MCE 2005 IR Blaster and Scheduled Recordings

[jsganga]

Hi All,

I posted a couple days back about having issues with HIP Changing Channels being inconsistent. Last night I decided to install the newest version of GBPVR. When I completed the setup, I setup that channel changing to occur with the MCE 2005 IR Blaster Plugin. I had the plugin learn my STB remote and gave it a try. The IR blaster works flawlessly when scanning the TV guide and jumping to a channel for live tv.

My next test was to schedule a recording to see if the blaster would change the channel on a schedule. No dice. It seems like GBPVR never sent the command to the blaster. Very strange. Has anyone had any luck with this for scheduled recordings?

I'd like to avoid using HIP if possible and stay within GBPVR. I'm not too concerned with the MCE remote changing my STB because I can use the STB remote to do that. Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks
-Joe

[sub]

I posted a couple days back about having issues with HIP Changing Channels being inconsistent. Last night I decided to install the newest version of GBPVR. When I completed the setup, I setup that channel changing to occur with the MCE 2005 IR Blaster Plugin. I had the plugin learn my STB remote and gave it a try. The IR blaster works flawlessly when scanning the TV guide and jumping to a channel for live tv.

My next test was to schedule a recording to see if the blaster would change the channel on a schedule. No dice. It seems like GBPVR never sent the command to the blaster. Very strange. Has anyone had any luck with this for scheduled recordings?

I'm guessing this will be a HIP bug. When GB-PVR is configured to use HIP, it only has to run the HIP executable passing the channel number as an argument. There isnt much that can go wrong on the GB-PVR side of things.

That said, you can post your GBPVRRecordingService.exe.log if you want. It should show that it is running the HIP executable each time a recording occurs.

I'd like to avoid using HIP if possible and stay within GBPVR.

You're probably better of sticking with hip. I started adding the MCE IR Blaster support feature then a few days later HIP was released, and lots of people were already using it by my next release. I never got around to finishing this half completed feature.

[jsganga]

Thanks for the reply sub.

Currently I don't have HIP installed or configured. Are you saying that the GBPVR uses HIP with the MCE 2005 IR Blaster Plugin? If thats the case, how does it work when changing channels through live TV?

Regards,
Joe

[sub]

Apparently HIP works well. I've never tried it myself.

[jsganga]

Well, I found this out from the logfile which might point me into the right direction:

9/25/2006 9:35:00 PM.171 VERBOSE [5] Changing to channel (GBPVR.Backend.Common.MCE2005TunerController): 306
9/25/2006 9:35:00 PM.171 VERBOSE [5] Changing channels with MCE2005 IR Blaster: 306
9/25/2006 9:35:00 PM.187 ERROR [5] Error changing to correct channel for recording: The process cannot access the file 'C:\Program Files\devnz\gbpvr\IR Definitions\MCE2005\Comcast\1.bin' because it is being used by another process.

Is that 1.bin file the file that holds the IR Configuration for the MCE plugin?

-Joe

[sub]

Yeah, this probably comes under the 'only half completed' comments above.

That said, I've fixed that specific problem for the next release.

There is no guarantees it'll work for you, but you could try the attached patch that addresses that error. Backup the original file first though - incase you need to restore it.

[jsganga]

I will give this a try!

-Joe

[jsganga]

Well, I was able to get the MCE IR Blaster to change channels on recordings, however the channel changes are still inconsistent. I am still missing recordings because of incorrect channels which is a bummer.

I have now tried HIP and the MCE Blaster Plugin and still can't get channel changes to be accurate (IE Try to change to 305, instead it goes to 35 or 05, etc). What's more frustrating is that this was working with HIP for over 6 months.

Now I do have comcast with a motorola HD box, so I am wondering if something is up with the box. I don't think the problem lies with the blaster because it works sometimes and not others. If I check the the logiles, I can see the software sending the channel change commands, however the box doesn't change to those channels always. I have no problems going through Live TV though, haven't had an error change selecting a channel from the guide. I know the IR Blaster positioning is accurate so its not that. So 3 questions remain:

1) Could my IR Blaster be broken?
2) Has anyone got this setup to work with a Motorola STB and the Comcast Service?
3) Has anyone else had a similar problem and gotten a way to fix it?

Thanks for listening.

-Joe

[offrotor]

I too am having this problem with the Blaster, It just decided Not work anymore. I am using HIP, and I have be re-configering Hip Over and over... Still will not change channels for a scheduled recording. Changes channels fine otherwize. I have'nt tryed useing the MCE Blaster plugin in Gbpvr.

[idkpmiller]

I am also having the same issue, inconsistant channel selection but only for scheduled recordings works every time for live TV and from the TV Guide. I am using hipsend {channel} 600 as the ir changer