Looking for a channel changing solution

[meesterblack]

Hello all...

Well, I've finally got my Linux SageTV setup up and running. For now, I have a single PVR500 card using analog cable to tune channels, etc, as that was the easiest to set up.

Ideally, I would like to move to using the S-Video inputs and digital STB's from my cable company to tune both analog and digital channels. The quirky part comes when deciding which is the easiest/best solution for channel tuning. The STB that I will be using is a SA3250HD that accepts a 1/4" IR plug in the back, has firewire 1394 ports and a USB port on the front.

I've looked all over the net and it seems like there are not real sure-fire solutions that are easily implemented. Sadly, I spent the last three days trying to get my base Sage system running (long story) properly and finally everything is in good shape. As a result, I am not looking forward into investing more than 12 hours of tinkering trying to get something to work as it should.

I would love to find something like a USB-IR blaster that is linux/lirc compatible, but those seem to be few and far between (from what I've searched).

I haven't found any solutions that allow for command-line firewire tuning or USB control in Linux (I've read on the forum here about setting up firewire channel changing in Windows).

Can anyone offer any advice or direction?

SageTV reps - is the "beta" 1394 support in the Linux version allow for channel changing only?

Thanks..

[_Demo_]

I had not thought about firewire tuning only plugin. I will look if it's possible to implement easily. (should be)

Can you try the current test firewire capture to see if it finds your device?

_Demo_

[meesterblack]

Very cool. I think a lot of folks would be really pleased if they could do without IR blasting and the associated headaches.

I have an SA3250HD cable STB with 1394 ports. I've had it now for probably 1.5 months and never played with it enough to see if I can get a connection. I've done a lot of research online about linux, firewire and cable STB's and have learned that they are all a big pain in the arse. Most channels are encrypted, and the only thing you will likely get is a handful of network-broadcast HD channels.

However, as I'm as curious as anybody to see if we can get channel-changing-via-firewire working in Sage, I set out to hook up my SA3250HD to my computer via firewire.

Short answer -- it works.

Long answer -- had to install libraw1394, libiec61883, and libavc1394. A good guide is on ubuntu-mythtv.blogspot.com.

Used a utility provided in the libiec61883 tarball test-mpeg2 to copy the output stream to a file. Then I copied the file over to a windows box and tried to play it on windows media player (I know, shameful).

Output is a valid mpeg2 transport stream in HD.

I have absolutely no clue how to change the channel (don't think there is a command-line program available anyway). I just set it manually through the cable box just to see if I could get some output.

I would suggest, if anyone who is looking into this hasn't already found it yet, take a look at the MythTV project -- they have the channel-change-via-firewire built-in internally to their source code.

_DEMO_, please update us if you happen to strike gold on this in any way.... I would try to figure it out on my own if my programming abilities weren't as limited as they are. Nonetheless, let me know if I can be of any help.

Many thanks in advance...

-m-

PS -- I just deleted my Sage.properties and restarted sage, so far nothing to indicate that it might be auto-sensing any firewire capture interfaces.

[_Demo_]

You need to add the linux/enable_firewire_capture=true in your Sage.properties to enable firewire. (this will only work if you have already installed the firewire libraries you mentioned)

This might cause some conflict with standard pvr cards recording though.

_Demo_

[meesterblack]

I will give it a shot.

As I imagine, though, TW is probably using 5c encryption and I can probably only get a handful of HD channels. And sadly, since I am yet to own a real HDTV set as of yet, it will be of no real use to me. I will enable it and report the results just for the heck of it.

DEMO, any guesses as to how long or *if* we might ever see a firewire tuning plugin?

Just curious, thanks again for the help so far..

[_Demo_]

If the current firewire works (even if it only change channel and not actually record) it should be easy to do the tuning plugin...

_Demo_

[meesterblack]

Sadly, I enabled the linux-firewire option in Sage.properties and while I was able to add the firewire as a video source and configure it, I was never able to get a picture or change any channels.

All I get is "No Signal".