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[madbrain]

I have a HD Homerun Flex 4K. One JRiver MC instance on a Windows system is using it to record TV programs. The library is shared through DLNA.

If I use MC as a client on one Linux system, with no video tuner or capture hardware, I am able to tune to TV channels successfully, without having ever run Television setup.

If I use MC as a client on one Windows system, and try to tune to a TV channel, I get the error that "no television tuner is available to fulfill your request". The Windows client does have many video devices. However, I have disabled them all under Television / Manage devices, so the client should not attempt to use them. It should use the tuner shared by the server.

What am I missing ?

[tzr916]

What works for me is:
1. On the Server machine ensure that Tools > Options > Television > Advanced > Allow setup on clients => is not checked.
2. On Client machines do NOT run Tools > Options > Television > Setup. If you already have run TV Setup then do a Reset, and delete any Tuner Profiles on the Client machines.

Reboot the tuners and the Server machine, then reboot the Client machines.

PS: You might ask to have this topic moved to the TV sub-forum.

[madbrain]

Hi,

Thanks for your response. More inline.

What works for me is:
1. On the Server machine ensure that Tools > Options > Television > Advanced > Allow setup on clients => is not checked.

That was already unchecked.

2. On Client machines do NOT run Tools > Options > Television > Setup. If you already have run TV Setup then do a Reset, and delete any Tuner Profiles on the Client machines.

That was previously run. I tried to clear up everything, but that sent changes to the server and reset all the settings there, not on the client side. I had to restore them from a backup.

Reboot the tuners and the Server machine, then reboot the Client machines.

I rebooted them both, but unfortunately, there was no change in behavior.

What's the rationale for the reboots ? Shouldn't exiting and restarting JRiver MC on both sides be enough ? I have other daemons running on the host that runs JRiver MC server, so I prefer to avoid it.

PS: You might ask to have this topic moved to the TV sub-forum.

How/who do I ask to do this ?

[tzr916]

Clearing TV setup and Tuner profiles on a Client should not ever do anything to the setup on the Server.

I recommend reboots because changes to Client/Server configurations like these might not take effect until the MC Server Service is restarted and the Client re-connects to the newly restarted Service.

[madbrain]

Clearing TV setup and Tuner profiles on a Client should not ever do anything to the setup on the Server.

It does, because I have username authentication enabled on the DLNA server. This lets me delete programs from the server when I am done watching on a given client. That same feature also lets the client make changes to things like the server's TV lineup. So, I can't just reset it on the client while being connected to the library server.

If I disconnect the client from the library server, and use the local library, I can then set the TV settings.

However, once I reconnect to the server, and open a live TV channel, I get the same error that no television tuner is available.

I recommend reboots because changes to Client/Server configurations like these might not take effect until the MC Server Service is restarted and the Client re-connects to the newly restarted Service.

Making sure the processes are gone from task manager on both client & server sides, and restarting them in the right order is enough, IMO. I have a Home Assistant VM managing over 400 devices that I would rather not reboot unless required. I have been thinking about using Proxmox so that Windows (which hosts my MC server) can be rebooted separately, but that's probably in the distant future.

[tzr916]

Ah, I bet you are using DMS Tuner Stream method, and this the main reason why I don't! Because MC Clients cannot see if/when a tuner is busy on the Server when using DMS method... See the top of my list:
https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,110383.0.html

Code: [Select]

...these are what's on my wish list:

- ATSC3 Encryption License (DRM/copy protection).
- Proper DMS Server-Client functionality.
- Bitstream audio for DMS Live tv.

It's a kinda huge "bug" which really needs to attention. Only work around would be to re-order the tuners, have the Server start at one end and the client at the other.

[madbrain]

Ah, I bet you are using DMS Tuner Stream method, and this the main reason why I don't! Because MC Clients cannot see if/when a tuner is busy on the Server when using DMS method...

Yes, it appears I'm using that method. I tried disabling the 4 DMS tuners on the servers, and leaving only the 4 ATSC tuners. However, I was then unable to tune to a TV channel - still using the server only.

It's a kinda huge "bug" which really needs to attention. Only work around would be to re-order the tuners, have the Server start at one end and the client at the other.

I have attached the TV device list for both the server and client.
Only the server shows the DMS tuners. The client does not.

How would I go about re-ordering the tuners, on either the client or server, so that my client can tune live TV ?

I also attached the TV device list for my Linux client. It is empty, and that client has no problem tuning live TV.

[tzr916]

Move UP / Move Down buttons in the bottom right corner.

[madbrain]

Move UP / Move Down buttons in the bottom right corner.

Thanks. I get that. My question was in which order I should place the devices to make TV tuning work on the Windows client.

[tzr916]

The opposite order of the server should reduce the chances of a "collision". But the more machines you have, the harder it becomes because they don't monitor each other's usage.

Still hoping one day this bug will get some attention by MC devs.

[Yaobing]

Yes, it appears I'm using that method. I tried disabling the 4 DMS tuners on the servers, and leaving only the 4 ATSC tuners. However, I was then unable to tune to a TV channel - still using the server only.

What are the symptoms when you try tuning to an ATSC channel? Is the channel you tried updated? You might need to rescan to get the updated channel parameters.

[madbrain]

The opposite order of the server should reduce the chances of a "collision". But the more machines you have, the harder it becomes because they don't monitor each other's usage.

Still hoping one day this bug will get some attention by MC devs.

It's difficult to put the "opposite" order when the list of devices on each side is quite different.

Also, I tried disabling all the TV devices on the Windows client. I would then have expected it to work like the Linux client, which doesn't show any TV device. But it did not. The devices are apparently not fully disabled.

[tzr916]

Ditching DMS method, using ATSC method on the Server AND the Client will solve your issues for Windows. No clue on Linux.

[madbrain]

What are the symptoms when you try tuning to an ATSC channel? Is the channel you tried updated? You might need to rescan to get the updated channel parameters.

I attached a screenshot of what happens on the Windows client. I get "No television tuner is available to fullfill your request. Please make sure you have a device that is not in use."

I just tried on Linux again. The TV device list is no longer empty, unlike in the screenshot I posted yesterday. The list now shows the 4 SiliconDust DMS tuners. And I now get the same pop-up.

I do not know why the 4 DMS tuners suddenly appeared in MC31 Linux today. Maybe some change I made on my LAN to add IPv6, but it could be unrelated. In any case, I disabled those DMS tuners in MC31 on Linux too, but the pop-up still shows up. It looks like the problem is that if there are any local TV devices at all, even if disabled, the MC31 always tries to use them, and fails.

[madbrain]

Ditching DMS method, using ATSC method on the Server AND the Client will solve your issues for Windows. No clue on Linux.

I'm using the SiliconDust guide. Can I still use this guide with the ATSC method ?

Also, I did the ATSC scan before. It found perhaps 6 out of 100 channels, even doing the "long" scan. Not really sure what that's about. I'll try again.

[madbrain]

Ditching DMS method, using ATSC method on the Server AND the Client will solve your issues for Windows. No clue on Linux.

Here is the result of the ATSC scan. Only 5 channels were found.
You can see the long list of channels previously available through the DMS tuners in the background.

I tried to tune to one of these 5 channels on the server side, channel 7.1, KGO-HD. It goes to a black screen, and fails to get a channel lock.

After restarting the client, the behavior is unchanged - the pop-up still shows up, complaining about no tuner available.

I can tune channel 7.1 just fine using the Silicon Dust Android or Windows apps. No problem getting a signal lock, and the full list of channels shows up.

[tzr916]

Yes, SiliconDust guide data works with ATSC method. If you are serious about switching to ATSC mode, you should just start from scratch...

Disconnect the Client from the Server library. Reset all TV setup and disable ALL SliconDust tuners on the Client. It will get everything from the Server.

Then create a NEW clean TEST library on the Server - Run through TV Setup using ATSC method, disable DMS tuners, run the scan, setup channels and guide. Test playback.

Now, on the Client connect to that NEW clean TEST Server library. Don't run TV setup and verify the SiliconDust tuners are disabled. You should not see any tuner profiles on the Client. Go to Guide and try to play a channel.

[madbrain]

Yes, SiliconDust guide data works with ATSC method. If you are serious about switching to ATSC mode, you should just start from scratch...

Disconnect the Client from the Server library. Reset all TV setup and disable ALL SliconDust tuners on the Client. It will get everything from the Server.

Then create a NEW clean TEST library on the Server - Run through TV Setup using ATSC method, disable DMS tuners, run the scan, setup channels and guide. Test playback.

Now, on the Client connect to that NEW clean TEST Server library. Don't run TV setup and verify the SiliconDust tuners are disabled. You should not see any tuner profiles on the Client. Go to Guide and try to play a channel.

So, I backed up both my server & client settings and libraries.

I exited the client.

1) I uninstalled/reinstalled MC31 on the server.

2) I went through TV setup on the server, using the ATSC tuners.

3) For the guide, I selected SiliconDust .

4) It told me to enable DLNA, restart MC, and run TV setup again

5) I did, and proceeded with the channel scan

6) It found the same list of 5 channels I posted earlier - 7.1, 7.2, 7.3, 7.4, 4.5 .

7) Unfortunately, it also found channels using TunerStream, even though I had never told MC to use them. I can't tune to any of the ATSC channels, however. There is no signal lock.

It looks like enabling DLNA in step 3 to get the guide caused the TunerStream tuners devices to show up in TV devices, unfortunately.

So, I repeated these steps, except in step 3, I chose "no electronic program guide".

At that point, the channel scan found the 5 ATSC channels. But I can't tune to any of them in the server GUI. It looks like the ATSC tuners just aren't working at all with MC31, even with the server alone, so there is no point in trying to further share them with a client.

I also installed a trial version of MC33. The channel scan found all the channels through ATSC. And I'm able to tune to all of them in the server GUI !

I am also able to tune to all these channels in my MC31 client.

So, it looks like there are two issues :

a) TunerStream tuners can't be shared successfully with the client
b) the ATSC channel scan and tuning fails in MC31. But that bug is fixed in MC33.

[Yaobing]

6) It found the same list of 5 channels I posted earlier - 7.1, 7.2, 7.3, 7.4, 4.5 .

https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,140197.msg972559.html#msg972559

What build of MC are you using? Make sure it is the latest, as there was a channel scanning issue that was recently fixed.

[madbrain]

https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,140197.msg972559.html#msg972559

What build of MC are you using? Make sure it is the latest, as there was a channel scanning issue that was recently fixed.

I'm using MC 31.0.87 64-bit. This is the latest build of MC31 available. I know MC33 has the channel scan fix due to the trial I did yesterday. Not sure if fixes are still being made or being backported to MC31. I know the ATSC channel scan worked in some older versions of MC I licensed.

The good news is that I found a workaround for my issue, without using ATSC channel scan. I enabled only the 4 DMS tuners on the server. I then enabled the same 4 DMS tuners on the client, and left everything else disabled. At that point, I was able to tune channels on the client. It appears to use the channel list from the MC server, but directly talks to the tuner, not through the MC server. That's good enough for me at this time.

One of my HTPCs also has an HVR-1275 (not a typo) PCIe card with ATSC tuner. The channel scan also fails on it in MC31. It works fine in Hauppauge's WinTV Windows app. I am not relying on that tuner at this time, but if I were, it would be unusable in MC31.

[Yaobing]

I see. I believe Microsoft's recent updates broke some functionalities of DirectShow ATSC channel scanning. That was why I had to make some changes to get around the issue.

One good thing about the HDHomerun tuners is that it can be accessed by all devices on the same network. So in your case the client just directly accesses the tuners.