Newbie messed up, please don’t yell!

[supplier]

Hi folks,

I promised my 8 y.o. on her birthdays, among other gifts, she will get an upgrade of her cable box to DVR box, so she can record her favorite cartoons and watch on weekend. Suddenly I came across this pretty decent TV tuner card for $19 (MCE-3000) and convinced her we will upgrade her PC to DVR (we are on strict budget and it will give us more functionality we needed, like converting family VHS tapes to DVDs). So far I got myself in more troubles than I expected or could pull out. It was just a hardware kit – no software. So I went googling and found this awesome free software/forum. After 1 week of reading and fixing some minor problems I got everything working pretty well. (Most of the time went to researching how to setup a “non-supported” TV card, listings setup and some freezing of the PC – so far all done and working pretty well for our needs). I’m getting frustrated with few last pieces I cannot get how to get it work, even though I read all instructions on WiKi and forum. And my child getting upset as weekend one day away and she wants something to be recorded, while us going to be away. So any detailed answer will be GREATLY appreciated.

My PC is P4, 2.66Ghz, 533MHz FSB, 1GB DDR-333, ATI Radeon-9550, 120GB IDE, WinXP with SP2 with all available upgrades done. TV tuner is ADStech MCE-3000 (a.k.a. ADS PTV 305). The remote closely resembles Microsoft MCE Remote 2005 (version 2a) and supported by GBPVR. If I connect cable directly to Tv card – I can do everything I need, but I have a cable box before TV card. (in GBPVR v.1.1.5 I set the source as fixed channel “3”. Went through the procedure teaching IR transceiver to get commands from cable’s remote (I tried in channel changer MCE2005 IR Blaster plug-in) – I could not make IR blaster to change cable channels. Maybe I needed to install this plug-in?

My second try was to choose .exe Changer plug-in and installing HIP as software and HIP plug-in for MCE remote). From there a was totally lost how to make HIP to work.

So for my my setup with TV card and cable box as (RF channel 3) input my questions:

1. Do I need HIP if I have only WinXP SP2?
2. if I do, what HIP software and plug-ins (or only plug-ins) to use?
3. What setup guide to use? I mean Setting GBPVR with MCE or setting HIP with a remote?

Guide me please. I need to finish it tonight or I’m in a big “troubles”. The bottom line I need to make IR blaster to work and schedule two-three recordings on this weekend from different channels.

Sincerely,
Old man

[flyswatta]

I can't really help you with the HIP configs, but to buy you some time, you should be able to set a "timer" on your STB, and then schedule the show in GBPVR.
I do this all of the time on my receiver that has a UHF remote. You can probably schedule a 'recurring timer' on your STB, and set one in GBPVR so you're covered.
This also works out well for recording during "off hours" - middle of the night and school hours, vacation, etc.

It's not the best solution, but it's rock solid and will give you time to tinker with the blaster later.

Good luck!

[supplier]

I will definetely look into this solution. I just never heard my Cablevision box can be programmed with timer. I'll look for a manual for TSB. The second solution i thought is to bring a second cable box from other room and leave the two boxes running side by side on different channels. One input will be comming from RF and one via AV cable to the TV card.

I'm not sure yet if GBPVR allows to schedule recording from different sources on the same TV card. Anyone knows quick answer for that?

Thanks a lot

[stustunz]

ok hip sounds harder to use than it is
have you tried the hip guide on the wiki i started typing how to do then thought i would have a look what it said there and it was the same so just follow the directions from about half way down the page
about learning the codes
basically you teach hip from your remote and it just copies that action when the set top box need to change channel
im not sure where you got lost

1 teach hip your codes
2 tell gbpvr to use hip to change channel (done when you add your tuner )


http://gbpvr.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Tips/HipGuide#toc4
details i think you have already been there but try again and ask when you get stuck
if you cant find what you want

[supplier]

ok hip sounds harder to use than it is
have you tried the hip guide on the wiki i started typing how to do then thought i would have a look what it said there and it was the same so just follow the directions from about half way down the page
about learning the codes
basically you teach hip from your remote and it just copies that action when the set top box need to change channel
im not sure where you got lost

1 teach hip your codes
2 tell gbpvr to use hip to change channel

http://gbpvr.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Tips/HipGuide#toc4
details i think you have already been there but try again and ask when you get stuck
if you cant find what you want

I've been there. i got stuck on steps where HIP pops up a learning window and tells to press any key to start.... pressing key doesn't do anything for me -- that box stays in "waiting for input" mode. My biggest challenge – I did a lot of things without knowing exactly what I’m doing, do I use MCE remote or just a remote, etc. It’s pure luck that I got to the point where everything but IR blaster working. Over time I will probably have more understanding how the things work, as it become more and more interesting for me.

Thanks a lot for your inputs.

[stustunz]

well you were in the right place just sounds like hip wasnt configured to recieve your remote
since the remote you have may not be a mce remote hip need to know what its meant to be listening for
just to make sure we are on the same page here
you need to open hip then go to file/prefernces/ir output
does it show "mce" in the change output box?

[flyswatta]

I will definetely look into this solution. I just never heard my Cablevision box can be programmed with timer. I'll look for a manual for TSB.

Look around in the on-screen guide - Also, on an old comcast cable box, I found it in the 'setup' part of the menu.

The second solution i thought is to bring a second cable box from other room and leave the two boxes running side by side on different channels. One input will be comming from RF and one via AV cable to the TV card.

I'm not sure yet if GBPVR allows to schedule recording from different sources on the same TV card. Anyone knows quick answer for that?

Thanks a lot

Yes, it can handle multiple capture sources for one card with different inputs, however, it always will take the first capture source for a recording, second capture source for another recording at the same time. There are work arounds for this behavior, and I could help you set that up, but I wouldn't recommend it until you have a better understanding of how it all works - you really don't need to add a whole new layer of complexity to your setup .

Personally, I'd focus on the timer thing first - spent 10-15 minutes looking around your menus (there may even be a 'record' button on the remote, even if it's not a DVR) . That'll take away the pressure to stay up until you get HIP working and makes for a good backup plan.

Then, I'd focus on HIP. I've messed with HIP just a little bit, and stustunz is right - you were in the right area. I was able to learn my remote, but the HIP kept crashing on me when I went to configure another part :eek:. That was with a serial setup - I'm planning on getting a USB MCE receiver/emitter and will attempt it again.

Good luck, and let us know how it turns out!

[supplier]

Thanks to all for advice.

I still not able to use IR blasters, but the timer programming worked great and I think I will stick to it for now

Last night I reinstalled winXP Sp2 and gbpvr -- everything is working smooth, but I think TV quality went down -- colors are less saturated, than before I reinstalled everything. Maybe I need to play with decoding settings....

Guys, one more questions. Originally my Dell came with Original Windows Media Center (I believe it was 2002-2003). From your opinion should I continue using XP pro SP2 or downgrade to Original MCE and install all updates including SP2? ( I found I still have a good working image copy of original 80GB hard drive with Original MCE) :o) I read someplace that original MCE was build on XP pro version and not on XP home, like 2003, 2004 and 2005 versions.

Thanks

[stustunz]

mce is just a slightly different version of xp pro (mce cant be on a domain or some crap )
i have use both and notice no difference

[bdgbill]

I have pretty much the same setup as you. I would highly reccomend you find a PVR-150 card with the included remote and blaster. This has been working flawlessly for me for years.

Your 8yo may have problems setting timers on the STB and setting up recordings in GBPVR.

You should be able to find a PVR-150 with remote and blaster on Ebay for 50-60 bucks.