New utility to help with channel tuning probs

[Gandalf]

And thanx for your quick answers sub!

I solved the problem! With luck i agree

I run regedit and erased the map "TV System services" from the registry. It was freqcopy who made it all go wrong. Now
i can see all channels both on GB-PVR and your scanning utility. Thanx for all help...

One question thou:

It seems to me that LiveTV quality is better fullscreen on WinTV2000 than on GB-PVR. Ive tried "use SBE" option but it wont work at all. Im using 12000kB/s both in winTV2000 and GB-PVR in LiveTV setting. Do you know of any filter or such that could improve LiveTV quality? Sports are much worse on computer than on my "real TV".

Thanx again

[sub]

Glad here you got it going, and my utility is working just fine.

Quote[/b] ]It seems to me that LiveTV quality is better fullscreen on WinTV2000 than on GB-PVR. Ive tried "use SBE" option but it wont work at all. Im using 12000kB/s both in winTV2000 and GB-PVR in LiveTV setting. Do you know of any filter or such that could improve LiveTV quality? Sports are much worse on computer than on my "real TV".

In theory the quality between WinTV2000 and GB-PVR should be pretty much the same. We both use the hardware MPEG2 encoder to produce the video. We *can* both use the same MPEG2 decoder for playback.

GB-PVR may be using a different MPEG2 decoder filter than WinTV2000 for playback. If you have multiple MPEG2 decoders on your machine, try setting preferred decoder. I find all the decoders produce a slightly different looking picture.

The hardware decoders (MVP/PVR350/XCard) produce a much better picture than the software decoders.

Quote[/b] ]Ive tried "use SBE" option but it wont work at all.

SBE wont improve the quality of your picture. SBE can be a little picky with which MPEG2 decoders it will work reliably with. If you have multiple MPEG2 decoders on your machine, try explicitly setting preferred decoder. 'System Default' sometimes picks a decoder that wont work with SBE.

[mvpaaagh]

Hi Sub,
I was about to give up on live tv when I came across your tuning assistant as I was having no joy tuning tv stations in. The tunning assistant has helped but I still have a problem. The TV reception on most stations is quite poor whereas through WINTV reception is perfect. I assume the frequencies found by the tunning assitant need fine tuning. Do you know if the frequencies used by WINTV are stored in the registry. If so I was thinking I could extract them and enter them into the tv system services section of the registry. I have tried FREQCOPY for the same purpose but it hasn't worked. Any thoughts appreciated.
regards,
mvpaaagh.

[sub]

mvpaaagh, send me an email and I'll see if a slightly different version of the tuning assistant will do the job for you.

[wesa]

Thanks for the utility. It solved my major problem I wanted to post.

Seems like I'm the only swiss (switzerland for the search engine). So here comes my experience with the tool using Hauppauge PVR250 without FM:
- All cable channels found
- All antenna channels found

Apart from one channel (ORF2 - Austria2) which seems to be placed somewhere in the middle of the frequencies.

As an additional info. I'm using cablecom which is the biggest provider (1.5 million households - small country) in switzerland.
The settings of this provider can be found here: http://www.cablecom.ch/sendert....rd=8037 (8037 is the ZIP)

[profjoe]

Has anyone tried this on US cahnnels?

I am having an awful time trying to tune any channels on anything other than wintv2000 (tried freqcopy, and directly editing the registry by hand, no joy).

I will try when I get home, just curious about my likelihood of success.

sub: it looks like this would be a great addition to the base package if it works everywhere

[sub]

I suspect this utility wont help you. Its just likely to show you that it cant tune all your channels.

From what I've read of the problem, the device drivers are not working correctly with this particular tuner, and Hauppauge will eventually release some new drivers. The Microsoft channel tuning APIs that usually set channels fine on the older PVR250s etc, just dont seem to work for this device.

Some more reading from a another user with the same problem a few days ago: http://gbpvr.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=2;t=864

[arttext]

Anyone tried it in The Netherlands already, especially in Amsterdam (frigging UPC) The problem here is that alot of channels are set a litttle bit off (+ or -). In Wintv I only could use the option "All Channels" which search on frequencies instead of channel # and that works ok.

cheers,
arttext

[sub]

arttext, just try it. It doesn't change anything on your machine. It just does a simple scan through the channels so you can see whats there. If you use the "Cable" tuning type, it'll probably find your channels.

[JcM]

Thanx for a fantastic util Sub!

Works fine in Sweden, all channels tuned in without problems.
Provider: ComHem
Tuner: PVR 250