Should we be getting excited about FreeSat HD?

[motobarsteward]

This looks like it's about to launch. Does anyone know if we will be able to used DVB-S2 cards to capture these channels?

[doc]

I'm seriously thinking about upgrading my sage box as I can record HD from BBC-HD on my Nova-S2-HD card, but it doesn't half slow everything else down.

I can't wait for more channels to come out. It would be nice if the BBC would broadcast for a few more hours in the day.

So far I've watched Mountains, Earth: The Power of the Planet, How We Built Britain and Top Gear:Polar Challenge and the quality is amazing.

I have to use my Athlon x2 5600 as a dedicated client. It can't cope with recording and playback together. It may be because I have vista on it but I haven't tried it with XP.

I nearly got excited when Channel 4 HD came out, but its encrypted

If we get more free channels, I'll definately be thinking of getting more tuners.

[jaminben]

Yep, I'm getting excited about it although I'm not going to hold my breath for a March 08 release. I was also thinnking about how we scan for the eurobird 1 satellite as I only have Astra 19.2 & 28.2 within the PredefinedDVBS for the UK, would we need another PredefinedDVBS.frq? and if so could we get this inadvance so its ready for launch day?

Anyway heres the link to the offical website for those who havent seen it yet http://www.freesat.co.uk/home.php

Cheers

Ben

[Whitey]

Originally Posted by jaminben

Yep, I'm getting excited about it although I'm not going to hold my breath for a March 08 release. I was also thinnking about how we scan for the eurobird 1 satellite as I only have Astra 19.2 & 28.2 within the PredefinedDVBS for the UK, would we need another PredefinedDVBS.frq? and if so could we get this inadvance so its ready for launch day?

Anyway heres the link to the offical website for those who havent seen it yet http://www.freesat.co.uk/home.php

Cheers

Ben

Freesat will be broadcast from 28 deg east, the same as sky. BBC and ITV etc. are not going to waste money broadcasting from another satellite. I think the problem we should be thinking about is getting DVB-S2 working reliably in sage. I have a S2-3200 card that does not work very well on DVB-S2 transponders in sage. I don't know if DVB-S2 is officially supported or not.

Whitey

[jaminben]

Originally Posted by Whitey

BBC and ITV etc. are not going to waste money broadcasting from another satellite.

So even though they have stated that they are going to use the eurobird one satellite you dont think its going to be a problem?

The Freesat platform is to use the Eurobird 1 satellite situated at 28.5° east

http://www.astra2d.com/freesat.htm

I dont have any expirence with DVB-S2 so I'll leave that for someone else to comment on.

Ben

[Whitey]

There are channels on the sky platform that already broadcast on Eurobird 1, so no it's not going to be a problem. What I'm getting at is BBC and ITV aren't going to broadcast two versions of all their channels, one for freesat and one for sky.

Whitey

[jaminben]

ah I see what you mean now

I've just got my Nova HD S2 card today and have got all the regular channels working ok but BBC HD fails to work like it does with my HVR4000, any tips on which codec to use ? except cyberlinks as I dont like those.

[doc]

Originally Posted by jaminben

ah I see what you mean now

I've just got my Nova HD S2 card today and have got all the regular channels working ok but BBC HD fails to work like it does with my HVR4000, any tips on which codec to use ? except cyberlinks as I dont like those.

To get my nova-s2-hd card working and playing back fine I had to seperate my sage server from the client that plays it back.

I play it back using the standard sage decoder, with 3d acceleration turned off. I can tell you the exact details on Friday when I get home.

Have you tried playing a recorded file on a different system, or in a different application to check that its recording the mpg file properly?

[jaminben]

Originally Posted by doc

To get my nova-s2-hd card working and playing back fine I had to seperate my sage server from the client that plays it back.

I play it back using the standard sage decoder, with 3d acceleration turned off. I can tell you the exact details on Friday when I get home.

Have you tried playing a recorded file on a different system, or in a different application to check that its recording the mpg file properly?

Thx for the quick reply Doc

Yes I have got the card recording BBC hd and it will play the recording fine in another player (mediaplayer classic) I havent tried playing via my client as I havent put the card in my server yet as I dont want to upset the WAF if it went tits up. I will record another programme a bit later and transfer it over to the server and see if it plays via the client. I'm not sure if thats what you mean by seperating the sage server from the client.

Cheers

Ben

[doc]

Originally Posted by jaminben

I'm not sure if thats what you mean by seperating the sage server from the client.

Yes, my sage server records it (xp3200) and I play it back on a sage client (x2 5600).

One other setting I remember changing was the mpeg4 playback setting under setup - detailed settings - video / audio. I cant remember what I changed it from/to but I think it made a difference.

It was a PITA getting it to play back semi-decently. I nearly threw it out the window a few times. I gave up at one point but went back to it the following weekend when I was bored.

I've enjoyed watching Wainwrights Walks, Mountain and Earth: The Power of the Planet, but the EPG does seem to be somewhat hit and miss. Last Saturdays recordings were all an hour out for some reason. Luckily I'd recorded most of the afternoon so I renamed them in the web server.

I have to admit its well worth it when you get it working nicely. You'll end up watching any old rubbish, not for the program, just to say 'wow, what a picture'

Now all we need is more channels....

[motobarsteward]

As a thought, I guess we could MyTheater as a network encoder for the DVB-S2 card. I don't particular want my server working hard but I have a files server sitting up there not doing much except file serving.

[jaminben]

Originally Posted by doc

One other setting I remember changing was the mpeg4 playback setting under setup - detailed settings - video / audio. I cant remember what I changed it from/to but I think it made a difference.

I found that setting and tried it both ways but it did nothing I've tried almost everything I can think of now and it just doesnt want to play nice.

So I gave up and installed Cyberlink Power DVD deluxe and it worked first time. Trouble is I dont like the picture quality on my other HD content so I've played around with the merits using DSF Manager and I think I've got BBCHD using cyberlink and H.264 etc using CoreAVC / Nvidia.

That'll have to do for now

Cheers for the help.

Regards

Ben

[doc]

Did you try

regsvr32 /u "C:\Program Files\SageTV\Common\stvm2vd.ax"

as mentioned in this post http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=29054

I have no idea if its relevant or not, but I did run it while messing about.

[jaminben]

Originally Posted by doc

Did you try

regsvr32 /u "C:\Program Files\SageTV\Common\stvm2vd.ax"

as mentioned in this post http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=29054

I have no idea if its relevant or not, but I did run it while messing about.

No that doesnt make any diffrence. The stupid thing is lux HD uses coreavc but I assume thats because Lux Is h264 and BBC HD is mpeg4. I'll just stick with coreavc for h264 and power dvd for BBC HD.

Cheers

[motobarsteward]

The channel lineup does not include Channel 4 or Channel five or many of the other channels that you would normally associate with 'FreeView'. I'm not sure how they are going to sell this as an alternative to 'FreeView' for people who can't get a FreeView signal as it does not offer the same services.

So, the only way to get a digital source of Ch4 or Ch5 is with a Terrestrial Freeview card for some time to come, unless these two and the other channels can get out of their contracts with Sky.

[Whitey]

Just use a dragon CAM and a FTV card from sky. This gives you C4, C4HD, five, five US, Five Life and sky three.

Whitey

[mickm]

Originally Posted by motobarsteward

The channel lineup does not include Channel 4 or Channel five or many of the other channels that you would normally associate with 'FreeView'.

Has the launch line-up been officially announced or are you speculating? I can't see why Channel 4 are currently broadcasting FTA if not in preparation for the Freesat launch...

[jaminben]

I dont think the launch lineup has been offically announced yet, but its getting real close to the launch date of May 18th. Thats if that date is to be believed, I would however expect channel 4 and 5 to eventually be available sooner rather than later (fingers crossed).

[cactusbob]

I can't imagine it launching without C4 or Five. I think C4 are under some contractual obligation to Sky until the Autumn, but I don't think this stops them from broadcasting elsewhere as well. Couldnt care less whether it launches with Five or not

[brewston]

Just out of interest - could I set this up with a single PCI card (dont have room for a card reader in this PC) ? I'd also like to keep my Sky digibox (WAF issues) - can you split the cable coming from the wall and send one to the digibox and one to a DVB-S card ?

Tim