DCTTuner plugin pre-Alpha test

[whurlston]

I was hoping to have this plugin completed before the new season started but it did not work out.

If anyone is willing to run some tests for me, this is a base for a DCTTuner plugin. It is not useable for recording or live TV but it will gather some information that I need to detect clear QAM channels and copy-freely programming. It will not make changes to your database such as adding channels so it should not affect regular recordings. It does save a capture source to the database but no channels will be associated with it.

The couple of people that previously ran a test for me should delete their "[userdata]\Plugins\Common\PSIP Parser.*" files if you still have them. The new version does not have a space in the name so it will not be overwritten.

1. Stop all NPVR processes.
   
2. Unzip the file to your [userdata]\Plugins folder.
   
3. Start NPVR.
   
4. Open Settings.
   
5. Select Devices.
   
6. You should see a capture source with type "DCTRecorder" for each of your tuners (a Prime would have 3 capture sources listed).
   
   
   
   
7. Select one and open the Device Settings (or double click on the capture source).
   
8. If "Carrier Lock" has a check mark, it means the CableCard has an OOB lock with your provider and you should see a list of channels.
   
9. If you do not see any channels or if you see an incomplete list, close the device settings screen and re-open it after a few seconds (giving it a little more time to acquire the OOB data). It usually takes about 30 seconds after starting NPVR for my ATI to aquire the data.
   
10. If it takes significantly longer than 30-60 seconds, try rebooting the machine and/or tuner and then try again.
    

Once your channels are listed, you will see a "Test" button and a "Scan" button.



"Test" will scan the selected channels and print some debug information in the logs.
A "selected" channel means one that is highlighted, not one that is checked as "Enabled" (check marks can be ignored for now).
You can select multiple channels using "Alt + click" or "Shift + click" or you can simple test one channel at a time.
If possible, select one of each of the following and click the "Test" button:

1. A known Clear QAM channel (one of your local channels is a good choice).
   
2. A known encrypted channel to which you are subscribed.
   
3. A known encrypted channel to which you are not subscribed.
   
4. A PPV channel.
   
5. An OnDemand channel.
   

"Scan" will scan all channels in the list and print the same debug information in the logs.
This will take a long time (about 15 minutes for 500 channels by my tests). This will be significantly decreased this once I get the information I seek. I don't recommend running a full scan at this time but I left if enabled in case someone just has nothing better to do.

After the test/scan is complete, you will get a popup telling you that it completed, the number of channels scanned and the time it took.

Please post your Nextpvr.log after running the test. I'm specifically looking for Prime/2650/Ceton tests and tests from a Scientific Atlanta CableCard. (I am running an ATI with a Motorola CableCard).

@wtg, if you run this test, you can use channels 64, 145, 156, 501 and any channel to which you are not subscribed.

Once the tests are complete, you can stop all NPVR processes and remove the Plugins\DCTRecorder folder if you wish.

[pcostanza]

Bill, due to the new tv shows and my personal life a bit busy, I can't promise I can get to this tonite but I will try for sure over the next few days.
I have a question regarding QAM and the Ceton tuner....it is my understanding that when a cablecard is inserted, it does not receive QAM and you have to remove the cablecard in order for it to get QAM channels. Supposedly, a future update will allow QAM and their USB version due out this week is supposed to support it. Will this make any difference regarding your test?
Thanks for your time in working on this.

[whurlston]

No rush on this, don't worry. I was really hoping to get this out before today because I know everyone will be recording like mad (I will too).

it is my understanding that when a cablecard is inserted, it does not receive QAM and you have to remove the cablecard in order for it to get QAM channels

Technically, it will still receive the clear QAM channels as long as your CableCard subscription is valid and those channels are mapped in your lineup somewhere. But as far as this test is concerned, no it doesn't matter. I'm just looking for a way to detect the channels that are clear QAM.

I can already do it on my system with the ATI but it requires that I query and parse a webpage on the CableCard because ATI does not update the StateVariables that they are supposed to in order to report Conditional Access. :mad:
That webpage will be the same layout for all Motorola CableCards regardless of tuner but it will be different for Scientific Atlanta cards.

I'm hoping that the Prime/Ceton/2250 implement Conditional Access reporting properly and I don't need to query and parse a webpage for them and instead just query a StateVariable.

The purpose of detecting Clear QAM channels (and not just copy freely) is so that I can create an automapping function for clear QAM tuners that are also installed in a system.

[lovemyram4x4]

Yeah I was hoping to have NVPR up and working for the new season, but that's going to happen, now it's going to be hard to get it working properly and reliable enough that I can trust putting it online in our home since I have to find time to test things w/ not wanting to mess w/ recordings that are going on w/ my 7MC setup(SageDCT has grabbed a tuner that was assigned to 7MC even though it was set to use a different) and wanting to watch all the new stuff.

I'll test Ceton for you, if I get a chance I can also move my ATI DCT over to my server w/ the Ceton and test w/ both connected.

[whurlston]

K. This test should not affect any recordings and can be done even while a recording is in progress. I am only querying the device and requesting OOB data and not attempting to perform any streaming.

One thing to note. Once an application subscribes to a service on the device, I have discovered that the ATI will become dramatically slower at responding to queries if the application fails to unsubscribe from the service before the application exits. So I recommend that you actually "Stop" the recording service and "Exit" NextPVR rather than just killing the processes in Task Manager. This is true of any application (SageDCT, etc).

Killing and restoring power to the tuner is the only way to get it to start responding in a timely fashion again.

I don't know if the same things happen with the Ceton and the Prime/2650 since I don't have them to test.

[lovemyram4x4]

How long should this test scan take? It's been going for a few min now.

[lovemyram4x4]

Well I noticed in the pix there's a process bar, mine isn't moving, hence why I didn't notice it locally.

[pcostanza]

Bill, when I double click on my ATI device, I get the same scan screen as you do in your post. However, when I try one of the Ceton tuners, I don't get an option to test, just scan and though it lists the specific tuner, it does not show any channels at all and looks a bit different.
Here's my Ceton log after a scan. I'm not even sure it did anything as it only took about 4 minutes. No matter how long I waited and reopened my devices, I never saw a list of channels.
Did you still want me to send my ATI info since you have one to try? I'm thinking you likely need the Ceton stuff more.

[pcostanza]

Just in case I get busy and you do want this, here's the ATI scan log.

[whurlston]

@lovemyram4x4: you should see the progress bar start to move within seconds. Can you post your logs?

@Paul: These two lines show that it's still loading the old version of the files:

Code:

    Line 770: 2011-09-19 22:19:09.631    [DEBUG][1]    DCTScanning: Received STT table.
    Line 1197: 2011-09-19 22:25:09.688    [DEBUG][1]    DCTScanning: dumping tables:

This version doesn't do that. Make sure that the recording service is stopped and that the tray app is closed before replacing the new files.

Edit: the ATI log looks good.