Sheduled Recording

[dchurch24]

Hi,

I scheduled a recording last night for a Miramax film - gbpvr seemed to record it all - indeed, I only have one capture card, so when I attempted to watch TV while it was recording, it informed me that I had the choice of not watching TV or watching the recording in progress.

At the end of the recording - I attempted playback, which worked fine for the part of the recording before the film started. When it got the the Miramax logo the screen froze - I don't mean gbpvr froze, just the playback - even though it looked like it was playing (I could FF and Rewind, but it would just show the 'frozen' part of the screen.

I have recorded things from BBC CBeebies and it has worked fine (I have only had it up and running this last weekend, so have been experimenting), also the Live-TV Pause works fine too.

I was wondering if this might be caused by a signal being broadcast that dissallows the recording of this film maybe?

If so, is there a way around this limitation?

[gEd]

I was wondering if this might be caused by a signal being broadcast that dissallows the recording of this film maybe?

If so, is there a way around this limitation?

no, I don;t believe that there is any such restriction.

Are you using analogue or digital? - what card? are u using the latest drivers for this card?

sounds like the timebase of the recording may have gotten messed up. can u watch the recording in window media player or some other non-gbpvr software?

[dchurch24]

Thanks for the quick reply.

It does the same in Windows Media Player, i.e. the time bar along the bottom shows the correct length, but if you place the 'thumb' past the point where it halts, then you just see the same frame.

Oddly, the file size is about 150 meg - nothing like the size I would expect to see for a full length film.

It's a digital card - the Nova-T (PCI) and it has been working perfectly. I recorded a film using the bundled WinTV software, and it wouldn't play back properly using Media Player, yet played perfectly using XBMC. So I don't think the card is at fault.

I think it may have just been an unlucky one-off. I shall experiment some more and see if it re-occurres.

[neilraymond]

Sounds fairly similar to a problem that I've had on occasions - see here for more info http://forums.nextpvr.com/showthread.php?t=12684.

I've had the same problem recording other programs both before and since. I'm thinking at the moment that the nova-t might struggle with poor quality signals, so I'm in the process of upgrading my aerial and wiring - something that needed doing anyway. Do you know what your signal quality is like?

[dchurch24]

Hi, thanks for that.

The signal, when gbpvr found the channels was high - this is reflected in the quality of the recording (the amount that did record).

I also scheduled a recording (before I installed gbpvr) using the WinTV2000 program that came with the card, and although Windows Media Player struggled to play it back, it worked fine when streaming it to my xbox via XBMC.

The thing that does point to poor signal though, is if I use a splitter box and split the signal between a Freeview box and the Nova-T, then neither receive a signal at all. I put this down to the box having had it's day, but based on your info I will investigate further.

Thank you.

[dazzyb2k3]

In actual fact the Nova T is better than most other cards at handling weak signals as it uses (or centainly did use) the Thomson tuner which is more sensitive than some of the others.

Signal quality makes a big difference with DVB though and if you must split the signal then use a combined amplifier/splitter and high quality cable. If you do decide on an amplifier then make sure that the input to the amp is good as if you amplify a noisy signal then it just makes amplified noise which will cause more problems than it solves.

If this still doesn't help then try using a different mux. DVR-MS seems much more tolerant of breaks in the signal than the others.

[djtaylor]

[QUOTE=dchurch24The thing that does point to poor signal though, is if I use a splitter box and split the signal between a Freeview box and the Nova-T, then neither receive a signal at all. I put this down to the box having had it's day, but based on your info I will investigate further.
Thank you.[/QUOTE]
That sounds classic crappy signal to me. I've had that sort of problem, 150MB is way too short for the full film as you know. That should be around 2GB to 3GB. You've clearly got a broken recording and even Videoredo isn't going to fix that because there just isn't enough recorded to patch up and repair the timeline.

Given that when you split the signal your halving the available signal to each device, I would suggest that you invest in a masthead amplifier which will give 10dB gain (or thereabouts) to *each* outlet (if you buy a 4 way amp) and then you've got to run 50m of cable to get the signal back to that which the aerial is delivering direct. An amp is only there to overcome losses, not to boost a crappy signal in the first place but you should then be able to run a single cable to your devices and then split if you want to.

You can try adding a booster at the end of the chain but that's really the worst place as noise and interference has been introduced by then and you amplify that too which isn't what you want.

David.

[dchurch24]

Hi guys, thanks for the replies again.

I was only splitting the cable (and it was through an amplifier, I forgot to add that. I really do think the amp has just died) while I was setting the gbpvr box up. My daughter wanted to watch CBeebies and of course I was using the signal into the gbpvr box and playing/setting it up so I split the signal so that she could still watch it on the tv while I could still set-up gbpvr. It wasn't/isn't intended as a permenant solution. Thank you for the advice though, it's very much appreciated.

It's not a noisy signal in general, and works fine through a 'normal' Freeview box, however, it is an old aerial and I consider ourselves lucky to get it working with Freeview.

So, even though the picture quality is excellent, it could still be a weak signal? If so, would upgrading the aerial fix this problem does anyone think?

Also, FYI, it was recorded as DVR-MS.

[djtaylor]

[QUOTE=dchurch24]So, even though the picture quality is excellent, it could still be a weak signal? If so, would upgrading the aerial fix this problem does anyone think?
QUOTE]
Well from a purely technical point of view, aerials don't really wear out so if the current aerial hasn't fallen down and is still pointing in the same direction and more importantly still serves a single freeview box then I wouldn't start there.

If you can get a masthead amp with say 4 outlets up by the aerial and change the cabling to CT100 or equivalent (H109 etc) then that's a good start and run that all the way to each TV so each tuner has it's own feed or just split between the two on shorter runs. Where it goes pear shaped is when it's split and split again and again and then amp'd to try to get the signal back up at the end.

You might want to have a browse around http://www.satcure.co.uk Good prices for cabling, aerials and amps and Martin will give advice too if you ask.

If you really feel like bunging up a killer aerial then you'll find those too but then you probably don't have to if you can already receive the signal to one device as it stands.

David.

[dchurch24]

Excellent news. Thanks so much for the advice - even though I'm a techie, this is still quite a steep learning curve. I've never done anything with Audio/visual stuff before, so this is all new to me - all help has been greatfully received.

Thanks.