I feel like a QAM n00b. Ugh.

[wirecreative]

I love Sage, but the QAM scanning is so confusing sometimes, it really is the only major hurdle to recommending this system to more people.

I have two Sage machines (not running a server, both have separately licensed versions of the software).

Machine #1 tuners:
2 month-or-so-old Hauppage HVR-2250s (set up as 4 digital tuners w/ the same lineup, and 2 s-video inputs without a lineup)

Machine #2:
2 old Hauppage HVR-1800s (set-up as two digital tuners)

On both machines, I want to tune QAM from Comcast.

On Machine #1, I scanned one of the tuners, painstakingly went through, checked and re-mapped every channel in the lineup. It took several hours, but that first tuner works perfectly.

Then I set the other three digital tuners on that box to use the same lineup, but these three tuners don't always tune the correct channel. Whereas tuner#1 tunes NBC correctly, tuner#3 thinks it has tuned NBC but is really tuning ABC.

Machine #2 has similar problems. Also I can rarely get a scan to finish successfully on that box without a freeze. (WAF is suffering severely. That's her and the kids' daytime TV).

It seems like I should be able to scan one tuner -- like my first tuner in #1 that works well -- and copy its scan and frequency data into the other 5 tuners?

I checked the existing frq files in my Sage installation directories, but am not sure how to replicate these effectively, or if that will even work.

The re-mapping is highly irritating in itself. I don't think this is Sage's fault, but it would be nice if there was a local QAM lineup to choose from the set-up wizard.

I don't consider myself a n00b at most HTPC stuff, but this seems needlessly complicated, and when I sense the needless part my brain often shuts down.

Can anyone enlighten me on this? It seems like there are so many QAM problem threads, this forum could really use an updated comprehensive guide, if any one has the know-how.

Thanks!
Greg.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by wirecreative

On Machine #1, I scanned one of the tuners, painstakingly went through, checked and re-mapped every channel in the lineup. It took several hours, but that first tuner works perfectly.

Then I set the other three digital tuners on that box to use the same lineup, but these three tuners don't always tune the correct channel. Whereas tuner#1 tunes NBC correctly, tuner#3 thinks it has tuned NBC but is really tuning ABC.

You have to scan for channels on every digital tuner in order for QAM tuning to work correctly. You cannot simply use the same lineup and skip dealing with tuning.This is why tuning is working for you only on the one you scanned.


There is an alternative that should work...

It seems like I should be able to scan one tuner -- like my first tuner in #1 that works well -- and copy its scan and frequency data into the other 5 tuners?

I checked the existing frq files in my Sage installation directories, but am not sure how to replicate these effectively, or if that will even work.

... if every QAM tuner will be tuning the same exact set of channels, then you can copy the .frq file from the one that performed the full channel scan & rename the copy to match the required .frq file for each of the remaining tuners. You still need to assign each one the same lineup in SageTV.

How do you know what file name to give to each .frq file? Well, the easiest way would be to run a channel scan on a tuner to find out what .frq file gets created. (You might be a able to start a scan, then cancel it when the file gets created.)

- Andy

[wirecreative]

Originally Posted by Opus4

... if every QAM tuner will be tuning the same exact set of channels, then you can copy the .frq file from the one that performed the full channel scan & rename the copy to match the required .frq file for each of the remaining tuners. You still need to assign each one the same lineup in SageTV.

I'll give this a try.

It's a little confusing because you can't scan your tuner until you have it associated with a lineup. Since I have the first tuner working with a lineup that I don't want to mess up with a new tuner scan, I'll associate the other tuners with other lineups, start a scan to create the FRQ files, and then cancle and reset them to use the already remapped lineup.

Is it also possible to copy my lineup remappings from one Sage box to another? The FRQ files don't seem to store that info. Where does that get stored?



Thanks.