PVR-500 Coax & S-video connection?

[Rrowan]

Hi Folks,

I need to connect a Fios SD STB to a long time working GB-pvr computer with 2 PVR-500 cards. I have been using an analog cable connection until last week when we switched over to Verizon Fios.

PLEASE ignore the HD part. Yes I know that the pvr500 is SD only and that is fine.

Here is a block diagram of what I am trying to do (sorry for the bad design - first time using Visio 2007)



In the config I have the following: (using Schedule Direct EPG)
sd-1 = pvr500 (no fm) internal #1
sd-2 = pvr500 (no fm) internal #2
sd-3 = pvr500 (with FM) internal #3
sd-4 = pvr500 (with FM) internal #4

Now that works and I get about 20 unencrypted channels and MOST of the time the wife is fine with that. The problem comes up with when the wife wants to record something on the encrypted channels.

SD STB = Motorola QIP2500-3

SD STB to PVR 500:
1 - Using S-video and rca jack audio. Do I connect to the S-video port right under the coax connector or the extra bracket ports for the pvr-500?

2 - I have not tried it yet, control the stb with the ir from the blaster or serial cable from the computer?

3 - Do I need to remove sd-4 for the stb to work or will GB-pvr ignore one of the ports?

4 - How do I configure GB-pvr to use the STB?
---a - Do I need to configure Schedule Direct to use all of the channels on digital Fios?
--- b - How is that "capture card" configured? Fios-1 external, channel 3, etc
--- c - Any screen shots of setting up for the STB/S-video would be greatly appreciated.

5 - What is the USB port on the back of the STB for?

6 - What channel does the s-video get? Like can I test it with Live-tv?

7 - I had another question but for the life of me I can't remember it.


Last question:
Am I fighting a losing battle? Should I just get the Fios HD-DVR? I would rather continue using GB-pvr. I hate to buy new hardware (ie: pvr-1600, etc) only to find out later that I could of saved the money and pay the monthly charge (which I really hate) for the Fios dvr.

Many thanks

Rick R.

[Rrowan]

Well I have made progress

I have video & audio from the STB. I kept playing with the config settings and ports on the back of the pvr-500 until it worked.

Doing a test record from the stb but I won't know how that goes for a couple of hours. Since the wife is using the box to view and record stuff.

At the moment we are manually setting the channel on the STB and need to get it automatic from GB-PVR.

At the moment the channel "FIOS" has no info (yeah I know its not a real channel). So does that mean I need to change my channel lineup on Schedule Direct to include all of the FIOS channels?

Rick R.

[Rrowan]

Thanks for all of the help

Rick R.

[gazoo]

I love Visio too lol

[flyswatta]

I'll throw out a couple of thoughts. My setup is not that different from yours, from the perspective of mixing "standard unencrypted channels" (in my case OTA) and output from an STB (in my case Dish Network).

To integrate the two, you'll need to setup an IR blaster for your STBs that you'll want to record from. I'm assuming one STB - but you can emulate the setup for any additional ones.

1. Create a second lineup (IIRC you can have up to 4 lineups) via schedules direct for all of the channels that you get via the STB.
2. Create a capture source for S-Video in, external tuner. For the purposes of this conversation, we'll call it "sd-4fios'
3. Set up your blaster (not sure which one you have, you'll have to consult the wiki &/or this forum for that). This should also configure sd-4fios "Channel Changer" in the recording source.
4. use your new EPG source for this capture source

So what'll happen now is that your 'tv guide' will list all of the channels in your regular lineup AND your FIOS lineup (if the channel names are the same, then it will only show once). If you select a channel to view or record that's one of your regular channels, then GBPVR will use it's own mechanism to select a tuner (if it happens to select the sd-4fios one, then it'll blast the channel). If you select a channel that's only available on the STB, then it'll blast the STB and record/view that channel.


If you want to get a little fancier, you can edit your lineup for FIOS to NOT include the channels you get on the other tuners, this will mean that you won't use the STB unless you select a channel that's only available on the STB.

Hope this helps or make sense...

[replaytv]

I am interested to see if you can get the Microsoft IR blaster to work with the PVR500. So far I only use the IR Blaster from HVR1600 and Coax for PVR500. I have the MCE remote and IR blaster but I have not test it yet.

Dan L.

[flyswatta]

I had it working with my two PVR150's via HIP. I don't see why it wouldn't work with the 500.

[Rrowan]

Hi flyswatta,

I'll give that a try, once the wife stops using the GB-pvr computer.

thanks again

Rick R.

[flyswatta]

Here's a tip from Sub when you have multiple lineups in Schedules Direct:

For those that have multiple lineups, there is one trick you can do. When setting up the capture source, in the username field you can do the following to get it to use the channels from only one lineup:

username;DISH501:-

This is a semi-colon followed by the lineup code. This lineup code can be seen on the SchedulesDirect website (shown in the URL when you click the 'edit' button on a lineup).

If you've got a specific channel lineup that contains just the OTA channels, then doing this should result in a much smaller list for that capture source, making the mapping a little simpler.