Solution for ALL/most Software-encoder based TV-Cards (3 Viewers)

[mike827]

Thanks for the detailed response!

I am in the process of doing as you requested, but the strangest thing to me is, I have been a long time user of media portal.

I would say about 5-6 years ago, when my HTPC was new, I was able to install and use mediaportal perfectly, with live tv support!

Then I didn't use the PC with the tv tuner for over 5 years, and now, trying to set everything up again, it doesn't work!

Not sure if it's because this time I used drivers from AMD's website, and last time i used the drivers on the CD that came with the card, but hopefully once I do the graph thing, we can get it sorted out.

EDIT: Post is up, I hope I did it correctly!

 

[mm1352000]

I would say about 5-6 years ago, when my HTPC was new, I was able to install and use mediaportal perfectly, with live tv support!

Then I didn't use the PC with the tv tuner for over 5 years, and now, trying to set everything up again, it doesn't work!

Not sure if it's because this time I used drivers from AMD's website, and last time i used the drivers on the CD that came with the card, but hopefully once I do the graph thing, we can get it sorted out.

MediaPortal has been through some radical changes since that time. I guess you were probably using a version before 1.x? Earlier versions of MP had a TV engine built into the client so you didn't need the TV Server like you do now. When that engine was removed, support for some tuners was intentionally removed while support for other tuners was probably unintentionally broken. As long as your TV tuner doesn't require a cable connection to the soundcard there is an excellent chance that we can re-add support...

As far as the drivers go: it is possible that the original drivers might help, but I couldn't possibly comment until I see the screenshot...

 

[mike827]

Well that's a bummer... The AIW 9000 has a short cable that goes out from the card and into line in on the sound card... perhaps thats part of the issue?

Also, I edited my post above to include the screen shot.

 

[mm1352000]

Darn
All is not lost, but things are looking significantly less hopeful. I'll need another screenshot I'm afraid. Follow the same instructions as before except this time select the "WDM Streaming Capture Devices" category instead of the crossbar category...

 

[mike827]

Yes you are correct, I was using a version of mediaportal that had the tv server and client in one package.

I remember reading on the dev blog about the impending split between the tv server and frontend client.

As you requested, here is the screenshot.

Thanks again for all your help!

 

[mm1352000]

Hi again

I'm really sorry but I think it is just not going to be possible to add support for your card at this time. Please believe me when I say that I have tried to add support for cards like yours in the [not too distant] past (you might be interested to have a look at this and this).

The major point from the first thread that MisterD raised (MisterD is the expert for analog cards) is that adding support for your card has potential to tie up the sound card so it can't be used for anything else.

You're welcome to try the patches from the second thread but having written them myself I am 99% certain they will not work for you without modification. The patches never worked for the other user either. Last week or the week before we talked for an hour or so on ICQ and I tried some things on his computer via VNC. That helped to clarify the problem but didn't help to find the solution. We were tantalisingly close to getting things working and although the user agreed that the best solution was probably to buy another tuner, he asked me to keep thinking to see if I could solve the problem. Perhaps if you were willing to invest some time into this, we could work together to find a solution for the problem. There is no guarantee of success and ultimately even if we did succeed, there is no guarantee that the team would allow support for your card to be added to TV Server. Technically speaking, it is just poor design by ATI. Of course things have changed a lot since your tuner was released so perhaps I am being too hard on them.

One other possible "solution" is to just stick with the last version of MP 0.x.

So to clarify your possibilities:
1. Buy a new tuner that doesn't require a cable connection to the soundcard. I'd recommend one with hardware encoding if you decide to go down this route.
2. Work with me to add support for the card with no guarantees of success or acceptance from the rest of the team. I'm more than willing to give this a shot!
3. Stick with an older version of MP.

Those are hard choices and I'm sorry to have to be so blunt. Please feel free to ask questions if you need something clarified.

 

[mike827]

mm, no reason to be embarrased or sorry, I can't thank you enough for how much time you have put in on my behalf already, I want you to know I really appreciate it!

If it interests you, I would be more than happy to attempt some fixes/patches, and I read those other threads, and I am surprised there was no solution available.

However, I am very busy for the next few days and would not be available for a VNC session until next weekend most likely...

In the mean time, I will try to use the most recent version of media portal before the split, and see if that works.

(However this won't really solve my problem, because I wanted to be able to connect to the tv-server from both mediaportal and xbmc front end clients.)

Thanks again for all your help, and we will be in touch!

 

[aidyduk]

just a stupid question but whats the problem for the solution

 

[mm1352000]

Not a dumb question...

The problem is that some analog tuners require two small pieces of software called encoders in order to function. One encoder for video, one encoder for audio. Their job is to convert the raw TV output from the tuner into something (technically: usually an MPEG 2 stream, but sometimes an h.264 stream) that the rest of the computer can deal with. These encoders are relatively hard to come by. The tuner manufacturers often (but not always) provide encoders with the tuner, however performance (CPU required), video/audio quality and compatibility of these encoders varies quite widely. This thread provides three or four encoder options for those users that weren't supplied with encoders by their tuners' manufacturer, as well as users who would like to try other encoders to see if they provide better quality or performance than the ones they already use. Hope that makes sense .

BTW: those analog tuners that do not require this software have dedicated hardware to do the job (so-called "hardware encoders"). Hardware encoders do exactly the same job as software encoders. Tuners with hardware encoders generally produce better quality video and audio, but tend to be more expensive too.

 

[naibaf7]

AW: Solution for ALL/most Software-encoder based TV-Cards

can't explain it better than mm1352000

It's better to have hardware encoder cards, also because of the CPU usage... but on the cons side... hardware encoders have a tendence to run hot and they are kinda expensive.

The cool thing with this fix is also that you don't really have to install any third party software (TV software that would eventually make your computer slower because of their own TV services etc.), you can ONLY install the encoders and the drivers of the cards, together with MP.