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PostPosted: Wed Aug 10, 2005 4:10 pm 
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Joined: Wed Aug 10, 2005 1:30 pm
Posts: 2
Oops. Don't flame please. This probably could have gone in another section (Hints, Usage/HowTo, or HDTV probably would have worked). I'll re-post in the HDTV section. It's fairly detailed and since I did edit some files to get my hardware working, I figured it would go here... Sorry once again.

Do yourself a favor and read the whole thing and print it out if you're actually going to follow my directions. I forgot a couple things that you should do first and put that in the middle, and it just makes good sense. I claim no responsibility to the death of any and all of your Linux/Windows/ANY boxes which you may own. I am NO expert. I'm a lousy NOOB who only sort of knows what he is doing. This is what I can recall from memory of what worked for my HD3000 front and backend. A lot of this info was obtained from the how-to guide at eff.org. You could follow that, but then you would have an out dated version of knoppmyth, and if you follow those directions with the current version R5A16, then it WON'T work since they use the V4L drivers in the R5A10 version and they use the DVB drivers now (if I understand correctly). They really should update the info.

http://www.thefreecountry.com/utilities ... tors.shtml

I've been working on getting my mythbox working well enough to use for quite a while. With some help from message boards and others, I've got it up and running at a satifactory level. It still needs a bit of tweaking, but it records, plays live tv and recordings, and has a clearly working channel guide. If my backend crashes (never has happened yet), then I just need to reboot it and it and it will boot the backend right back up with not typing. I don't even have a monitor hooked up to it, but can control it through ssh (I talk about how later) if I like. I live in Mesa, AZ (85204) area and get CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX, UPN, WB, PAX, and a couple Spanish stations and a few religious stations.

For my backend I have an old HP pavilion with a Celron 650 in it with 128MB of RAM with an HD3000 capture card and a 100GB HD, and some random network card with an Intel chipset. It's currently conntected to the excellent HDTVa Terk antenna. I just auto installed the defaults for knoppmyth R5A16 installation and it worked just fine.

There are a number of details you have to pay attention to though. First, thing you will see is the desktop with an open window prompting you for the root password. Ignore it for now. I first had to bring up a terminal (xterm). Right click on the desktop, find it under shells, and click on xterm. Type "ping www.google.com" Your output should look like this:
Quote:
mythtv@mythtv:~$ ping www.google.com
PING www.l.google.com (64.233.161.147) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 64.233.161.147: icmp_seq=1 ttl=242 time=92.8 ms
64 bytes from 64.233.161.147: icmp_seq=2 ttl=242 time=94.0 ms
64 bytes from 64.233.161.147: icmp_seq=3 ttl=242 time=94.8 ms
Hit CTRL-C to stop it. If it said host no found, or timed out the connect or something like that, then become the root user (at command line type "su" <enter> root password <enter>) then run "dhclient" to enable a connection to the internet/the frontend. If you wish to install firefox to browse around then type "apt-get update" then "apt-get install firefox". If there are no errors then type firefox and it should bring up the browser. You will be prompted to download. Just type 'y' and get on with it.

I then ran 'ifconfig' to find out what my ip address was for the backend. You'll need the line that says
Quote:
inet addr:192.168.0.xxx
Write down the number, you'll need it later when setting up mythtv. Go ahead and type in your root password in the other window that popped up to start the setup. If it's not there, then bring up the command line and type "mythtv-setup". In the general settings specify the 192.168.0.xxx number (mine was 192.168.0.103) in the master server IP address, and mythtv IP address lines. If you are only using one computer instead of two for a front and backend setup (hey, it's your loss buddy), then just leave localhost typed in there. Go ahead and leave most of the other setting alone, but change tv format to ATSC and VBI format to NTSC closed caption and channel freq table to us-bcast. The only other setting you should mess with (if you have a slow backend and plan on on flagging commericals (so you can skip them while watching recordings by pressing the END key) or by transcoding to another format) is the queue start and end time. Set the times (in 24 hour format) for a time when you AREN'T recording or watching live tv (mine is set to start at 23:00 (11PM) and 7:00 (7AM). This is so your backend wont be bogged down with CPU intensive work while your trying to watch or record shows. This will screw things up majorly if you have a slow backend such as mine and try to watch tv or playback a recording while you're flagging commercials. If you have a fast system then you can probably do it all at the same time (the settings are in the general tab as well). Don't ask me how fast. I've never tried.

Now for the Capture card settings. Create a new card. Card type should be DVB card, It should then automatically display that you have an pcHDTV HD3000 card for your card name and have a card type of ATSC. If not then try a different card number. If it doesn't work at all, then you may have not pushed your card into your system properly. Once you get things working, then go onto the next section.

The Video Source section is pretty straight forward. Name the video source whatever you want (HDTV is what I have). Next specify that you want North America Data Direct, and enter your user name and password (that you setup previously at labs.zap2it.com, sorry about mentioning it in the middle of the guide follow the directions for the zap2it site on the eff.org guide linked to at the top of the page) once you go to the next entry area it will automatically retrieve your zap2it tv lineup if you have a connection to the internet setup and a correct password and name. Set channel freq. table to us-bcast. Next section.

In the Input connections set the video source to the name you specified in the Video Sources section (for me HDTV), then type in a starting channel that you a pretty sure you can receive. If you want, check antennaweb.org and type in your zip code to see what digital channels you can receive. Check the option to show digital channels only. Provided that the stations are fairly close to you with not too many obstructions (mine are 16 miles from me and I get plenty good signals) then you should be fine. If you receive a station that they list on antennaweb.org that is close, that has the channel number listed as "8.1", then type in "81" in the "starting channel" section. From now on you can generally ignore the frequency numbers for the most part. If you receive channel 8 in your area over standard analog transmissions (NTSC), then, if they transmit digitally as well, they generally have 8.1 or 8_1 as the channel 8 in the ATSC band. This is not the frequency. Simply the channel 'name' so to speak. Since mythtv wants numbers that you can change to without any extra characters other than numbers, then you type in 81 in place of 8.1 or 8_1. 81 means channel 8 with subchannel 1. Next section.

Channel Editor. Here you should be able to scan for channels. If you have any crappy amplified antenna then it will work 'ok' if you need it. Otherwise go spend some cash at radioshack, walmart, or Fry's to buy either a terk hdtvi or hdtva antenna or one that looks like a weird arrow that you would point towards station. Specify your video source as HDTV (at least for me) and scan away. It will take a while to go through the list. Make sure your antenna is pointed towards the best areas as per antennaweb.org. If you have stations spread around and can't point your antenna in one particular direction, then chances are that you will still detect them but wont be able to pick them up to watch (yet). Once it is done you SHOULD have a number of stations listed. If this is not the case then there is some problem with you antenna (most likely). If you recieved your channel line up just fine, then exit completely (escape a couple times) and then become the root. "su" <enter> password <enter> then run "/etc/cron.daily/mythtv-backend". This will take a while and you must have your account setup at zap2it first before it will work. Once it is completed exit root mode, "exit" <enter>, then run "xterm &" to bring up another command line and type "mythbackend" <enter> It should say that it has successfully tuned to channel 81 (in my case) and finally say something like "Seems to be woken by user". Your backend should be working (almost). There is a slight problem with the channel setup (at least on my end). Go back to the first window and type mythtv-setup <enter>. Go into the channel line up. If things happened the way they did on my system you'll have a bunch of channels listed that weren't there before such as 8_1 or 61_1 and such. These are the channels that were added by populating the database with Zap2it info.

Here's where it gets tedious. For every channel that was detected when you scanned such as 81, find 8_1 press enter to edit it, write down the XMLTV ID number down (usually this is a 5 digit number). Go into the original channel (81) that appeared when you scanned, and enter the number under the 81 channel. Now delete the 8_1 channel by highlighting it, pressing m, then delete it. Once you have done that with all your channels, you're good to go. Exit the setup again, become root again and type "/etc/cron.daily/mythtv-backend".

Now that the general setup is done, you need to reboot to see if your internet connection and mythbackend started up normally. As the root user type reboot. Once you are back to the main screen it may bring up the fontend (just exit). Bring up another terminal and type ping www.google.com. If it has the proper output that I specified above, then you can leave out the dhclient line in the file we're going to create below. Next, type mythbackend <enter>. If it says something to the effect of
Quote:
Failed to bind port: 6543
on the last line, then mythbackend is already running properly. If not then you need to start it at boot up as well. This is how I did it. Of course this may not be the easiest way or the smartest, but cut me some slack. I'm way new to Linux.

Become the root user. Type "nano /etc/init.d/local" This should bring up a new blank file. I don't believe that I had to create the /etc/init.d directory (I probably sound stupid for suggesting such a thing... Oh well.). If I did I was root user, typed "cd /etc" then typed mkdir init.d, but you shouldn't have to do that if I recall, I'm just covering my bases. Anyway, with the blank file type in
Quote:
#! /bin/bash
dhclient
mythbackend &
(leave out the parts you don't need, and be sure to include the '&' on the mythbackend line or your system will load mythbackend and then stop. Hit Ctrl-X, type 'y' to save changes and hit <enter> to save it to that file. Now type "chmod +x /etc/init.d/local" <enter> in order to enable the file to be executed. Last, "update-rc.d local defaults 60" to link to the file.

You backend should be working just fine now. If you reboot and the frontend comes up (and you have a sufficiently fast system, then you should be able to just watch tv right now if your antenna is oriented properly and your video drivers are loaded (I believe, but cannot guarantee)... If they aren't and you have a Geforce4mx, or fx card, etc, then you can follow the directions to load them here:

http://www.eff.org/broadcastflag/cookbook/print.html

Look under perfecting video setting under nvidia users. If you need a cheap FX5200 (its a great card for HDTV, and sufficient but a bit slow for 3D), then do a froogle for fx5200 and click price low to high. I got mine from zipzoomfly.com for $30 shipped (2nd day air) but they seem to have raised the price to about $48 so that must have been a pricing error. I have the XFX FX5200 128MB and it works great (for that specific card, make sure you have a AGP 2.0 or 3.0 slot since it won't work in a 1.0 slot).

Next, boot up your frontend and install knoppmyth. I didn't have any major issues booting it with windows that I can recall. I just shrunk my windows parition by using the tools here:

http://www.thefreecountry.com/utilities ... tors.shtml

It was either the ultimate boot cd listed there or the system rescue CD image where I found the partition shirnking program. Both are VERY useful to have around, so get both.

Once I did a full install of Knoppmyth. I rebooted, did the install of the nvidia drivers as per the instructions linked to above. Ran the setup program changed the general tab to the IP address on my backend for Master server and Mythtv IP address. Then everything worked great. I have to move my antenna around to get the channels right. I do sometimes freeze the frontend, so I like to exit immediately upon startup and bring up a couple xterminals so that if it freezes, I can hit Alt-Tab to go to a terminal, type 'top' to find out what the process id number is (number on the very right) for the mythfrontend, and then kill it by typing 'kill ####'. Then type mythfrontend to start it up again. If there are any steps I found they can probably be found on the eff how-to that I linked to. If you have any additions, then fire away. I hope that someone learns from my ignorance (or something like that). Oh yeah. One LAST IMPORTANT THING!!!! AFTER I installed the nvidia drivers I had to go into the setting in the mythfrontend and enable XVMC (should be under Util/Setup, Setup, TV Settings, Playback on the 5th screen of settings be sure to check "use hardware XvMC MPEG decoding". If I don't do that then I have all kinds of issues with playback such as pauses EVERY 1 second of playback or so. Like I said before I'm no pro. Good Luck! I'll try to clear this up a bit later.


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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2006 8:25 pm 
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Joined: Wed May 04, 2005 1:11 pm
Posts: 23
Location: Georgia
Good stuff.

hbattraw1 wrote:
Here's where it gets tedious. For every channel that was detected when you scanned such as 81, find 8_1 press enter to edit it, write down the XMLTV ID number down (usually this is a 5 digit number). Go into the original channel (81) that appeared when you scanned, and enter the number under the 81 channel. Now delete the 8_1 channel by highlighting it, pressing m, then delete it. Once you have done that with all your channels, you're good to go. Exit the setup again, become root again and type "/etc/cron.daily/mythtv-backend".


You lost me here.

I got all the XMLTV numbers for all 7 channels that show up in the list under Channel Editor (of mythtv-setup). But I'm confused about where I retype the XMLTV ID number, and what I delete.

Laramie

_________________
Intel P4 3.2 GHz (with HT)
Intel D865GBF motherboard
pcHDTV HD-3000
GeForce FX 5200, 256 MB, AGP 8x
1 GB RAM
300 GB Seagate Barracuda hard drive
Antec Overture II case
Samsung LCD display (sadly 1280x1024 max)


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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2006 10:12 pm 
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Joined: Fri Sep 19, 2003 7:05 pm
Posts: 5088
Location: Fontana, Ca
How does this ever belong in Tier 2? You don't even describe your hardware...

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cesman

When the source is open, the possibilities are endless!


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PostPosted: Thu Mar 02, 2006 10:08 am 
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Joined: Wed May 04, 2005 1:11 pm
Posts: 23
Location: Georgia
cesman wrote:
How does this ever belong in Tier 2?

Who, me, or the OP? It was just a question in direct response to the original post.
cesman wrote:
You don't even describe your hardware...

Who, me, or the OP? My hardware's spelled out my sig.... OP's is buried in the post.

Laramie

_________________
Intel P4 3.2 GHz (with HT)
Intel D865GBF motherboard
pcHDTV HD-3000
GeForce FX 5200, 256 MB, AGP 8x
1 GB RAM
300 GB Seagate Barracuda hard drive
Antec Overture II case
Samsung LCD display (sadly 1280x1024 max)


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Mar 04, 2006 1:23 pm 
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Joined: Fri Sep 19, 2003 7:05 pm
Posts: 5088
Location: Fontana, Ca
This is post could be better. The Hardware section is meant to be for recommendations. It does no good to bury the hardware details in the post. I had to read this several times to see what hardware is in use.

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cesman

When the source is open, the possibilities are endless!


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PostPosted: Sat Mar 04, 2006 1:24 pm 
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Joined: Fri Sep 19, 2003 7:05 pm
Posts: 5088
Location: Fontana, Ca
This is post could be better. The Hardware section is meant to be for recommendations. It does no good to bury the hardware details in the post. I had to read this several times to see what hardware is in use.

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cesman

When the source is open, the possibilities are endless!


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