DVB-S setup with Digiguide EPG Grabber & XMLTV importer

[MCE-Refugee]

I have two FloppyDTV-S2 cards. They were working well under Vista Media Center using the drivers that emulate DVB-T tuners & I have been using DVBViewer or FireDTV Viewer for watching/recording HDTV. I thought that I would look at SageTV as it is supposed to support DVB-S2 & HDTV unlike Media Center. However I am struggling with the setup as the User Guide is very US-centric & doesn't discuss DVB-S or how to setup XMLTV as the EPG data source.

Firstly I setup SageTV opting for no program guide during the setup. I scanned & found many channels but compared to other DVB programs e.g. DVBViewer I seem to have little or no control over the scanning. I cannot specify which transponders to scan & I can only scan all transponders. Is this correct? I also have no way of knowing what transponders are being scanned. I found about 500 channels but I am sure that some must be missing not least there appear to be no radio channels found. I sorted through the guide & just enabled a few channels & get the broadcast Now/Next data.

I was impressed with setting up & using SageTV Client running on either a Windows machine or a Mac although channel changing seems rather slow. When I use DVBviewer as a client & DVBServer the channel changing is much quicker. Am I doing something wrong?

Final questions for today:-) I am trying to use the Digiguide->XMLTV converter which appears to work OK & produces an XML file with the listings from the setup of channels that I have in Digiguide. However when I try to import this I have a problem. In SageTV setup if when setting up EPG data for the FloppyDTV tuner I specify "Use US, Canada or XMLTV Guide data with this Source" I get prompted for a Zip/post code after I select Cable or Satellite & then get prompted with US or canadian TV providors.

I assume therefore that I must first set up the XMLTV importer before I can configure the EPG in SageTV. Is that correct? Because if it is I am again blocked as when I try & configure that it then the Importer crashes out when I try to create a Channel Lineup with the error message in attachment.

Is this a bug in the XMLTV importer or am I just doing things all in the wrong order?

Finally is there a straightforward step by step guide for setting up UK DVB-S Freesat anywhere? I am normally OK with setting up satellite TV stuff on the PC & have used XMLTV as the EPG source for DVBViewer but SageTV appears far more complicated to set up than any of the other programs that I have used or perhaps this is just down to this basic lack of documentation.

Thanks in advance.

[MCE-Refugee]

It looks like it's a bug in the XMLTV Importer as I just tried importing an XMLTV file created by Alan Birtle's Radio Times XMLTV Grabber & I get exactly the same .Net crash & error message. I will take this to the appropriate thread where StephaneM will hopefully have an answer.

Despite the steep learning curve I am getting to like SageTV. The client works impeccably apart from slowish channel changes. The fact that it is multi-platform is a big win as previously I was using DVBViewer client running in a VM on MAC OS wich while it worked pretty well was not half as smooth as SageTV Client. When I do finally manage to get the EPG loaded with data I am sure that I will appreciate the fact that I have been able to change the channel numbers to match the Sky digibox channel numbers & hence other listings i.e. Digiguide.

In future I will post single questions in single posts rather than confusing everybody with a load of questions in one post.

[doc]

Just a thought, do you have .net 3.5 installed? I know Stephanes software will ask to download and install it (I think) but you could try downloading it seperately.

[StephaneM]

Originally Posted by MCE-Refugee

Is this a bug in the XMLTV importer or am I just doing things all in the wrong order?

It's a bug (You have made some customization to your regional settings and the Importer doesn't like it). A new version will be out this week to take care of it.

Regards,
Stéphane.

[MCE-Refugee]

Originally Posted by StephaneM

It's a bug (You have made some customization to your regional settings and the Importer doesn't like it). A new version will be out this week to take care of it.

Thanks for the quick reply.

I don't know what the issue may be as I have a recent fresh Vista Ultimate SP1 installation. I have done nothing with my regional settings which are set to UK although the PC & I are actually in France.

I will attach a log file so you can confirm exactly what the problem is.

[MCE-Refugee]

Thanks to the new version of StephaneM's XMLTV Importer I can now use Digiguide data. However I am being driven mad with frustration over the past couple of days with my inability to set up the EPG properly.

I am using DVB-S with 2 x FloppyDTV-S2 tuners. I want to set up the channel numbers to match those on the Sky service e.g. 101 BBC1, 102 BBC2, 103 ITV1 etc It appears that there are several different ways that I can achieve this but I cannot everything working. I can get a full EPG with 'No Signal' for some of the channels or I can get all the channels that I want but no EPG data for some of them.

When I scan for channels & opt to not use an EPG I get 5-600 channels in the .FREQ file. I haven't yet managed to get all the chanels that I want when scanning as it always seems to be that at least one transponder is missing & I can see no way of just scanning one transponder. Doing another scan I end up with some channels with different channel numbers to what I had before. I don't see any pattern to how the channels are scanned to how channel numbers are assigned. Could someone explain?

Using Alan Birtle's XMLTV grabber I get the data from Digiguide that is configured with the 20-odd FTA/FTV channels that I want in the EPG with the numbers as per the Sky EPG. I have tried using Stephane's Importer & entered the channel numbers as found in the .FREQ file. I then reconfigure my Video Source & specify using XMLTV data. However I get some channels with data & correct channel numbers plus other channels with wrong numbers, no data &/or no signal. I have been able to remap some channels without data to other channels with data & have it work sometimes but other times I am left with just the EPG listing & no way of viewing the channel even though it was there albeit with the wrong number before I started remapping. I can't get my head around the differences between "Map to Different Logical Channel Number", "Map to Different Physical Number" & "Map Different Station to this Physical Channel"

I have read the SageTV User Guide & spent hours on this forum but I still can't figure it out. It's not helped by the fact that as I discover there are multiple XMLTV Importers & even multiple Digiguide XMLTV Exporters so a description of a solution for one part of the puzzle may not work with other parts. I am sure that everyone on here using DVB-S has been through this same steep learning curve & you now all seem pretty happy with how it works so I am assuming that a solution is possible. At this stage I really don't care about First Run, Repeats, Categories etc. I just want all the channels working with EPG data.

Please could someone point me to an explanation in words of one syllable of what I need to do step by step to achieve my goal?

[jaminben]

First off I would use DG2XML as my importer for Digiguide as this works best for me.http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/down...do=file&id=222

I would then scan the DVB-S channels twice (once in the morning and once in the evening) keeping both .frq files in a safe place.

You will then need to sort through both the .frq files and filter out the channels you want to keep and delete the rest, once thats done merge the two files into one .frq file (making sure you save the file to the name of your DVB-S card).

Now with your master .frq file change the numbers of the channels to what channel numbers you like (for you it will be sky channel numbering but their is no point so I started mine from 40 upwards)

Example of my DVB-S .frq (where CH:64 is the channel number)

CH:64 onid:2 tsid:2412 sid:54015 frq:11680077 rate:27500 mod:0 pol:2 fec_rate_in:2 sat:0 ctrl:1 #:Sci-fi
CH:65 onid:2 tsid:2315 sid:10510 frq:11426000 rate:27500 mod:0 pol:1 fec_rate_in:2 sat:0 ctrl:1 #:ITV-HD
CH:66 onid:2 tsid:2404 sid:50360 frq:11527000 rate:27500 mod:0 pol:2 fec_rate_in:2 sat:0 ctrl:1 #:World Movies

The cool thing about the Digiguide UI is you can change the channel numbers to match the way you setup your .frq. So thats what I did next, it took a little while but not too long. See attached image. I also made my lineup within Digiguide exactly the same as how I wanted to veiw it in Sage and also how the .frq has them listed. So BBC One is at the top (channel 1) and Fight Network is at the bottom (channel 72).

If you have done this correctly when you view the xml file within Stephs importer it should look exactly the same as your .frq and Digiguide layout. See attached image. All you have to do is then add the channel number to the channels tab and thats it.

Hope this helps and doesnt confuse you even more. This is the way I setup my system and maybe not the best or quickest way but it works good for me.

If you need more help I'll be around later tonight.

Regards

Ben

[StephaneM]

Hello,

Originally Posted by MCE-Refugee

I am being driven mad with frustration over the past couple of days with my inability to set up the EPG properly.../...I want to set up the channel numbers to match those on the Sky service e.g. 101 BBC1, 102 BBC2, 103 ITV1 etc.../...Could someone explain?

You should not use the remap feature in SageTV, it could mess things very badly.

So to start Fresh:

* Remove your video sources
* Shut down SageTV
* In the SageTV folder delete the .frq files corresponding to your tuners
* In the SageTV folder edit the sage.properties file and delete all the lines such as epg/lineup_overrides; epg/lineup_physical_overrides
* Start SageTV
* Add a video source, choose "No Data" for the EPG and do a channel scan (do it for both tuners)
* Shutdown SageTV. Edit the .frq files so that each channel get the number you want. A channel line is like this:

CH:23 onid:1 tsid:1072 sid:8215 frq:11856000 rate:27500 mod:20 pol:2 fec_rate_in:3 ctrl:3 #:SCI-FI

The number you want to edit is CH:23, this is the SageTV channel number.

You can of course add/remove channels in that list manually (for adding channels missed by the scan). Copy the content of the edited frq file to the other (I suppose both tuners receive the exact same channels)

* Start SageTV
* Start the XMLTV Importer
* Go to "Channels Lineup", edit your lineup
* Right click on a channel in the lineup and select "Remove all channels"
* Click on the "Add channels" button, select "From SageTV"
* Select the right Frequency file in the drop down list. Edit channel name / call sign if you want, click on the "Ok" button
* In the lineup editor verify that each channel has the right XMLTV data linked to it
* Click on the "Ok" button to save your lineup changes
* Go to "Update Guide Data", click on "Start Import", wait for import completion
* Launch SageTV, edit your video source to select the new lineup AND DONT SCAN OR REMAP (you may need to disable / enable a channel for the EPG to refresh: just click on it twice).

Regards,
Stéphane.

[ElGato]

Originally Posted by StephaneM

* Shutdown SageTV. Edit the .frq files so that each channel get the number you want. A channel line is like this:

CH:23 onid:1 tsid:1072 sid:8215 frq:11856000 rate:27500 mod:20 pol:2 fec_rate_in:3 ctrl:3 #:SCI-FI

The number you want to edit is CH:23, this is the SageTV channel number.

You can of course add/remove channels in that list manually (for adding channels missed by the scan). Copy the content of the edited frq file to the other (I suppose both tuners receive the exact same channels)

I've never been able to get this to work personally, so I have had to live with using what ever channel numbers the scan dictates, not a major problem, but a minor annoyance.

[MCE-Refugee]

Thank you so much guys. Editing the .FREQ file was the piece that I was missing. I think that I attempted it at one stage in my flailing around for a solution but it didn't work properly that time for some reason.

Now I have it almost all working. I added the channel details for those like E4 & More4 that were missed in the scan & BBC3/4 that weren't broadcasting when I scanned. In fact it appears that I don't actually need to do a scan at all but can just create a .FREQ file by hand. I have EPG data for all the channels via DG2XML & Stephane's XMLTV Importer. It is working nicely with all the FTA channels plus decrypting Five, FIVER, Five US & Sky Three with the Dragon CAMs & FTV cards.

At the moment the two channels that are eluding me are Movies4Men & Movies4Men2. I found these on the scan & can view them using DVBViewer but get 'No Signal' when tuning to them. It's probably some typo in my .FREQ file but I guess that I will have to do another scan & then amalgamate those results with my currently working file.

Once again thanks for the advice. Having moved from MCE I obviously put too much faith in using the GUI to do the setup by remapping channel numbers. I am in any case much happier with the solution of editing the .FREQ file but would have spent a less frustrating couple of days if I had figured that out earlier:-)

[jaminben]

Rather than scanning for movies4men and other missing channels you could try using King of Sat to get all the details you need to make your .frq.

http://en.kingofsat.net/find.php?question=movies4men

[doc]

I don't know if this helps but those 2 channels work ok for me with the following settings.

CH:325 onid:2 tsid:2312 sid:53109 frq:11224000 rate:27500 pol:2 fec_rate_in:2 sat:0 ctrl:1 #:movies4men

CH:327 onid:2 tsid:2312 sid:53110 frq:11224000 rate:27500 pol:2 fec_rate_in:2 sat:0 ctrl:1 #:movies4men-2

[ElGato]

eIf setting up the Sage.frq file is so easy, why aren't there predefined ones available for download anywhere? Or people sharing their's? It almost seems as though it is frowned upon, but again if it works why the reluctance?

Like I said earlier I completed a scan and spent hours editing the .frq file to exactly hjow I wanted it only to have it not work, and I've not tried since. Especially now that I have my epg working at long last using Stéphanes importer.

[jaminben]

Proberly because people dont want the same number lineup or channels as others.

[MCE-Refugee]

Originally Posted by jaminben

Rather than scanning for movies4men and other missing channels you could try using King of Sat to get all the details you need to make your .frq.

I already figured that one:-) In fact I used Lyngsat http://www.lyngsat.com The problem was as I had suspected with a typo in the .FREQ file I had the wrong channel numbers (325 & 327 instead of 323 & 325).

[elyl]

Whenever I edit the .frq files, this doesn't change the lineup in SageTV - it's still the original order that the first scan put the channels.

Anyone know what I'm doing wrong?

[jaminben]

Originally Posted by elyl

Anyone know what I'm doing wrong?

Have you closed Sage including the service if its running before you save your new .frq file?
You may also need to manually force an epg update, you can do this by disableling one of the channels from within Sage's channel setup UI and then re-enabling the channel again. If that doesnt work try removing the tuner from within Sage's UI, close Sage, then re-enable the tuner but dont scan for channels when it asks you to.

[MCE-Refugee]

I don't know if all these stages are necessary but doing every step works for me:-

* Set up Digiguide with the channels that you want.
* Use DG2XML to create the XMLTV file.
* Use Stephane's program to import that data & make sure to map the channel numbers as you would like them & with ID the same as Number e.g BBC1 is 101 for both.
* In SageTV Setup remove the video source(s)
* Exit from SageTV & stop the service
* Edit the .FRQ files in C:\Program Files\SageTV\SageTV changing the Channel Numbers to those that you chose in the Stephane's XMLTV Importer tool
* In the same folder edit the Sage.properties file & delete all the lines to do with the channel lineup i.e. epg/channel_lineups, epg/lineup_overrides,epg/lineup_physical_overrides
* Rename any .autobackup files
* Restart SageTV & start to add the video sources.
* Select 'Do Not Use Program Guide Data with this Source' & you will still get the Now/Next data over the air & can check that all your channels are working correctly with the correct channel numbers.
* Re-run the setup but this time select 'Use US, Canada, or XMLTV Guide Data with this Source'

Finally Never Scan for channels unless you want to overwrite your .frq file

[ElGato]

Originally Posted by jaminben

Proberly because people dont want the same number lineup or channels as others.

But I figure the main reason for doing this is to mimic one of the mainstreams epg numbering, like sky or freesat, or even virgin, so there aren't many variations.

[MCE-Refugee]

Originally Posted by ElGato

If setting up the Sage.frq file is so easy, why aren't there predefined ones available for download anywhere? Or people sharing their's? It almost seems as though it is frowned upon, but again if it works why the reluctance?

DVB-S setup in SageTV appears to suffer from the fact that it has been added as an afterthought to a program designed for US TV. It also suffers from the same problem as Windows Media Center that of 'dumbing down' & trying to make it possible to setup everything on a TV with just a remote control. There is little proper description of how to setup DVB-S in the official documentation.

Now that I have understood the process properly it actually appears very straightforward & once everything is setup should only require the .frq file to be edited again when Sky perform one of their periodic channel number shuffling exercises.

To start the ball rolling here is the .frq file for my current basic Sky-FTA/FTV setup. Also attached is the lineups.xml from C:\ProgramData\LM Gestion\SageTV XMLTV Importer which contains the mapping of Digiguide channels to XMLTV. Just remove the .txt from each of the filenames for use.