South Africa MUG
Contents
ZAMUG
Created this page to gauge interest, as well as to have some info specifc to running MythTV in South Africa
Members
- Chris Picton - WinFast2000
- Frank - Fedora Core 5 + Hauppauge PVR 150
- Dave Jones - Ubuntu Feisty + WinTV-PVR350 (lirc fixed after a leetle hack)
TV Tuner/ Capture Cards
The follwoing cards are reported to be working well in SA:
Leadtek Winfast2000XP RM
The Leadtek Winfast2000XP RM can be sourced from Corex, Rectron. Uses bttv module, with the following in modules.conf:
options bttv tuner=24 card=34 above bttv ir_kbd_gpio
The following kernel patch is needed to get the remote working properly under kernel 2.6.11
--- linux/drivers/media/video/ir-kbd-gpio.c.orig 2005-04-01 14:27:08.000000000 +0200
+++ linux/drivers/media/video/ir-kbd-gpio.c 2005-04-01 15:32:18.000000000 +0200
@@ -136,7 +136,7 @@
[ 12 ] = KEY_CHANNELUP,
[ 16 ] = KEY_CHANNELDOWN,
[ 3 ] = KEY_ZOOM, // fullscreen
- [ 31 ] = KEY_SUBTITLE, // closed caption/teletext
+// [ 31 ] = KEY_SUBTITLE, // closed caption/teletext
[ 32 ] = KEY_SLEEP,
// [ 41 ] = boss key
[ 20 ] = KEY_MUTE,
@@ -155,8 +155,30 @@
[ 36 ] = KEY_NEXT,
// [ 37 ] = time shifting
[ 38 ] = KEY_STOP,
- [ 39 ] = KEY_RECORD
+ [ 39 ] = KEY_RECORD,
// [ 40 ] = snapshot
+
+ [ 17 ] = KEY_BACKSPACE, // Revert
+ [ 22 ] = KEY_MODE, // Display
+ [ 27 ] = KEY_AUDIO, // Audio
+ [ 31 ] = KEY_TEXT, // Teletext/CC
+ [ 37 ] = KEY_UNKNOWN, // Time Shift
+ [ 40 ] = KEY_UNKNOWN, // Snapshot
+ [ 41 ] = KEY_UNKNOWN, // Boss Key
+ [ 42 ] = KEY_UNKNOWN, // PIP
+ [ 47 ] = KEY_MENU, // Menu
+ [ 48 ] = KEY_ESC, // Cancel
+ [ 49 ] = KEY_DIRECTORY, // TV Guide
+ [ 50 ] = KEY_SUBTITLE, // Subtitles
+ [ 51 ] = KEY_LANGUAGE, // Language
+ [ 52 ] = KEY_REWIND, // Rewind
+ [ 53 ] = KEY_FASTFORWARD, // Fastforward
+ [ 54 ] = KEY_TV, // TV
+ [ 55 ] = KEY_RADIO, // FM
+ [ 56 ] = KEY_DVD, // DVD
+
+
+
};
static IR_KEYTAB_TYPE ir_codes_pixelview[IR_KEYTAB_SIZE] = {
@@ -389,7 +411,7 @@
case BTTV_WINFAST2000:
ir_codes = winfast_codes;
- ir->mask_keycode = 0x1f8;
+ ir->mask_keycode = 0x8f8;
break;
case BTTV_MAGICTVIEW061:
case BTTV_MAGICTVIEW063:
HAUPPAUGE WinTV-PVR 150 MCE
The HAUPPAUGE WinTV-PVR 150 MCE can be sourced from megastore.co.za and various other on-line shops. The main advantage of this card is that it does hardware MPEG encoding (host CPU doesn't have to do it). It uses the ivtv module.
Version 4.5 and above of ivtv is required for the 150 MCE card. Installation instructions for Fedora Core: http://www.ivtvdriver.org/index.php/Howto:Fedora
Some useful commands to see if your card is working:
Scan available TV stations:
scantv -n PAL-I -f southafrica -o stations.txt
Tune in to a channel:
ivtv-tune -t southafrica -c 29 # Tune to eTV
Start playback:
mplayer -vo xvidix /dev/video
TV Out
You need a video card that supports TV-out. South Africa uses the PAL-I TV output format. This section decribes configuration settings for South Africa:
ATI Video Card
Download and install the ATI proprietary X.org driver and libraries (non-free). Typical commands:
aticonfig --query-monitor
aticonfig --initial=dual-head --tvs VIDEO --tvf PAL-I --dtop clone
aticonfig --force-monitor=crt1,tv
GeForce Video Card
GeForce6600LE (Cheaper version of Geforce6600/6600GT)
So far I'm using the VGA with my LCD TV so it looks and works like a giant Laptop screen, albeit very very well.
The card does run hot though, and the VGA cooler I bought to correct that is a bit noisy and appears to generating slight signal interference .
On Ubuntu Feisty the drivers are well supported, under the restricted repositories. Really easy.
LIRC
(Infrared modules so your remote can control Mythtv)
[Please note that apparently the lirc code has been fixed so the steps here are unnecessary - but I'm a pessimist so I'm leaving this section in) There is a bug in lirc in that it will not compile against kernels over 2.6.18 because a *conf.h file has been renamed and so make fails w.r.t. the "missing file".
Here is a sample of the error message:
ERROR: Kernel configuration is invalid."; \
echo " include/linux/autoconf.h or include/config/auto.conf are missing."; \
echo " Run 'make oldconfig && make prepare' on kernel src to fix it."; \
echo;
The solution is to create the empty autoconf.h and auto.conf files in the correct locations.
Know though that it's simple to fix and after that make compiles perfectly.
For me the file is created thusly:
$ touch /usr/src//linux/include/linux/autoconf.h $ touch /usr/src//linux/include/config/auto.conf
IR Transmitters
An Infrared Transmitter/ Blaster would be needed if you want MythTV to change your M-NET/ DSTV channels. However, I don't know if one can buy these in South Africa. You will probably need to order one from overseas. If you now of a local dealer, please update this page!
The following IR Transmitters should work:
- IRBlaster (+- US$15) - http://irblaster.info/
- High-Power LIRC Transmitter/Receiver (+- US$30) - http://iguanaworks.net/ir/
Here is the lirc codes needed to simulate the black Multichoice remote: http://lirc.sourceforge.net/remotes/multichoice/DSD910
Note to users with a dualview or PVR: there is currently no config file to simulate the blue remote. If someone can help recording it, please update this page!
Typical configuration:
# cp /usr/share/lirc-remotes/multichoice/DSD910 /etc/lircd.conf
# grep '^[^ #]' /etc/sysconfig/lircd DRIVER=default HWMOD=lirc_serial DEVICE=/dev/lirc/0 COM_PORT=/dev/ttyS0 DRIVER_OPTS="irq=4 io=0x3f8 type=0"
# /etc/init.d/lircd start
# irsend SEND_ONCE Multichoice_DSD910 3 # irsend SEND_ONCE Multichoice_DSD910 progup # irsend SEND_ONCE Multichoice_DSD910 voldn
VFD Display
Some Media Center Cases has a buitd-in VFD or vacuum fluorescent display. Unless you install special drivers, you wil not be able to use the VFD on linux.
- Linux drivers for the Soundgraph iMON USB IR/VFD devices can be downloaded from http://venky.ws/projects/imon/
Media Center Cases
Some of the cases:
Electronic Program Guides
There are two ways to get XMLtv data (program schedules) for MythTV. You can either download it from flash.za.org, or use the XMLTV grabber plugin:
Download
Regularly download the XML schedule file from flash.za.org. Example commands:
wget http://download.flash.za.org/schedule/ZA-XMLTV.xml.gz gunzip ZA-XMLTV.xml.gz mythfilldatabase --file 1 -1 ZA-XMLTV.xml
XMLtv grabber
There is also a tv_grab_za in the latest distribution of XMLTV. This can be obtained from SourceForge.
This grabber attempts to categorise movies and other types of shows.
Last time I've checked the grabber wasn't working properly. Check its current status at here.
