Infinity USB Smart + New CS + Acamd = :)

Forums › Home Theatre (including HTPC and EPG Collector) › Infinity USB Smart + New CS + Acamd = :)

Rsmith

35 posts

Geek

#58883 22-Mar-2010 18:09

I have been trying to set up sky on my HTPC over the last few days and I thought that the people here would appreciate a write up of my experiences.

First of all, I would like to thank the members of these forums for the invaluable information they have provided, without this forum I wouldn't have even known it was possible. Thanks especially to Rusty Gonad who seems to have a good handle on all of this.

I ordered an Infinity USB smart some time ago as they had a special and i intended to get sky eventually.
http://www.infinityusb.com/default.asp?show=productsdetail&ProductID=12

After researching the forums and googling extensively, I downloaded the following software:

NewCS 1.5
Acamd 0.6.1.8
DVBLink TVSource v2.01
Windows 7 Home Premium (ok i bought this one..)

I got sky installed and asked for an NZ45xx card (installer was indifferent)

This setup worked but i was getting glitches every 6 seconds, I determined that this was due to the Card ECM taking 2-3 seconds.

At this point I was pretty much resigned to purchasing a Jaycar reader and ditching the Infinity as i hadn't read anything good about the Infinity's, but I did a bit more googleing nonetheless and found this..

http://www.infinityusb.com/default.asp?show=supportdetail&ProductID=12&SupportID=29

It turns out that there are two modes of using the Smart, one uses a windows program to create a virtual com port, this was how I had things running initially. But it is also possible to load a secondary firmware module on board, in this mode the windows software is not required, only drivers, and it sets up a different virtual com port which can be configured visa device manager.

After installing this module and setting the latency to 1ms, I re launched media centre and no more glitches! I have noticed that the Card ECM tim eis down to 0.36 seconds which i guess is the key.

Not sure if this will work with the Infinity USB unlimited, but tbh when the Smart is cheaper I don't know why you would bother..

Also, I am sure that other versions of the software I have used would work I downloaded several versions of NewCS and preferred 1.5 because the Card ECM times were lower than for 1.65.

Also, note that I have only had this running for ~1hr so far so there's plenty of time for it all to go pear shaped.

The picture is 1000x better than through the Pace box over 576i component. Shame it's not possible to get the HD ticket without an HDi box, because I don't think the HTPC would be worth it with an HDi sitting there..

CYaBro

4708 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1182

ID Verified

Trusted

#312260 29-Mar-2010 00:49

Can you post your newcs.XML file please?
I've been having a go this weekend trying to get a similar setup going but having lots of problems, mainly because I have no idea what I'm doing.
Does anybody know what is the best way to test a jaycar reader so that I know if I have assembled it correctly?
Does the button on it have to be in the in position or out. When it is out the red led is on and I think this means it is in write mode so I have the button pressed in and assume this is read mode?
I have the two jumpers on pheonix and 3.579mhz, are they correct?
I think I did have newcs 1.65 working at one stage as it had a screen similar to what someone has posted here on geekzone showing what a succesful card read should look like. But now whenever I run newcs it always says reset failure and I don't know what I did to cause this??!!
I have wmc picking up the virtual tuners from dvblink tvsource but don't know what I should be doing in that program to test if it us correctly configured to talk to newcs.

Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

gibben

46 posts

Geek

#312276 29-Mar-2010 08:23

CYaBro: Can you post your newcs.XML file please?

I've been having a go this weekend trying to get a similar setup going but having lots of problems, mainly because I have no idea what I'm doing.

Does anybody know what is the best way to test a jaycar reader so that I know if I have assembled it correctly?

Does the button on it have to be in the in position or out. When it is out the red led is on and I think this means it is in write mode so I have the button pressed in and assume this is read mode?

I have the two jumpers on pheonix and 3.579mhz, are they correct?

I think I did have newcs 1.65 working at one stage as it had a screen similar to what someone has posted here on geekzone showing what a succesful card read should look like. But now whenever I run newcs it always says reset failure and I don't know what I did to cause this??!!

I have wmc picking up the virtual tuners from dvblink tvsource but don't know what I should be doing in that program to test if it us correctly configured to talk to newcs.

I have recently gone through this exercise.

Yes, button in = green light, read mode.
Your jumpers are correct.

What messages are you getting on the console? Does it stop with a reset failed message? I had to do the card detect invert modification to get mine working.

I have v1.65 working successfully on a quad core cpu.

Rsmith

35 posts

Geek

#312278 29-Mar-2010 08:36

I don't think that I can be of much help with the Jaycar reader unfortuantely.

Re the NewCS.XML, I only changed the details for the NewCamd server, made sure card detect was off and turned off all of the EMM updates - not sure if anyone can confirm that these work so will have to try later, just wanted to watch the GP this weekend before I go and screw up my config! :)

Btw, I was running into performance issues with certain channels with DVBLink TVSource V2. My little celeron E1200 was maxing out and playback was not smooth.

I fixed it by finding a copy of FFdecsa.dll and putting it in the plugins directory, seems that the built in CSA in TVSource is not up to high bitrate streams..

RustyGonad

495 posts

Ultimate Geek

Trusted

#312335 29-Mar-2010 11:12

NewCS 1.65 has an issue with the standard Jaycar reader and "card detection". You can get around this by pulling the card out about 1mm, which cause the card detect sensor to go click. Once you do this it all works...

It also tends to lock up the serial port if your mucking around with it ie running/stopping/running etc - which prevents itself and any other app from getting to the serial port. You can do a unstall/reinstall of the serial port via the device manager if your doing alot of testing.

CYaBro - I'd say this is causing your issue...

Someone else might want to post up the card detection mod instructions if they have them.

NewCS 1.67 doesn't have this issue (but you need to run it in Linux) - it works out of the box with the standard Jaycar. NDSCam also works out of the box. NDSCam/DVBDream combo is very good for testing the reader, it pretty easy to setup (much less of of a learning curve than NewCS), but its pretty limited in alot of other places.

If anyone wants I can post up a working NewCS.xml (with all the junk removed) for the Jaycar's later on...

Glazza

279 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 11

Trusted

#313361 31-Mar-2010 09:38

RustyGonad: If anyone wants I can post up a working NewCS.xml (with all the junk removed) for the Jaycar's later on...

Please - does one still need to move there card back to the sky decoder every few months to keep it alive?

Satch

1985 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 259

#313447 31-Mar-2010 12:21

Glazza:
RustyGonad: If anyone wants I can post up a working NewCS.xml (with all the junk removed) for the Jaycar's later on...

Please - does one still need to move there card back to the sky decoder every few months to keep it alive?

Yes. Sometimes I leave it too long (laziness) and the Sky card stops working. Popping it in the Sky STB for anywhere between 15 and 60 minutes normally does the trick to reactivate it. Note that the Sky STB tells you that you are not subscribed to any channels while it is waiting for reactivation, so no need for alarm. Once a channel starts playing again, you are good to go.

Just make sure you leave the STB on a subscribed channel and not something like TV1, TV2, or a channel you have no subscription for. The reason being that it will easily allow you to see when your card becomes active again.

Apple TV

Stream your favourite shows now on Apple TV (affiliate link).

Glazza

279 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 11

Trusted

#313752 1-Apr-2010 10:04

Hi

Playing with NewCS 1.67 on Linux - and not getting anywhere to quickly.

If I set card detect to No - I get the following:

This is NewCS 1.67 RC1 [Build: 95] - the New CardServer by the Butter-team..
Compiled on Jul 14 2009 at 12:12:45
Reading Config file from /etc/newcs.xml
TCP-log password is enabled, set to: NewCSpwd
level: internal
type: all
output: console,tcp
logger config: level 16777215 type 255 output 5
Console log options: level 16777215 type 255
TCP log options: level 1 type 255
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Box detect ] Box type 1 (General Boxtype - Generic)
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Config ] Option <blockc0> for device 0 (Phoenix on Com1) not present, defaulting to NO
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Config ] Pincode for device 0 (Phoenix on Com1): 0000
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Config ] Option <sid> for device 0 (Phoenix on Com1) not present, no static sids added to filter
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Config ] Option <protectedsid> for device 0 (Phoenix on Com1) not present, no PIN Code will be sent
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Config ] /dev/ttyS0 ECM priority: round
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Chameleon2 ] Adding name myname on destination remote (Realm: myShares) on port 1234 - 0x9ffcf18 [ op ptr 0x9fff0c0 ]
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Newcamd ] Server name : newcs
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Newcamd ] Des key : 0102030405060708091011121314
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Config ] Option <readers> not present for User: tuner1, NO reader control enabled
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Newcamd ] User 2: tuner1, Pass: b1teme, Host localhost, Port: 15000, Au: On, Spider allowed: No, Sidoverride: No, level: 1
[ 16:57:09 ] [ httpd ] httpd-user: newcs, password: newcs, accesslevel: admin
[ 16:57:09 ] [ EMM Cache ] Initialising dynamic Cache
[ 16:57:09 ] [ ECM Cache ] Initialising dynamic Cache
[ NewCS ] Process ID is: 4944
[ 16:57:09 ] Calibrating delay loops
[ 16:57:09 ] usleep(5) takes: 0 s 7 us
[ 16:57:09 ] usleep(10) takes: 0 s 12 us
[ 16:57:09 ] usleep(100) takes: 0 s 102 us
[ 16:57:09 ] usleep(500) takes: 0 s 501 us
[ 16:57:09 ] Allocation memory for 200 regular users
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Loader ] Starting Telnet on port 1001
[ 16:57:09 ] [ SockSrv ] Server thread started
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Loader ] Started HTTP-server on port: 8080
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Loader ] Reader type 2 on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 16:57:09 ] [ CardMan ] Reseting reader parameters
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Phoenix ] Opening device /dev/ttyS0
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting Parity to: ODD
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting 2 Stop bits on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 16:57:09 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting Baud to standard 9600
[ 16:57:10 ] [ Phoenix ] Normal RESET on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 16:57:11 ] [ Loader ] Reset failed ...
[ 16:57:11 ] [ Loader ] Starting Newcamd Server on port 15000
[ 16:57:11 ] [ NewCS ] Ready to GO! :)
[ 16:57:11 ] [ Card queue /dev/ttyS0 ] Starting...
[ 16:57:11 ] [ Newcamd ] Newcamd thread Server started on port 15000

However with card detect set to yes, I get the above, but with repeated a lot...

[ 17:03:50 ] [ Loader ] Reader type 2 on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:50 ] [ CardMan ] Reseting reader parameters
[ 17:03:50 ] [ Phoenix ] Opening device /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:50 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting Parity to: ODD
[ 17:03:50 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting 2 Stop bits on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:50 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting Baud to standard 9600
[ 17:03:51 ] [ Phoenix ] Normal RESET on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:52 ] [ Loader ] Reset failed ...
[ 17:03:52 ] [ Loader ] Reader type 2 on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:52 ] [ CardMan ] Reseting reader parameters
[ 17:03:52 ] [ Phoenix ] Opening device /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:52 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting Parity to: ODD
[ 17:03:52 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting 2 Stop bits on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:52 ] [ Phoenix ] Setting Baud to standard 9600
[ 17:03:53 ] [ Phoenix ] Normal RESET on node /dev/ttyS0
[ 17:03:54 ] [ Loader ] Reset failed ...

Now, I assume it cant talk to the card - any ideas to keep me going?

The reader is a Jaycar version.

Cheers
David

Rsmith

35 posts

Geek

#313762 1-Apr-2010 10:19

Hi Glazza,

I created this thread to document my experience with the Infinity USB Smart reader specificially because I had read that people were having trouble with Infinity readers (albeit with the Infinity USB Unlimited which is different) and I figured i might be able to help out.

There are a lot of threads already regarding the Jaycar reader, for example:

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=84&topicid=39124

Glazza

279 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 11

Trusted

#313792 1-Apr-2010 11:32

Rsmith: Hi Glazza,

I created this thread to document my experience with the Infinity USB Smart reader specificially because I had read that people were having trouble with Infinity readers (albeit with the Infinity USB Unlimited which is different) and I figured i might be able to help out.

There are a lot of threads already regarding the Jaycar reader, for example:

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=84&topicid=39124

Yup, fair point - created new thread - due to others been locked at http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=84&topicid=59301

Cheers

Rsmith

35 posts

Geek

#527144 29-Sep-2011 12:04

I've been PM'd by a couple of people over the last few months who were having trouble getting this to work properly so I figured I'd post an update.

1) I think that the newer versions of the Infinity USB Smart software have different 'modules' included with them and I have a suspicion that the modules included with the newer versions of the software are causing problems.

I haven't had time to test this myself (if it ain't broke..) but I have got a list of most of the versions of the software from WB Electronics:

http://www.infinityusb.com/files/infsmartsetup113.exe v1.13http://www.infinityusb.com/files/infsmartsetup112.exe v1.12http://www.infinityusb.com/files/infsmartsetup111.exe v1.11http://www.infinityusb.com/files/infsmartsetup110.exe v1.10http://www.infinityusb.com/files/infsmartsetup109.exe v1.09http://www.infinityusb.com/files/infsmartsetup108.exe v1.08

I think I used 1.08 or 1.09 when I was setting this up myself.
2) Someone whom I was helping to this set up has told me that they have it successfully running with the reader in 'normal' mode using OSCam.

I haven't had any experience with OSCam since, again.. NewCS is plugging away happily. But I was never able to get NewCS to work in 'normal' mode without glitching continuously. So if you're unable to get things working in 'module' mode with this reader, then it would be worth checking out OSCam (Might be worth starting with OSCam anyway)

I hope this is helpful to someone, I really wouldn't want anyone to buy the reader on my account and not be able to get it to work.