H1600 QAM question

[sramirez]

I am having problems trying to get HD channels (ex: 121-3) on my 1600 capture card. My analog cable channels come in fine but I can't get the HD channels to come in. In fact a channel scan doesn't find them.

My question (I am a newbie) is this, on the 1600 card, should I be able to get both analog cable SD channels and the QAM HD channels from the same cable input? Or should i be using a splitter and trying to get the QAM channels on the second cable input of the 1600 card.

Thanks,
Shawn

[EmuZombie]

Yes, you will need a splitter, the second input is for the digital tuner.

However, be warned you still might not pick up any channels. They need to be sent in clear qam by the cable company. Most now days will only send the local hd channels in clear qam but some also encrypt all of them. Of course you may be lucky have them all be clear qam.

[Conejo]

Also note that you should have TWO tuners in SageTV for this card. One is for ANALOG ONLY, the other for DIGITAL ONLY.

And as the previous poster noted, you will need to split the cable input to feed each tuner port.

You may want to try installing the Hauppauge WinTV 2000 application to verify that you can tune digital ATSC OTA (digital Over The Air) or QAM (digital cable TV) broadcasts.

And when you add the digital tuner in SageTV, remember to pick a different lineup (the digital version) for your digital tuner. This will keep SageTV from trying to tune an analog channel using your digital tuner, or vis-versa.

[sramirez]

Originally Posted by Conejo

And when you add the digital tuner in SageTV, remember to pick a different lineup (the digital version) for your digital tuner. This will keep SageTV from trying to tune an analog channel using your digital tuner, or vis-versa.

Sorry to ask, but what do you mean by "a different lineup" I am kinda new to this stuff.

Thanks,
Shawn

[sramirez]

Thanks much for the advice. I have it working now. I didn't try using both inputs because the manual said one of them was ATSC or something like that. I didn't realize that it could do cable.

Now for another question. The channel scan found and labeled the channels for me. They are label "121-3". How do I change this to say "NBC-HD" or something like that. And how do I get the program guide to show the TV program line up for the station?

Thanks for all the help,
Shawn

[Conejo]

When you use SETUP VIDEO SOURCES > ADD NEW SOURCE, you're directed to select a tuner/encoder and associate it with a lineup; in the US you can select a Cable, Satellite or Over-The-Air lineup based on the zipcode you provide.

In SageTV, Lineups are a list of channels you can receive but also contain the StationID, the Zap2It ID to get the Electronic Program Guide, and tuning information/instructions (needed for STBs, digital tuners and network encoders).

For ease of setup, SageTV allows similar tuners to SHARE lineups. For example, if you disable a channel on analog tuner#1 because you don't like it, it's also disabled on your other analog tuners (if you have more than one).

If you used the same named lineup for both an analog and digital tuner, it would be like trying to tune an AM station using an FM radio. You won't get what you want. For this reason, SageTV usually provides an additional DIGITAL version of your area lineup so that the digital tuner's lineup won't have non-tunable stations (analog or encrypted) enabled. It may list ALL the channels but you, in the setup process, would only enable the channels that worked.

[Conejo]

Originally Posted by sramirez

Now for another question. The channel scan found and labeled the channels for me. They are label "121-3". How do I change this to say "NBC-HD" or something like that. And how do I get the program guide to show the TV program line up for the station?

Take a look at this FAQ: SETUP WinTV HVR-1600 with QAM

The First two posts describe everything in detail.