Freeview in NZ

[mobiusnz]

Ok - I'm looking into going satellite in my PVR. Currently I have two Hauppauge MCE500's and these have been VERY reliable. I will keep one for Prime and as an additional tuner and want to run at least two satellite cards.

I have a DVB-S set top box I got cheap a while back and just got a new dish (I previously took the set-top box to a family holiday home where there was a sky dish installed) and got that up and running with the dish standing on a table outside so I know I have a good disk and LNB all ready to go.

My questions are:

What Satellite cards should I buy - is there a difference in quality of the hardware?

Pinnacle make a Dual DVB-S card but it seems to have 2 antenna inputs? Is this because you can't split the signal from the LNB or is this incase you need two LNB's for different satellites?

What I REALLY want is 2 x Dual tuner satellite cards and two split the signal from the dish/lnb into the two cards and hopefully have the Cards have an internal split to the two onboard tuners (As the MCE500's do for analogue signal) - Am I dreaming here? Can you split a satellite signal and how many times - If the split is internal to a card then its over a VERY short distance so shouldn't weaken the signal much.

Basically I've managed through some research online to workout how to change the setup of my set-top box from the Old Optus B1 to the new Optus D1 and focus the dish with a compass so I'm starting to understand a little about the transponders etc but I still don't know much about multiple tuners with one dish etc.

Are people in NZ (Sub) successfully getting the EPG from the freeview signal - is that working well?

Any pointers on this would be great - I figure 3 tuners would be about optimal for my viewing to be able to get 5 minute overlaps on all my recordings even when they are back to back but 4 would be Ideal for the odd time when theres too much on and to future proof for additional channels comming online on Freeview

Thanks,

Matt

[martint123]

I'm not sure about NZ, but I guess things must be similar to the UK.
The Sat signal can be Vertically or Horizontally polarised and as two channels can be on the same frequency but different polarizations, then you can't feed both down the same coax. The tuner/STB sends a signal to the LNB asking for V or H polarization. This means you need a separate output from the LNB at the dish for each tuner you have - you can't split the signal in the house. This is the reason Dual or Quad LNB's are available.

[sub]

Pinnacle make a Dual DVB-S card but it seems to have 2 antenna inputs? Is this because you can't split the signal from the LNB or is this incase you need two LNB's for different satellites?

What I REALLY want is 2 x Dual tuner satellite cards and two split the signal from the dish/lnb into the two cards and hopefully have the Cards have an internal split to the two onboard tuners (As the MCE500's do for analogue signal) - Am I dreaming here? Can you split a satellite signal and how many times - If the split is internal to a card then its over a VERY short distance so shouldn't weaken the signal much.

I cant really give you much in the way of dual tuner DVB-S recommendations since I havnt used any myself.

Some capture devices have "in" and "out" connectors that allow you to chain the signals through multiple devices - so you might not be seeing two inputs.

Everything on Freeview is going to be horizontal, so you dont need to worry about diseqc switchs or multi-LNB setups at this stage. You can get cheap satellite splitters so that you cable can go to both inputs. I've split the freeview signals between 3 devices and all functioned fine. You can also get amplifiers if you need them.

Are people in NZ (Sub) successfully getting the EPG from the freeview signal - is that working well?

Yeah, the freeview EPG works pretty well, since thats what I used used for my development of this feature (or at least the TVNZ trial signals before they officially became "freeview").

[mobiusnz]

YAY - this is all good news Sub - Totally forgot about In and Out that most satellite gear has so you are probably right there (I'm going to download the manual to find out). Good news about the splitters - According to the Set top box I have I was getting Close to 90% signal strength and I think from memory perfect signal qual so should be ok to split and that was with little focusing on the disk - Basically I got a signal - I stopped moving the dish, once I have it solidly mounted I'll be able to make more precise adjustments than when its standing on a table held upright by a brick on the base

Now the REALLY tricky bit - Finding a Dual tuner Pinnacle card and pricing and getting capital expendeture approval from the Boss! Really want this all running and well tested so I can Record the Rugby world cup on TV3 in widescreen (assumung they do the world cup in widescreen) in all its perfect digital quality.

I cant really give you much in the way of dual tuner DVB-S recommendations since I havnt used any myself.

Some capture devices have "in" and "out" connectors that allow you to chain the signals through multiple devices - so you might not be seeing two inputs.

Everything on Freeview is going to be horizontal, so you dont need to worry about diseqc switchs or multi-LNB setups at this stage. You can get cheap satellite splitters so that you cable can go to both inputs. I've split the freeview signals between 3 devices and all functioned fine. You can also get amplifiers if you need them.

Yeah, the freeview EPG works pretty well, since thats what I used used for my development of this feature (or at least the TVNZ trial signals before they officially became "freeview").

[mobiusnz]

One more question - What file sizes can I expect per hour assuming I'm not re-encoding the recordings. Do I have things right that basically I would just be saving the exact digital stream in from the Satellite signal directly??

How big a drama is converting this to DVD compliant Mpeg2? Not that this is a real problem for me as I've only ever saved a couple of kids programs to DVD - Everything else is watch and delete.

[sub]

One more question - What file sizes can I expect per hour assuming I'm not re-encoding the recordings.

Sorry, I dont really have any figures for the new Freeview platform for you. I know they're using quite high bitrates since launching a few days back, so probably pretty big files comparitively.

Do I have things right that basically I would just be saving the exact digital stream in from the Satellite signal directly??

Correct.

How big a drama is converting this to DVD compliant Mpeg2?

I record directly to .mpg files using the Cyberlink mux v5.0.0.1307, and it works well. I'm not sure the resolutions of all the channels is DVD compliant though. I seem to remember sometimes DVB channels use resolutions not in the DVD standard....I'm not sure if thats the case with freeview though.

[psycik]

Thread hijack.

Without a DVB-S card do we know of any other ways of getting EPG data around this part of the world. I tried from the DVB-C cards I had but it didn't seem to load much.

[sub]

I tried from the DVB-C cards I had but it didn't seem to load much.

This is because TelstraClear do not transmit the DVB EPG. Instead they opted to use some proprietary EPG based on MHP, accessed over IP using the cable modem.

Freeview and Sky both transmit standard DVB EPG. Otherwise you need to look at using things like xmltvnz, or some of the other less well known pre-prepared XMLTV files that are published on some URLs.

[mobiusnz]

Thread hijack.

Without a DVB-S card do we know of any other ways of getting EPG data around this part of the world. I tried from the DVB-C cards I had but it didn't seem to load much.

I'm using XMLTVNZ from http://www.reven.co.nz - I've had pretty good success with this getting EPG's for

TV1, TV2, TV3, C4, Prime and Sky Sport (We have Sky UHF with only Sport)

Occaissionally I get hickups where one day lists a 6am program running till midnight and sometimes "providers" change their websites and you have to wait for reven to release an update (but he's bloody quick with these generally), in the mean time you can source TVNZ etc EPG's from an alternate such as Sky or Saturn's websites.

[psycik]

yeah that's why I'm asking, mine has a hiccup at the moment with tv1 tv2....was looking for seeing if there are any other options... so I'm not totally reliant on that.