Ok. I don't know jack about linux. I've done searches and come across guides that get me half way through this process.
http://mysettopbox.tv/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3747&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15
http://knoppmythwiki.org/index.php?page=HauppaugeOneFiftyInstallation
Neither of which are complete guides for the latest version of knoppmyth (by complete, I mean step by step for a non-linux person)

My goal is to get knoppmyth working on my computer with a PVR-150 and in the process, create a guide for people like me who don't know what the hell they're doing.

Please correct my steps as they will be wrong because I don't have it working yet.


For the guide, I assume you've successfully created an installation CD of r5a16 and have just installed using the auto-install option and you've just entered the root password at the prompt...

0. Head over to http://labs.zap2it.com/ Make an account and set up your channel listings. It takes a while for the account to make it through their systems (I waited overnight for it to work).

1. Acknowledge that it's not the author's fault if your computer explodes.

2. Select 'No Action' when it asks you about timezone stuff

3. Does the router on your home network have DHCP setup? If it does, select yes, if not, select no and you will be prompted for ip address and stuff.

4. Is your processor better then a Pentium Pro or equivalent AMD? If it is, select the i686 option and hit OK

5. You will be at a blue screen asking you about deleting settings, Select 'No' both times.

6. Select 'Capture cards' and press enter.

7. Select (New capture card).

8. Set the card type to 'MPEG-2 Encoder card (PVR-250, PVR-350)'

9. Set the Default Input to Tuner 0 if you're using coaxial in and S-Video0 if you're using S-Video in

10. Select finish, and hit escape to go back to the setup menu.

11. Select Video sources and hit enter.

12. Select (New video source).

13. name the video source 'cable' and select finish, then hit escape to go back to the setup menu

14. Select Input connections and hit enter

15. If you're using coaxial input, Select '[ MPEG : /dev/video0 ] (Tuner 0) -> (None)' and hit enter.
If you're using S-Video input, Select '[ MPEG : /dev/video0 ] (S-Video 0) -> (None)' and hit enter.

16. Set the Video source to 'cable' and hit enter, then escape to get back to the setup menu

17. Hit escape to leave the setup menu and wait for the frontend to start up.

18. Select watch TV and change to a channel that you know has a picture

19. Swear loudly at the static. call your friend who knows about linux. Swear loudly at him.

20. hit escape to exit mythtv and select yes, exit now

--OK, here is where things probably get really wrong--

21. Start up a command prompt like bash under apps->Shells->bash

22. type in 'su root' and enter your password

23. change to the usr/src directory: 'cd /usr/src'

24. unzip the kernel source: 'tar jxvf kernel-source-2.6.11.9-chw-2.tar.bz2'

25. download the latest ivtv: 'wget http://www.ivtv.tv/releases/ivtv-0.3/ivtv-0.3.7d.tgz'

26. unzip the latest ivtv: 'tar zxvf ivtv-0.3.7d.tgz'

27. change to the driver directory: 'cd ivtv-0.3.7d/driver'

28. make the driver: 'make'

29. type this in: 'make install' (what does this do? install the driver?)

30. change to the utils directory: 'cd ../utils'

31. make something else: 'make'

32. make install something else: 'make install'

33. Backup your current firmware: 'cp /lib/modules/ivtv-fw-enc.bin /root/ivtv-fw-enc.bin' then 'cp /lib/modules/ivtv-fw-dec.bin /root/ivtv-fw-dec.bin'

34. Download the new firmware: 'wget ftp://ftp.shspvr.com/download/wintv-pvr ... .22037.exe

35. run the Perl script which extracts the firmware payload from this MS-Windows self extracting archive .exe file and drops it in the right place under the /lib/modules directory : './ivtvfwextract.pl pvr48wdm_1.8.22037.exe'

36. put in the cd you got with the pvr-150 and mount the drive: 'mount /dev/cdrom'

37. copy HcwMakoA.ROM to your harddrive: 'cp /cdrom/HcwMakoA.ROM /lib/modules'

38. delete tuner.ko and tveeprom.ko: 'rm /lib/modules/2.6.11.9-chw-2/v4l2/tveeprom.ko' then 'rm /lib/modules/2.6.11.9-chw-2/v4l2/tuner.ko'

At this point, it works, but the picture quality sucks. Anyone know how to make it better?

I'm going to keep this updated as I make mistakes, so please, correct me, i have no clue what I'm doing.

Thanks in advance for the help.

I think you're aiming to wide, you really don't want to duplicate _ALL_ of the install instructions. The way to go about this is to make it modular and only document the extra things you need to do, accessed as links in the main directions. For example step 0 may be to get X working, so you can even see the window to enter the root password....

Step 4 - call out which the 5/6 line in AMD processors too

...

Just copy the existing files somewhere safe... Hang on while I look up the names.. Looks like they're
"/lib/modules/ivtv-fw-enc.bin" and "/lib/modules/ivtv-fw-dec.bin". The new ones need to go in the same place.

Thanks for the help. I'm trying to make the guide as specific as possible since I was having trouble with elementry things.

Why do I have to have this file somewhere safe? couldn't I just redownload new/existing firmware to install? Where would be safe on a linux system?

In order... convenience, yes, and /myth/backup or even just /root (the root users home directory).

do folks really use DHCP for their mythbox? DHCP is better suited to clients and not servers (which the backend and apache are).

If you have vision of accessing ssh, mythweb, webmin, backend (from networked frontends) I suggest a static IP.

_________________
R5F1 - Dell P4 2.4Ghz 500MB - PVR250 x 2 - GeForce FX 5200 - Onboard sound/NIC 80GB ATA/250GB ATA/400GB SATA

I use DHCP for my MythTV box but I have my FreeBSD machine hand out the same IP address each time for a particular MAC. It just makes things easier in my opinion.

I use DHCP because I only have a single MythTV box for both the back and front ends, so I'm using 127.0.0.1 to acesses it.

Not me... It kind of messes things up when addresses get handed out arbitrarily based on boot order... And my routers DHCP server doesn't seem to be smart enough to do MAC mapping...

ah, you'll change your tune when you add boxes to you LAN or want to access the backend from anoth PC (expecially from the internet)


Im with you tjc, not like a fixed IP is a hard thing to do.

_________________
R5F1 - Dell P4 2.4Ghz 500MB - PVR250 x 2 - GeForce FX 5200 - Onboard sound/NIC 80GB ATA/250GB ATA/400GB SATA

Hi,
Just have to put in my pennys worth. I open an xterm after the first reboot and do netcardconfig selecting dhcp before I even do the first login. That gets the dns information, allows me to set the time zone with tzconfig and set the clock with ntpdate pool.ntp.org plus I set other details.

Then when I make the first login, the clock is right, select no to dhcp and enter a static ip, fix the gateway, and procede with the install. Why? I never have issues with time errors when getting zap2it information, backend picks up the static ip and if it is an upgrade most everything is correct.

I also cheat and do this with a script from a floppy for an install

Mike

I have to say that I know where MrFahrenheit is coming from. (Though up here in Canada
we still use Celsius, but I digress.)

A valiant effort so far, MrFahrenheit.

When I first started with my Mythbox, it was extremely painful to discern exactly which procedures
did what, and which ones I needed to eliminate, having already done a similar set of procedures
earlier. There was just so much overlap in all the HOWTOs. Again, this was mostly because
I didn't know what each part of procedure did, exactly. "Install the ivtv driver" sounds really nice
when you're reading it....but it's not exactly descriptive of say...a 17-step process.

As for your other question, MrF...I believe the "ivtvfwextract.pl filename.exe" is a
Perl script which extracts the firmware from the (Windows) executable file and puts it in
a format Linux understands. Personally, I always found that in the Windows and
networking worlds, if I knew (or could guess) what some acronym stood for, I could know
what it did.


Ciao

shplad

_________________
KnoppMyth R5C7
Abit NF7-S
Athlon XP Mobile 2500+
Hauppauge PVR-150 + PVR-150MCE
nVidia Geforce 6600GT
Samsung Spinpoint SATA 120GB
NEC ND-3520A DVD
Seasonic Super Tornado 350
BTC 9019URF Wireless Kbd. w. Joystick

i was wondering if you had any specific reason when you chose to download this particular version of the firmware.
the latest one is ftp://ftp.shspvr.com/download/wintv-pvr ... .22280.exe

i know that some versions are better than others, and that sometime your're better off using not the latest one. so, is anything worng with pvr48wdm_2.0.22280.exe? which one should i choose?
thanks

.... and here is me answering my own quesition

http://ivtv.writeme.ch/tiki-index.php?p ... reVersions

so it seems that pvr48wdm_1.8.22037.exe IS the version of firmware recommended for use with ivtv.

Just adding an update.

Currently, watching tv works, however the visual quality is crap.

To verify this, i connected my DVD player to the S-Video in on the PVR-150, and I connected the S-Video out on my Geforce 4 MX 440 to my TV. The quality is terrible.

However, when I put a DVD into the DVD drive on the computer and watch the movie on the TV using the same S-Video out, the quality is fantastic.

This leads me to beleive that I haven't set up the PVR card properly yet and would welcome any ideas on how to get better quality out of it.

"24. unzip the kernel source: 'tar jxvf kernel-source-2.6.11.9-chw-2.tar.bz2' "

I get stuck at this part. I looked around some, but I'm really getting frustrated and would appreciate any help from you guys.


I have a fresh install of R5a16. I set up the channels and all that stuff, then downloaded IVTV. Of course I can't build the drivers without the kernel source, however, When I try to untar the source it says

over and over and over again, for what seems like every file in the tar. Then of course the drivers can't build.


Does anyone have any ideas what would cause this? Perhaps I need to d/l the source, if so, where can I do this? Thank you so much ahead of time.