps 1 to 7.
13. Click OK and OK again to save the change.

Hopefully the channel should work after that.

 

[mores369]

You absolutely did it! I was trying to change all sorts of tuning numbers to get it to work, but I never tried that one. Thanks again for all of your help.

 

[mm1352000]

Brilliant! I was hoping that would work, because that was my last idea.

I was trying to change all sorts of tuning numbers to get it to work...

Ahhh, be careful. I'd advise not to touch any numbers unless you have to. The "major" [channel number] field in the tuning detail dialog must always match Charter's channel number. Also, if you happened to have clear QAM tuners (ie. cable tuners without CableCARD support) that shared the same channels, the "channel" and "frequency" fields must match the actual broadcast details.

Anyhow, you now have a procedure for making channels delivered via SDV work without rescanning.
I'd be interested to know how often you have to use the procedure over time...