Basic Trial Setup Questions w Wintv 150

[Al1]

Sorry to be tabling such basic questions but Tech support turn will exceed the Sage TV trial period, and I am loosing it....
-PC Conf: WinTV 150 Card; MS XP Home SP2; Asus P4P800 Mobo; P4 2.8G; 2G ram; Motorola Digital Cable box; NVIDIA 5500 G card;Java and Direct X downloaded and verified (Java), IR Blaster restarted every re-boot.
-With WinTV alone, it works, dual displays - clone mode, no audio or visual issues, recording fine etc - all fine.

I attach Cable box (set top) to WinTV card via coax. From NVIDIA graphics card to the monitor using the 15 pin connector.

With Sage, On single display (CRT monitor) I am unable to get a picture (or anything) - error message "Playback exception error ~4,0x0 Problem rendering the video portion for playback."


1) Basics (primitive perhaps) In set up, "Select Device Input". Sage offers these choices - Composite, Composite 2; S-video, S-video2, or Tuner. In my configuration what is the coax supposed to be? I have tried all with no success. The preview window always fails.

2) Unable to verify that the IR Blaster (as provided with WinTV) is functioning (in contrast to WinTV where I can see it 'blasting'...)
At what point should I be verifying the IR Blaster?

Sorry to be asking such a sophisticated crowd these fundamentals

[Opus4]

(I don't have a 150) ... but if I am understanding correctly, then with your connections, you will want to choose the TV Tuner (coax connection) & then say that you are using an external receiver. This should be covered in the v4.1 PDF manual in your SageTV directory, starting on p. 145 & continuing from there to step 3B. In Step 5 on p. 147, you should see an opton for the Hauppauge IR blaster & so on.

- Andy

[Al1]

Andy I really appreciate your efforts.
Per guidance:
--I select 'TV Tuner' (preview comes back, failed, same error message ~4,0x0),
--it prompts for "Select a tuning Option"
--I select External, it prompts for channel (3 or 4) -which does not make sense to me, as the blaster should 'tell' the cabel box what channel to 'go to'
--I enter / try '3 or 4'
--it then asks me to select a tuner plugin - I have no idea which to choose (3 choices: 1-direct TV -asks for a 'com' port so I assign one, but have no idea if this is valid, 2)- USB-UIR gives a messgae "Failed Setting IRE port" - I check drivers and they are presnet, and 3) actisys lR200L - which gives similiar error msg as for USB-UIR but to ensure serial port (none in use) are enable in Bios.

Program Guide downloads just great, etc etc

At Finish Set up I get same error code / msg ~4,0x0.

I have been at this spot too many times ??

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Al1

--I select External, it prompts for channel (3 or 4) -which does not make sense to me, as the blaster should 'tell' the cabel box what channel to 'go to'

This is the channel that the box will output via coax to the card's tuner input. It is not a channel that will be watched -- just like sending coax to your TV from the STB, you would have to set the TV to 3 or 4 & then set the box to output on that channel.

--it then asks me to select a tuner plugin - I have no idea which to choose (3 choices: 1-direct TV -asks for a 'com' port so I assign one, but have no idea if this is valid, 2)- USB-UIR gives a messgae "Failed Setting IRE port" - I check drivers and they are presnet, and 3) actisys lR200L - which gives similiar error msg as for USB-UIR but to ensure serial port (none in use) are enable in Bios.

(Again, I don't have a 150) Before configuring your source in SageTV, you should configure the 150's IR blaster using the Hauppauge software. Once that is done, you should see an option to select the Hauppauge IR Blaster at this point of source setup. Maybe someone who has a 150 & uses that blaster could jump in.

If you are running in service mode, try turning that off & worry about service mode once it is all working.

At Finish Set up I get same error code / msg ~4,0x0.

This error number at playback just indicates some sort of generic error. I've been told that the best thing to do at that point is to do a complete uninstall & reinstall of SageTV. Get rid of the existing SageTV installation directory while you are at it.

- Andy

[Al1]

Again - I really appreciate your effort.

Under "Tuner Control" I have entered a value (3 and also 4) and it prompts for "select an IR code" - but the list is .. well empty ? Only the 'close' option?

The blaster was working with Win TV. In fact WinTV is immediately available. Should I de-instal -all or part of it?

[Guyverix]

For the channel 3/ 4 option, choose the channel that is NOT broadcast locally. IE, if KOMO 4 is in your broadcast area, always choose channel 3. As for the IR blaster, I dont use it, but I will reconfigure my VCR to be my tuner and see if I can help you out with that within the next day or so..

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Al1

Under "Tuner Control" I have entered a value (3 and also 4) and it prompts for "select an IR code" - but the list is .. well empty ? Only the 'close' option?

I don't know what screen or dialog this is referring to. For the channel 3/4 selection, I am referring to Step 4 at the bottom of p. 146 in the v4.1 PDF manual -- there is no Close option on that dialog.

The blaster was working with Win TV. In fact WinTV is immediately available. Should I de-instal -all or part of it?

You shouldn't have to uninstall WinTV, but it should not be running when trying to configure SageTV. The Hauppauge IR software should be running, however.

- Andy

[jagee23]

Have your tried connecting your 150 to your STB with RCA cables instead of coax?...if possible. I have a 150 i am using with a DirecTV reciever and ir blaster and it works great. I had a little trouble getting it to work using coax as well so I got a single composite cable for video and picked up a RCA to 1/4 in. jack little cable for sound at Radio Shack for a couple of bucks...set the source for composite and all works well. You might give that a shot...hope it helps.