Anyone with a WinTV-HVR-1800?

[_dagger_]

I'm guessing the support is pretty beta about now because the only thing I could watch it with was tvtime. Xawtv has a green/distorted picture, mplayer says it can't seek backwards in a linear stream, a cat /dev/video0 produces a 'rawdv' file according to nuvinfo, and in my first attempt I couldn't add it to mythtv. I'm not sure what all that means but if just watching tv is what you want, tvtime will do it.

Rockytfox: download the zip and the extract script to the same directory, make the script executable (chmod 755 extract.sh), and run it (./extract.sh). Then cp the two firmware files it creates to /lib/firmware

[Danp60]

I'm guessing the support is pretty beta about now because the only thing I could watch it with was tvtime. Xawtv has a green/distorted picture, mplayer says it can't seek backwards in a linear stream, a cat /dev/video0 produces a 'rawdv' file according to nuvinfo, and in my first attempt I couldn't add it to mythtv. I'm not sure what all that means but if just watching tv is what you want, tvtime will do it.

Rockytfox: download the zip and the extract script to the same directory, make the script executable (chmod 755 extract.sh), and run it (./extract.sh). Then cp the two firmware files it creates to /lib/firmware

Were you able to get audio in tvtime? I've also been trying to get the analog tuner working for the HVR 1800. I can get video working in tvtime, but I get no audio.

[thesun]

Wow...you've gotten farther than I have. I still don't have a /dev/video0 (or its equivalent) and just get a blue screen with tvtime. If I plug in my webcam and logout, when l log back in the webcam works under Cheese and Tvtime (it creates a /dev/video0, in otherwords), but I can't for the life of me get a /dev/video0 for my analog tv. What I'd like to have, in an ideal world where everyone has a puppy and puppies never grow old, is the webcam AND analog tv...maybe /dev/video0 for the analog tv and /dev/video1 for the webcam. But I've played around for weeks and can't get it going.

If you can tell me what tricks you did to get the tvtime to work, maybe I can help with the audio -- my audio for the digital Clear QAM channels is fine...I use mplayer at the command line and it works just fine. But I'm still at square one (a blue rectangle, actually) with tvtime. Any and all help would be hugely welcome...

:-)

[Danp60]

Wow...you've gotten farther than I have. I still don't have a /dev/video0 (or its equivalent) and just get a blue screen with tvtime. If I plug in my webcam and logout, when l log back in the webcam works under Cheese and Tvtime (it creates a /dev/video0, in otherwords), but I can't for the life of me get a /dev/video0 for my analog tv. What I'd like to have, in an ideal world where everyone has a puppy and puppies never grow old, is the webcam AND analog tv...maybe /dev/video0 for the analog tv and /dev/video1 for the webcam. But I've played around for weeks and can't get it going.

If you can tell me what tricks you did to get the tvtime to work, maybe I can help with the audio -- my audio for the digital Clear QAM channels is fine...I use mplayer at the command line and it works just fine. But I'm still at square one (a blue rectangle, actually) with tvtime. Any and all help would be hugely welcome...

:-)

Sure, I'll go through the steps I did. Although I'm using Ubuntu I'm sure the steps are very similar in Fedora.

1. Get the firmware listed a couple posts back at http://steventoth.net/linux/hvr1800/ and place them in /lib/firmware/your-kernel-version
2. Install mercurial (In ubuntu it was sudo aptitude install mercurial)
3. hg clone http://linuxtv.org/hg/v4l-dvb/
4. cd v4l-dvb
5. make && make install
6. modprobe tuner
7. modprobe cx25840

You should now see a /dev/video0

[thesun]

Awesome, that worked...I've got video...and a video0. I _thought_ that's what I already had done, but either I messed something up the first time or maybe the new drivers are slightly different than those of a few weeks ago. I also installed my firmware in two places: /lib/firmware (there's no kernel directory) and /usr/src/kernels/2.6.24.4-64.fc8-i686/drivers/firmware...if this latter was the "right" spot, then that's what did the trick since I hadn't gotten any love before.

Unfortunately, like you, I now have no audio. For the Clear QAM channels I was using mplayer and that was fine. But I tried messing around with the TVTime audio settings (as I'm sure you did too) and didn't find anything that worked. So...still at the drawing board, I guess.

If you figure it out, please post to this thread. I'll do the same...in the meantime, thanks so much for the clear instructions. They were really helpful.

[thesun]

Anyone out there able to help me getting TVTime to work? I was getting video for a few weeks but now I just get a black screen. At no point did I get sound. The Clear QAM side of things works fine under mplayer, but only getting 6 channels of the 100 or so that are available is frustrating.

[Coyotesrt]

Just wondering if anyone of you have succeeded in getting the HVR-1800 functioning. Seems like this thread has grown a little stale.

I, too, am trying to get this card to work. I'm running FedoraCore10 and have had some positive
results. However, I do still have problems. So, here's a bit about my set up and problem...

FedoraCore10
Hauppauge HVR-1800
Nvidia driver (GTX 260)
firmware additions
TVTime (only app that works, sort of)
/dev/video0
/dev/video1
Cable Set Top Box
Panasonic DVD player DVD RV32
JVC VCR Player
Sony 5.1 Surround Sound
ASUS P5QC

After a lot of work, and a lot of dickering around (but not nearly so much as with my last system
and the ATI/Gatos setup -which still works great on Fedora Core 9!) finding firmware, loading
modules, etc. I finally got TvTime to take the feed from my cable set-top box and I'm able to
watch TV (cable input to the HVR-1800 is through the middle coax connector). However, as some
have noted, I have no sound. But I got around that by using the audio output ports on my cable
box and connecting that to my Sony Surround sound (stereo amp/tuner/entertainment audio). I
am also able to use the S-video connection to the HRV_1800 to connect my external DVD player,
with sound, though the DVD player is also connected directly to the Sony stereo.

I could actually live with this setup, if only the TvTime app didn't hang. It runs for some variable
amount of time. I've had it run for as much as 30 minutes, and as few as 2, before the TvTime app
freezes. Though the video freezes, I can still access menus, but they are slow in responding. After
a freeze, the application will no longer run properly, just giving a blue screen. If I reboot, I can then
watch TV for a short while longer.

I have not tried taking the cable set-top box out of the way and connecting directly to the HVR-1800
for cable tuning, as this won't suit. There are higher numbered channels that are a must, and 125
channels just doesn't cut it.

BTW, I've had zero success in getting any other application to display TV (none of Kaffiene, Xawtv, mplayer).

So, any progress on the sound front? Any ideas about what's happening with the freez?

Thanks

[Coyotesrt]

So, I know it's bad form to follow up one's one post... but in the chance that there is someone
reading this list, I thought I'd share my further experience with the Hauppauge HVR 1800 running
on Fedora Core 10.

Just a little added history first... I've always been a fan of the ATI All-in-Wonder series of cards. They
produce fantastic picture quality. But, setting up Gatos under Linux has always been a real bear. I've
done this several times over the years, And have even gotten a Radeon 7500 to run Gatos (AVview) on Fedora Core 9. I though this go around I'd do the "easy" thing and get a card that is explicitly
supported by V4L. Though this has proven easier than Gatos and ATI, it still has not been easy.

I read everything I could find on this subject and installed the HVR 1800. After much re-reading and
tweaking the configuration, I've finally met with a certain level of success, but the hack job is not what
I'd call satisfactory as TvTime still hangs (though I'm now getting about 2 hours of play time between
hangs).

I've found that by removing the moduless (cx23885, et. al.) and reloading, I can restart Tvtime and it
will run for another hour or so before freezing. I've also found that if I decrease the nice value to -15,
I can extend the amount of time between freezes (this, though is not a satisfactory solution). I've also
been able to capture extended error messages which are thrown at the time TvTime freezes.

I've also found that the problem with sound can be resolved by plugging the audio outputs from
my cable set top box into the input jack for my integrated sound system (on board sound controller).
Silly me... not making sure that the TV card has a sound output jack which can be linked to the
sound controller inputs. But, this setup does work, so I'm not unhappy with that. External DVD player
also works through the S-video/Composite connector.

But, this freezing is quite irritating. It always happens at a critical part of whatever program I am
watching. But, after a little scripting, I can restart within a few seconds. through testing, I believe
the problem is in the cx23885 module. I'll continue p laying with this, and maybe dig into the code
to see if I can find the fault, and if I have any further success, I'll post back here to share.

Below is a listing of the extended errors I've captured, in the hope that someone with more
programming experience on this project will find it helpful:

Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: VID A - dma channel status dump
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: init risc lo : 0x32d20000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: init risc hi : 0x00000000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: cdt base : 0x000107b0
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: cdt size : 0x0000000c
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: iq base : 0x000105b0
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: iq size : 0x00000010
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: risc pc lo : 0x00000030
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: risc pc hi : 0x00000000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: iq wr ptr : 0x0000000c
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: iq rd ptr : 0x00000000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: cdt current : 0x00000000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: pci target lo : 0x00000000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: pci target hi : 0x00000000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cmds: line / byte : 0x00000000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: risc0: 0x00000000 [ INVALID count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: risc1: 0x00000000 [ INVALID count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: risc2: 0x00000000 [ INVALID count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: risc3: 0x00000000 [ INVALID count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: (0x000105b0) iq 0: 0x80008000 [ sync resync count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: (0x000105b4) iq 1: 0x1c0005a0 [ write sol eol count=1440 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq 2: 0x32c5b5a0 [ arg #1 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq 3: 0x00000000 [ arg #2 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: (0x000105c0) iq 4: 0x1c0005a0 [ write sol eol count=1440 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq 5: 0x3306f0e0 [ arg #1 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq 6: 0x00000000 [ arg #2 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: (0x000105cc) iq 7: 0xd2000000 [ writecr irq2 count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq 8: 0x00130040 [ arg #1 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq 9: 0x00000000 [ arg #2 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq a: 0x00000011 [ arg #3 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: (0x000105dc) iq b: 0x70000000 [ jump count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq c: 0xd2000000 [ arg #1 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: iq d: 0x00130040 [ arg #2 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: (0x000105e8) iq e: 0x00000000 [ INVALID count=0 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: (0x000105ec) iq f: 0x00000011 [ INVALID count=17 ]
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: fifo: 0x00000040 -> 0x2840
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: ctrl: 0x000105b0 -> 0x10610
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: ptr1_reg: 0x00000640
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: ptr2_reg: 0x000107c8
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cnt1_reg: 0x00000018
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: cnt2_reg: 0x00000009
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]/0: [f41b49c0/0] timeout - dma=0x32d20000
Jan 12 19:42:18 percival kernel: cx23885[0]/0: [f41b4180/1] timeout - dma=0x33020000
Jan 12 19:42:19 percival kernel: cx23885[0]: VID A - dma channel status dump


CoyoteSRT

[weitjong]

I don't have the exact same card, but I may be able to answer some of your questions.

Sound

To get sound over the DMA channel I use something like this on the command line:

$ sox -c 2 -s -r 44100 -t ossdsp /dev/dsp1 -t ossdsp -r 44100 /dev/dsp

The /dev/dsp1 is the sound output from my Hauppauge card and the /dev/dsp is the sound input to my onboard sound card. How do I know that? From the output of this command:

$ cat /proc/asound/cards

On my output it shows index 0 as my sound card and index 1 as Bt878 (from Hauppauge card).


And if I wish the sounds to be redirected to all my surround speakers, I use this command instead:

$ sox -r 44100 -t ossdsp /dev/dsp1 -t alsa plug:surround71



Play

I am using TVtime and I have never encountered any problems like you described. F8/F9/F10 all choose "bttv" driver for my WinTV Hauppauge card. So I guess "bttv" is more stable then the driver that you are using. But with TVtime I only get video and no sound. I have use the sox command to get the audio.

Alternatively, I can also use this command to play both video and sound through mplayer.

$ mplayer tv:// -tv driver=v4l2:norm=PAL:input=0:immediatemode=0:amode =1:width=384:height=288:outfmt=yv12:device=/dev/video0:audiorate=44100:forceaudio:volume=100:alsa: adevice=hw.1,0

Again this works for me after I have done some home work on the devices number to use. Yours could be different. You can specify other screen size.


Capture

One you master how to play, to capture it is just changing the command from mplayer to mencoder.

$ mencoder tv:// -tv driver=v4l2:norm=PAL:input=0:immediatemode=0:amode =1:width=384:height=288:outfmt=yv12:device=/dev/video0:audiorate=44100:forceaudio:volume=100:alsa: adevice=hw.1,0 -o title.avi -oac copy -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=mpeg4


Unfortunately I have no idea how to fix your cx23885 driver problem.

[Coyotesrt]

Hey, thanks for the response and info. Unfortunately when I cat /proc/acound/cards, I only see the onboard HD sound port, nothing for the Hauppauge card. This, though, is solved to my satisfaction
by the method I described in my earlier post. I had the extra input port on the sound interface, and it
meets my need.

As for execution of Tvtime, the bttv driver has been around for quite some time and is very well
tested. The cx23885 seems to be a bit newer, and I suspect it will be a little time before all the little
kinks are shaken out. However, I have now hacked up my system enough that Tvtime will now
play for 1 to 2 hours before freeze up, and since moving from Xinerama for the dual display to
Nvidia's TwinView, I've not had any X freeze ups.

I'm hoping that later releases of the cx23995 code will resolve any further issues.

Any other info you might be able to provide would be appreciated.

Tthanks,

Coyotesrt

[weitjong]

I wonder you have tried the cat /proc/asound/cards with the "loop back" cable as you described still attached. I am not absolutely certain but the card may detect the presence of the loop back cable and "disable" its internal circuitry to output the sound from the card to computer.

Anyway, if your current setup works for you then I say just leave it. Before I know sox command, I was also using this loop back method and for quite a long while too. The problem with this approach is I could not find a way to record with sound to avi format.

[thesun]

I'm still following this post but am unable to really provide much useful info. I still don't have anything going with TVTime. It just doesn't seem to know the card exists and I just get static. If I plug in my webcam it seems to recognize that and try to get a video feed there instead of from the HVR-1800.

I can watch tv fine though by clicking on the "DVB" button in Xine. That's what I've been doing for a while, though there's another really odd issue there where the channel keeps switching. My only solution to that was to only put one channel at a time (the one I wanted to watch) into the .xine/channels.conf file and then it didn't switch anymore. I get occasional Xine hangs or crashes but not enough to worry about it.

If anyone DOES have a simple walkthrough of what they did to get their HVR-1800 working with TVTime and so on, I would love to know.

When I try to use mplayer as described above I get "error: tv:// must have a parameter"

Xine's been okay thus far, but I would love some DVR capability or even just the option to use mplayer.

[MALDATA]

I know this is an old thread, but I'm wondering where things stand with this.

I'm currently trying to get this card working on a Gentoo box (and failing). All of the devices show up just fine, but I can't do a channel scan (it finds no channels with w_scan, dvbscan, and Kaffeine). I know that the signals are coming in because I have a splitter that goes to my TV and I get several ATSC channels through that. I'm not interested in receiving analog or FM, so I'm not worried about those parts.

I use Fedora at work, so I would be OK with switching over to Fedora at home if there are reports that this works well. Anyone got any news?

Thanks!