What filters are you guys using to play back your transport streams? I have had mixed results. Here's a summary of some of my pain:

1. Elecard MPEG-2 Demultiplexer: For many files, this demuxer works just fine. It defaults to using PTS for seeking, but on files recorded from FOX (24 is the only one I have recorded) its algorithm switches to seeking by bitrate. This results in grossly miscalculated timing (it thinks a 2 hour show is only 31 minutes long).



I haven't figured out how to permanently set "Use PTS" without it being overriden by their "smart" algorithm. Here is a description of the algorithm:



"Our demultiplexer has own "IP" and select the seeking method itself. The fact the demultiplexer is always selecting the method for seeking "By bitrate" when detected any "wrong" issue in the stream. As usually this wrong issue is a big difference between bitrate from sequence header and real bitrate or PTS gaps in the stream.



"For example: when the demuxer has connected with file source it looks on sequence header information about bitrate. Then it asks the file source about file size and tries to calculate the duration of stream based on following formula: duration(sec)= File size(Mbyte)/ Bitrate(Mbit/sec) *8(byte=8bit). Next the demuxer is looking on the first - last PTS and calculate the duration like Last PTS minus First PTS. If these "two"

durations are different the demuxer "supposes" that stream has some problem with PTS order and select seeking method "By bitrate"."





Another problem is that the combination of the elecard demux and NVDVD video codec for these files causes regular hiccups in the video stream. The elecard video codec works fine, though. So the only downside is the lack of HW accel and slightly better PQ with NVDVD (in my opinion).



2. HDTV Pump: this is a new demultiplexer that only works for transport streams. It works with the NVDVD video codec, which is good. The developer is still working on it and while he says he can get it to seek in Zoomplayer, he can't figure out how to get it to seek in MCE or WMP10. Here is his description of the problem:



"I know about the not seeking in MCE2005 and MP10. I have implemented the necessary interface (IMediaSeeking), but the both players seem to use another unknown interface. If anybody can help me with this, I can add the missing stuff. But I am currently not aware, what is missing."



Not being able to skip through commercials is a dealbreaker. Can anybody help this guy?



2. NVIDIA HDTV Demux: (This comes with NVDVD's latest version). While this demux provides the lowest CPU overhead and of course works with NVDVD's video codec, files all appear to be 0:00 long so there is no seeking even by clicking on the seek bar in WMP.



Does anybody have a solid method of playing null-bit-stripped HDTV .ts files in MCE? I'll switch to any demuxer and video codec that will work!!



---

Here is a link to Elecard, where you can D/L their DVD player for free: http://www.moonlight.co.il/index.php



Here is a link to the HDTV Pump thread: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=489114&perpage=20



Here is a link to get the NVDVD package with the Nvidia HDTV Demux filter: http://www.nvidia.com/object/dvd_decoder_1.00.67.html

I tried out powerdvd deluxe 6 and it works the best, beat zoomplayer + varied filters when FFing-FWing. But you must uncheck CLEV video enchacement to prevent stuttering. My fx51 can' handle CLEVing ts file, time for dual xeon...? LOL

Heh... PowerDVD... the only one I *haven't* tried yet. To be clear, I'm going to be watching everying in Media Center, I just need the right demux and video codec.

Originally posted by airedale
Is there a website I can read that will get me up to date ont he 5C stuff and all the other HDTV standards like it? http://www.dtcp.com has all the publicy-available details on 5C/DTCP copy protection system.

this question is for anyone who has gotten this neat technique to work, which service pack of winXP do you have? and what chipset is your MoBo?

Babel-17
Thanks for all the help. I'm still not there. I look under "messages" on VLC and I get a red "dshow error: can't open video". I know I'm getting video through the Panasonic because I can capture it with DVHSCap and play it back with VLC. Any ideas? I'm running out of hair to pull.

Belay my last transmission. It's working and all is well.
Thanks

Originally posted by jimre
5C copy-protection over firewire (broadcast flag is something entirely different) is normally set to "copy one-generation" by most cable providers for premium channels, which also means the data is encrypted. If it's not set this way for you - then your cable co has probably screwed up & you should enjoy recording stuff until they discover their error.
Wouldn't the transfer from the cable box to his computer constitute the one-generation copy? If he tried to record that file back to a D-VHS then it might reject it because of the flag.

Just got my Firewire cable in the mail today. Everything is working pefectly but I'm not getting any sound. :(

Tried installing the AC3.... and the kazaa lite k++ mega codec pack has been installed. Yet I still get no sound. Anyone have any ideas?

Originally posted by Brian Conrad
Wouldn't the transfer from the cable box to his computer constitute the one-generation copy? If he tried to record that file back to a D-VHS then it might reject it because of the flag. Um, no. You think the movie studios will then trust his PC to never, ever make any more copies of that file? The whole point of this system is for studios to prevent their protected content from ever getting into an un-trusted system like a PC.

In actual implementation - content flagged "copy one-generation" is also encrypted. Only trusted devices with a valid 5C license - like DVHS decks - can decrypt the content in the first place. Those devices are trusted because they obey the rules: when they make a copy of "copy-one-generation" content, they encrypt that copy and flag it as "no-more-copies".

OK, so now I am in good shape.
I used the last nightly build of VLC to play live and it worked fine.
Also, after recording with CapDVHS, I was able to burn the ts to DVD with NeroVision express (OEM with Sony DRU-710A dual layer burner) in only a few steps.
No intermediate steps - captured with CapDVHS and burned with NeroVision!
It did take time (2 hours to capture, and antoher 30 min. to burn) but, it went very smoothly.

"Now open CAPDVHS and a device should be listed under capture device.

Under settings I have the following boxes checked.
Convert 188 bytes
Check PTS
Delete to SyncByte

I use .ts for all my file extensions and I left the file name format to the default.

Select the "Data Info." tab and hit the "Rec" Button " When I go into Data info i can't click on Rec its black and white and wont let me do anything!Am i missing something?thanks

did you specify a name for the recorded file?

Originally posted by bobwsx
"Now open CAPDVHS and a device should be listed under capture device.

Under settings I have the following boxes checked.
Convert 188 bytes
Check PTS
Delete to SyncByte

I use .ts for all my file extensions and I left the file name format to the default.

Select the "Data Info." tab and hit the "Rec" Button " When I go into Data info i can't click on Rec its black and white and wont let me do anything!Am i missing something?thanks

Ok, off the top of my head, two questions.

Can you play the live strean with VLC?

If yes:

In CAPDVHS under the Settings Tab have you designated a "Save Folder"?

I can't remember if that needs to be done, hence the question.

Mine is set to what I know can't be the default.

Also, check to see that the location actually exists. By that I mean sometimes people or Windows itself reset drive letters. If the location is non-existent or locked as "read only" then naturally nothing can be recorded ..... I would think.

Originally posted by Carpe_noctem
this question is for anyone who has gotten this neat technique to work, which service pack of winXP do you have? and what chipset is your MoBo?

It worked for me under SP 1 (fully patched) and now it still works with SP 2.

Asus P4PE is the mobo. It's based on the Intel i845 IIRC.

when i click on the CapDVHS folder i get an error cannot find capture device.i hit ok then then i go to settings all the correct boxes are checked but i cant change anything even if i wanted too.it wont let me.the only thing i can click on is open folder under setting.when i go to data info i cant click on anything.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by edraven
[B]Is there still no app that can change the channel on a motorola 62xx via firewire for Windows? I remember seeing an app that could do this with a Mac months ago, and even documented how they've done it. Is DCTRecord still being developed? If not, is anyone else working on these kinds of things still?

Thanks!


He posted this over a year ago, but nobody has answered. So I ask if anyone knows this answer now? I've been googling all day for an app that would do it. Only mac has one.. Damn that new Mini Mac is only $700

Ok I got my audio working (even though it's EXTREMELY quiet on the computer and I have to turn the volume way up)...

But all of the sudden it's recording at 1920x1088. So I'm getting a small gray line near the bottom of everything I record in HD. Anyone have any idea how I can fix that?

you can't..... that's what is being broadcast, since 1080 isn't byte-aligned (divisible by 8). If you notice it during playback, your player isn't obeying the flag to display only 1080 lines..... or the flag is broken in your source....

:cool:

Originally posted by Lee K
Ok I got my audio working (even though it's EXTREMELY quiet on the computer and I have to turn the volume way up)...

But all of the sudden it's recording at 1920x1088. So I'm getting a small gray line near the bottom of everything I record in HD. Anyone have any idea how I can fix that?

The AC3 filter has a tendency when it encounters a glitch to reset the gain to a very low level.

Try opening up the AC3 configuration tool. Under the Main tab you will see a slider for the Gain, it's right next too the slider for Master. Move it up to an equal position.

Some people advise unchecking "Normalize" and "Use DRC".

That's my setting and just clicking on the "Main" slider without moving it will restore the Gain slider to an equal position.

The AC3 filter will still exhibit the dropoff in sound/Gain when hitting a glitchy point in the encode though.

I've yet to read of a way of preventing that.

I think that playing back with PowerDVD 6 or WinDVD 6 avoids this issue as they use their own proprietary audio solutions. Not positive about that though.

Power DVD doesn't open the files, but messing with the AC3 settings did. THANK YOU for taking the time to help me. :) Much appreciated.


Now if I can only figure out a way to make these files way smaller in size. :o

Here in Atlanta, I've just discovered that I can capture via 1394 to my pc's hard drive the encrypted comcast HDTV channels ESPNHD, Discovery HD, INHD and INHD2 with CAPDVHS. I have a 6208. Previously this worked only
for the channels that are available OTA. I wonder what has changed. My firmware is still 7.15. These channels can also be viewed with VLC.

Originally posted by Babel-17
The AC3 filter has a tendency when it encounters a glitch to reset the gain to a very low level.

I've yet to read of a way of preventing that. If you're using the open-source AC3Filter, just go to the Mixer tab and uncheck Auto gain control.

Incidentally, I found out why my recordings were so glitchy. I was using a cheap firewire/usb2.0 combo card with dual VIA chipsets. I got a Belkin card (TI chipset) and a premium cable, and voila, problem gone.

I just tried to hook up my 6412 and found a couple of differences from the guide which I thought I would pass on (one other poster mentioned this some way back I believe). When I first hooked up the STB to my pc, it was "found" immediately. As the instructions said the wizard opened...actually 3 wizards one right after the other...the first was "AV/C Device"...the second was "AV/C Tuner" and the third was "AV/C Panel". Cancelled the first one...for the AVC Tuner selected "Install from a list...(Advanced). Next screen selected "Don't seach. I will choose the driver to install". This brings up the Hardware Type window..Common Hardware Types are in the scroll box (Show All Devices is first). Scrolling thru the list of devices...there is no selection for Panasonic anything. Note...there is no check box on any of these screens to uncheck "Show Compatible Devices". Choices range from 1394 Debugger Device...to Bluetooth Radios...to Disk drives etc. Double clicking on Show All Devices brings up a list of all devices by manufacturer...at this screen you can select "have disk"...pointed it to the Miedvhs directory (which contained 3 inf files) and tried each one...each one returned an error saying it contained no information about my device.

So something seems to have changed with the Windows dialogue boxes between "Don't Search" and "Have Disk" since you can't get to the "Have Disk" part unless you select a device type.

I am sure I am missing something obvious...but I definately don't get the same dialogue screens as are shown in the guide on the first page (one poster back a few hundred posts said he got it to work by clicking "where the check box should be"...I had no luck with this.

Of course, installation failed...I went into Device Manager and removed all the AV/C entries (which were listed under "Other Devices" and not functioning obviously.

Unplugged the STB...rebooted...waited a few minutes...replugged in the STB. Hardware wizard opened immediately..only this time it shows "Unknown" for Device in wizard 1, AV/S Panel in wizard 2 and "Unknown" for wizard 3. I have tried it now using both the right and left 1394 ports..each time revoming the AV/S entries under Device Manager. Whatever I did to it, it now doesn't recognize 2 of the 3 devices (although it still finds 3 new pieces of hardware just as with the first attempt). Note..the order that the wizards come up is now different as well...with AV/C Panel second instead of 3rd as it was on the first attempt.

Any ideas?

For reference, I am using WindowsXP Pro, SP2 with all recommended updates from M$oft.

At the very least, maybe someone could expose on what has changed with Windows to make it a little different from that in the guide :)

Thanks qubit, that sounds logical and I have now adjusted the setting. :)

I am a lifelong Minny fan with family in cheezeland, well I also came from there. I found myself at CES last weekend and was unable to record the game in HD. I would love to archive this game since #1 it was the first ever playoff game between the two and #2 as a Minny fan the season became complete with the final score.
I'd be willing to pay for dvd media or ship some or download the files.
Someone has to have the game in HD.
I have it on my Replay DVR but thats not the same, 4x3 SD
Please pm me
Jerry

sbeswick i'm having the same problem.i went i device manager to delete but,i could not find it.how did you do it?

bobwsx,

To get to device manager: Control Panel - System Icon - Hardware Tab - Device Manager button at the top. In my case, because the STB was "found" by Windows but didn't install correctly, it is listed under "other devices" at the lower end of the list...just right click each and hit "uninstall". After that, I unplugged the STB from the PC at one end...rebooted...plugged the firewire cable back in...windows would see the new hardware and you are ready to go thru the install again.

As I said above, once I tried to reinstall, it would only recognize the STB as "unknown" device....hopefully someone will point me in the right direction to fix that problem :) Then, of course, I need to figure out why I am not getting a device selection with Panasonic - AV/S Tape anywhere on the list. I do have the new file copied over to the meidvhs directory btw....but when I point the device manager at it all I get is an error saying the inf files in that directory don't contain info about my device etc..

Anyone try this with Adelphia using the SA8000HD?
I am on the Waterbury,CT system (in Wolcott, CT)

sparc5:

I understand that MythTV for linux has code for changing channels on a Moto (6200) via FW. The code is open source and would need porting to W32. However, driver might be the bigger issue.

I pass this on as second hand info that I read in another forum. Same gist though: changing channels thru FW with Windows. Quote:

"There is an external program/plugin type thing included w/ mythtv called 6200ch. I took a look at the source code which you can find if you download the mythtv tarball, and look under the contrib directory. The file is called 6200ch.c."

DFA

WOW!! DFA Great Find!!!
I am going to try this, theoretically it should work on all 1394 tuners.

Linux isn't hard to setup, and considering this it would make the perfect HTPC, considering MythTV is one of the best PC based DVR software.

bdraw:

Glad you are going to pursue it. Drop a line on what you find after you get down into it.

DFA

Originally posted by xkode2002
[B]What filters are you guys using to play back your transport streams? I have had mixed results. Here's a summary of some of my pain:

1. Elecard MPEG-2 Demultiplexer: For many files, this demuxer works just fine. It defaults to using PTS for seeking, but on files recorded from FOX (24 is the only one I have recorded) its algorithm switches to seeking by bitrate. This results in grossly miscalculated timing (it thinks a 2 hour show is only 31 minutes long). Switch it to "Simple" mode. This will cause it to calculate runtime correctly. Then once you've opened a transport stream, switch it to PTS seeking mode (it will always default to bitrate seeking in Simple mode). You only have to set "Simple" mode once, but you will need to set PTS seeking every time you open a stream.

There is only one type of file which will fail then: one where the PTS wraps around over the 26 hour 30 minute 43.718 second boundary back to zero. This has a 7.54% chance of happening in a 2 hour show. In this case Elecard MPEG-2 Demultiplexer will not only unavoidably misreport the runtime, but will refuse to do any PTS seeking; if you try, it will fail to do any seeking whatsoever. The only way around this is to pass the file through a program which shifts PCR/PTS/DTS to avoid wraparound, and I'm not aware of any that does this (I use a primitive one I have written which isn't ready for release). You could try converting to a program stream and back to a transport stream (the latter can be accomplished with VLC).

Was just reading the Motorola website FAQ's for their 64xx and thought it was funny that they actually linked to this thread to explain how to copy to an external PC.

No kidding? Well that means Moto is "listening" if not speaking. Might start a "Wish Motorola had this feature" thread. I wish my SA had discrete "On" / "Off" IR codes and even a SW selector switch for different IR code sets like my old JVC S-VHS has. In the case of STB's, even 3 or 4 different IR code sets would be useful. Just a little bit of coding is all that is needed and included in a later SW update to the STB.

Are you listening Moto / SA? Or am I just dreaming...

DFA

Well I got it setup and it doesn't work with my TV, it immediately kicks back and says it can't find a 62xx, on the firewire bus. I have emailed the author, with some details of my setup in hopes that it can be easily modified to work with other tuners.

If I can get it to work with other tuners, I was thinking of writing a howto setup a Linux box to use as a HDTV DVR using MythTV.

Would any of you be interested? I may post a poll on this site to see if others are interested. I would do it for myself except that I have a HD-Tivo and probably wouldn't use it anyways. But I think this would be the ultimate HTPC.

bdraw:

When you conduct the poll, consider asking how many would like to see a port to W32. Ofcourse what you would use it with is another thing.

DFA

Hey sbeswick!!Any luck?

I've been debating on whether or not to go out and purchase a firewire cable and try this with my new 6412. Has anyone actually caused any damage to their pc or motorolla box by trying to transfer data? Thanks

It would be next to impossible to damage your dct/pc. What we're doing is no different than plugging your digital camera in.

P.S. That's not to say Windows couldn't get bitched up if a step isn't followed right, but that's only software.

Originally posted by travisbell
It would be next to impossible to damage your dct/pc. What we're doing is no different than plugging your digital camera in.

P.S. That's not to say Windows couldn't get bitched up if a step isn't followed right, but that's only software.

Thanks. It was mainly the box I was worried about screwing up. Anything on the PC I could fix.

sbeswick-

I had the same problem you did. I was able to get around it and install.

Here's what worked for me...

In the screen for devices, I think you can pick anything. Might not what to select all devices, that takes a while - you just want to get to the next screen.

This part is weird. On the next screen I could choose the directory, but when I went to the meidvhs directory and clicked ok, the next screen didn't show Panasonic at first.

I simply hit the back button and repeated this a few times (trying to see if there was an option I'd missed) and on about the 3rd try, Panasonic showed up in the left hand side of the screen. When I selected Panasonic, the options showed up on the right as described on the 1st page of this thread. After that everything worked.

Hope this helps.

Brett

I have upgraded to XP to be able to capture the HD and I have the Capdvhs working properly it would seem, but I can get no audio playback at all. video is smooth and clean no problem. No matter how loud i turn up volume I hear nothing. tried playing on zoomplayer elecard sasem on air and wmp. What the heck? Any suggestions? By the way using on board audio asus p4p800 deluxe with sound max if that means anything.

You know what would be great? If Windoze MCE was actually useful, that's what.

I'd LOVE to do a HTPC and I'm confident I'd have no problems using an XP based system for DVD's, music server, photos and recording TV/HDTV etc. However, I have a GF and step-daughter who would need to use the system as well...

That's where something like MCE would be great, they could turn it on, and just go to "watch TV", "view photos" or whatever. Nice and easy and user friendly. None of the "why isn't this working", "why can't I do that", "why did you put this stupid machine in here anyways" kinds of comments... Possibly leading to the demolition of our relationship.... lol

Unfortunately as far as I can tell, with MCE if you want to change any hardware or might prefer a different software etc than what comes with, you're hooped. So much for all of us hands on, PC DIY's.

Not to mention that there still seems to be no functionality (with MCE and or easily in XP either, see this thread for proof...) to simply connect a STB via firewire as per this thread and have the PC change channels, record etc. Let's face it I'm going to guess that a good 80% (if not more) of the US population who recieves or is capable of recieving HDTV does so via cable or satellite. Requiring a STB or at the very least a cable card. In most of Canada those are currently our only options. So all the fancy HD OTA tuner cards out there are basically useless to the majority of the population. Great! :rolleyes: PC hardware MF's/Microsoft need to get their collective s%*t together and catch up. Fast.

My version of MCE would have a nice user friendly "User Mode" built right in to XP that would function basically like the existing MCE (with actual HD functionality as stated above though just like, gasp... a Mac!!) Then you would have an "Administrative Mode" that functions exactly like regular XP where you could specify what software drivers etc to use for what functions, upgrade hardware and it's appropriate drivers etc. just like, gasp... a normal computer!! Is that really so much to ask...? I've even got a name for it... Windows Media Centre Pro ...ooooh... ahhhhh:p

Let me start by apologizing. I have searched all over this forum and tried to read every post and I can't get it right and the instructions don't seem to fit what is actually happening when i install the firewire cable.


can someone please tell me how to do this and make it work. I have a 6412 and the firewire is enabled and i hook to my machine and try to install the drivers but something isn't quite right and the instructions on the first post just don't seem to follow with the way things are actually appearing. Any help would be appreciated. IF i ever get this working. Is there a way to just pull the files off of the DVR straight to the PC or do i have to record from the DVR?

thanks a ton,

jeff

stottle,

Haha I can't believe it...that worked! Took about 4 trys and it popped up. At least it seems I have it installed correctly now...will play with it later tonight one the kiddies are in bed.

I haven't ever seen this before btw...where hitting the back button a few times brings up new "stuff"...wonder what that is all about :)

Originally posted by bdraw
If I can get it to work with other tuners, I was thinking of writing a howto setup a Linux box to use as a HDTV DVR using MythTV.

Would any of you be interested?

YES.

Also, if anyone manages to port the mythtv code to change channels on a 6200 to win32, let us know. (see: http://pvrguide.no-ip.com/bbs-old/viewtopic/6280.html )

Originally posted by aud19
So all the fancy HD OTA tuner cards out there are basically useless to the majority of the population. [/B]

While I completely agree with your sentiment about MCE, I have to completely disagree with the above statement. OTA HD is almost the ONLY way to get HD locals. SAT offers a couple national feeds of the networks, if you happen to be in the 2% of the population that qualifies for them, but most SAT subscribers still have to rely on OTA for them. Plus, I don't think any of the SAT STB provide FW support, so their isn't any way (with the exception of a few complicated mods) to record SAT to a PC anyway.
Cable is only marginally better, in that some of the cable system offer the OTA channels via the STB as well, but unless you happen to have an STB that has an active FW port, you won't be recording anything to a PC their either.
Even with all of that aside, I use my MyHD 120 for playback of my recorded content via FW from my 6200, as it is the most reliable playback device for the PC yet. Beats the heck out of any software only solution. And with the recent announcement of the MyHD 130 card, there will now be a way to record QAM modulated signals from a CTV source as well. (The fusion card does this now, but has some serious stability issues with it's software.)

--Eric

Cable is only marginally better, in that some of the cable system offer the OTA channels via the STB as well, but unless you happen to have an STB that has an active FW port, you won't be recording anything to a PC their either. I thought that as of July of 2004, all cable companies that provided HD were required to include active Firewire ports on any STBs that were capable of HD?

how do i remove all the drivers i have tried to install, to no avail so that i can start over from the beginning and get all three install pop ups again?

jhollon,
Look in Device Manager. Remove all of the Firewire stuff. You also need to look for Tuner Devices or some such thing. Mine weren't in the Firewire group. Remove that and then you should get everything.

I think some folks are having problems when they install because they are associating drivers with the AVC Tuner that pops up. From what I understand, you want to associate it with the DVHS device instead. Or I could be all wrong. At least that's what I did when I had it working. I've just had a major system crash (heat problem in my system possibly) and am in the process of rebuilding my system. The bad thing is I'd been on travel and had recorded a bunch of stuff via SAGETV that I can't view now. I guess I'll have to rent some first season DVDs of Nip/Tuck! :)

Originally posted by JBlacklow
I thought that as of July of 2004, all cable companies that provided HD were required to include active Firewire ports on any STBs that were capable of HD?

I believe that was the order, but for what ever reason that hasn't been completely followed. I don't know the specific of the ruling, but maybe there is some type of loop hole that lets some cable companies get away with out providing it, for a time at least, since not all do as of this time.

--Eric

Originally posted by EHHoffman
I believe that was the order, but for what ever reason that hasn't been completely followed. I don't know the specific of the ruling, but maybe there is some type of loop hole that lets some cable companies get away with out providing it, for a time at least, since not all do as of this time.AFAIK, they'll all provide a STB with FW if asked to do so.

Originally posted by EHHoffman
While I completely agree with your sentiment about MCE, I have to completely disagree with the above statement. OTA HD is almost the ONLY way to get HD locals. SAT offers a couple national feeds of the networks, if you happen to be in the 2% of the population that qualifies for them, but most SAT subscribers still have to rely on OTA for them. Plus, I don't think any of the SAT STB provide FW support, so their isn't any way (with the exception of a few complicated mods) to record SAT to a PC anyway.
Cable is only marginally better, in that some of the cable system offer the OTA channels via the STB as well, but unless you happen to have an STB that has an active FW port, you won't be recording anything to a PC their either.
Even with all of that aside, I use my MyHD 120 for playback of my recorded content via FW from my 6200, as it is the most reliable playback device for the PC yet. Beats the heck out of any software only solution. And with the recent announcement of the MyHD 130 card, there will now be a way to record QAM modulated signals from a CTV source as well. (The fusion card does this now, but has some serious stability issues with it's software.)

--Eric

Well I wasn't talking about HD locals. Especially here in Canada there are no HD locals anyways so we rely on national feeds from the major US networks anyways as I'm sure most of the less metropoliton areas of the US do as well. Though I know that is changing a little faster in the US than here, even with broadcaster's dragging their collective feet...

As mentioned SP's do have to offer a FW output IF you ask for it... in the US anyways...

You mentioned playback via your MyHD120 but can you record HD via FW to your MyHD120 on to your PC easily? Ie: none of this dressing XP up as a D-VHS deck for Halloween?

Originally posted by EHHoffman
I believe that was the order, but for what ever reason that hasn't been completely followed. I don't know the specific of the ruling, but maybe there is some type of loop hole that lets some cable companies get away with out providing it, for a time at least, since not all do as of this time.

--Eric

All HD Cable STB's have to have 1394 by this July, but as of last april they have to offer a HD box per request.

I'm very much a newbie to all of this so please forgive my simple level of understanding. I have a motorola 6400 with 09.12 firmware. I see it has the 1394 ports on the back, as well as two USBs and an ethernet port. Has anyone had experience with this machine and transferring to PC? I have a laptop (compaq presario 2500) with a firewire port. I need to get a firewire cable in order to test whether my laptop will recognize the box I think. I take it there is no way to do this wirelessly to my main PC with DVD burner? Considering this uploading is something I would do only occasionally with a program I wish to save, would it make more sense to get a longer firewire cable and string it to the next room directly to my main PC? I'm determined to make this work, well hopefully.

I'm curious, has anyone tried this with the new 6412? I'm hoping to pick up the 6412 in the next month or so if my cable provider smartens up and offers a lease program and not just a purchase one. Will the instructions on the first page of this thread still work for the 6412 as well?

Also any idea what the USB ports on the 6412 might be useful for? I'm hoping that if there's no easy way to change the channel on the STB via FW, perhaps the USB connection can help here? Stupid that you'd have to connect both though if that's the case :rolleyes:

Also if I go through with this, when building the PC, is onboard firewire just as good or should I opt for a seperate card? In other words is there any major advantages of using a sperate card?

Thanks :)

You may want to search through this thread a bit...

There are numerous mentions of the 6412 - now u just need to figure out if they are saying if it works or not :D

I have read all posts in this forum and must admit I still a little confused...

Can anyone tell me if the method posted will enable me to view and access the hard drive located in the 6412 (similar to adding an external hard drive)? My goal is to use the 6214 DVR capabilities to record programs. As needed I would access the 6214 hard drive and then convert the files to usable MPEG 2, or DVD. Would I use different drivers to accomplish this and do they exist?

If this isn't possible, is there anything I need to change from the 6208 instructions to enable access to the 6214?

Lastly, is there a single post that is updated to reflect the latest methods to make this work?

martini: no. you can stream programs from your 6412 to your PC like it was a VCR (it's emulating a DVHS recorder). But you can't access the HDD directly. You have to be watching the program (either live or playing a recorded show) and it will stream in real time to your PC. CapDVHS lets you set timers so you can just press REC and walk away.

Originally posted by xkode2002
martini: no. you can stream programs from your 6412 to your PC like it was a VCR (it's emulating a DVHS recorder). But you can't access the HDD directly. You have to be watching the program (either live or playing a recorded show) and it will stream in real time to your PC. CapDVHS lets you set timers so you can just press REC and walk away.

That's too bad. Though I suppose if you needed to make space on the 6412 or if you wanted to move specific programs you've recorded to the PC for archiving to DVD's etc you could simply set it to play and your PC to record while you were out. Heck with the dual tuners, you could do this while watching/recording something else too I would imagine...?

how many people take the time to reencode their hdtv streams?
What method do you use?

Any tips? I know I have been playing around with it and am not happy w/ what is offered out there (ease of use).

If I get into this I'm toying with using Divx. It will keep the 1080i/720p resolutions and HD quality (or real close to the original HD broadcast's quality) and fit on a normal DVD. The downside is that it will only be playable in a PC...

yeah, but you may run into issues...

I know I am!

I am playing with either DivX, using Dr. Divx or XviD using AutoGK

Originally posted by xkode2002
martini: no. you can stream programs from your 6412 to your PC like it was a VCR (it's emulating a DVHS recorder). But you can't access the HDD directly. You have to be watching the program (either live or playing a recorded show) and it will stream in real time to your PC. CapDVHS lets you set timers so you can just press REC and walk away.

Bummer:mad:, that's what I was afraid of. I'm just trying to simplify this process. A friend has SageTV which records the programs in MPEG2. He can view with any standard player and can easily burn them to DVDs. This was a big improvment over Tivo. It's all about trade offs & for now the 6412 with the dual tuners and HD capable DVR are hard to beat.

By the way no problem getting the drivers to work with 6412 per the original instructions. Early tests with CapDVHS seem to work. Haven't tried VLC. My provider is Comcast in Denver.

Are there any drivers for the other two devices that appear when you connect the 1394 cable?

Thought I would mention something about capturing...

Make sure you HD is defragmented and nothing else is going on, on your machine!

I am capturing with my 3 Ghz laptop and it was getting stuttering video clips. I defragged the HD and killed a bunch of processes and everything seems to be much better. I am not sure if killing the processes helped, but it couldn't of hurt!

jvheitz
You mentined you burned the TS files right to DVD with Nero... can you detail that process for us?

Has anyone else burned the TS files or transport streams directly to DVD for play in a DVD player?

I have a compilation that I want to put together that's likely going to be about 2hours or a little more. The videos add upto about 16gb, but I know they could be greatly compressed for FVD since the video is 60 fps and 1280 by 720 whereas I believe DVD only needs to be 30 fps and something like 848x480.

I briefly tried HDTVtoMPEG and it turned a 36 second ts into a 48 second mpg.

Can you capture shows you have saved? If so how. Seems like my connection works fine and I’m just having trouble finding information in this forum on capturing saved shows. I have the Motorola.

Thanks

**MOVED FROM ANOTHER THREAD**
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I stumbled upon this thread as I searched for a way to make my 34XBR960 TV talk to the firewire port on my laptop (XP).

I have an SA8000HD DVR, that of course does not have the firewire port enabld (Time Warner NY is cruel).

But the thread is 34 pages, and a lot of the info dates back to 2003. I would like to know, if now, a year or more later, it is possible to capture HD via my TV using capDVHS? In the beginning of the thread I see mention of a Panasonic software needed..is that still so.

I also came across this..
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/prin...?postid=3818890


But the hardware mentioned (itsubishi Integrated TV's, SA3250HD, Motorola 620X) all seem the be PVR's and not televisions.

Any updated info would be greatly appreciated.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

This appears to be the updated and improved thread, except that this one is 41 pages long.

So, capturing via a televison firewire port, possible?
Thanks again.

There is a forum just for the 960 (see http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?threadid=408146&goto=newpost) , you should check out that out. Also try the search feature. I've heard that people have recorded from their 960 to an actual DVHS player, but unless there's a PC driver, I don't see how it would be possible. My PC recognized that it was connected to my 960 via firewire, but it could not install a driver and I couldn't find one out there on the net anywhere.

Mike3.

Yep, same here. I wonder if that sort of driver even exists. I wonder what type of D-VHS machines the 960 would work with. You would think making it think the PC is a Panasonic D-VHS ( I tried all three drivers too) would do it.

That 960 thread, to me anyway, has been nothing sort of useless. It's really long and any question I ever posted in it has never been responded to. Searching it for such words as "firewire, 1394, i.link" has been less than helpful to. I really appreciate the response by the way.

Mike3,
As I said in my previous post, there is not much to how it was done. I am using NeroVision Express 2.
Create New video DVD
Add video files (change extensions to "all files")
Select the file (saved as *.ts captured via CapDVHS)
Edit menus, backgrounds, etc.
Burn movie
There are no 'user initiated' steps to convert the ts, Nero does this automatically.
Single layer DVD will only give you around 4GB of space, I have not tried to burn more than that yet.
My disc was 4 30 minute non-HD shows, total size of all 4 ts was right arount 4GB

I've been working on trying to get my HD .ts recordings transferred to DVD format as well with little success. So far the best option I've come across is the following long and involved process:
1. Convert .ts to MPEG with HDTV2MPEG
2. Demux audio and video using TMPGENC 3.0 (TMPEG doesn't seem to like the AC3 Audio)
3. Re-encode video to NTSC-DVD MPEG format using TMPGENC 3.0
4. Remux audio and video with TMPGENC 3.0
5. Burn to DVD using your favorite program (I use TMPG DVD author 1.6)

This gives GREAT video, but my audio progressively becomes out of sync, making the file useless. I've tried a version of NERO Vision, but it wouldn't accept the .ts files. Maybe I'll try a newer version tonight. NERO would accept my file converted from HDTV2MPEG, but it too made the audio out of sync after a while.

What a pain... Any other ideas? By the way, do you HAVE to use a menu for your DVD in NERO? I couldn't find a way to exclude one.

A couple questions for the guy using Nerovision to burn .ts files to DVD format:
1. Is the .ts file you are using HD or SD?
2. Is the audio in the .ts file AC3 ?

I'm just wondering if the HD or AC3 content is the source of my problems. A lot of programs seem to have issues with AC3 audio.

buffalo b,
The shows recorded were SD, I will try to do some HD recordings tonight.
I am not sure what the audio is in the .ts file. I did not do any converting, or demuxing.

buff b--

I've burned both HD and SD TS files to STB-readable DVD directly using NVE3 (but mostly SD, since I prefer to keep full HD quality by just buring the TS to DVD). The A/V stay in sync in my experience. You can turn off the DVD-menu generation in one of the Video Options dialogs.

The audio in ATSC files is always AC-3.

Originally posted by buffalo b
I've been working on trying to get my HD .ts recordings transferred to DVD format as well with little success. So far the best option I've come across is the following long and involved process:
1. Convert .ts to MPEG with HDTV2MPEG
2. Demux audio and video using TMPGENC 3.0 (TMPEG doesn't seem to like the AC3 Audio)
3. Re-encode video to NTSC-DVD MPEG format using TMPGENC 3.0
4. Remux audio and video with TMPGENC 3.0
5. Burn to DVD using your favorite program (I use TMPG DVD author 1.6)

This gives GREAT video, but my audio progressively becomes out of sync, making the file useless. I've tried a version of NERO Vision, but it wouldn't accept the .ts files. Maybe I'll try a newer version tonight. NERO would accept my file converted from HDTV2MPEG, but it too made the audio out of sync after a while.

What a pain... Any other ideas? By the way, do you HAVE to use a menu for your DVD in NERO? I couldn't find a way to exclude one.

Try using Xmuxer by moonlight to Demux .tp into seperate streams (.m2v and .mpa). Then use Xmuxer again to Remux the two streams you just created into a .mpg.

Load the .mpg created into Virtual Dub Mod and export the audio only under stream list into an .ac3 file.

Now take the origional .tp file and load into TMPGEnc and export as .m2v. (ES Video only).

Load this .m2v file into TMPG DVD author along with the .ac3 file created with Virtual Dub...

ps I tried to eliminate the first step with HDTV2MPEG. It worked but the audio was off so after trial and error I came up with this method!

also, If you want to boost up the volume a little you can export as a .wav in Virtual Dub Mod and do full processing mode and boost the volume with perfect results! only drawback is the file size increases. Eric

I seem to have hit a snag in making this work. I don't have a 1394 port on my laptop or desktop PC. Is there an adaptor that I can buy which will fit into USB ports? I'm guessing the answer to that will be no since the data transfer rate is so different. I'll have to add a 1394 card to expand my ports?

You can get PCMCIA Firewire cards for you laptop, but unfortunately USB is simply to slow to have an adapter. The alternative for your PC is just a PCI card, I have an Adaptec card and it has worked very well.

Cheers,

jvheitz,
i'm able to copy the .ts files successfully from my Comcast DVR using CAPDVHS, but I am unable to open the .ts files using NeroVision Express 2. When I select the files upon trying to create a DVD, I get an error message indicating the files cannot be openend....any ideas? I'm wondering if I'm running into a copy-protection issue as I can't even view the files using VLC

tbasket,
Try recording a non-HD program and see if you have the same issues.
Can you view live with VLC?

I had capdvhs working via firewire and now it can't find the capture device.

! on 61883 Class Bus Device
! on 2 unknown device

Any way to force it to start over?

Please help, it was working so well!
Thanks

Originally posted by tbasket
jvheitz,
i'm able to copy the .ts files successfully from my Comcast DVR using CAPDVHS, but I am unable to open the .ts files using NeroVision Express 2. When I select the files upon trying to create a DVD, I get an error message indicating the files cannot be openend....any ideas? I'm wondering if I'm running into a copy-protection issue as I can't even view the files using VLC Go to Nero website and update to NVE3. Each update has improved NVE's ability to handle TS.

Here's an update on what is and is not working with my 6412 box:

working:

Panasonic D-VHS AV/C Deivce driver works well for capturing
CapDVSH is successfully capturing SD channels using .ts
VLC v.7.2 successfully captures and plays .ts

not working:

I haven't been able to capture or view any HD channels, DVR programming, and on demand content using CapDVHS or VLC v.7.1

I upgrade to VLC .8.1, but can't seem to get it to work. It also caused a blue screen during a restart

Ever since I started this process my PC DVD player is struggling to play DVDs. Something has been corrupted, but I haven't figured out what yet.

Questions for the group:

Has anyone been able to capture and play any HD content (e.g., Discovery HD), DVR programming or On Demand content? What settings did you change?

Has anyone experienced corrupted drivers that impact playing DVDs? Which software is causing this?

Is anyone using VLC .8.1 or is it better to stick with .7.2?

Has anyone found more stable software to capture HD?

I have a 6412. I was able to install the drivers and D-VHS MPEG2 Transport Stream Capture tells me it can see it. I set it up the way the instructions say to do so, and when I click on record, I get "Error 800705AA: Cannot start capture" and it leaves a .ts file on my drive with 0 bytes. Yea, ok, you're going to tell me the driver isn't installed correctly. That's great and all, but, I followed the directions EXACTLY as they were laid out and have reinstalled the driver 3 times now just to make sure. I get the exact same error every time. Anyone have any ideas? I'd love to be able to record off this thing tonight if possible. Thanks!!

*EDIT*

Ok, I solved my problem. Wasn't a driver issue. However, those with two different firewire chipsets in your machine, you may want to be careful. In my case, I have an SB card with a firewire port on it. My motherboard(nforce 3) also has firewire ports on it. This does NOT work with the motherboard ports but it DOES work with the SB card's firewire port. I hope that helps anyone seeing the same error I was. Thanks!

For demuxing and cutting commercials out of my .ts files I use Project X. It does a very nice job of keeping the 5.1 ac3 file in sync so that I can use that ac3 file for my dvd's. Of course, it doesn't like ESPNHD, Discovery HD, or HBO HD streams so I have to open up those in another program first.

Once I have my files demuxed. I open up DGIndex, select the m2v file (video only) and create a D2V file for re-encoding to a DVD compliant file--although today I think I realized I've been setting up the force film option wrong! I then use an avisynth script to re-encode the file. Once done I then use the original 5.1 ac3 file for my dvd encodes. It's a pain and I'm sure there are better ways.

I'll add more to this later, but I'm late as it is.

Thanks for the set up guide. I wouldn't be doing this at all without it.

Originally posted by hdtvmartini
.......

Is anyone using VLC .8.1 or is it better to stick with .7.2?

Has anyone found more stable software to capture HD?


i tried 8.1, and it cant play direct streams from the STB (horrible greenish freezing pixelated images). Reverting back to 7.2 the streams worked fine again.
needless to say, i junked 8.1.

still using DVHSCap for HD captures here.

Originally posted by airedale
yeah, but you may run into issues...

I know I am!

I am playing with either DivX, using Dr. Divx or XviD using AutoGK

Could you elaborate? What issues are you having with this. I was hoping it would be nice and easy, just convert to Divx and burn the Divx files to a DVD....? Is it the Divx software not co-operating and if so, at what point?

does anyone know if this works with the motoroala dual tuner i just purchased one from shaw

Originally posted by boxer82003
does anyone know if this works with the motoroala dual tuner i just purchased one from shaw

Not even Shaw's leasing them!?!? This does not bode well for me... :(

After upgrading to latest nve3, I was able to drop in a ts and burn to DVD with one huge catch and one small catch.

The ts was ac3 and nve3 stated that I needed a 3rd party plugin so there was no sound at all. Additionally, I burnt to a +rw disc and I think my DVD player wasn't crazy about the disc (stuttering and bad disc errors), When I put it back in the PC and played it there, it appeared fine other than the no audio. It was a bit on the long side for rendering.

Ultimately I'd love to be able to record more than 2hrs on it the way you can with a DVD burners and setting the recording speed.

I just have the new laptop with ILink port, also have the Motorola 6200 box. What cable I have to buy since my laptop has 4 pins Ilink port.

I have a Motorola 6412 DVR box from Comcast connected to my 4-pin 1394 port on my laptop.

When I follow the steps described in this thread, analog channels have a bar of static on top, about 1/8" thick.

When I try to view a HD channel, such as FOXD, with VLC, CPU usage is about 70%, and both audio and video is very choppy.

If I record something with the D-VHS capture program, analog channels replay fine in VLC/Elecard. But if I record a HD channel, playback is very choppy in both, with near 100% CPU usage.

What's wrong? Is my 2.8 GHz P4 too weak?

Thanks.

TM

Originally posted by ffolkes
...But if I record a HD channel, playback is very choppy in both, with near 100% CPU usage. What's wrong? Is my 2.8 GHz P4 too weak?Basically...yes. Not the CPU, per se, but the laptop as a whole. Smooth playback of HD content generally requires hardware video acceleration. One thing that you could check is to make sure that UDMA is enabled for the hard disk.

For the record, it's a VAIO GRT100. While it's nothing good, it was touted as a "multimedia" laptop when I bought it September 2003 - it was even one of the few laptops at the time that came standard with a DVD R/W.

Since then I've upgraded to 1 GB RAM, and recently bought a 7200 RPM 60 GB hard drive.

VLC has choppy audio, and sort of choppy video, while Elecard has perfect audio, and very choppy video.

Given that information, do you think it's recording alright? Because I could then copy them to my main computer when I get home and deal with them there.

Thanks.

TM

TM--

Recording HD is not nearly as demanding as playing it, so your recordings may be OK. "Multimedia" on a laptop in 2003 meant DVD, which is less than a quarter the data rate of HD.

'tis a shame..... this thread was SOOOOO interesting in the beginning, BFC (before five c).... then, it was dominated by late coming newbies and moaning about "locals only".... but recently it took an interesting turn with talk of finally implementing Tuner control from windows.... but sadly, that too has passed..... sigh....

:(

Finally got around to trying bdraw's instructions a few days ago. Moto 6412 -> XP. No joy, tried everything and was about to reinstall windows, when I swapped in my Audigy 2. Tried the Audigy's ieee and bam, everything worked. If you are having problems, I would suggest trying a different ieee chip. My mobo's TI chip wouldnt take, but my audigy's ieee worked.

I hate to throw a wet rag on this thread, but I suspect that, when they get it working properly, the Broadcast Flag will make the procedures in this thread ineffective for making useful captures of primetime commercial television. Not too surprising, since that's the purpose of the BF.

Anything that tunes BF'd content is charged with protecting it as it is moved in digital form over digital connections (i.e., 1394). For 1394/DTCP, the associated portion of the BF legislation states (this (http://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6516082666) document, PDF page 8, last sentence in the paragraph above Section D):While EMI and Embedded CCI enable several settings under the Encoding Rules (including copy-freely, copy-never, copy one generation, or no-more-copies) according to limitations that are similar to those set forth in the Cable-CE “Plug and Play” Agreement, as relevant to this proceeding the Encoding Rules for DTCP require that Marked Content shall be encoded as EPN.The EPN field has no relavance except when CCI is Copy Freely--it specifies that Copy Freely content is to be moved and stored securely, but that recordings of it can be copied again the the same fashion without limitation. It essentially modifies "Copy Freely" to "Copy Freely Between DTCP-Licensed Devices Only".

The long and the short of it is that, when the cable companies' equipment sees the Redistribution Control Descriptor (Broadcast Flag) in the PSIP for an OTA program, by law, their equipment is supposed to assert EPN in the DTCP Descriptors in the stream that they send out over the wire, which should cause the programming to come out of the 1394/DTCP connections of the cable STBs in encrypted form.

I suspect that the Broadcast Flag is now present on all primetime commercial OTA programming (heck, maybe all commercial OTA programming, period). It is further suspected that compliance with the order to propogate it by the cable companies in some locations is disabling 1394/DTCP compliant equipment, because the cable STBs are not handling the EPN-Asserted-Copy-Freely content properly. They should have it encrypted on output through 1394 and apparently are not, and the EMI fields of the 1394 isochronous packet headers are set to N/A; DTCP says that this is illegal when combined with EPN-Asserted-Copy-Freely content, so compliant receiving devices reject it. We've recently been discussing this elsewhere, and how to get the cable providers to fix the problem.

However, it will not be possible to record Broadcast Flag'd programming onto a PC using a vanilla 1394 card in a cable system that marks such content properly upon rebroadcast, with cable STBs that output that marked content through 1394/DTCP properly. It will always be possible to capture OTA DTV rebroadcast on cable, BF'd or not, using a QAM capture card, the sale of which will remain legal until the 1st of July.

Greets,

I have been following this thread for a while, and have read all the prior posts. My needs are a little simpler and I hope someone will take pity on me and answer a few questions. I have the drivers set up for my comcast dvr just fine.

I am trying to dump some Cartoon Network shows. I had digitized them from regular videotape, but believe (correct me if I'm wrong) that I can probably get a much better signal taking them off the Comcast box. I would like to then be able to edit them in Premiere.

Since they are not HDTV, much of the discussion above may not apply. Can someone please tell me how to go from capturing a program (across a few .ts because of size), to converting it to something which Premiere can edit?

Thank you SO VERY VERY MUCH!

Originally posted by jimwhite
'tis a shame..... this thread was SOOOOO interesting in the beginning, BFC (before five c).... then, it was dominated by late coming newbies and moaning about "locals only".... but recently it took an interesting turn with talk of finally implementing Tuner control from windows.... but sadly, that too has passed.....

I agree!

I was working with the author of the 6200ch.c program to make it work on other STB's but his code would not work with my Mitsu Tuner. It would probably work with any STB that doesn't use sub channels. But to access channel 10.1 on my box I have to hit 0101 and his program will only send 3 digits 101 so it won't work. I asked him how to change this, and haven't heard back in the past few weeks, so I am not sure what is going on. I have the modified code if anyone wants to take a crack at it. It is hard to code when you don't have the spec, which is expensive to buy. I think it was like $300 and no one wants to spend that money.

I apologize if this is on the board somewhere, but after searching and reading through threads I couldn't find it...

Anyway, what I'm wondering is what sort of hardware requirements are necessary to use dctrecord or capdvhs (or similar programs). I know I need a beefier machine to manipulate the ts file once I get it, but what about what's necessary just to record it off the cable box?

I've been doing this for a while (using dctrecord to pull from the 6412 via firewire), but the machine I used to record those (P4 1.8GHz) needs to go away and be replaced by a much less powerful one. Assuming the hard drive can keep up with it, could a machine like a P2II 300 with 256MB of ram handle something like this?

Thanks.

Originally posted by doncaruana
Assuming the hard drive can keep up with it, could a machine like a P2II 300 with 256MB of ram handle something like this?

Thanks.

I suspect that would be about the slowest machine you could use, assuming you had a good disk setup. There really isn't a lot of processing going on when recording digital content from the 1394 port. It basically consists of assembling the packets and monitoring the control protocols. The biggest hit will be in sending that data to the drive.
I've also got a MyHD120 card wich records OTA HD, and I believe that is the min spec it states for recording. IN my expereince, the OTA streams tend to be near the max too, while the STB streams are usualy less. (They don't contain the null packets in many cases.)

--Eric

Originally posted by bdraw
I agree!

I was working with the author of the 6200ch.c program to make it work on other STB's but his code would not work with my Mitsu Tuner. It would probably work with any STB that doesn't use sub channels. But to access channel 10.1 on my box I have to hit 0101 and his program will only send 3 digits 101 so it won't work. I asked him how to change this, and haven't heard back in the past few weeks, so I am not sure what is going on. I have the modified code if anyone wants to take a crack at it. It is hard to code when you don't have the spec, which is expensive to buy. I think it was like $300 and no one wants to spend that money.

Are you still working under linux, or did you manage a windows port?

Originally posted by litz
Are you still working under linux, or did you manage a windows port?

Linux

I brought my desktop over, and while it does work better, it still isn't good.

It's running at about 3 GHz, 1.5 GB RAM, decent video card with 256 MB RAM, and it still has choppy sound. And as soon as I turn interlacing on, forget it.

And worst of all, the sound is not syncing to the video - the sound lags behind about 1/2 a second.

What the heck do you need to view live HDTV on a computer? Why is it such an intensive process?

The OPs post is invaluable

Now to fine tune things

THanks

Tweekerz

What do you mean by the OPs post? I must have missed something, sorry if this question has already been answered.

Thanks,
RO

I just wanted to acknowledge the initial bit of info this thread started.

It helped me copy TV to DVD in a bit better quality than VHS....

Now, to get a hi def capture card rather than this Radeon 9000 Low Profile in my Win XP MCE 2002.

Any suggestions, or is firewire as good as hi def capture?
Thanks

Matt

What the heck do you need to view live HDTV on a computer? Why is it such an intensive process?


we don't watch, we take what is given.

Any suggestions, or is firewire as good as hi def capture?

i can't vault on all hd capture card but i used to have myhd 120 and it's much better due to non-compression OTA trasport file. One single hour of hd material is 8.5GB. Almost twice the size compare to comcast Transfer.

Originally posted by zeroendless
i can't vault on all hd capture card but i used to have myhd 120 and it's much better due to non-compression OTA trasport file. One single hour of hd material is 8.5GB. Almost twice the size compare to comcast Transfer. Most capture card software stores the stream verbatim, and doesn't remove any of the chaff. ATSC requires that the transport streams be padded out to the full 19.34 Mpbs, which should be a little over 8 GB/hour. If you remove the null-packet padding (or run your file through some analysis software), you may find that the broadcasters are not encoding the payload at nearly that rate. The cable company is not going to put the null-packet padding on the line and its not going to come out of the 1394 connection on the STB.

The one big advantage to the capture-card route is that they will continue to work forever with all clear QAM. (It will become illegal to manufacture new ones after 1 July, so get one soon). Eventually the cable companies will have to make the STBs work properly with Broadcast Flag'd content (probably all primetime commercial television) and it will begin to emerge from the 1394 connections of cable STBs in encrypted form.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
...Eventually the cable companies will have to make the STBs work properly with Broadcast Flag'd content (probably all primetime commercial television) and it will begin to emerge from the 1394 connections of cable STBs in encrypted form. You probably know this, but the cable co's are already encrypting the 1394 output of their boxes (at least Comcast is) - although it's based on 5C/DTCP flags, not broadcast flag, and it seems to be on a per-channel basis, not per show. And fortunately the local HD channels so far seem to be exempt from this.

Are you saying the cable co's will have to start encrypting things per-show, based on BF, including the local HD channels? Guess I'm a bit confused on the relationship between BF and 5C flags....

I've tried everything, with same results...
When I open CapDVHS I get "Can not find capture device"
I have a Moto 6412 (I think) have the device installed under Imaging Devices - Tuner AV/C Device
I tried the original driver download, then the alternate meitape.inf as well...
The hardware is recognized, when I plug in the firewire.
Is there a new driver?
Should the device in Device Manager read "Panasonic D-VHS AV/C Device"
or just "Tuner AV/C Device"?
Any help would be appreciated!

So, what QAM tuner cards are you guys using? This motivates me to finally go out and get one, but I would like some recommendations from the pros. :)

Originally posted by jimre
Are you saying the cable co's will have to start encrypting things per-show, based on BF, including the local HD channels? Guess I'm a bit confused on the relationship between BF and 5C flags.... The BF is designed to prevent OTA DTV from being copied over the Internet. Fictional series television isn't released all over the world simultaneously--it's repackaged for different markets and scheduled to first air on different dates in different locales. The people who sell this stuff complain that their distribution models are disrupted by the free trading of recordings of television programs across the Internet, which has been common in various file sharing services for quite some time, and recently even HD programming is available. If the stuff has already been viewed by any significant number of people who downloaded it (or got it on discs from friends who downloaded it, etc), then it has less value for broadcasters in new areas. That's the excuse. Personally, I think that the relatively new market for season-sets of DVDs has more than a little bit to do with it, since the day is coming when you can probably download a season's worth of recordings of a show from filesharing services (if you can't already). If they're "perfect" recordings of DTV, why bother buying DVDs? (The DVDs are likely to have much higher quality video with interesting ancilliary content, but most people won't be swayed by that).

In any case, the BF is expressed as something called the Redistribution Control Descriptor, located in the PSIP for an OTA program. Though this descriptor has space for optional additional information, currently none such is defined, and it's either present or not present. If present, it signals the broadcaster's intent that the program not be moved over the Internet.

The BF legislation requires receivers of OTA programming to recognize this flag and to protect marked content in some approved manner. "Demodulators" (i.e., tuners) of OTA DTV rebroadcast on cable have to do the same. By FCC law, the technology accepted for cable STBs which output 1394/DTCP to protect marked content is to output it through 1394 as EPN-asserted-Copy-Freely. This involves setting the Encryption-Plus-Non-assertion (EPN) field of the DTCP Descriptors in the stream to their "asserted" state. This field is only relavant to content with Copy Freely CCI (all other content would be encrypted, anyway). When asserted, it means tthat the content has to be encrypted on the wire and, if stored by the receiver, stored in an approved secure fashion. Recordings of it can be moved through 1394/DTCP in this form repeatedly without restriction. Having a recording of this type of content on a HD DVD, you could connect two HD DVD recorders and create unlimited copies of it over 1394/DTCP, but since it's encrypted, it could only be copied this way to another licensed 1394/DTCP device.

I'm not certain whether the cable providers are affecting compliance with this by sensing the Redistribution Control Descriptor (Broadcast Flag) in an OTA program's PSIP (the ATSC "Program and System Information Protocol" stuff, which also contains guide data) and asserting EPN in the content at the headend before transmission from there, or if the boxes have been or will be modified to sense it in the program's PSIP, which FCC regulations also requires to be sent on the wire. I thought that I'd read somewhere that it was the former, but I can't find a reference. Seems to me that either would work, but they have to do it one way or another.

Currently, there are indications that this is screwed up with some equipment. In at least one area there is a suspicion that the EPN flag is being asserted in content which is apparently not being encrypted by the cable boxes, which is an illegal combination, so compliant 1394/DTCP recorders like the newer JVC D-VHS decks refuse to record it. Paradoxically you should be able to record and play that back with a PC and a vanilla 1394 card.

Mike:

Thank you for your informative post.

DFA

Hi all

Great to have all of u talking on the forum...

Is it raw data from the Motorola DCT6208 IEEE or can I try to
connect my MiniDV Camcorder to record ?

Just wandering...


Thanx

Stef66

It's ok,

I try to connect a MiniDV in the IEEE of the Motorola with no success...



Will try with the PC but I need a repeater cuz I have more than 15ft distance from the machines...


Bye

Stef66

ecrrolson
I think it should say Panasonic

Can anyone think of why a JVC HM-DT100 DVHS deck would work well with CapDVHS but not work with DVHSTools? CapDVHS recognizes the deck and all controls function properly. DVHSTools won't even recognize the deck. The computer is recognized by the DT100 as a valid I.Link device.

Just wondering if anyone has hit this situation with any of the other JVC decks?

wow this is a really long thread... this is my first post on avs forum, but i've been reading for a while... really like the community

i have a motorola hd box from comcast cable ... and based on the pictures that i found of motorola cable boxes online... i'm pretty sure i have the dct6200 ... i have the 2 firewire ports in the back.

i connected the box via firewire to the laptop and it was detected fine as a 6200 (further confirmation) ... i followed all the steps and the capdvhs worked with a standard ntsc channel... but it wouldn't record any of the hd channels

i understand there is the 5c encryption or whatever, but from whati 've read in the forum, most people have been able to record at least inhd ... or the local hd channels... none of these are working either

also ... something interesting i noted is that my firmware version is 8.12

does anyone have this same firmware or know of any issues/fixes related to this firmware

thank you very much

Have you tried recording a local PBS HD channel? (I wouldn't think that there'd be any protection whatsoever on it).

Howdy -- first of all, thanks for posting these instructions, and all the helpful tips. I had problems at first, but this was directly attributable to not following the instructions closely enough, and I ought to have known better!

One thing I haven't tried yet is burning to DVD. Someone mentioned using that program from Nero to burn directly from the .ts to DVD. Does this produce a DVD that one can simply pop into a standard DVD player and watch, lor is it PC-viewable only? And has anyone had any luck with any other kind of software for one-step .ts-to-DVD conversion?

Thanks!

Originally posted by gmbrown
....Someone mentioned using that program from Nero to burn directly from the .ts to DVD. Does this produce a DVD that one can simply pop into a standard DVD player and watch...?Yes.

Picked up a moto 6412 from my mediacom office today. On the back, the space labeled 1394-Firewire had a little piece of black plastic covering it, and when i removed it, there was just empty space behind it. apparently nothing was ever there. anyone else find this on their box? kind of a bummer. Still nice that this + hd upgrade didnt cost me anything over my analog subscription, but was looking forward ot archiving some hd caps.

bald

I was able to get a SA 3250 HD with the firewire enabled on it from Time Warner Cable in Minneapolis. I picked up a combo firewire/usb 2.0 card because my PC didn't have firewire. The USB 2.0 on the card works, but I have nothing else firewire to test it. When I hooked everything up, it detected the AV/C Tuner, and I installed the driver fine.

When I go to try to record in either CapDVHS, or DCTRecord, it creates a file that is sizeable, but does not work. In the "Data info" tab of CapDVHS it does not show any information there while recording. The cable box is turned on and set to an HD station.

Once I try to play back the file, it shows "Cannot play back the file. The format is not supported." I have tried PowerDVD, WinDVD, VLC (tried VLC playing live as well), and nothing works. I have also reinstalled Windows XP w/SP1 as well and it still does the same thing.

Does anyone have any guesses to what might be wrong/making it not work, or have a similar issue?

When I go to try to record in either CapDVHS, or DCTRecord, it creates a file that is sizeable, but does not work. In the "Data info" tab of CapDVHS it does not show any information there while recording.

what channel you were recording? It's encrypted, read again this thread

Anyone who's connected their HTPC-HDPVR setup to DVHS successfully, please PM me or email me directly at hifipj at conentric.net. Thanks!

Pat M.
former HTPC Guru, SGHT

For anyone looking to add cheap 1394 firewire to your pc.
Compusa has a 4 Port FireWire PCI Card + Video Editing Software $9.99
$10+tax if you pick up or do delivery for $5 after $20 instant rebate.
http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=274516&pfp=cat3
I have not yet tried this card with Caps, I plan to pick my two cards up later today. Not sure at this time what chip this card is based upon.

EDIT UPDATE:
I now have my $10 1394 cards and they work real nice with CapsDVHS ;)
Also FREE 5ft Cable included in the package with the firewire card, mini DV to 1394 and Unlead Video Studio 7 SE Basic software.
XP found the card and installed it without the need of addtional drivers or even the XP CD, Fully plug & play card.
This card is IEEE OHCI compliant. The chip is from VIA VT6306
http://www.vntek.com/en/products/1394/vt6306.jsp
The card has two external 1394 ports, one external mini DV port and one 1394 internal port. Great deal for someone that needs firewire for HD XP recording.

Originally posted by zeroendless
what channel you were recording? It's encrypted, read again this thread

I was trying to record off of Discovery HD theatre, along with a lot of the local stations, which should not be encrypted.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
...By FCC law, the technology accepted for cable STBs which output 1394/DTCP to protect marked content is to output it through 1394 as EPN-asserted-Copy-Freely. This involves setting the Encryption-Plus-Non-assertion (EPN) field of the DTCP Descriptors in the stream to their "asserted" state. This field is only relavant to content with Copy Freely CCI (all other content would be encrypted, anyway). When asserted, it means tthat the content has to be encrypted on the wire and, if stored by the receiver, stored in an approved secure fashion. ... This seems to be at odds with what's stated in the original DTCP whitepaper from dtcp.com:No authentication or encryption is required to protect content that can be copied freely.Guess it's not surprising this requirement (copy-freely, but encrypted anyway) might not actually work in existing implementations, if it was not the original intent of the spec.

Thanks for the info....

Is someone willing to PM me the BASIC steps to copy recording from Comcast Moto 6412 to my XP hdd? As well as any CURRENT drivers/software I will need to convert it to a DVD eventually?

This post is TOO LONG need an up to date FAQ.

I updated my post with further info about those $10 1394 firewire cards at CompUSA http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=5127460#post5127460

Hey all,

I've made it through this thread and I have my 6412 working with VLC on only basic, non-digital Comcast channels. Clearly this is a protect issue.

Is there any non-recording viewer that can be used to watch all material???

Help!

--- Nancy

:confused:

Originally posted by jimre
This seems to be at odds with what's stated in the original DTCP whitepaper from dtcp.com:Guess it's not surprising this requirement (copy-freely, but encrypted anyway) might not actually work in existing implementations, if it was not the original intent of the spec.

Thanks for the info.... The EPN thing has been in the protocol for a long time--I don't know when it was added but it's discussed in the July 2001 version of the DTCP Adopter's Agreement (http://www.dtcp.com/data/DTCP_Adopters_Agreement010730.PDF) (of course, though over 3.5 years ago, it was exactly 3 years after that whitepaper (http://www.dtcp.com/data/wp_spec.pdf), which was issued about 4 months before the first over-the-air DTV broadcast in November 1998). Lots of discussion between that whitepaper and that Adopter's Agreement and the "Content Protection Technical Working Group", which formulated the Broadcast Flag proposal, formed in 1999 or 2000 (I think).

None of the existing implementations in cable STBs or the software packages used to implemented them were in existence in 2001, so "the original intent" is not an excuse. When the software was written, the specification was there and it's easy enough to handle.

Originally posted by emtbyker
Is there any non-recording viewer that can be used to watch all material???
Yeah, Nancy, it's called a "set top box" and comes from the cableco. ;)

Yes, the handy, dandy instructions with my set top box (DCT6412) clearly state that my ieee1394 port can be used to watch HD on my monitor or computer!

Poo!

Now I need to see if I can get the CV output to work with my monitor or get DVI to VGA. Can't afford an HD set at the moment.

--- Nancy

Originally posted by emtbyker
Yes, the handy, dandy instructions with my set top box (DCT6412) clearly state that my ieee1394 port can be used to watch HD on my monitor or computer!

Poo!

Now I need to see if I can get the CV output to work with my monitor or get DVI to VGA. Can't afford an HD set at the moment.

--- Nancy Sorry, I misread your question. I thought you were asking to view encrypted content from the cable and didn't realize that you apparently cannot view even unencrypted OTA HDTV carried on your cable. I haven't set up VLC as described here but, IIUC, others are viewing DTV from cable on PC displays using the recipe in the first post and VLC/CapDVHS. Good luck.

Originally posted by emtbyker
Yes, the handy, dandy instructions with my set top box (DCT6412) clearly state that my ieee1394 port can be used to watch HD on my monitor or computer!Nancy, have you tried watching your PBS DTV channel? Also, is Discovery in your basic-basic (as opposed to expanded basic) tier?

Now I need to see if I can get the CV output to work with my monitor or get DVI to VGA

dvi out from 6412 is HDCPed, your pc? monitor it's not going to work on 6412 unless you buy the magic box (Dtrovision, DC-DA1 ~$250). Try component > Vga probably a cheaper route. If your monitor sync on green, get a $15 compoent to vga breakout cable otherwise you need a transcoder.

Originally posted by zeroendless
[B]the magic box (Dtrovision, DC-DA1 ~$250)Hadn't heard of this--very interesting. DVI/HDCP to RGBHV conversion.

Now I have OTA SDTV and HDTV signals working with VLC. Seems that anything our of the Basic Digital range on Comcast Berkeley is protected and won't display.

It's something. Nice to have HD now even if just OTA.

There's got to be a player out there that will act like a plain ieee1394 display. I don't care about saving the stream.

--- Nancy

[i]...There's got to be a player out there that will act like a plain ieee1394 display. I don't care about saving the stream....[/B] What exactly is a "plain ieee1394 display"? Do you mean, one that implements 5C/DTCP copy-protection in order to display encrypted programs? Ain't gonna happen on a PC - probably ever. Sorry.

It is so cool!!!!!! Thank you all for the information in this thread!

I hooked up the Firewire from the Moto 6200 to my HTPC. I can record and play all the HD channels. INHD1, INHD2, Discovery HD, and HBO HD. I followed the procedures here and it works great. Audio play back could be better, but I am still working on that. I have since pulled the MyHD MDP120 out of my system. Anybody want to buy my used MDP120 with DVI Daughter card? :D

I am using CapDVHS for capture and VLC for playback and realtime streaming.

I have:

Samsung HP5039 Plasma with DVI
Moto 6200 Cable box
2.8 Intel P4
1 gig pc3200
200 gig sata Seagate drive
NEC Dual Layer DVD Burner (this drive is very noisy spinning up)
5500 FX Gforce with 256
Abit IC-7G mobo

Digital audio out via onboard optical SPDIF to a Denon 5600

Its amazing after fussing with the MyHD for a year now trying to figure out how to make it work with cable. I can now use the Firewire and it cost me $4.97 for a 14' cable from Radio Shack. It was cool they had them on sale even.

Thanks Again for all this Great info!!! :D :D :D :D

Patrick

Originally posted by emtbyker
Now I have OTA SDTV and HDTV signals working with VLC. Seems that anything our of the Basic Digital range on Comcast Berkeley is protected and won't display.By law, the cable company is not allowed to encrypt anything in the basic tier on the wire. They can encrypt anything else and add at least Copy One Generation protection to it as it's sent over 1394/DTCP. As it comes out of 1394, the box can turn it into EPN-Asserted-Copy-Freely, which will also be encrypted, if your local over-the-air broadcasters start applying the Redistribution Control Discriptor (i.e., Broadcast Flag) to their digital broadcasts. That's why I asked whether you'd tried tuning PBS, since I don't expect them to use the BF.

Originally posted by bob_vdi
Is someone willing to PM me the BASIC steps to copy recording from Comcast Moto 6412 to my XP hdd? As well as any CURRENT drivers/software I will need to convert it to a DVD eventually?

This post is TOO LONG need an up to date FAQ.

The Howto is up to date. All the links work.
What seems to be the problem.

The only potential problem seems to be with XP SP2, but only two have reported it, and neither has submited a solution. I have yet to confirm the problem so I am not sure it there is even one.
Let me know what you think needs updated and I will take care of it.

I hooked up my 6412 to my PC today and it is recording but on playback the video is bad. The color on it seems to be off and you can actually watch the color changing as the video plays. Sound appears to be fine.

I am running a P4 2.0 ghz with 512mb with XP pro SP2

I tried to download the meitape files and it seems that they aren't there. If I missed some information that might be obvious, I apologize. If anyone could help me locate the files, I would really appreciate your help.

I first looked at the location at the beginning of this post, and it goes back several months.

bdraw,
Are you getting tuner control yet? If I understand correctly, you are trying to use a linux app to change channels, etc?

I gave up for some reason the author doesn't respond to my emails anymore.

I'm running a 1.8ghz p4 512mb and at first I couldn't get stable HD. I've tweaked the settings in VLC (v0.8 doesn't work well, 0.7 does) to do quick mutexs, not resample audio and 10xed the stream buffer. Also have it running at a higher priority.

The results? WOW!!!! I'm watching the Superbowl in HD while still on the net and with a chat client up. No glitches. This is my first HD Experience and I'm stunned.

Damned Comcast and their protection of the enhanced Digital channels pisses me off. Guess a real HD monitor is in my future. ieee1394 is my only current interface to the 6412. I'll have a SDTV soon for programming it.

--- Nancy

Hi guys, I connected my SA3250HD box to my HTPC and followed the instructions. CapDVHS says Panasonic MPEG2TS Tape Subunit Device (Unknown Video #1) in the drop down menu but when I hit record no information appears in the Data Info boxes. The files get bigger as I record longer but they don't play back in VLC or ZP Pro.

This happens to all channels so I guess encryption is not an issue. Should I be trying another program than CapDVHS?

If someone could please answer a very basic question I would be extremely grateful. I have an HD TIVO box (HR10-250). Can I transfer recorded HD programs from my HD TIVO box to a stand alone DVD recorder???

I simply want to transfer some recordings to DVD. Seems like it would be a lot easier than recording to Windows XP and then to DVD.

Originally posted by Scotty L
Hi guys, I connected my SA3250HD box to my HTPC and followed the instructions. CapDVHS says Panasonic MPEG2TS Tape Subunit Device (Unknown Video #1) in the drop down menu but when I hit record no information appears in the Data Info boxes. The files get bigger as I record longer but they don't play back in VLC or ZP Pro.

This happens to all channels so I guess encryption is not an issue. Should I be trying another program than CapDVHS? Your complaint seems to be identical to this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=5126756#post5126756) post, to which someone replied that encryption was the problem.

Crap! Thanks for the info though, I searched the thread 4x but I guess the answer was 2 pages back. :) Looks like I'll have to try my luck with the HD capture cards. :\

If someone could please answer a very basic question I would be extremely grateful. I have an HD TIVO box (HR10-250). Can I transfer recorded HD programs from my HD TIVO box to a stand alone DVD recorder???


You could get more valuable answers from dvd recorder thread, this is not the right thread to start with.

[edit:] If i am not wrong, you can't transfer hd source straight to dvdr player.

On top of my head........
1st: DVDR is not DTCP, nor it carry firewire.
2nd: None of DVDR will let you record source from hd component/dvi/hdmi
3nd: DVD media is too small to store original hd material. 30 - 45 minutes?

you just have to wait for hd-dvd or blueray recorder

I've got a Mitsubishi WD52725 with a built-in HD tuner that I am trying to hookup to my XP Home w SP2 PC via firewire. I see 3 devices that PnP identifies, 2 unknown and an AVC Monitor device. I don't see any tuner device. It isn't identified as a tuner device during the initial install or in the device manager after the fact.

Also, none of these devices work with the mei drivers... xp says the drivers don't work for the device. I've tried installing during the initial install and from device manager. No go either way.

I've tried searching but most of the issues seem to resolve around finding the Panasonic device later in the process. I just can't get that far. Any ideas?

Just curious--when you bring up NetCommand, can your Mitsubishi see your "virtual D-VHS recorder"? If so, can it manipulate it?

I've searched the thread (it's long and I may have missed this) but will this work if I switch to Windows MCE? What might I lose?

Originally posted by zeroendless
You could get more valuable answers from dvd recorder thread, this is not the right thread to start with.

[edit:] If i am not wrong, you can't transfer hd source straight to dvdr player.

On top of my head........
1st: DVDR is not DTCP, nor it carry firewire.
2nd: None of DVDR will let you record source from hd component/dvi/hdmi
3nd: DVD media is too small to store original hd material. 30 - 45 minutes?

you just have to wait for hd-dvd or blueray recorder

Also don't forget the simpliest reason it won't work with a DVD video recorder - DVD video is limited to a max of 9 mbps transfer rates. It is about half of what you need for reasonable HD video.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
Just curious--when you bring up NetCommand, can your Mitsubishi see your "virtual D-VHS recorder"? If so, can it manipulate it?

This does not show up on mine. But it is a 04.

Originally posted by BigAl
I see 3 devices that PnP identifies, 2 unknown and an AVC Monitor device. I don't see any tuner device. It isn't identified as a tuner device during the initial install or in the device manager after the fact.

Also, none of these devices work with the mei drivers... xp says the drivers don't work for the device. I've tried installing during the initial install and from device manager. No go either way.


Not sure why you don't see a tuner device. You might try a different 1394 card, especially if you are using a port that is integrated with your MB.

As for XP indicating that it is the wrong driver, it is supposed to do that. This isn't the right driver and XP knowes it. But since there isn't a better driver it will have to do.

When I say the drivers won't work for the device I mean I bypass the MS WHQL certification warning and I get a message that says something like the driver file doesn't contain a driver that will work with the device I'm trying to install.

Was able to capture the superbown I had recorded on the dvr. Hit play on the recorded show and rec on the cap app.

Find media player classic is a little smoother than vlc.

Now, whats the best method to convert to dvd format? still tmpeg?

Will most likely edit out all the commercials and just keep the game. Hmm maybe put 1st half on 1 disc and 2nd half on 2nd disc.

Edit: This is on an HP NC6000 laptop 1.6ghz 512 megs ram with a firewire pcmcia card. Playing the files is fine, playing live stream is choppy as heck.

Originally posted by chuckvb
I've searched the thread (it's long and I may have missed this) but will this work if I switch to Windows MCE? What might I lose?

Anyone got an answer for this?

Originally posted by bdraw
The Howto is up to date. All the links work.
What seems to be the problem.

The only potential problem seems to be with XP SP2, but only two have reported it, and neither has submited a solution. I have yet to confirm the problem so I am not sure it there is even one.

What is the potential problem with SP2- not seeing the Panasonic device?

Should I then not install SP2 before I try to set up the transfer?

- Phil

It works fine under XP.(Which is the basic OS that MCE runs on)

I am using it on a homebuilt shuttle.

I have the Motorola 6412 and a Dell Inspiron 8600 notebook computer with a firewire port. I'd like to save the national anthem and the halftime show of the Super Bowl to get the great 5.1 sound, but I haven't yet bought a cable. When I ran into the store looking at firewire cables, I saw that there were a few different kinds (I almost bought them all to try them out).

Dell's website has the image below in the information window about the firewire port. The port on the 8600 looks like it would engage with the narrow connector of the cable and the port on the 6412 looks like it engages with the wide connector of the cable. What do you call this - a 6P to 4P IEEE-1394 cable?

Thanks!

Tim

yes, 6 pin to 4 pin firewire(Ieee-1394) cable.

Originally posted by michaeltscott
Your complaint seems to be identical to this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=5126756#post5126756) post, to which someone replied that encryption was the problem.

Try a hard reset of the box. I had the same problem with recording all of my channels after attempting to record an encrypted channel. Only a hard reset (unplugging the box) worked to fix the problem.

target sells a 6 pin to 6 pin that comes with two 6 to 4 pin adapters. One cable for all your firewire needs for less than 20 bucks.

Originally posted by Philip Klein
What is the potential problem with SP2- not seeing the Panasonic device?

Should I then not install SP2 before I try to set up the transfer?

- Phil

The steps may be out of order, it still works but the direction might need to be changed.
But like I said I never tried it myself, and no one else has ever posted the direcctions for sp2.

Friend of mine have the 6412 to xp sp2 running without a single problem.

im using XP SP2 - no problems whatsoever. and ive had the HTPC reinstalled from the ground up at least 4 times. never had an issue recognizing the STB with every firewire installation.
the only problem is (as always) recording premium, VOD, or INHD channels thru CapDVHS - its simply encrypted. i tried to "trick it", but it doesnt work with me.

smooth streaming thru VLC 8.something (using the latest nightly build). the official version 8 cant read the stream. Much better too, because i can now control the hue, gamma, brightness, saturation, etc, and it sticks. 7.2 doesnt - you have to manually go in the settings and "guess" the position of the sliders. plus there is a screen capture function that works effectively with the hardware acceleration turned on. usually if you turn it on, you get a black screen for your captured images.

i playback recorded streams thru VLC also, without any issues. media player classic reads it, but is kinda jerky. audio is flawless in both. I also use theatertek and thats even better playback features (but i dedicate it for DVD playback now).

Originally posted by powaking
Was able to capture the superbown I had recorded on the dvr. Hit play on the recorded show and rec on the cap app.

Find media player classic is a little smoother than vlc.

Now, whats the best method to convert to dvd format? still tmpeg?

Will most likely edit out all the commercials and just keep the game. Hmm maybe put 1st half on 1 disc and 2nd half on 2nd disc.

Edit: This is on an HP NC6000 laptop 1.6ghz 512 megs ram with a firewire pcmcia card. Playing the files is fine, playing live stream is choppy as heck.

heh, i got the superbowl on the DVR AND on my PC, recorded at the same time. i dont have to watch mcnabb choke in the last minute to record it to my hard drive again (he he! i kid! i like donovan).

stream and recorded file playback is handled by VLC 8.2 (nightly build vlc-0.8.2-svn-20050204). much more improved controls over 7.2. love the screen cap with hardware acceleration, and the video control sliders actually stick now.
i still love the way VLC can detect TRUE dolby 5.1 when available, using digital coax or optical out to my receiver. MPC 6.4 probably can detect it, but i never bothered looking for it.

im converting my recorded streams to DVD using the latest version of Nero Vision Express (NVE3 should be included with nero 6.6). takes forever (well, 2-3hrs to burn either a DVD-R or DVD+R at 2.4x since it has to transcode the file before burning it). but its relatively EASY with NVE3 - i just drag and drop the files to the NVE3, and you can have it make chapters and menus automatically. almost a no brainer. iev dont the route of TMPEG and thats way too much work compared to the NVE3, and ive found to come out with teh same result. Free is good, but convenience (to me) is better) if the end result is the same.

the problem i did encounter is when it has to reduce the size and bitrate to fit it in the disc(s) - unless youre doing 30 to 60 minutes at a time, the PQ will DEFINITELY be much lower. I recorded the NFC championship game, edited the commercials out, and ended up doing it one quarter at a time (4 discs for the whole game). i did the full 3 hours in one disc, and its just bad PQ. even doing 2 halves didnt give a good enough quality (for me anyway). Each quarter though gave a very acceptable PQ. not up to full HD quality (obviously), but definitely much better than DVD-quality (i monitored the bitrate of the 4th quarter i burned to disc, and the bitrate is around 9Mbps - LOTR extended and the new remastered The Matrix DVD goes to about 6 to 8Mbps only).

to cut out the commercials and separate each quarter, i use HDTV2MPEG2. real easy. its actually the first step before i drag and drop the resulting files to NVE3.

anyone tryed using a SA 8300 HD from adelphia ?? just got mine 2 days ago,my 3250 HD just went bad out of the blue,lol, im going to compusa in the morning to get a 1394 board for my computer, will i be the first to use this 8300 to comp ? also ,im in the buffalo area



dice

bah I'm so close. My HTPC finally saw the SA3250HD box and I installed the drivers just fine. My captures now even display info in the data section during record, but on playback the files are all garbled. VLC locks up just after I see some of the capture. The bitrate is 80mbps. (?)

I may just go by my comcast office and see if I can get a new HD box.

Originally posted by Scotty L
bah I'm so close. My HTPC finally saw the SA3250HD box and I installed the drivers just fine. My captures now even display info in the data section during record, but on playback the files are all garbled. VLC locks up just after I see some of the capture. The bitrate is 80mbps. (?)

I may just go by my comcast office and see if I can get a new HD box.

Top of my head I seem to remember that Windows XP drivers had crippled the max baud rate of 1394 hardware to prevent problems in communications. But if you installed the manufactures drivers for the firewire port you could gain back the speed. I might have this all messed up but your mention of a low baud rate sparked this memory.

I have the Moto 6412 (comcast), installed CapDVHS and VLC 7.2, and had no problems streaming using the firewire output. Then, I installed VLC 8.1 and found that streaming no long worked - lots of pixelation and stops and starts. Still able to capture and record HDTV using CapDVHS. Went back to VLC 7 and had no problems. Are there any settings for VLC 8x that will smooth out streaming from the Moto 6412 using firewire that I should be aware of?

What is the Max length of Firewire you can use before there is any signal loss from recording from the 6412 to a pc? I need to connect aprox 35 feet of cable, and need to know if there will be problems before getting the cable.

I have a moto6412 and I am running fine on XP SP2 (aside from encryption issues). No problems with CapDVHS or VLC, but am now using SageTV to view and record streams (thanks to the hard work of AndersNolberger & DFA!).

ryalch - Try the latest nightly build of VLC - 0.8.1 did not work for me either.

scanpa - The longest standard firewire run you could go is 14' without a repeater.

Originally posted by scanpa
What is the Max length of Firewire you can use before there is any signal loss fro recording from the 6412 to a pc? I need to connect aprox 35 feet of cable, and need to know if there will be problems before getting the cable.

I'm in the same boat. I needed about 40 ft so I bought a 25 ft and a 15 ft cable with a hub/repeater for the middle connection. The problem I have is getting data through the hub. The 25 ft cable by itself works and the 15 ft cable also works but when connecting the two through the hub, the connection isn't recognized by windows.

So, will there be problems? My guess is yes. The first problem is finding a place to buy a 35 ft cable. The longest I found was the Sanmax 25 ft'r at newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=12-149-012&depa=0

Originally posted by SK8_MD
I'm in the same boat. I needed about 40 ft so I bought a 25 ft and a 15 ft cable with a hub/repeater for the middle connection. The problem I have is getting data through the hub. The 25 ft cable by itself works and the 15 ft cable also works but when connecting the two through the hub, the connection isn't recognized by windows.

So, will there be problems? My guess is yes. The first problem is finding a place to buy a 35 ft cable. The longest I found was the Sanmax 25 ft'r at newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=12-149-012&depa=0

Does it matter if it is 4 pin or 6 pin to connect the 6412 to the pc???

No go on the SA 8300 HD , no wizzard no nothing ,did i miss something ?? please help



dice

Originally posted by scanpa
Does it matter if it is 4 pin or 6 pin to connect the 6412 to the pc???

The 6412 has a 6-pin connector and I have used it to connect to a 6-pim connector on my desktop and a 4-pin connector on my laptop. Both worked.

I think the extra 2 wires can supply power, if needed.

Originally posted by dice65
No go on the SA 8300 HD , no wizzard no nothing ,did i miss something ?? please help



dice
As far as I know, firewire is not active on the 8300HD. Most cable providers have only been activating firewire on models without a hard drive. In my area, only the 4200HD has firewire active.

I'm sure this is a dumb question, but I'm a newbie when it comes to transferring from DVR to PC to DVD media. I have the Moto 6412 and plan on connecting it to my Sony VAIO laptop so I can transfer recorded programs from the DVR to my PC and then edit for burning to DVD. What I need to know is should I buy a 6-pin to 6-pin firewire cable or a 6-pin to 4-pin cable? I would guess if I get a 6 to 6 that I can get a 6 to 4 adapter to attach if needed for the future? Can someone help me out as I'd like to be able to start doing this. Also, other than what's laid out in the very first post in this thread, do I need anything else in order to transfer from the DVR to my XP SP2 laptop. Thanks.

Thanks jonnyb, i was hoping they are active and i missed something,o well ,i called adelphia and they said they thought all ports are on, so maybe they will do something to enable them, thanks again for the confirm

What I need to know is should I buy a 6-pin to 6-pin firewire cable or a 6-pin to 4-pin cable?

If you ain't much of a tech person, search or look into ya PC/Laptor menu see it says 4/6 pins firewire. OR simply look into the firewire port on the 6412 then compare the size to your sony. 6412 is 6pins and if your vaio IEEE port look way smaller than the 6412 then it should be 4 pins. No one can tell what size of firewire of a pc/laptor you got there, it's different from one model to another. On the safe side, even the same model, who knows you may have the add-on. Firewire is only $7-12 bucks a piece if you know where to look.

Okay, question - How does using the setup outlined in the previous 47 pages (which I got about 2/3 of the way through before my eyes started bleeding) contrast w/ simply using a QAM-enabled card like the MyHD-130 or the Fusion3G QAM?

(Other than the discussion of how to get it to record C5 channels via clickery, or the legit but not what I'm aiming for discussion of using HD-VHS).

in SOME cases, some of your cable channels will be recordable with this method since the 5C flag will be not implemented or set to copy freely... but the channel could still be scrambled by the cable company (VERY common) and NOT recordable by the MDP-130.

:cool:

Originally posted by Squalish
Okay, question - How does using the setup outlined in the previous 47 pages (which I got about 2/3 of the way through before my eyes started bleeding) contrast w/ simply using a QAM-enabled card like the MyHD-130 or the Fusion3G QAM?You should be able to use the software which comes with those cards to make recordings of any non-encrypted QAM channels on your cable system (and probably any non-scrambled analog). However, the cable company is legally allowed to scramble everything other than the stuff on the basic tier. The only digital channels that they have to put on the basic tier are any channels of rebroadcast free-to-air DTV that they carry, so all of that should be recordable. If they carry any local DTV channels in an encrypted state, then they are breaking FCC regulations, and you should call them on it.

The networks will begin to apply the Broadcast Flag to their programming but, since it doesn't constitute encryption of the signal over-the-air on on the cable, it won't affect your ability to record it with tuner cards.

I don't know if anyone has talked about this or not but.....you don't need an HDTV to use the Motorola 6412. I thought of this when I played recorded HDTV Shows with my Avel LinkPlayer on a standard TV. It looked a lot better then Standard/Digital cable. So I borrowed my friends Motorola 6412 box and low and behold. It is beautiful. So I went to Comcast picked up the box and am now in heaven. To compare it. HD shows on a standard TV appear like you are watching a DVD movie. So, if you have been wanting this box and are waiting until you get an HDTV, wait no more.

My TV (Apex AT2702S) has a S-Video input on it, but composite looks good too.

Run to your area Comcast equipment place. Pick up the box and tell them you have a HDTV. It's 9.95 extra, but that is nothing really. If you call the toll free number, they will make you pay $30 to have someone come and install it.

If this has already been talked about in another thread, let me know.

Just followed the instructions:
Worked great with some patience. Follow the directions carefully.
I have the motorola dual tuner from comcast. Firmware is in the 9's.
Anyway, analogue stations record without a problem and playback in windows media and other programs such as powerdvd is perfect.
However, some problems with recording the high def stations:

The channels that are not broadcasting in full HD (ie the ones with the bars on the sides) are able to record fine but have problems with playback with winmedia player and power dvd ..not sure why...So, I read one of the above posts and found a mention of vlc. NOt knowing what this is, i searched it and found a free downloadable vlc player, and the media plays without a problem with this player. Thumbs up for this player..seems very powerful and also free.

However, when trying to record full HD channels I cant. My guess is that there is copyright protection on them. Can anyone confirm or refute this?
Also, I am interested in videoediting and converting some of my saved shows to a dvd. But, adobe premier doesnt seem to recognize these captured video files. Anyone have any suggestions on how to save the media to a dvd? thanks.

I think I anwered my questions from reading the many posts before mine.
Thanks. This stuff is cool. However, we need to work on the hd recordings. Thanks!

I just want to say that I have been successful in recording and playing HD from Comcast's Motorola 6214 using the instructions at the beginning of this thread. Number of programs have been recommended and seem to be needed to finalize this process with recording to a DVD. The last product that I have played with is the NeroVision 3 that seem to have all the needed parts to do this in one program (I actually almost purchased this product not realizing that My copy of Nero suite covers the license for this product).
Everything was fine with the NeroVision except the part that lets you capture video to hard drive from any device. When I selected the Panasonic D-VHS AV/C Device from the list of usable devices in the NeroVision, the program refused to recognize this device as a valid device. Is there something about the NeroVision that prevents it to see this device since the other programs like CapDVHS or VLC see this device just fine?

I just wish to have this all in one program working so I do not have to switch from one to another just to do one job

Has anyone been able to hook up an external Firewire drive and archive saved shows to it? Or how about an external Firewire DVD burner.

Originally posted by WillGonz
Has anyone been able to hook up an external Firewire drive and archive saved shows to it? Or how about an external Firewire DVD burner.

Boy, Do I wish this was possible......:)

Has anyone else noticed that a new version of MythTV is out, here is a quote from the changelog.



New Feature(FireWire Capture)
Myth now supports capture of MPEG-TS streams via FireWire from FireWire-enabled cable boxes. It has been tested on set-top models DCT-6200 and SA 3250 thus far. libraw1394 version 1.1.0+ (www.linux1394.org) and libiec61883 svn revision 49+ (svn://svn.linux1394.org/libiec61883) are required to use this feature. Only external channel changing is supported at this point, but most everything (livetv/recording/ff/etc) else should be working.


I may try this if I have time this week.

Are there any "minimum system requirements" for capturing without dropping frames? I captured the national anthem from the Super Bowl to my Dell Inspiron 8600 (Pentium M 1.5GHz, 512MB RAM, 5400rpm HD) and noticed the playback was a slight bit choppy. I moved the file to my faster, more powerful desktop and noted that the choppiness was almost non-existent, but still just barely perceptible.

There didn't seem to be any problems when making the capture. Even though I'm using a 25 ft firewire cable, I saw no error messages and have made several apparently successful captures of short segments.

Are there some limitations that are known for being able to capture the stream without errors and are there marginalizing factors?

Thanks,

Tim

Originally posted by scanpa Originally posted by WillGonz
Has anyone been able to hook up an external Firewire drive and archive saved shows to it? Or how about an external Firewire DVD burner. Boy, Do I wish this was possible......:) What scanpa's trying to say is that it's not part of the design. Some DVRs with active Firewire connections have an "archive to tape"-type function which will drive an external device using AV/C commands (turning it on, telling it to record, etc, all over the Firewire), but this cannot be done with a vanilla Firewire disk drive. There are harddrives with Firewire connections which can be manipulated through an AV/C protocol--they're called AV-HDDs. I believe that RCA's "DVRs" are driven by this protocol--by their televisions (you can see a spec for one of them here (http://tv.rca.com/NR/rdonlyres/407336B0-B43B-4C22-AD7C-4E9E2D8C56EB/0/DVR2160.pdf)). I think that people have reported success controlling these things using their Mitsubishi televisions. The cable STBs which can manipulate D-VHS decks, however, may only be able to deal with those (it's a different AV/C subunit protocol).

Originally posted by tluxon
Are there any "minimum system requirements" for capturing without dropping frames?

Hey Tim,

I think this is a hard question to answer. There are too many variables, like programs running in the background & fragmented hard disks.
I just configured an old PC I had lying around as a dedicated recorder. It's a 1.6Ghz P4 with 512M of ram and a 7200 rpm HD. I have no problems capturing with it. Clean Windows install with minimal applications.
The CPU usage while capturing averages around 10-12% which leads me to believe even a 1.6Ghz P4 is fast enough.
A bottleneck could be the sustained transfer rate of the hard disk though I would assume any hard disk and supporting chipset paired with a Pentium M should be fast enough.

Roger

I have had problems capturing on a laptop from DV before, the hard drive just couldn't keep up. I am not sure if that is what is causing your problem. But DV has a similar bit rate to HD material, so it definitely possible.

I think the cable operators like Comcast will sell/rent external drives which will be used to increase storage. Come on, you only get 15 hours of recording HDTV using the 120GB hard drive that it comes with. They would have to do something to stay competitive.

Originally posted by WillGonz
I think the cable operators like Comcast will sell/rent external drives which will be used to increase storage. Come on, you only get 15 hours of recording HDTV using the 120GB hard drive that it comes with. They would have to do something to stay competitive. Competitive to what? I don't think that the cable companies are really worried about losing DVR lease business to people purchasing $1000 CableCARD TiVos (whensoever these appear) that'd take 4 or 5 years to make pay for themselves versus the monthly cost of leasing a DVR.

Some models of STB, like the Scientific Atlanta 8300HD, have a Serial ATA connection for the addition of an external HDD. (We were discussing that in another thread, here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=5122626#post5122626)). We don't know quite yet but we suspect that these expansion drives will only be available for lease--it's certain that, if you connect one, an STBs will only use it if it's hit with a command from the headend to enable it--the spec sheet for the external drive says so.

The specs that the FCC requires that an STB's 1394 connections be compliant to would seem to preclude them being used by the STB as an interface for vanilla, off-the-shelf, Firewire HDDs.

anyone have any luck porting 6200ch to windows ? would be great for sageTV implementation of firewire capture

OKay, I have a Motorola 6214 DVR Dual Tuner box using Firmware 9.12 on Comcast. I am trying to record using a firewire cable. I have followed the instructions on this thread over and over, I have used both versions of the .inf drivers (meitape) and I just can not get it to work. Also, I cant see anything when I load up the VLC program. I boots up fine, but nothing shows. And when I close it its still running in the background, in task manager, and when I close it from there my computer reboots.

I have read many others that have had this working for some time now, but I have tried and failed :(

Any information that would help me get this working would be greatly apreciated. TIA

Hi Everyone,

I have a SA Explorer 8000 from Charter (MA) and reading these threads I guess that the firewire port will probably NOT work.

I am preparing to contact Charter to request a working firewire port model under FCC guidlines.

BUT before I do, I would like to know of a definate way of confirming or denying if the firewire port works on the STB.

I have three Widnows XP PC's:
One is a Desktop with PCI Audigy sound card Firewire port
One is a Laptop with built in (NEC?) firewire port
One is a Desktop with Nforce4 Motherboard with 2 (Nvidia?) FireWire Ports

What compatibility can I expect ?
How should I check if I have a live conection , which PC and software will give me the best responce for intial testing?

Help!

I have a SA3250 on Cox connected to my HTPC and I do not get the "found new hardware" when I plug in the firewire cable. I'm running windows XP and have two different firewire ports, one on my AIW 8500DV card and the other on the motherboard. Both show up in the device manager. Cox says the firewire port is active on my cable box. Any one got any ideas how to resolve this? Is there a way to check that the SA3250's firewire is really active?

Originally posted by nemi


I have three Widnows XP PC's:
One is a Desktop with PCI Audigy sound card Firewire port
One is a Laptop with built in (NEC?) firewire port
One is a Desktop with Nforce4 Motherboard with 2 (Nvidia?) FireWire Ports

What compatibility can I expect ?
How should I check if I have a live conection , which PC and software will give me the best responce for intial testing?

Help!

I also have 3 PC's I've used for testing this interface and all 3 PC's work with the Motorola 6200. One desktop has am Abit motherboard with a Texas Instruments 1394 controller, one desktop has an Asus MB with a Via 1394 Controller, and an HP laptop with a Texas Instruments 1394 controller.
From my experience, I expect the compatibility to be good. At least one of your computers should work.
Good Luck

I can't seem to get my SA3250HD to link with either of my two different firewire ports on my winXP HTPC (I can connect the two ports to each other and they will link). Cox thinks my firewire port in my box is active. Is their anything I need to add to the firewire ports like clients or something to link with the SA3250?

Is there an easy way to compress HD files once on the hard drive? I'm using TT2 to play and I want to stay with TS for HD (realize I can downconvert to DVD but this q is just for staying full resolution). I see where the files are already quite a bit smaller than equivalent files recorded OTA (due to the STB stripping null packets and other streams before sending over firewire?) but was still interested in compressing if feasible.

Is there a consensus on how to fix the SampleGrabber error?

I have a Motorola 6200 (when I check the firmware it says 7.15 (?)) I'm running XP with SP2. When I run CapDVHS I get the same error message some others have. I've tried disconnecting/reconnecting the firewire cable and also tried the other port on the 6200.

Originally posted by chuckvb
I can't seem to get my SA3250HD to link with either of my two different firewire ports on my winXP HTPC (I can connect the two ports to each other and they will link). Cox thinks my firewire port in my box is active. Is their anything I need to add to the firewire ports like clients or something to link with the SA3250?
Chucky search for the last several posts regarding that box "SA3250HD"

I had the same problem. Someone told me to do a hard reset, unplugging the cable box for half a minute then powering it back on. It was detected and I even saw numbers in CapDVHS's data box during capture but the .ts files are all jumbled. :( Seems this box is the most problematic.

is there a way to setup a batch job or something to record the shows off the 6412? I woudl prefer to do that instead of having to manually hit play on the 6412 and record on my HTPC.

Would like to treat the 6412 as an remote share and scheduling copying fo shows off of it.

Well a hard reset and the software that brings didn't do it. Cox came by and updated the firmware to 1.2. They said and thing less than 1.2 (I had 1.0) does not have the firewire port active. Now it links but I having trouble with the test recording so I have more work to do but I'm outof time tonight. Perhaps tomorrow I will approach it again.

After reading more I may have been trying BF'ed channels and that's why I got zero KB size files. Can I use the firewire to recieve any of the SD channels over the firewire connection or do I still need a seperate card for that?

Originally posted by chuckvb
After reading more I may have been trying BF'ed channels and that's why I got zero KB size files. Can I use the firewire to recieve any of the SD channels over the firewire connection or do I still need a seperate card for that?

Not sure about your situation, but for me, on Adelphia using a MoTo 6200, I was able to record EVERY single channel I subscribed to as a TS file. This included the analog channels from 2-99. I'm not sure if the box had an MPEG encoder built in or if they were simulcasting digital versions, but they came out as TS files just fine. They have since started flagging some stuff with 5C, and cut back on the number of "free" HD channels, so my choices are more limited now.

--Eric

Originally posted by chuckvb
After reading more I may have been trying BF'ed channels and that's why I got zero KB size files. Can I use the firewire to recieve any of the SD channels over the firewire connection or do I still need a seperate card for that?

do you have capvhs setup correctly? When I was set to output ps I also get 0 byte files, but set to convert 188 bytes it works fine

Originally posted by bobby_t1
is there a way to setup a batch job or something to record the shows off the 6412? I woudl prefer to do that instead of having to manually hit play on the 6412 and record on my HTPC.

Would like to treat the 6412 as an remote share and scheduling copying fo shows off of it.

Not really a batch file but you can set up to be automatic instead of present. I have a 6208. Set a reminder to watch in the HD box for any show you want to watch and place a matching entry(or set a litttle earlier and end a little later if your computer time is off from the cable box) in Capdvhs for the time and day and length of recording (make sure not to turn the cable box off from capdvhs if you have multiple recordings schedulred

I'm having some issues getting the drivers for the firewire setup correctly. Could some one with a SA3250 post a screen print of their "Device Manager" list so I can see what should be showing up?

Well I get .ts files but they won't play back. Also in CapDHS the files under "Data" info don't populate when I select record.

Hah, I was testing this out. It worked for a minute or two, until it crashed not only my computer, but my STB as well! :(

I have a laptop with an Athlon 3200, 512 MB RAM, and an 80 GB hard drive. When using CapDVHS everything works well except when trying to record HDTV - I get audio dropouts. Would this because of the hard drive? Unfortunately I don't know anything about the drive speed. It has been defragmented. Would things be better with a desktop PC?

There are upgradeable 7200 rpm notebook hard drives out there for sale. It will improve your stock hard drive performance, which in some, to most cases, is 4200 rpm. I can be honest in thinking that even 5400tpm is an upgrade to a standard 4200rpm drive.

5400 rpm is a lot more common for stock drives, if buying today.

Originally posted by tweekerz
There are upgradeable 7200 rpm notebook hard drives out there for sale. It will improve your stock hard drive performance, which in some, to most cases, is 4200 rpm. I can be honest in thinking that even 5400tpm is an upgrade to a standard 4200rpm drive.

5400 rpm is a lot more common for stock drives, if buying today.


Thanks. I didn't realize stock notebook drives were THAT slow :eek:

Originally posted by Allez
I have a laptop with an Athlon 3200, 512 MB RAM, and an 80 GB hard drive. When using CapDVHS everything works well except when trying to record HDTV - I get audio dropouts. Would this because of the hard drive? Unfortunately I don't know anything about the drive speed. It has been defragmented. Would things be better with a desktop PC?

There could be other contributing factor, namely sound card itself. Some sound cards don't have any processor and all sound is processed by CPU. Due to timing issues even fast processor may not keep up. Since you're recording to the hard drive audio/video stream if the drive was too slow to record I would think you should have audio and video dropouts not just audio.

I can see the sound card being an issue during playback but not while recording the stream. While recording, the bottleneck is the hard disk performance.

A good test would be to play the recorded file on a higher performing desktop and see if the audio skips are still there.

I don't think it the speed of the actual Hard drive that is hurting you. I can can capture without drop out on my Mac Mini and it only has a 4200rpm drive. But my Sharp ultra portable which has the same speed drive cannot capture without drop out. I think it is either the drive it self, or the chipset.

I have tried playing back the files on my desktop with an Athlon 3200, 1 gig RAM, and a 7200 rpm drive with the same problem. Also, the dropouts occur at the same places each time I play it, so my assumption was that it had to do with the recording.

Another test would be to see if the recordings are better/worse with different rate bitstreams. On my local Comcast system, HBOHD is a 14 Mb/s stream where local broadcasts are typically 19 Mb/s and Comcast sportsnet is 25Mb/s.

Well, I figured it out: it's my player. Just downloaded VLC, and it works fine with HD. Thanks for everyone's help!

My Mitsubishi WD52525 TV seems to randomly switch between the two tuners (digital and analog) when sending out a signal on the firewire. Does anyone know how to get the Mitsu TV to stick with one tuner instead of randomly switching between the two?

This was asked before but I don't see an answer to it. How can you determine if 5C is used on an individual channel if your firewire is not working. Is there a list or a tool to use?

When I plug in my 6412 to my XP PC's Firewire port the box is not even detected.

Does something have to be done with the 6412 box to turn on the IEEE1394 port?

At least on my SA3250 I needed new firmware that I could not load (simple power down and back up) to enable the firewire to be detected. I called my provider and they came out and made the update.

Originally posted by jmpage2
When I plug in my 6412 to my XP PC's Firewire port the box is not even detected.

Does something have to be done with the 6412 box to turn on the IEEE1394 port?

I didn't have to do anything on my 6200, it was enabled when I got it.

Is your PC firewire port enabled?
Check Windows' Device Manager to make sure you have a 'IEEE 1394 Bus Host Controller' as an entry.

Sigh..... this thread has turned into AIM messenger....

:(

Originally posted by jimwhite
Sigh..... this thread has turned into AIM messenger....

:(

And your post was such a contribution too. :D If you aren't helping then what's the point of whining about the thread going in a direction you don't like?

Thanks to this thread, got the capturing all set up. When I play-back an analog recorded show (Comedy Central Ch 72) via myDVR I have no problem recording it via CAP.

The problem is when I try to capture a game I've recorded (FSW ch 401). I get nothing. I've tried recording the analog channel and then invoking myDVR to play back the FSW game, but when I view the results in VLC, the recording always stops at the point of the switch.

I AM able to record FSW live though (analog for a couple of secs, then change to 401).

I'm pretty certain it's not a PC issue (2.8gHz, 7200 HD, 1GB RAM..etc).
I've got xp-sp2, read about some limit on IEEE (not willing to go down this road yet).
CAP - 3.0.6
Moto 6412 FW 9.12
Comcast
VLC

Checking through the diagnostics on the box, I noticed that it had an analog tuner and a digital QAM tuner. Could the issue be that it's playing back via the QAM and thus I need to go down that road?

Any thoughts/suggestions/hints would be greatly appreciated.

"If you aren't helping then what's the point of whining about the thread going in a direction you don't like?"

okay... I'll help..... 99% of the questions asked these days can be answered by reading the thread (or searching the forum)....

:cool:

Originally posted by zeroendless
what channel you were recording? It's encrypted, read again this thread

Although I have read most of this thread I didn't find the description of what a encrypted recorded file acted like. So are you saying you will see no data in the fields in CAPVHS and the file will have a size above zero but be unreadable?

Also I have search the thread and posted this question many times but no one seems to have the answer to this question. How can I determine what channels my provider has encrypted with 5C?

Chuck, you didn't read carefully enough. There are posts that describe how to check the status of your STB and see if a given channel is 5C encoded or not.

Okay I did a search again, perhaps I didn't find just the right terms. Does anyone know how to see if a channel is 5c encoded?

It seems there are alot of people asking the same questions so why don't we get the answers edited up top in the FAQ. From the sounds of some of the posts this whole thread may be a waste of time for many of use but you can't find that out until you invest the time. If this 5C thing is such a problem perhaps it's the first check that should be done.

- At least half of the questions could be eliminated if someone would post a picture of the devices you should and shouldn't have in "Device Manager" if you got it set up correctly.
- A couple of picts of the CAPVHS screens would ensure we've got that correct as well
-A better Description of what you get if the channel is encrypted and how to determine it.

Answers that say "it's in the thread" really don't help when the thread is this long. I you don't choose the right search term you get nothing and the thread just gets longer and harder use. If it sounds like I'm frustrated I am. I see alot of questions but very few true answers to the forum.

Maybe this thread is dying as Bdraw who started the thread PM'ed me and said "he does not use this method to record anymore". Wow.

Just to check, I did a thread search on "5C" and sifted through the 128 hits backwards from the beginning and quickly found a post showing how to determine whether a channel on a 620x is 5C encoded (here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=3855086#post3855086)), but I see that you're using a SA3250HD. Do you even know what IPG it's running (SARA or Passport)? What's your carrier? If you're in Pheonix it's probably Cox and your IPG on an SA box is almost certainly SARA--there's some information on finding out 5C status of a channel on an SARA box here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=4613067#post4613067). If, by chance, it's Passport, the procedure for how to do it is given here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=4617480#post4617480).

There really ought to be a FAQ, but then, so few threads like this ever get one.Originally posted by chuckvb
Maybe this thread is dying as Bdraw who started the thread PM'ed me and said "he does not use this method to record anymore". Wow. I could be wrong, but I suspect that once cable companies properly comply with the Broadcast Flag legislation, this will cease to be a very useful method of recording, because very little will emerge from cable STB 1394 connections which is not 5C-protected. I discussed this at length here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=5071108#post5071108) and here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=5102207#post5102207).

Thank you Micheal Scott, now I can check and see what if anything I can record. Yes I'm on Cox in Phoenix with a SA3250. I've previously read your posts on the BF issue and found it informing. One question I have not gotten a clear answer on is; (Ps this is a bit a thread jacking, but related) If I buy a pre July2005 QAM card will it be able to do things that cards built to reconize the BF won't?

Originally posted by jimwhite
"If you aren't helping then what's the point of whining about the thread going in a direction you don't like?"

okay... I'll help..... 99% of the questions asked these days can be answered by reading the thread (or searching the forum)....

:cool:

That is why I don't respond to most of the post now.

I do like the Idea of adding more to the troubleshooting sectin at the top.

I will review it, if you have any FAQ, in the form of questions and answers pm me and I will add them to the top.

Updated Troubleshooting sectin added michaeltscott's links from his post.
Moved the modified drivers for older 620x firmware to the troubleshooting section.
Added some details in the intro, such as 5C and dd5.1 stream.

Let me know if I should change anything else.
Thanks.

Originally posted by chuckvb
If I buy a pre July2005 QAM card will it be able to do things that cards built to reconcile the BF won't? I don't know what QAM tuning cards built to recognize the BF will or will not do. It looks as though there may be provisions for HTPCs which even support CableCARD--at least one was being shown at CES (see here (http://mediapcs.engadget.com/entry/1234000583027047/)). I'm assuming that such equipment would tether flagged recordings to it in some fashion, such that they couldn't be arbitrarily copied, but it would be perfectly legal for such a PC to make the same sort of copy of a BF'd recording to HD removable media that a recording device connected via 1394/DTCP to a cable STB could make.

Since it's not encrypted on the cable, any current-model QAM tuner card should be completely unaffected by the BF, unless the software is so brain-dead that it blows up when confronted with unrecognized descriptor types in a program's PSIP information. Clear copies could be made which could be played on any arbitrary PC which could be posted on the Internet for download. So the short answer to your question is "Yes".