VistaView Saber 2020

[ARMYB77]

This seems to be the general forum for the Saber 2020 at this point, so I just thought I'd let everyone know that the driver release for multiple card support should be out in 2 weeks. This was reported by someone from the BTV forum one week ago on 3 November (Then they said 3 weeks so I did the math).

I don't know how much faith I have in that but we can all hope. The Vista View seems to be trying their hardest, but their priority for drivers is still in Windows Vista 64Bit Certification. So you can probably bet that the drivers will either come after the 64Bit ones or in conjunction with.

Cheers!
Armyb77

[95TBird]

Actually...

I'm currently running 2 Saber 2020 Cards using the 1030.3.0.1 Drivers that they have posted on their web site.

They asked me if I was willing to help test dual card installation under Sage & I agreed. All I needed to do to get it working on my 6.13 Sage was to install the Tuners in the correct order...

The correct order is :

Card 1 Tuner 0
Card 2 Tuner 0
Card 1 Tuner 1
Card 2 Tuner 1

Or as they appear in The Sage Setup Menus...

7162 BDA Analog Capture0
7162 BDA Analog Capture0 #2
7162 BDA Analog Capture1
7162 BDA Analog Capture1 #2

No video appeared in the preview window when I set them up, but they are working perfectly!!

And the picture quality is fantastic!!!

[ARMYB77]

95TBird

have you actually tried to do 4 active records at once? According to Vista View it will not work because the current drivers do not contain the card IDs. This results in if you try to actively record 4 programs or 3 for that matter for Sage TV not to know which card is which. If you were lucky enough to get it to work that is great but almost everyone else including Vista View have said the only way to get all four tuners to work is through GraphEdit and guessing the card IDs.

If you were able to make it work in Sage, I'm curious on how you installed the cards? Did you install one card and drivers, and then add them in sage? Then add the second card after that and add that one in sage? Or did you just put both in at once and install drivers?

Maybe the reason it worked for you is the way you installed it, so if you can give me some more details that would be great!

Thanks
Armyb77

[bjterry62]

Originally Posted by Jackal

Ok, so I know that my card works because I can get video through it with the Vista software and MCE. Any ideas of why I can't get an image through Sage? I still don't have any type of remotes or USB-IRT. I know that it offers to set up on channel 4 but I can't do it without that hardware. I'm currently researching remotes. I need one that will work with both MCE and STV v6.

Something I didn't mention in my earlier posts. During Sources setup in Sage, NOTHING comes up in the preview panel. At first, I thought that the card was not working. But after going on through and finishing up the wizard, there is video. Sorry I left that out, but some may think they are not getting a signal when they really are.

Also, if you get this card, make sure you set it up in the VV software first. When scanning fopr stations, the location defaults to Afghanistan and has to be changed to USA to pick up stations. I can't remember if this affected anything in Sage or not. But the VV PVR app would pick up nothing until it was changed for BOTH tuners.

BT

[bjterry62]

Final Update:

I switched out the K8NGM2-FID for the RS482M2-IL. I've decided that I'm not using it for the HTPC. With the ATI board, I get good video from the Saber and the other capture cards. Perhaps the nvidia MB has a defective NB or something. It works fine for a desktop MB and I need to upgrade my desktop, so it will find a home there. As for the PQ in Sage, it seems to be okay, but it still isn't what I would like. I guess I may have to try an aftermarket video card in the end.

Currently, I'm using Sage to record using the Saber and I've reverted to my old software and card for live tv. I just got tired of trying to get comparable PQ by tweaking and retweaking all the settings. I also didn't like the fact that all of my old recordings were difficult to bring into Sage. Other apps showed all files in the designated "Recorded TV" directory. However, Sage would not. As a matter of fact, when I reloaded Sage the other day, it didn't even show the recordings from the day before. Click on Recorded Shows and nothing. Same folder. Same types of files. WTF!!! Anyway, I'm happy now and things are looking better.

Best of luck to all others.

BT

[heffe2001]

If you didn't backup and restore your wiz.bin file when you reloaded Sage, all your recorded information is gone. If you had reinstall, replaced your wiz.bin with the one from the previous install, you'd still have any Sage recordings.

[bjterry62]

Originally Posted by heffe2001

If you didn't backup and restore your wiz.bin file when you reloaded Sage, all your recorded information is gone. If you had reinstall, replaced your wiz.bin with the one from the previous install, you'd still have any Sage recordings.

I didn't lose the recordings, the files are still there. It's just that they're not listed in the recorded tv section after re-installing Sage. I probably should have saved the wiz.bin file, but I also have files there that were recorded with my past system that I would like to have listed also. Maybe I'm just a little lazy and don't really care to import stuff into the archived section. Seems it would have been easier to just list all mpg files in the selected folder though when it's chosen during setup. But what do I know, I don't write code that much.

BT

[jmiddleton]

I bought a Saber2020 a week ago to replace my ehome wonder. Insallation was a breeze. I downloaded the latest drivers 1030.4.5.0; pulled the ehome wonder and pluged in the saber 2020; installed the drivers and rebooted. Sage detected the tuners and added my channel lineups. To this point a text book install. When I started watching TV I noticed a dramatic loss of picture quality and a dramatic spike in CPU utilization compared to the ehome wonder - Sage was obviously encoding the signal in software. I did some tweaking of Sage settings and then sent an e-mail to both Sage and Vista View support.

Both companies replied promptly. I'll post the rely from Sage:

"Subject: RE: Bug Submit
Date: Wed, 20 Dec 2006 09:54:52 -0800

The Saber 2020 currently isn't supported because the drivers don't correctly register themselves for multiple tuner usage.

SageTV Support Team
SageTV, LLC"

Vista View is aware of the problem but I'm not sure where it fits on their priority list. It is solvable since other cards using the ViXS Xcode II chip (i.e. Nvidia DualTV) are fully supported by Sage.

For now, I've plugged my ehome wonder back in, preferring quality over quantity, and I'm hoping for a driver update early in the new year.

[jmiddleton]

Vista View seemed genuinely unaware that they had a problem and genuinely interested in supporting the Sage community:

"Subject: RE: Vista View: Saber 2020 with SageTV
Date: Wed, 20 Dec 2006 19:42:25 +0200

Jim,

I do not know what Sage is doing wrong. I would suggest that you contact Sage on this issue. If they are not able to help you, please tell me and I will talk to them myself.

If you solve it, please let me know so that I can tell other Sage users who have the same problem.

Vista View Support Team

support@vistaview.tv"

I haven't heard back since forwarding the reply I received from Sage to them.

I have no intention of returning my board - it's the ideal solution for my slot challenged motherboard and I don't think it will take long to solve the problem now that it is out in the open. The other cards that use the Xcode II - Avermedia AVerTV 3D MCE 500 and Nvidia DualTV are both on the official supported list and all 3 companies likely started with the same VIXS reference drivers and SDK.

[Naph1337]

I'm a n00b when it comes to tuners and pvrs, but I've been having audio sync problems in Sage when using the Saber 2020. I received an e-mail from Sage stating that the 2020 isn't supported (this was actually in response to a different inquiry).

However, I'm able to configure both tuners and view live TV without any problems. Recorded TV is another story. While Sage records my shows just fine, when I play them back (in Sage, WMP, Media Player Classic -- pretty much anything), about 1/4 into an hour-long show the audio sync starts to get noticeably bad, and shortly thereafter, it's completely impossible to enjoy the disconnect. (While watching part one of the 24 season premiere, Ahmed falls through a glass table...about 10, 15 seconds later, you hear the glass shatter.)

I did manage to create a test recording using the Saber 2020's included PVR application (SaberView), and it maintained audio sync, although it did appear to drop a few frames -- I think, though, it's because the SaberView app uses a significant chunk of the CPU's cycles, and when switching apps, it hiccups.

I've tried a handful of different settings and codecs, but nothing seems to change anything. Here's what I'm running:

Giga-byte K8NF9 mobo (NF4 chipset, latest drivers/BIOS)
AMD Athlon 64 3500+
2 GB Corsair RAM (can't remember the timings)
180 GB Maxtor HDD, NTFS, 64K block size (for recordings)
WinXP Pro SP2, on a 40GB SATA 150 HDD
Sage 6.0.19 (installed on a 300GB SATA 150 HDD)

Within Sage, I'm using:
Video renderer: VMR9
MPEG2 video decoder: SageTV
Audio renderer: DirectSound Nvidia Nforce Audio
MPEG2 Audio decoder: AC3 filter
Audio playback delay (ms): 0

If anyone's managed to figure this out, I'd love to hear about it! My tests, as mentioned above, seem to indicate that the problem lies within Sage (or its configuration), not the Saber 2020.

[jmiddleton]

Other cards using the Xcode II chip are fully supported by Sage (i.e. Nvidia DualTV) and apparently working so I'm inclined to blame the VistaView drivers. I have experienced a significant improvement by turning off the SageTV service and by upgrading the Saber 2020 to the latest firmware/drivers. Be sure to clean boot your computer (run msconfig, choose selective startup, clear all checkboxes and reboot) before flashing the firmware.

[ARMYB77]

I've been having the same Audio/Video Sync problem as Naph1337 since I purchased the card when it first came out. I thought that it was an isolated problem and that my card may have been bad.

I too have tried every configuration, and every driver. I WOULD NOT! do the firmware upgrade. There are way to many people that have had nothing but problems with it. Even with a successful upgrade picture quality is worse, and it doesn't fix the problem.

I have tried disabling the Sage Service and it makes no difference. Its pretty much safe to record 1 show, but when trying more then one at a time, that's when the problems start just as described by Naph1337.

I would agree that there is nothing wrong with the Xcode II it's a great chip. But we have not idea if the problem is driver based, or SageTV. I've been on other forums and no one else is reporting this problem except Sage users, which makes me think it's sage.

The one thing that I'm worried about with VistaView is their horrible picture quality using the RF tuners, which unfortunately I don't believe they can fix with drivers because I think the tuners are bad them selves and it may require a full recall to fix.

VistaView has a great concept for a product, it's low-profile, dual tuner, and PCIe! How ever this card falls very short on the execution. Good group of people are running this company, I just think they don't have a clue what is wrong with their card or how to fix it.

[Naph1337]

Nothing earth-shattering here, but I uninstalled everything PVR related, flashed the firmware (again!), and reinstalled Sage. I recorded two shows last night, and when I was watching them this morning I didn't notice any audio sync issues -- however, I'm pretty sure that the last time I uninstalled Sage and reinstalled it, everything behaved, too, so we'll see how it goes when I record some stuff tonight...

As Army pointed out, VistaView appears to be a good company that wants to get their product right. I've been in contact with their VP of sales and marketing, and he's been nothing but helpful in trying to isolate the problems. It's just taking a while...

That said, I would like to get everything up and running properly!

[ARMYB77]

Ok I submitted my bug report to SageTV today, and this is their responce:

VistaViews drivers don't support using the hardware encoder for multiple
tuners correctly so if you enable the hardware encoding for the card then it
won't work at all in SageTV.

This is a problem in their drivers that we've informed them about. I have no
further information on when/if they plan to resolve this issue.

Thanks,

SageTV Support Team
SageTV, LLC
betatest@sagetv.com
http://www.sagetv.com/

This explains a lot of my problems that I have been having, from really poor picture quality, all the way to my audio/video sync issues. It seems that when I record 2 things at once, my CPU usages reaches a point that it just can't handle anything else being done during that time, so when I play a video or something else during the recordings, the result is my recordings end up with a audio/video sync problem.

My wife today installed BTV to see if the problems exist with their software, from what she says the PQ is much better, and there is no high CPU usage (00-02% during recording). Of course I hate BTV and there is no way i'm buying it, I just hope that we get a fix for this soon. It's a shame that this card has so much potential but is being limited by stuff like this.

Last question, if this is a driver problem, why does it work in BTV? Of course i'm sure there are bugs on their side too, I won't bother testing a software that I have no desire to use to find the bugs though.

Thanks
Armyb77

[Naph1337]

Armyb77, thanks for the updates.

As another "experiment," I completely uninstalled Sage and deleted everything, then flashed the Saber 2020's firmware (3 separate updates), then reinstalled Sage.

I set up my recording schedule, then put Sage on Standby, then exited it from the system tray.

So far, the recordings made after this update have not had any audio sync issues. I have to admit that I haven't been using my computer during these times, nor have I been recording two shows at one time, so those variables might give me different results...

Additionally, someone recommended this WinXP patch, which may or may not have helped things...

[ARMYB77]

I've been doing some looking at the Nvidia DualTV, and the Saber 2020. I have discovered something that may or may not be know to everyone here. The Nvidia, and Saber 2020 use two different chips for encoding. The Nvidia uses the Vixs XCode II, while the Saber 2020 uses the Vixs XCodeII-L. This could explain why there are 2 different qualities for the cards, and why the Nvidia has been able to fix their card to work well, while VistaView is still trying to figure it out.

Here is a snapshot of the 2 cards so you can see:
http://www.htpcnews.com/images/stori...card_front.jpg
http://www.htpcnews.com/images/stori...altv_front.jpg

So was this already a known or does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Naph1337, have you been able to confirm that you are using hardware encoding with sage yet? If so did this resolve the audio/video sync issue?

Cheers,
Armyb77

[jmiddleton]

I just did a test. Using my ATI eHome Wonder Sage TV service is using 5%-8%CPU. I start a recording and change channels. this activates the Saber 2020 S-Video connection to my digital cable box. CPU utilization jumps to 25%. I start a recording here and change the channel again. This activates the RF connection on the Saber 2020 and CPU utilization jumps to 50%. Sage is definitely NOT using hardware encoding.

The fact that the Saber 2020 used the XcodeII-L solves a problem that has been bothering me. The II-L has the 3D comb filter on chip which explains the poor RF picture quality with Sage or other software encoders. Once they fix the drivers so Sage can use hardware encoding I now expect PQ problems to go away.

The Vista launch will be out of the way in a couple of weeks. Hopefully the VistaView team will have time to work on the driver problem then.

[ARMYB77]

I really don't think that it's a VistaView driver issue. The fact that GB-PVR, and BTV can use the hardware encoder suggests to me that it is in fact a problem with SageTV. SageTV is just making it easier on themselves by claiming the driver issue.
But I could be wrong and it might very well be drivers I just don't know how you can explain the drivers working in MCE, BTV, and GB-PVR.

Armyb77

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by ARMYB77

I really don't think that it's a VistaView driver issue. The fact that GB-PVR, and BTV can use the hardware encoder suggests to me that it is in fact a problem with SageTV. SageTV is just making it easier on themselves by claiming the driver issue.
But I could be wrong and it might very well be drivers I just don't know how you can explain the drivers working in MCE, BTV, and GB-PVR.

Armyb77

Those products are using the BDA drivers and SageTV doesn't use or require BDA drivers. So for SageTV it is a driver issue.

Gerry

[ARMYB77]

Gerry,
That would explain a lot, I will pass that to VistaView, to see if they can come up with some WDM drivers for the vista view. I thought BDA Drivers were for Digital Tuners though? I need to reread those topics...lol

Thanks
Armyb77