1.30.0 5111: Parallel DVB EPG (3 Viewers)

[framug]

The signal level certainly looks believable, but is it correct?

I notice from the "TVService.log" (attached) that the signal level is shown initially as -29, but later processing changes this to +71. Are signal levels for the Pinnacle always negative, with more negative meaning a lower signal level? Just curious!

YES, it is correct, reveal the true signal strengh and btw, THX for testing it.
Since you are curious, I explain you how it works.
MediaPortal "standard" process give the average of signal values for all the tuners of a card.
Exemple for your card TBS :
Tuner 1 : 50, Tuner 2 = 60, Tuner 3 = 70, Tuner 4 = 80
MP returns (50 + 60 + 70 + 80) / 4 (number of tuners) = 65
The problem with PC2000i card is that, it's only Tuner 1 wich returns signal value then, the tuner 1 signal value is negative and, the tuner 2 signal value is always 100.
Then, because MP only take care a 0 to 100 signal, it does this :
Tuner 1 : nothing, Tuner 2 : 100
100 / 2 (tuners) = 50.
That's was what you had before.
For the 2000i in Tuner 1, value négative mean (for your case) -29 is 29 under the max (100).
That's why, calculation is -29 + 100 = 71.
Not divised by the number of tuners for this card because, only 1 tuner give signal.

Hope it' more clear.

Regards.

 

[framug]

Hello,
For those who want to try this :
(Setting in first screen is visible only if you have at least 2 available tuners).



1/ Stop TvService.
2/ Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal TV Server
3/ Backup SetupTv.exe and TvService.exe.
4/ Copy this 2 files in the folder by extracting the attached .rar file.
5/ Restart TvService.
6/ Try and (maybe) enjoy.

Feedback would be really appreciated.
See you.

 

[CyberSimian]

For those who want to try this

I downloaded your new versions, and this afternoon I installed them in my test partition and gave them a quick test. Unfortunately, they did not seem to do anything -- EPG grabbing ran for the whole scheduled 30 minutes, but the log file did not show that any EPG had been grabbed.

I will need to repeat this more carefully, using both old and new versions, and keep the log files. There are various settings that affect grabbing, and I may have stumbled upon a combination of settings that does not work as expected.

I am currently battling image borders, so it may take a day or two to repeat the tests.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[framug]

Well, we are not in a hurry (is it OK for UK language ?)
Testing it, will not be confortable...
And also, maybe some .dll are missing...
The first step could be to do this and report :



And after that, we will see.
And YES, for the moment, there is (are) no extra log(s) to trace it.
As explained before, it's experimental for the moment, it works for me but maybe, not for others.
If users want this improvment, I hope they can help "a bit" to make it possible...

B.R., CyberSimian

 

[framug]

Hello,
I thought a bit about it.
Did you reboot your computer after copying files ?
It is working fine on my 3 pc with 3 differents cards.
Then, how about your settings ?
here :

and here :

Also, tvservice.log in debug mode could help us to see if at least, grab epg is called.
CU.

 

[CyberSimian]

It was only a quick test to see what might happen, so I am not 100% sure that it was a valid test. I need to repeat the test, controlling the settings more carefully, and comparing the behaviour with the existing implementation.

To get valid results, one needs careful testing, but careful testing is time consuming.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[framug]

To get valid results, one needs careful testing, but careful testing is time consuming.

You can take all your time, we are in no rush.
Also, it would be great, if some users could test it a bit.

 

[CyberSimian]

how about your settings ?

I was looking at the two screen shots shown in your post.
Are these the settings that you use for your HTPC, or are these settings for testing only?

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[framug]

Hello,

These settings are on my dev PC.
The only difference for my HTPC at home and, my travel PC is that "Enable CRC check" is disabled (I forgot to uncheck it on my dev PC).

 

[CyberSimian]

it would be great, if some users could test it a bit.

I have been experimenting with the modified DLLs, and will post some results later this week. But in this post I want to make a couple of comments about the user interface:

(1) Neither of us is an expert in the various EPGs available via DVB-T around the world. Because of this, if we make any changes to "TV Server", it is important that we do not make a change that will cause problems for users in countries that have DVB-T EPG systems that are organised differently from France or the UK. Hence I had expected to see a new "TV Server" setting in the idle-grabber section called something like:
Maximum number of tuners to use concurrently for EPG grabbing

The default for this setting would be 1, which means that there should be no change from behaviour in previous releases. But users who live in countries that can benefit from multiple EPG grabbers (and whose HTPCs are capable of sustaining the extra load) could specify a value greater than 1.

Elsewhere in "TV Server Config", the value 0 is used to denote "all that are available". As there is already an enable/disable setting for the idle grabber, I would suggest that the new setting should accept 0 to mean "use all available tuners".

(2) It is not immediately obvious to me what the new Prefer lowest priority card setting should be used for. With the current implementation, EPG grabbing is always lowest priority, so if a tuner is needed to start a recording, but none is available, the EPG grabbing is stopped so that the tuner can be used for the recording instead. So it seems to me that it does not matter whether the EPG grabber uses the highest priority tuner, or the lowest priority tuner, or some other priority tuner.

In experimenting with this, I notice that:

• If this setting is disabled, TV Server uses only one tuner, starting with the highest priority tuner.
• If this setting is enabled, TV Server uses all tuners, starting with the lowest priority tuner.

So this setting performs some of the function that I suggested in my previous point.

What use case did you have in mind for this setting? If we want to retain it, I think that the control of the number of tuners used should be moved to a separate setting, so that it is clear what each setting does.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK