SageMCTuner - anyone have this working with cablecard?

[SuiDog]

How long does it take and how hard is it to get on the beta program? I submitted a ticket this morning.

Btw I want to clarify, This time I wasn't dropping tuners it was just giving recording errors and lots of halted recordings (HD and non-HD). Do you know if the latest firmware also fixes the artifacts that happen in the HD recordings?

One of the other things I've noticed is with my MediaMVP's I'm not having the best of luck view HD recordings now. I don't know if it's a SageTV beta thing or what. About 50% of the time I get a Black screen when trying to view the recording and the other 50% it works, BUT.. when it does work and I try to skip forward it will seem to hang the play back and I have to stop and start the playback of the recording to fix it.

Suidog

[King of Bayonne]

How long does it take and how hard is it to get on the beta program? I submitted a ticket this morning.

I received a reply granting me access to the beta program within about 24 hours of opening the ticket.

I alerted Ceton tech support that the 1.0.3.4 beta firmware did indeed seem to resolve this particular issue (InfiniTV 4 + SageDCT + SageTV 7) in the hopes that they would be sensitized to the issue and solution and therefore "grease the skids" for any other SageTV users who might contact them for the beta firmware.

Btw I want to clarify, This time I wasn't dropping tuners it was just giving recording errors and lots of halted recordings (HD and non-HD). Do you know if the latest firmware also fixes the artifacts that happen in the HD recordings?

I wasn't using the non-working combinations long enough to experience lost/dropped tuners, so I can't comment on that. The big problem I was seeing was the interrupted/halted recordings, and the 1.0.3.4 beta firmware completely resolved those issues for me.


KoB

[kmp14]

Originally Posted by SuiDog

I want to clarify, This time I wasn't dropping tuners it was just giving recording errors and lots of halted recordings (HD and non-HD). Do you know if the latest firmware also fixes the artifacts that happen in the HD recordings?

Suidog

Is it possible you are not getting a good signal to the ceton? It just sounds like problems that are old (fixed in 1.4). While you are waiting for beta access you may want to confirm that recordings work ok in windows media center.

[nebulink]

Originally Posted by anosis

Well, I got the Ceton working with my Sage setup, however I had to use SageMCTuner instead of SageDCT (my installation will not work with the .TS files produced).

I have Charter Basic and Extended (no HBO, Showtime, etc of the sorts) and all the channels are working inside SageTV. So if you go to this link and type in your zip and address : http://www.charter.com/channels/displayChannels.jsp
I have Digital View and HD Ultra selected, none of the others. I am however contenplating to add the Digital View Plus channels as BBCA is on there and my wife and I are big fans of the original Top Gear show. Those channels should be fine as well. If I do add them and they work I will report back.

Thanks for the feed back. I am just about to take the plung, however, I would like see a little more stability first.

[SuiDog]

Ok got the new firmware and the new hardware firmware(now running Firmware: 1.0.3.4 Hardware: 4884) . After a false start in which i had to power off my machine, power it back on and re-seat the cable card in the Ceton and then have the cable company send the reset command to it again, it seems to be working again. I'll report back and let you all know if it's going good.

[nebulink]

babgvant, do you feel the current release is stable? could this be recommended for the average user?

I have a friend that would like to try this out but I do not want to support him on an ongoing basis.

Thanks for everything you have done to support cable cards.

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by nebulink

babgvant, do you feel the current release is stable? could this be recommended for the average user?

That's a hard question to answer in general because I don't have anyway to measure success/failures besides this thread and my personal use. So very much FWIW - I've been using the release build (with bridging enabled) for a few days longer than it's been available without any issues (only had one recording "WARN" and reset during that time).

Overall I'm very happy with the performance and stability of the solution, but I still have some things I'd like figure out - like packet cleanup - that I haven't had the time to properly address.

[nebulink]

babgvant,

Thanks for the quick response. I think it is about time to pull the trigger.

Appreciate everything you have done to support the Ceton card.

[kmp14]

Originally Posted by nebulink

I have a friend that would like to try this out but I do not want to support him on an ongoing basis.

SageDCT is very stable, but I would bet you will still be supporting your friend on an ongoing basis anyway.

I have more than a few friends that I support. It has gotten to the point that when they call I answer "24 Hour Support Hotline".

[anosis]

Originally Posted by babgvant

That's a hard question to answer in general because I don't have anyway to measure success/failures besides this thread and my personal use. So very much FWIW - I've been using the release build (with bridging enabled) for a few days longer than it's been available without any issues (only had one recording "WARN" and reset during that time).

Overall I'm very happy with the performance and stability of the solution, but I still have some things I'd like figure out - like packet cleanup - that I haven't had the time to properly address.

Andy, are you still investigating a .mpg solution with SageDCT? If you need someone to test, I would be more than happy.

This last weekend I re-installed Sage from scratch (uninstall first, deleted all traces of files and installed a fresh copy V7 Beta) and made sure I had all the correct versions installed and it will not play with the .TS file. The PC is also used for solid CAD modeling and if I reinstall windows I have to deal with the configuration of the software which is not really an easy task either, so for now I am stuck with the current OS.

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by anosis

Andy, are you still investigating a .mpg solution with SageDCT? If you need someone to test, I would be more than happy.

Yes, but I don't know when I'll have a chance to pursue it further.

[kmp14]

Originally Posted by babgvant

Yes, but I don't know when I'll have a chance to pursue it further.

Slacker

[Griff]

Is there anything special those of us using SageDCT will have to do when upgrading to to latest Sage Beta (SageTV V7.1.7 Beta is Ready!)?

Thanks in advance for any direction you can give.

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by Griff

Is there anything special those of us using SageDCT will have to do when upgrading to to latest Sage Beta (SageTV V7.1.7 Beta is Ready!)?

nope

[Griff]

Thanks for the help. All four of my Ceton tuners failed in Sage today for some reason. They were available again after a reboot of the system. Based on King of Bayonne's suggestion in this and another thread, I advised Ceton in my trouble ticket that I was having trouble consistently tuning the Ceton Card in Sage, and Ceton indicated that they will allow me in the beta program after I upload my Ceton diagnostic data. Hopefully that will solve my problems.

[Gustovier]

FYI it looks the HD Homerun prime was just certified by cable labs. I'm wondering if this would make for a possibly better solution for copy freely content. The 6 tuner version should be avail first (prob within a month) with a 3 tuner to follow according to silicon dust forums.

[anosis]

Has anyone of you any experince building a graph with a network tuner.

Basically I am trying to investigate why my sagetv setup will work with SageMCTuner recording a .MPG file but will not work with SageDCT and the recorded .TS file.

I wanted to see if I could use GraphEdit to create a graph with one of the tuners as the capture device dumping the file once into a .TS file and than into a .MPG file and see what the difference might be.

How do I select the Ceton as a capture device from the filter selection within GraphEdit?

Help is much appreciated.

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by anosis

Has anyone of you any experince building a graph with a network tuner.

Basically I am trying to investigate why my sagetv setup will work with SageMCTuner recording a .MPG file but will not work with SageDCT and the recorded .TS file.

I wanted to see if I could use GraphEdit to create a graph with one of the tuners as the capture device dumping the file once into a .TS file and than into a .MPG file and see what the difference might be.

How do I select the Ceton as a capture device from the filter selection within GraphEdit?

Help is much appreciated.

The difference is that the weird information in the PAT/PMT get cleaned up when remuxing the file. If the latest Sage beta can't split the TS that is dumped you should submit a support ticket.

You won't be able to build a capture graph to use the Ceton card in GraphEdt because some code is required to configure the filters, but you can see the tuners listed in the PBDA section.

[anosis]

Originally Posted by babgvant

The difference is that the weird information in the PAT/PMT get cleaned up when remuxing the file. If the latest Sage beta can't split the TS that is dumped you should submit a support ticket.

You won't be able to build a capture graph to use the Ceton card in GraphEdt because some code is required to configure the filters, but you can see the tuners listed in the PBDA section.

Very odd. Mine show up only under the 64bit version of graph edit and they are listed under BDA.

Could that be a reason why my setup is not working?

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by anosis

Very odd. Mine show up only under the 64bit version of graph edit and they are listed under BDA.

Could that be a reason why my setup is not working?

My bad, they are listed under "BDA Receiver Components" and "BDA Source Filters".