MyTheatre DVB Network Encoder Plugin

[Motofreak75]

Originally Posted by xred

Basically, you need to 2 things to get this to work.

1) a working XMLTV plugin from the forums here (I use Nielm's multisource version).

2) XMLTV2MTEPG from the files section of the Mytheatre forums (its the in the XMLTV section). Set this app to output the xmltv data and get that file to SageTV to import.

That should do it. Only problem I am having is that data imported from XMLTV is all marked first run which screws up my favorites a bit...

Hey Xred, What are you doing to correct the channel numbering using Nielm's muiltisource? everytime I try to use that plugin I get all the listings but not in the order I set up my favorites in MT. the only thing that works for me is Corys plugin,but that doesnt support muilt- providers.

[xred]

Originally Posted by Motofreak75

Hey Xred, What are you doing to correct the channel numbering using Nielm's muiltisource? everytime I try to use that plugin I get all the listings but not in the order I set up my favorites in MT. the only thing that works for me is Corys plugin,but that doesnt support muilt- providers.

I just sort my favorites in Mytheatre by Channel # (SID). I don't use Peters method of numbering them by starting at 1. I use the enumerate using SID option in my theatre, which makes the favorite # sync with the channel number. Just easier for me.

[xred]

I was just trying to refresh my EPG data, and I *think* I have confirmed the problem with XMLTV2MTEPG. I have been using NielM's plugintester to check the data coming out of X2M and for some channels its not adding the channel number for SOME channels. The problem entires look like this;

<channel id="C1850.www.mtepgdplu.com">
<display-name>FX</display-name>
</channel>

Whereas a correct channel looks like this;

<channel id="C1572.www.mtepgdplu.com">
<display-name>261 EWTN</display-name>
<display-name>261</display-name>
<display-name>EWTN</display-name>
</channel>

In these cases, the plugin can't import the channel and just hangs when it comes across them; the plugintester also "stops" when it finds them as well. To make it work, you have to manually delete (or edit) these entries. Once you do the data imports fine. I'm going to bring this up on the Mytheatre forum as soon as I have some time to look at my "problem" channels in Mytheatre and see whats different about them.....

[Motofreak75]

Yeah thanks Xred, but for me with a custom fav list (using two providers in one list & editing out the bad/waste of time etc.. channels) I'm using custom numbering and the only plugin that works is corys xmltv. Neims import just shits the bed with my custom list. Well it works, it does import but for some reason the CH lineup is all over the place.

as for your other problem, when I worked with Dplu in making the export file xml sample file for X2M, I did bring it to his attention, but I think this problem is a sage issue having the same chID name in two different location with the same provider. I tested this by creating a xml file with the chID FX, and alter the spanish ch 837 FX-S in MT and the import worked. But I found it easier to remove the channels all together (for me) I was getting burnt out working with Dplu on his time zone (& I'm -0500)


prehaps we should start another thread for this plugin.

[hdtvrocks]

Originally Posted by peterjb

DVB Support does not appear to be a high priority for SageTV. So there is a high likely hood that we're always going to have to rely on external program support to provide this type functionality. Thankfully, SageTV provides the Network Encoder Protocol to allow it to happen. I'm not saying that MT is perfect, because it isn't. I'd be happy if Saar was able to produce a MyTheatre 'light' that merely provides tuning, recording and EPG functionality. But hey - It works!

Now as for describing my work as a hack into SageTV - Well that's another topic for discussion..

Cheers

Peter

Can I get some clarification as to how your SageTV plugin works with Mytheater? I currently don't have either products and I'm investigating DVB cards, I'm about to pick up a Twinhan 102G or a Skystar2. Anyhow, my goal is proper EPG to PVR integration ala Tivo/ReplayTV with Season Pass, Firstrun, etc functionality. Mytheater by itself has PVR functionality however I believe it's time based, so no firstrun or 2hr special functionality. Does SageTV with your plugin integrate the EPG to PVR functionality I am looking for? I noticed MeedioTV will be supported DVB-S cards, but it looks like they don't support encrypted channels quite yet.

Thanks!

[insomniac]

To answer your question in short, yep! The only snag as of this moment is that there is a small bit of lag between channel changes. Half of that is because of timeshifting(by design), the other half is still kind of unknown. But it works and works very well. Thats most important to me!

Basically, after initial setup with MT, you will never touch MT again. Just have it autostart and sage handles the rest. You get full sage functionality from then on. E.g. EPG, favorites(season pass), first run, intelligent recording, etc.

I own both of the cards you mentioned. They both work well.

I.

Originally Posted by hdtvrocks

Can I get some clarification as to how your SageTV plugin works with Mytheater? I currently don't have either products and I'm investigating DVB cards, I'm about to pick up a Twinhan 102G or a Skystar2. Anyhow, my goal is proper EPG to PVR integration ala Tivo/ReplayTV with Season Pass, Firstrun, etc functionality. Mytheater by itself has PVR functionality however I believe it's time based, so no firstrun or 2hr special functionality. Does SageTV with your plugin integrate the EPG to PVR functionality I am looking for? I noticed MeedioTV will be supported DVB-S cards, but it looks like they don't support encrypted channels quite yet.

Thanks!

[advocaterules]

2005-09-27 00:06:36 ERROR - Unknown SageTV Network Encoder Command - BUFFER MTSageTV Card 1 TV Tuner|2|16777216|C:\mtsagetv\MTSageTVCard1on1270016969TVTuner-0.mpg|DVD Standard Play

I am getting the same error with SageTV 4.0 but can't seem to make it go away.

Any ideas? I turned the video in menu's to never and the error does not go away.

??? Help

[technazz]

Ive got a new problem on my setup that just started the last 2 weeks.

When a show ends on the MT Plugin (on dish network), and I continue to watch on the same channel, Sage or MT will freeze or pause video for 3-4 min and then resume play. Its seems to lock up Sage and MT where the remote or keyboard wont respond.

Video is fine during playback and on mt PVR-250 card hooked up to cable.

If I CTRL-ALT-DEL and then close MT the video will run for however longs its been paused for then stop.

I have to close both programs and restart to get everything back in sync.

Ive upgraded to Sage 4.1 and My THeatre 3.3.5 and I can;t go back because I cant fine the old installs for them.

Any Idea or simular problems??

Thanks

Technazz

[peterjb]

The network encoder does not support BUFFER- As It's only used for a video preview when tuning channels. You've done the right thing changing the video setting to never or only if active - I'm assuming that you've stopped and started SageTV and/or it's service? Other than that - I've got no ideas

On the SageTV 4.1 front, I've run into some issues - particularly that it refuses to use my Sonic decoders on certain machines. And that it now supports AC3 playback for recordings but not for LiveTV

I've just upgraded to MT 3.33.5 on my development rig and I've found that it appears to consume less CPU & RAM than previous versions - I've had no stability issues with the limited testing I've done thus far. EDIT: There are a number of reports on the MT Support forum regarding lockups with the latest version - You may want to check these out.

So all in all - I've been no help at all! But on a more positive note, Santa brought me a Twinhan Starbox for Christmas - So I should at last be able to make some progress on the channel changes issue for the DVB-S people - If I can get it to work!

Cheers

Peter

[insomniac]

WOOHOO! I love SANTA! He brought me a Sony 55" Rear Projection TV and he may now be responsible for fixing my DVB-S slow channel changes!!

Originally Posted by peterjb

The network encoder does not support BUFFER- As It's only used for a video preview when tuning channels. You've done the right thing changing the video setting to never or only if active - I'm assuming that you've stopped and started SageTV and/or it's service? Other than that - I've got no ideas

On the SageTV 4.1 front, I've run into some issues - particularly that it refuses to use my Sonic decoders on certain machines. And that it now supports AC3 playback for recordings but not for LiveTV

I've just upgraded to MT 3.33.5 on my development rig and I've found that it appears to consume less CPU & RAM than previous versions - I've had no stability issues with the limited testing I've done thus far.

So all in all - I've been no help at all! But on a more positive note, Santa brought me a Twinhan Starbox for Christmas - So I should at last be able to make some progress on the channel changes issue for the DVB-S people - If I can get it to work!

Cheers

Peter

[rickgillyon]

Trying out this encoder, seems to be working pretty well, but with one problem: if I'm watching live TV, approximately every 10 minutes the picture hangs; the audio keeps moving but the picture is frozen; after 5-10 seconds the picture starts moving again, fast-forward, until it catches up with the audio. Bizarrely, if I watch the same thing on the recording, no problem, the pauses don't happen at all on the recorded video.

Can anyone shed a light on why this would happen?

Rick

[peterjb]

FYI - I appear to have had the same lock-up problem on my main rig tonite. On this machine I'm running SageTV 4.1.3 & Mt 3.33.3 with NVIDIA PureVideo & AC3Filter decoders. I didn't have logging turned on so I'm unsure as to what the cause may be - What software versions are you guys running?

I'm currently trying trying to replicate it on my development rig at the moment which is SageTV 4.1.4 Beta & MT V3.33.5. EDIT : I've managed to replicate it on my development rig - I'm investigating the possible cause.

Cheers

Peter

[technazz]

Originally Posted by peterjb

FYI - I appear to have had the same lock-up problem on my main rig tonite. On this machine I'm running SageTV 4.1.3 & Mt 3.33.3 with NVIDIA PureVideo & AC3Filter decoders. I didn't have logging turned on so I'm unsure as to what the cause may be - What software versions are you guys running?

I'm currently trying trying to replicate it on my development rig at the moment which is SageTV 4.1.4 Beta & MT V3.33.5. EDIT : I've managed to replicate it on my development rig - I'm investigating the possible cause.

Cheers

Peter

Im running Sage Version 4.1 and MT 3.33.5 and I believe I did have it for 3.33.3. I'm using also using Nvidea PureVideo. Doe anybody have the install exe for Sage 4.0? I can't find it to roll it back..

Regards,

technazz

[ben_gb]

Hi,

I wonder if it would be a good idea to edit the first posting on this thread so it always has the latest version of the plugin (plus a run-down of any changes since the last version).

Otherwise, anyone who might want to download it (like me!) has to go through all 9 (currently) pages of the thread to work out which is the latest.

Also it might be worth adding a page to the Sage Wiki about it..? (Though this appears to be blank at the moment, so maybe it was already there.)

...and finally, it would be great if the docs could be included in the latest .ZIP file.

Many thanks!

Ben

[vuego]

Originally Posted by technazz

Doe anybody have the install exe for Sage 4.0? I can't find it to roll it back..

It can be downloaded here http://sage.tv/postDL.php?tmpFile=Sa...4_0_0Setup.exe

[technazz]

Originally Posted by vuego

It can be downloaded here http://sage.tv/postDL.php?tmpFile=Sa...4_0_0Setup.exe

Thanks..

[ben_gb]

Hi,

I'm trying to get the Mytheatre plugin stuff working, but have come to what seems to be a dead end...

I'm using a Hauppauage Nova-T PCI card.

I've installed Mytheatre and got it working by itself, so it can view and record from DVB-T channels.

I setup the SageTV favorite with a few channels to test.

I installed the lines from the docs in the sage.properties file.

I setup the Source in Sage (to use the plugin tuner), and also setup TVTV for the EPG for the channels I selected in Mytheatre). I also mapped the channels so their numbers were the same as I had given them in Mytheatre (just 1 to 5).

However, when I try to use Sage and tune into a programme, I just get a black screen followed by a "No Signal" message after about 10 seconds.

The log files seem to be full of 'GET_FILE_SIZE' commands which are returning 0 all the time (a .mpg file with the correct file name does get created in the right directory - but it's always zero length).

I tried the fast_mux and network_encoder_delay changes suggested in previous messages, but neither of these has any affect.

Log files are attached.

I'm using Sage 4.1.4beta and the latest Mytheatre (trial) 3.33.5, I think.

Any ideas what might be going wrong?

Thanks for any help.

Regards,
Ben

[peterjb]

My investigations thus far into the 'freezing' problem appears to point to SageTV 4.1. From what I can see, the Encoder is still writing data to the mpeg file and in my case zoomplayer plays the files back without a problem. SageTV, however appears to stop asking for the file size and then things go a bit awry..

Can anyone who is still running 4.0 confirm that this is not a problem for them using this version? I'm continuing to investigate the problem on my end as well.

Ben - Your problem is due to MT not telling the plugin that it has actually changed channels ( because it hasn't- no FT_EVT_CHANNEL_CHANGED was recieved by the plugin from MT ). This could be due to signal strength ( lack of ), a H/W problem or a configuration issue in MT. Can you run the plugin in 'Test' mode, with debug trace, to check the results? For each MT_CMD_SWITCH_CHAN_BY_CHID event you should get a corresponding FT_EVT_CHANNEL_CHANGED event

Cheers

Peter

[technazz]

Originally Posted by peterjb

My investigations thus far into the 'freezing' problem appears to point to SageTV 4.1. From what I can see, the Encoder is still writing data to the mpeg file and in my case zoomplayer plays the files back without a problem. SageTV, however appears to stop asking for the file size and then things go a bit awry..

Can anyone who is still running 4.0 confirm that this is not a problem for them using this version? I'm continuing to investigate the problem on my end as well.


Cheers

Peter

I rolled back to 4.0 and the problem went away. I read the install notes for 4.1 and they did change somthing to do with the network encoder

Major Release Items included with 4.1:

1. Integrated Media Extender support (currently the Hauppauge MediaMVP is supported)
2. SageTV Application Definition files now use XML instead of binary files
3. Network encoder discovery
4. Component level transparency
5. Various bug fixes for ID3, music file importing
6. Improved text quality in 3D rendering mode
7. Added menu fading transitions
8. Significant improvements to HDTV playback & recording
9. Fixed case sensitivty for title based favorites
10. Fixed support for TVTV European EPG Data

Technazz

[ben_gb]

Originally Posted by peterjb

Ben - Your problem is due to MT not telling the plugin that it has actually changed channels ( because it hasn't- no FT_EVT_CHANNEL_CHANGED was recieved by the plugin from MT ). This could be due to signal strength ( lack of ), a H/W problem or a configuration issue in MT. Can you run the plugin in 'Test' mode, with debug trace, to check the results? For each MT_CMD_SWITCH_CHAN_BY_CHID event you should get a corresponding FT_EVT_CHANNEL_CHANGED event

Cheers

Peter

Hi Peter,

Thanks for the pointers...

I played around with the debugging, and it turned out that somehow there was a 'crashed' instance of Mytheatre running in the background (but not showing on the task bar or systray), which was holding on to the Nova card and therefore the working instance of Mytheatre wasn't able to access the card and do the channel changes (I should really have tried a reboot before sending my original message, as that is all that was needed to clear up the problem!).

Anyway, it is working with Sage now, so time for some more fiddling..er..configuration :-)

Regards,
Ben