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Author Topic: Lost abilty to watch live or record on just one channel (5 sub-channels)  (Read 1894 times)

OverTheAir

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Running JR19.  I am stumped and looking for help after multiple scans, channel clearance and re-scans have failed to resolve the problem. 

Problem background: Recording worked fine for over the air TV on all the channels I selected up until last week. Then JR stopped recording on just one PBS channel (virtual ch 54, physical ch 50 in the Bay Area), which has five sub channels.  Note that I get excellent signal reception on other TV channels on that same tower and also curiously on ch 54 (see below for more on this).  Using JR I have not able to watch live TV or record on any of those sub-channels since. I have isolated the issue down to JR at this point because the same combination of antenna, Avermedia PC card and DTV channel (KQEH/KQED+ on PSIP 54) is watchable using Microsoft WMC on the same computer.  However, what may have a bearing on this is that the PBS station is testing H.264 transmission on that same channel.  Another person saw this H.264 test stream as 54.6 using HD Homerun.  Would something like this throw off JR from decoding/playing the signal?  For each of the five sub-channels I see a black screen but I still get Quality/Signal strength of 100/100 when using the right click option in JR. 

An additional data point.  JRiver wouldn't let me watch any channel live after trying to record one of the sub-channels (54.3) on two separate occasions last night, instead reporting that I had no devices available to watch with, my Avermedia Duet card has two receivers.  Since then JR seems to have released both TV receivers in the Avermedia card so I can now watch other channels again.

The attached log shows the ability to successfully watch one totally different channel live (i.e. system is working fine for this channel) and then two subsequent failed attempts to watch the problem ch 54 live.

Finally, in case its relevant, more details ref the signal transmission.  The following links are to my post and a respondents on AVSForum who did the detection work.
My original problem: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-local-hdtv-info-reception/369015-san-francisco-ca-ota-420.html#post34743609
First comment: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-local-hdtv-info-reception/369015-san-francisco-ca-ota-420.html#post34744057
Second comment: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-local-hdtv-info-reception/369015-san-francisco-ca-ota-420.html#post34747273
Third comment: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/45-local-hdtv-info-reception/369015-san-francisco-ca-ota-420.html#post34771489

thanks
John
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Yaobing

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We had one previous user report of similar problem.  It turned out to be related to TV station switching to a temporary equipment because the main equipment failed.  As a result of such switch, there was an inconsistency in the transport stream ID that appeared in different tables.  This inconsistency throws Microsoft DirectShow off.

It might be something similar that is causing the problem. 

H264 may also be a problem as we have assumed that in the US all TV broadcasters use MPEG2 video.  As far as I can tell, they have not switched to H264 on all channels, right?
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Yaobing Deng, JRiver Media Center

Yaobing

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Yaobing Deng, JRiver Media Center

OverTheAir

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Thanks for the quick response.  It is only one sub-channel that has the H.264 signal - its a test signal 1080p 29.97fps apparently!

I had previously been in communication with the PBS station. It seems very likely that it is something the TV station changed, similar to the thread you linked to. The problem is that the populace aren't marching on KQED with burning torches and pitchforks in hand to protest so I'm not sure KQED will change their end since other TV's/systems don't appear to have the problem.  

Even in my case I can now watch the problem channels using Windows Media Center on the same PC, although when I first found the problem I wasn't able to see the channels on WMC either.  Perhaps it now works because WMC uses Media Foundation codecs in Win7 and is not tied to DirectShow?  The guy on AVS Forum who did the testing used HD Homerun and VLC IIRC.

Any plans to change JR behavior or am I stuck with this until KQED stop their tests (if ever) or I revert back to WMC or some other solution for my TV?  I assume if DVR functionality gets ported to Linux then you'd ideally want to avoid platform dependencies?

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Yaobing

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For now, without additional info, I can only guess.  If the problem is similar to the other case, there is not much we can do as we are still using DirectShow. 
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Yaobing Deng, JRiver Media Center

OverTheAir

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Do you need additional info from me or were you referring to another source? Also WMC works and JR doesn't in my situation so is this consistent with the use of DirectShow by JR?
Thanks
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Yaobing

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The log you provided only showed that after we submitted a tune request, there was nothing happening. DirectShow did not signal a "tune-changed" event.  I do not know what else you can provide to help.  Sorry.
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Yaobing Deng, JRiver Media Center
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