Something wrong with my PVR-250MCE?

[Aganerral]

Hey all,

I finished putting together a multi tuner HTPC about a week ago and been working fine until tonight. Both tuners are PVR-250MCEs, ordered as the multi tuner bundle from SageTV. One gets a direct cable fed and the other gets a cable feed from my set top box. The set top box tuner seems to be working fine, but starting tonight, the direct cable feed is coming in black and white with some distortions, and some 'pops' on the audio. I've tried the ole 'shutdown and try again' and that didn't help, and also checked all the cable connections and they seem solid. Any suggestions? Nothing changed in my system since the initial set up.

[kny3twalker]

yeah follow my directions in the FAQs and update the drivers from shspvr.com/forum

you may also want to get some svideo and composite cables for the box

coax is a really bad input from a box
ok when coming from the wall though

and update your video card drivers

choose overlay as render
and what decoder are you currently using?

[Aganerral]

Originally Posted by kny3twalker

yeah follow my directions in the FAQs and update the drivers from shspvr.com/forum

you may also want to get some svideo and composite cables for the box

coax is a really bad input from a box
ok when coming from the wall though

and update your video card drivers

choose overlay as render
and what decoder are you currently using?

Thansk for the advice, but not sure these will help solve my problem. It's the direct cable feed that's the problem, not the cable box feed. All my drivers are current, I downloaded all the latest when setting up the HTPC over the last couple weeks or so. And the direct cable tuner worked fine for a week, and only started having problems yesterday.

SageTV is set to default decoder right now.

[falchulk]

If you switch the cable's to the PVR's does the problem follow the direct cable input? If not, that PVR250 might be bad or you might try moving it to another slot.

[kny3twalker]

most of the time, it is best to choose the video rneder
video decoder and audio decoder
otherwise they could be an issue unless you know what is default

did you try following the directions on updating drivers?

[Aganerral]

Not yet, I'm at work right now, will try it when I get home.

[Aganerral]

Finally got around to playing with it tonight.

Tried changing the cable feeds to the cards...regardless of the feed (Direct or through cable box) that card was still B&W.

Reinstalled drivers, didn't fix it.

Video overlay is VMR9

Tried moving it to a different slot, and that didn't help either.

[SHS]

Try using one card at time
Intsall my LiteCD package from http://www.shspvr.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6172 that way you can try using WinTV2000 and besure test both card.
This maybe useful post "Driver Details" from WinTV2K. To do that, go to the Help menu and click about. Then go to the "Driver Details" tab and copy the content. You want to x out your serial number from each card before you post the message.

[Aganerral]

OK, some more clarification while trying to reesolve this. It seems as if the picture is fine when I first start up the computer from a very cold boot (hasn't been running a while) but then gradually degrades until it reaches that black and white stage. So it seems like maybe it's too close to an interference source? I don't know why it would suddenly start showing this issue after a week of use though