D11 serial control with patersontech.com usb serial adapter

[naln]

Hi,
Looked at the system reg as suggested earlier. Did not find any phantom com ports.

This is what I have so far- Serial control dll from October 06, also freezes after about a day and a half approximately.

So herez the question- can anyone point me to an automated way to restart the computer when sage is not recording anything? I am about ready to give up on fixing the serial port control issue- its frustrating because it happens every other day!!!

Also, could someone send me the DirecTV serial control dll from an earlier version of Sage....say a Sage version 5 or 4? I'll give that a shot and see if that fixes things. Meanwhile I'll also get in touch with Patersontech tech support and report back here for other users with similar problems.

[IncredibleHat]

So do you think the problem is the sage dll, or com drivers, or the tvt3?

Because after a couple days of it working, I checked it this morning, and tried changing a channel and it refused.

[IncredibleHat]

Actually scratch that...

I rebooted to get it to work again, but it is not. Its not responding. Not even the TV Trans Config says that serial is connected.

I unplugged both USB plugs, rebooted, even tried changing from COM4 (what it was on when it installed) to COM10... then COM2...

Nothing. Its dead, no response.

I tried following that registry information. My ComDB was of 07 00 00 00 .. for 18 sets. ???

[IncredibleHat]

Ok, more information...

The TVT3 device itself DIED. I plugged my second one in (firmware mode), and it is now showing up in the config utility. I try the initial one, and it does not show up. Not even USB connected. Its dead.

I wrote to pattersontech and hopefully they will replace this defective one.

That doesnt solve the problem in sage though. Even though I somehow got it working before for a couple days... I cannot get it working right now again. This is getting so tiring.

[IncredibleHat]

I love posting over n over hahaha.

I got it working again. Dont know for how long.

Turns out the DirecTVSerialControl.dll should be the root sage folder with sage.exe. I think. I was trying everything to get it working, then dedided to copy that file back into the sage folder, and now it seems to be working again.

But whats odd is, I copied it out to the common directory before to get it working before.

Oh gads I dont know. I just went through so many different things to try and get it working again, and now it finally all of a sudden starts to work. Coulda been any number of things.

As a note for the COM Reg fix... I didnt need to do anything there, things seemed clean when I uninstalled the serial/usb drivers and rebooted. COM1 apparently DOES exist on this machine. It is a header block, and not an actual builton port on the backside. I do not have any com brackets so I cant use it, hrm.

[naln]

Hey,
I have written to Patersontech for some tech support on this issue. I think its time we wrote to Sage Tech support as well this really is getting tiring.

I have these units work well for a couple of days and then they suddenly stop working- which totally kills it for me. Troubleshooting is getting really tiring post a near $100 bill for this hardware.....

Right now I am using the DirectTV serial control dll from an earlier thread.
Just changed it yesterday night. Will report back here in a day or so- when I expect the channel change freeze to happen.

Good luck with your setup!

Check here too- I don't think ours are isolated cases with these issues.

[unkyjoe]

I must say that since I updated the Patterson adapter to use 9600 baud instead of 19200 my DirecTV problems have disapeared.

It has been running fine for about 2 weeks now with no problems.

I use the stock 6.0.19 setup with the SageMC customization.

I would start clean, wipe out all those serial ports, and reset up the tuners from scratch. Make darn sure you have locked those PT adapters in at 9600 baud, there is a procedure on their website to do this.

I also posted these instructions in another thread in this forum, just do a search on my username and it should come up.

Hope this helps.

[naln]

Originally Posted by unkyjoe

I must say that since I updated the Patterson adapter to use 9600 baud instead of 19200 my DirecTV problems have disapeared.

It has been running fine for about 2 weeks now with no problems.

I use the stock 6.0.19 setup with the SageMC customization.

I would start clean, wipe out all those serial ports, and reset up the tuners from scratch. Make darn sure you have locked those PT adapters in at 9600 baud, there is a procedure on their website to do this.

I also posted these instructions in another thread in this forum, just do a search on my username and it should come up.

Hope this helps.

Is this for the D11-100? I think my TVtranslator3 has options of around 15200 and 9600. Do you change baud only on the translator or both on the com port settings via Hardware manager as well as the Usb tvtranslator? I thought the baud changes were only for the HD20 series of receivers.

I am trying out the older dlls right now. But as soon as I spot a problem with that as well, I'll lower the baud rate. Don't want to do too many things at the same time. I am currently using the dll from 5/1/06 - should spot problems if any in a day or so now- running it since yesterday night.

Thanks for the input. Greatly appreciate your help!!

[unkyjoe]

Nope just the translator.

I don't know if it is needed for the D11-100 or not.

My recommendation is to contact Patterson Tech or to read my thread STB channel changing for more information, it is a direct e-mail I received from Patterson Tech.

Hope this helps.

P.S You need to run 2 apps, the PT firware update and the DTV control to get the baud rate to stick!

[IncredibleHat]

I want to ask, those who use the patersontech, the dll, and a d11... do you notice if your system is sending a "ENTER" after the channel number?

Mine is clearly NOT.

I see the channel get inputted in the info bar, it sits, it sits, then it finally changes the channel. If I do a channel up/down after I see the channel input, and before the receiver finally times out and tunes to the channel, I get a garbage channel with a "Channel not available" error from the receiver.

Obviously it is not sending an "ENTER" after the channel, otherwise it would change much quicker than 5 seconds, and would not suffer from channel pileup.

Those who use an older DLL, do you notice this? Newer DLL users, do you?

[naln]

Not seeing this since I moved to the older dll - its pretty fast.
Have not turned the baud rate down.
Have not altered the default USB on/delay settings in the config utility from patersontech.

But too soon to suggest a switch....its been only a day without the intelligent recording and constant signal barrage to change channels.

I need to see this change the channels without intelligent recording and without lockups for at leats 4 -5 days before I can suggest a switch to the older dll....but so far so good. I'll report back on this in a couple of days....

[IncredibleHat]

Ok cool. Thanks for the report back. When you do report back in a few more days, and it seems better, could you post an actual link to the proper 'older' dll? I have like four or five dlls in my archives folder and dont know which is which lol!

[naln]

This is the thread with the older dll...

I am using the one Hector uploaded...there are a couple of others too if you want to try even older ones...mins is dated around 5/1/06....hope that helps...

If that does not work and if mine is stable for a couple of days..I can email you the copy that I have on Monday...

[IncredibleHat]

Well, I have an update!

Today, out of nowhere, my connection link died again. However instead of rebooting the machine, I quit the sage client, then opened Task Manager, and killed the sagetvservice service.

Immediately when I did this, the TVT3 Config utility saw the serial port again! I did NOT have to reboot to get the serial port (and adapter) working again.

The only thing I did was kill sage, so clearly it is sage that is causing the problem.

So, I downloaded and installed your reference DLL that Hector posted. I must say I likle this dll already as channel changes are INSTANT now! So, I will also 'wait and see' when/if the connection link dies again with this new (older) dll in place.

[naln]

I'm running this dll for about 4-5 days now...and have not had a problem with the dll at all......Only gripe is about Sage V6 being so resource intensive.....my poor old XP2100 is not able to handle the load...with comskip and all that.....so considering a server upgrade now....

[wags119]

I am looking at getting 8 - D11's and have no serial ports on my MOBO will this setup still work if I were to go USB(receiver) to USB(PC) or do I need to find something else to do.

Thanks

[naln]

Hi,
Don't know how stable all 8 would work. I've seen posts from people who are using 4 serial control boxes and have a stable setup. I presume the 8 will work normally too......

I only have experience with running 2 boxes simultaneously.

Good luck!

[naln]

Hi,
Some of the topics covered in this thread maybe of interest to you, specially since you do not have a serial port on your mobo.

I mentioned PCI risers/expanders to put in PCI - Serial cards. If you have PCIeX1...then you can think of getting PCIe serial adapters for that too....I think most mobos have at least 2 of those. There are some of those PCIe adapters that come with 4 serial ports...but the ones I found were too expensive -about $250 each, which is more expensive compared to getting USB to serial adapters. But their stability etc maybe a different thing altogether...I have no knowledge of that.....just some ideas to help you in setting up your 8 DTV box setup .