Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[GMan78]

Hi,

I have a very sophisticated Windows Media Center setup (Windows 7, but started back in 2004). Like so many others I wish to enhance the experience with greater flexibility, client server architecture, and whole home audio. J River looks like an exciting prospect. Of course TV is core to the application.

I am a noob with J River and attempting to set up the system with three DishNetwork Satellite external receivers. I have the following tuners;

WinTV-HVR-1250 (single analog, S-VIDEO input)
WinTV-HVR-2250 (dual analog, S-VIDEO and Composite input)

My remote is MCE V2 with IR Blasters to control the Dish recievers, however I have not yet set up IR control.

When I configure the tuners in MC I see the tuners and attempt to set them up. However, when I later try to launch the tuner to see "Live TV" I get nothing but a blank screen. I have not yet set up the EPG downloads, instead wanting to see that I have a signal before jumping through those hoops. Probably some stupid oversight, please toss me a bone. THANK YOU!!!

George

[JimH]

I'm assuming that your satelite box is the tuner, and that you then feed the signal into a Hauppauge card.  Is that right?

If so, and if MC recognizes the card, in MC you should see the inputs of the card.  Try selecting one of them.

Are you located in the U.S.?

[GMan78]

Jim, impressive response time, thanks! I am in the United States.

Yes, the DishNetwork recievers are the tuner. The Hauppauge cards simply act as capture devices via either S-Video or Compositie video inputs. Indeed, MC recognizes the cards when I go through "Television Options". I can pull up each of the three Hauppauge sources and click configure. I then get presented with the dialogue boxes and select my preferences. After that I am a little unclear where I go to test for a signal??? I have tried Theater View "Live TV" and also (after scanning channels) I have been able to select them off the "Television" tab in "Standard View". In either case I get no signal. I hasten to point out that if I relaunch Windows Media Center the tuners work fine. Do you think there is a confict?

Thanks....btw, in which country is J River based?

Regards, George

[JimH]

We're in Minnesota.

If you open Devices in the tree and click on Television, do you see any choices to the right?  This is where you would normally see the channels, but S-Video may show up.

Yaobing will be around in the morning and he should be able to provide better help.

[Yaobing]

MC does not currently support controlling set-top-boxes.  It can tune to whatever input line your STB is connected to (Composite or S-Video), but you will have to change channel using STB.

On initial setup, you need to do an analog channel scan (even though you do not have an input source connected to antenna/cable input, since your input is connected to S-Video or Composite).  After that you should see your Composite and/or S-Video input lines showing up in MC as "channels".  You can then tune to these channels.

[GMan78]

Yaobing! Say it isn't so! I was so eager to build my premiere HTPC using your software...alas, I am in a rural area and only have Satellite service for television. I am assuming that even a third party IR application like LM Remote, Girder or HIP will not work as well as you are not passing the channel change parameters???

Is there any roadmap for set top box support that you could share?

Thanks!
George

[JimH]

I think that our Media Center Remote could be taught to change channels on a STB.  MC will send any IR signal you teach it to whatever is at the other end of the emitter.

[GMan78]

Understood, but does the scheduler (in conjunction with the EPG) programtically send out the IR commands to instruct the exteral blasters to change the channel (with the STB learned commands)?

I really hope this works, but let me know what is possible...I spend too much time chasing code ghosts. LOL!

George

[Yaobing]

We are thinking about sending channel change request to STB, but have not jumped into action yet.  The problem is that MC TV has been designed on assumption that it obtains a set of channels by scanning the tuner device, and the EPG data is built around these channels.  With the tuner being external, this is not possible.

[GMan78]

 

I understand your approach to building the EPG around the available channels on the tuner, makes sense. Sadly, that puts me out of business with J River until such time as you find a way to also meet the needs of those of us with Set Top Boxes. If you do pursue this, please feel free to contact me for beta testing.

Best of luck guys, you have a great product!

George

[MusicHawk]

Unfortunately, same story here. I've tried OTA in many places in the western U.S. (10 states last month) and in general it's a non-starter -- too many mountains and valleys.

And the switch to digital made reception even more difficult because of weaker signals and all-or-nothing pictures. In the Palm Springs area of California (Coachella Valley), a year ago I could get most analog channels, if a tad noisy, but after the digital switch almost none come in -- and it's a flat valley with TV transmitters on high mountains! The problem is the heavily-populated valley spans close to 90 miles, too far to cover by OTA. So cable TV and/or satellite TV is the norm.

In the Los Angeles region (the largest city in the country), which is a mix of flat valleys and serious mountains, most TV stations are on tall Mount Wilson, which is at the far northern edge of the area. So coverage of the huge west, south and east areas is spotty to non-existent due to distance as well as mountains.

Here in San Diego, even people with a rooftop antenna who are close to the actual TV transmitters can't reliably use OTA because there are multiple transmitter sites scattered around and its not possible to point at more than one at a time. I'm in an SD 'burb, maybe 25 miles from several transmitters, and can't get a single TV channel OTA.