Compro Videomate S350 DVB-S

[martint123]

Update: Differences between Videomate S-350 scanned by gbpvr and someone else's scan, picked off this forum yesterday.

Scanned by gbpvr on videomate s-350

T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:0~ONID:0~TSID:2050~P:6903~V:2305~A:2306~L:eng~PMT:256~TXT:2313~PCR:2305~N:>Unknown1
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:0~ONID:0~TSID:2050~P:6904~V:2325~A:2326~L:eng~PMT:257~TXT:2327~PCR:2325~N:>Unknown2
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:0~ONID:0~TSID:2050~P:6940~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2330~L:NAR~PMT:258~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>Unknown3
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:0~ONID:0~TSID:2050~P:6940~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2329~L:eng(AC3)~PMT:258~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>Unknown3 (AC3)
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:0~ONID:0~TSID:2050~P:6945~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2330~L:NAR~PMT:259~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>Unknown4
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:0~ONID:0~TSID:2050~P:6945~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2329~L:eng(AC3)~PMT:259~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>Unknown4 (AC3)

Scanned by A.N. Other on who knows what

T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:32~ONID:2~TSID:2050~P:6903~V:2305~A:2306~L:eng~PMT:256~TXT:2313~PCR:2305~N:>BBC 1 East (W)
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:32~ONID:2~TSID:2050~P:6904~V:2325~A:2326~L:eng~PMT:257~TXT:2327~PCR:2325~N:>BBC 1 CI
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:32~ONID:2~TSID:2050~P:6940~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2330~L:NAR~PMT:258~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>BBC HD
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:32~ONID:2~TSID:2050~P:6940~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2329~L:eng(AC3)~PMT:258~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>BBC HD (AC3)
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:32~ONID:2~TSID:2050~P:6945~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2330~L:NAR~PMT:259~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>6945
T:10847,V,22000,56~NID:32~ONID:2~TSID:2050~P:6945~V:2328~VTYPE:H264~A:2329~L:eng(AC3)~PMT:259~TXT:2331~PCR:2328~N:>6945 (AC3)

[liteswap]

I've also got an S350 and was amazed how cheap it was. No problems with it yet either.

But I will also soon be acquiring a Hauppauge HVR4000, which will add, among other things, a pair of DVB-S tuners to my setup. I have two cables running from my dish and was planning to use the Compro's loop-through to connect to one of the new DVB-S tuners.

What are the limitations of this approach? What won't I be able to pick up when the Compro is receiving? And are there any other issues I need to be aware of? Thanks for the benefit of your experience.

[martint123]

The problem with satellite is that it uses both horizontal and vertical polarisation to squeeze more channels into the available frequency range.
The LNB is switched from H to V by changing the volatge sent to it (12/18v ISTR).

Now the problem is - which tuner will supply power and therefor select the polarisation.
This is why Sky+ needs a dual lnb so it can record/watch more then one channel.

Get yourself onto ebay and grab a quad LNB and run some more cables. I think I only paid a fiver or so for mine.

p.s. I think NZ uses only one polarisation, so they can get away with splitters to feed multiple tuners without this problem.

[liteswap]

Interesting - it's a more complex issue that I imagined - thank you martin123 for the detailed response. As a point of fact, I did take the precaution of installing a quad LNB when the dish went up about a month ago so I will need only to run new cables from it when necessary.

Fortunately, it looks like my original question has been superseded: the HVR4000 arrived this morning and, contrary to my expectations (and despite having examined a number of photos of it), it has only one DVB-S connector for both tuners. So I'll just hook up the second (currently unused) cable to the HVR4000 and hope that it and the Compro play nicely together...

This way I can use the two cables already installed wiuth three tuners, which should be enough.

[martint123]

Yes, I think the "twin satellite tuners" means just the dvb-s and dvb-s2 tuners and not that you can use both at the same time - so the problem I mentioned doesn't apply now.

Am I guessing right the analogue doesn't have the hardware encoder we need?
Can you use dvb-t and dvb-s(2) at the same time?

I have to say that my Compro has behaved perfectly in all the time I have had it, other than the scanning issues

[sub]

The HVR-4000 only has one DVB-S/S2 tuner, so only needs one connector.

[liteswap]

So it does - thanks sub.

Note to self: read specs more carefully...

[liteswap]

Just a quick thought, following on from http://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.php?t=43055another thread where I reported problems with zero-length recordings: has anyone noticed problems with the S350 when used with another tuner? I thought I'd resolved the recording problem but now it seems to have returned - I'm wondering if it just doesn't work properly if it's not the sole tuner.

[martint123]

Assuming you meant S350 then I have one alongside a PVR150 and nova-t-500 and it works fine.

[DanielP]

Hi Liteswap....

I just picked up your comments about going into advanced BDA settings and ticking the "always ignore >>whatever, can't remember<< errors". Doing this fixes both my "no signal" issue (i.e. nothing first channel tune request, then every fine the next) and zero byte recordings.

Thanks so much- I must have had this set before, as the card worked at first. Then when I rescanned, I must have cleared everything whilst playing around.

Daniel