[mythtv-users] DirecTV and HDPVR (SOLVED Re: HD-PVR: Encoding Errors Running 0.22)

Alan Young ayoung at teleport.com
Fri Jan 15 21:06:37 UTC 2010


Well as the subject suggests, I found the source of my problem.

It's not Mythtv.  It's not the Linux driver.  It's not the HDPVR.  It's not 
even the USB cable.

It's the DirecTV box.

There is/has been a change to the firmware in DirecTV boxes to turn off 
component outputs on certain channels.  Supposedly the PPV ones only right 
now.  From a post I found [1], it went in right around the beginning of 
November.  Which just happened to be when I upgraded to 0.22...  Also, there's 
posts on the DBStalk.com forums that seem to indicate they may be trying to 
play that and other changes down as the last couple of firmware updates have 
not had release notes issued like they usually have.

Anyway, the aforementioned DirecTV change has a bug (or intentional change?) 
that if the HDMI cable is plugged into a device and the box detects the 
connection, it will constantly try to do the HDMI handshake.  If the device on 
the other end does not respond, it tries to reset hardware (I think) and try 
again.  During that reset, it also resets the component hardware which causes 
the flickering.  (Or it could be overloading the component output signal and 
causing the flickering as a basic attempt at copy protection...)  And it 
happens on any channel.  Even OTA ones that are being carried.

Now that I found out what the issue is, I was easily able to reproduce it with 
the TV by turning the TV on and set to component, but leaving the AVR off.

With the TV plugged into the component outputs and the HDMI plugged in to the 
AVR, I get flickering.

If I unplug the HDMI cable from the box, the flickering stops.

If I plug it back in, it starts again.

As a short term workaround, I've put a Monoprice HDMI switch between the 
DirecTV box and the AVR.  With the switch off, the box thinks the HDMI is not 
connected and output appears uncorrupted on the component output.  I just have 
to set my remote to always turn the switch off when the AVR is not on the 
DirecTV input.  (Which is easy to do with the harmony remote.)

I did about 8 hours of overnight recording on various channels and did not 
have any error messages logged.

As a long term workaround, I'm considering a HDFury.

On the flip side, I did learn a lot about the HDPVR driver and USB.  :-)

Some of which I think can be used to make the HDPVR driver and Mythtv logic 
better.  I just need to take a breather, re-upgrade back up to .22-fixes and 
clean up the code.

Alan

[1] http://forums.directv.com/pe/action/forums/displaythread?postID=10616350


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