Vista Media Center TV Pack issues

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Satch

1985 posts

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#25658 28-Aug-2008 12:27

I guess I did speak too soon (see the Fiji thread in the DVB-T/DVB-S forum). I lost the Sky feed last night so had to close VMC, stop the DVBSBridge service, open up DVBViewer, and start the service again before getting the signal back in VMC.

This is disappointing as it makes the setup unreliable to record TV shows.

I'm also struggling with the guide. I set TV1, 2, and 3 to pick up listings off just Freeview (or that's what I believe I did!) but my guide for those three channels stops at midnight on Monday 1 Sept. I'm sure it should go out until Friday 5th?

How are others finding their TV Pack setups? What other issues are you encountering, and how have you overcome them?

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9 posts

Wannabe Geek

#160741 29-Aug-2008 15:14

I have had trouble as well. I had the TV Pack installed and running with no problems for a week until this Monday, I can not record anything now and apparently its to do with guide issues they are having. I even went back to a restore point of 18 Aug and removed all the updates including KB950126 but it hasn’t helped. Nor did setting up the tuners again and mapping all the guides to the STB channels (no quick task).

Does anyone know if Media Centre will get the guide data from the satellite or dose it only try to download from MS? I thought it might be part of my problem if it only downloads now given we don’t have any support in the TV set up.

Satch

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#160746 29-Aug-2008 15:41

The TV Pack can only get NZ EPG via the broadcast as far as I'm aware. And if you have Sky integrated into your setup (via card reader), it only gets guide data for the channel if you watch it. This means that you have to watch each channel one by one to update the EPG. Annoying.

Well I've had a bit of time to play around today with things, and I've come across an interesting discovery. Everyone else may already know this, but it is new learnings for me at least!

The TV Pack appears to be able to pull all guide data for all channels on a single transponder. So the first time you set up Freeview for example, when you watch one of the channels on say transponder 12456, it pulls the guide data for all channels on that transponder and updates the VMC guide accordingly. So I took this one step further for my Sky setup...

I'm running Sky into VMC using DVBSBridge for DVBViewer. Under that setup I have to watch each Sky channel individually to pull the guide data into the VMC guide. So I thought why not scan the 'raw' (encrypted) Sky channels too to see if I can pull guide data for a group of Sky channels on the same transponder. I tried to watch one of the encrypted channels, and as expected VMC told me the signal was encryted and I could not see any pictures. BUT....the guide data did populate for that channel! An for all other channels on the same transponder! I did not have to watch more than one Sky channel on the same transponder to get guide data for all channels on that same transponder. The guide data for Sky is not encrypted.

I could map (not merge) the guide data from the encrypted feed onto the same channel which I was decrypted via DVBSBridge. Furthermore, I could map hidden channels onto my decrypted channels. E.g. I scanned transponder 12644 which contains ESPN and Nickelodeon. I mapped those two channels to their equivalent decrypted channels in the guide from DVBSBridge. Then I hid the Nickelodeon encrypted channel and left the ESPN encrypted channel in the guide. I "watched" the encrypted ESPN feed for a few seconds, and both my decrypted ESPN and Nickelodeon channels had full guide data!

Now my reasoning for doing this convoluted setup was to try to eliminate having to regularly watch all 38 Sky channels I have to update the guide data. There are only approx 11 transponders which represent my 38 Sky channels, so I figured trying to deal with updating guide data from 11 channels would be a bit easier. I'd set up 11 regular recordings of these channels which would update the whole EPG data on a regular basis.

My next predicament I would like to throw open to the forum to see if anyone has any ideas. I've found that at least one channel has to show in the guide for each transponder for the guide update to work. I cannot set up a recording and then hide the channel, as the recording disappears too. Does anyone have any bright ideas how to work this so I don't have 11 extra channels showing, and how to automate recording and deleting of TV shows so I don't have to regularly delete 11 recordings all the time?

Nety

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#160770 29-Aug-2008 16:52

Seems to me that it would still be better to get the old method working downloading the channel data and importing it into Mediacenter.

Does anyone have the knowhow to work out how to get that going again?

Media centre PC - Case Silverstone LC16M with 2 X 80mm AcoustiFan DustPROOF, MOBO Gigabyte MA785GT-UD3H, CPU AMD X2 240 under volted, RAM 4 Gig DDR3 1033, HDD 120Gig System/512Gig data, Tuners 2 X Hauppauge HVR-3000, 1 X HVR-2200, Video Palit GT 220, Sound Realtek 886A HD (onboard), Optical LiteOn DH-401S Blue-ray using TotalMedia Theatre Power Corsair VX Series, 450W ATX PSU OS Windows 7 x64

Satch

1985 posts

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#160775 29-Aug-2008 17:11

Nety: Seems to me that it would still be better to get the old method working downloading the channel data and importing it into Mediacenter.

Does anyone have the knowhow to work out how to get that going again?

Agreed mate. Unfortunately my technical abilities do not extend that far so I'm in line waiting too!

CYaBro

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#162925 7-Sep-2008 20:31

Well I've had a HTPC with the TV Pack running for almost a couple of weeks now.
Everything appears to be working great, can view all Freeview channels/radio and the EPG is updating all the time.
The problem is that no scheduled recordings will actually record.
The red dot/dots show in the EPG to say that it is going to be recorded but it never does.
Not sure what is going on here.

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

gehenna

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#162948 7-Sep-2008 22:17

Where abouts can the TV Pack be purchased in NZ? I know it's OEM but still...

Nety

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#163022 8-Sep-2008 10:44

gehenna: Where abouts can the TV Pack be purchased in NZ? I know it's OEM but still...

It cant be purchased but do a google and you should find it. It is a update so not something that has to be purchased.

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gehenna

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#163023 8-Sep-2008 10:53

Nety:
gehenna: Where abouts can the TV Pack be purchased in NZ? I know it's OEM but still...

It cant be purchased but do a google and you should find it. It is a update so not something that has to be purchased.

Really, I was sure I read about it being an OEM product and there was heaps of fuss about it that it was only being released to OEMs so that they could control the quality of HTPC builds..

illicit

553 posts

Ultimate Geek

#163410 9-Sep-2008 23:37

Satch:
Nety: Seems to me that it would still be better to get the old method working downloading the channel data and importing it into Mediacenter.

Does anyone have the knowhow to work out how to get that going again?

Agreed mate. Unfortunately my technical abilities do not extend that far so I'm in line waiting too!

search for "tivo" and i think was about page 3-5 for the download links

Nety

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#163450 10-Sep-2008 09:58

illicit:
Satch:
Nety: Seems to me that it would still be better to get the old method working downloading the channel data and importing it into Mediacenter.

Does anyone have the knowhow to work out how to get that going again?

Agreed mate. Unfortunately my technical abilities do not extend that far so I'm in line waiting too!

search for "tivo" and i think was about page 3-5 for the download links

Sorry can you enlarge? Software for what?

avman

1 post

Wannabe Geek

#164613 15-Sep-2008 20:30

CYaBro: Well I've had a HTPC with the TV Pack running for almost a couple of weeks now.
Everything appears to be working great, can view all Freeview channels/radio and the EPG is updating all the time.
The problem is that no scheduled recordings will actually record.
The red dot/dots show in the EPG to say that it is going to be recorded but it never does.
Not sure what is going on here.

Same problem as me,

on Saturday it stopped recording anything to the folder. says its recording on the guide but nothing happens.

i have reset tuners, changed the recording location, its just that there are no errors at all from Media center. what i was going to do next was roll back to Sat Morning, (when it was working last) or rebuild the OS.

Jon

meanderingmark

65 posts

Master Geek

#166999 25-Sep-2008 11:04

avman:
CYaBro: Well I've had a HTPC with the TV Pack running for almost a couple of weeks now.
Everything appears to be working great, can view all Freeview channels/radio and the EPG is updating all the time.
The problem is that no scheduled recordings will actually record.
The red dot/dots show in the EPG to say that it is going to be recorded but it never does.
Not sure what is going on here.

Same problem as me,

on Saturday it stopped recording anything to the folder. says its recording on the guide but nothing happens.

i have reset tuners, changed the recording location, its just that there are no errors at all from Media center. what i was going to do next was roll back to Sat Morning, (when it was working last) or rebuild the OS.

Jon

CYaBro / Avman / Satch:

I have the same problem. I installed the TV Pack as is, rather than re-installing vista as suggested. Did you guys do the same? I wonder if that was the problem.

Is there anyone who has installed the 2008 TV Pack who doesn't have problems recording?

red5ive

15 posts

Geek

#167066 25-Sep-2008 14:41

Hi Guys,

I've been following this problem across several websites. I have been in contact with a member of the eHome team in Redmond and we're due to catch up sometime at the end of this week. Microsoft are very much aware of the problem and they're working on a fix.

I'll keep everyone updated as I go along.

Also, just a reminder that if you do a manual recording for the time you want to record (e.g. TV3 at 5:00pm to 5:30pm) will record perfectly and will read the EPG for the show that is on at that time. So, I just entered Mon - Fri, TV3, 5:00pm to 5:30pm and it knows I want to record The Simpsons.

I knows it's a pain, but it does work... for now.

meanderingmark

65 posts

Master Geek

#167168 25-Sep-2008 20:56

@red5ive

that's great news, thanks. i was dreading someone would say that i should re-install vista

Satch

1985 posts

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#167322 26-Sep-2008 12:32

Check my post here for a workaround http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?ForumId=83&TopicId=26434

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