Table of Contents

Backend

Intro

I bought this tuner card ( Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 Dual TV Tuner / Encoder 1229 PCI-Express x1 Interface - OEM ) to put in my new atom based backend. It doesn't seem to be as solid as a recorder as my Das Original Air2PC cards… BUT… we'll try again.

Install

Base

  1. Fresh install of Mythbuntu 10.04 LTS wiping out the original.
    • Chose the primary backend
    • Enabled ALL services: SAMBA, NFS, SSH, Mythtv
  2. Update the packages to the latest and reboot
  3. Install some programs I cannot live without:
    1. jed:
       sudo apt-get install jed 

Configuration

  1. Set the IP address to be static (help found here): modify /etc/network/interfaces to reflect the local IP
    1. remove the network manager stuff
      aptitude remove network-manager
    2. remove the DHCP client:
      sudo apt-get remove dhcp-client
    3. set our IP address to what you want:
      # The primary network interface                                                 
      auto eth0                                                                       
      iface eth0 inet static                                                          
              address xx.xx.xx.xx
              netmask 255.255.255.0                                                   
              network xx.xx.xx.xx                                                   
              broadcast xx.xx.xx.255                                               
              gateway xx.xx.xx.1                                                   
              # dns-* options are implemented by the resolvconf package, if installed 
              dns-nameservers xx.xx.xx.xx                            
              dns-search some.domain.com

HVR-2250 Drivers

Prep:

sudo apt-get install unzip
wget http://www.steventoth.net/linux/hvr22xx/22xxdrv_27086.zip
wget http://www.steventoth.net/linux/hvr22xx/HVR-12x0-14x0-17x0_1_25_25271_WHQL.zip
wget http://www.steventoth.net/linux/hvr22xx/extract.sh
chmod 755 extract.sh
sh extract.sh
# THIS FW I had to find by googling:
wget http://steventoth.net/linux/hvr22xx/firmwares/4038864/v4l-saa7164-1.0.3-3.fw
# END mods
sudo cp *fw /lib/firmware
sudo apt-get install mercurial libncurses5-dev
hg clone http://kernellabs.com/hg/saa7164-stable/
cd saa7164-stable
make CONFIG_DVB_FIREDTV:=n
sudo make install
sudo reboot ; exit

Re-Install Drivers

Since every time I rebooted, mythtv claimed there was no active tuner… so, again, did this: — David Lloyd Rabine 2010/09/19 22:31

  1. Remove the installed firmware:
    sudo rm /lib/firmware/*.fw
  2. Repeat the above procedure
  3. Run the mythtv backend setup
    1. Remove all tuners
    2. Add new tuners (find each DVB device and add it)
    3. Connect the “local tv” stations to each tuner card and set the default channel to 2_1
  4. Reboot

Backend Configuration

Frontend

Basics

  1. Installed Mythbuntu from CD making this computer just a “front end”
  2. Enabled SSH
  3. Left DHCP as I have my daemon giving out the proper IP based on MAC address

Configuration

  1. Modified theme to the one I LIKE!
  2. Modified ALSA mixer so that audio SPDIF is output
    1. Load up the mixer as root
      sudo alsamixer
    2. Modify the line: Item: S/PDIF Output [Off] with the 'M' key
    3. Save your configuration with:
      sudo alsactl store 0
  3. Modified the Audio output to use S/PDIF:
    1. Utilities / Setup → Setup → General → Page 4
      1. Speaker Configuration from Stereo to 5.1
      2. Upmix: Best
      3. Audio Processing Capabilities: Check both Dolby Digital AND DTS
  4. Set our VIDEO output to VDPAU:
    1. Utilities / Setup → TV Settings → Playback → Page 3/8
    2. Current Video Playback Profile:VDPAU High Quality

Remote Control Configuration

I added the following lines to my lirc configuration: ~/.lirc/mythtv

### added by david rabine (dlr) 2009.12.28 ###

# I added the following - dlr 2008/10/18
# Skip forward (10 min default)
begin
    remote = Streamzap_PC_Remote
    prog = mythtv
    button = >>
    repeat = 0
    config = PgDown
    delay = 0
end

begin
    remote = Streamzap_PC_Remote
    prog = mythtv
    button = <<
    repeat = 0
    config = PgUp
    delay = 0
end

# Seek to previous commercial cut point
begin
    remote = Streamzap_PC_Remote
    prog = mythtv
    button = YELLOW
    repeat = 0
    config = Q
end

# Seek to next commercial cut point
begin
    remote = Streamzap_PC_Remote
    prog = mythtv
    button = BLUE
    repeat = 0
    config = Z
end

Media Library

Audio

  1. Add in symbolic links to our libraries
  2. Go to Listen to Music and it will scan for new files

Video

  1. Add in symbolic links for all our shares / files
  2. Go to Utilities / Setup → Setup → Media Settings → Video Settings → General Settings: /var/lib/mythtv/video as Directories that hold videos

Trouble Shooting

  1. The images were “tearing” with some High Definition content, found http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/VDPAU this page. Not sure why disabling the composite output on the card fixes this, but it does.
    sudo nvidia-xconfig --no-composite