VBox

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Version:
0.28
VBox support was added in 0.28

V@Box Communications manufactures and sells a variety of network-attached tuner devices. Detailed information is available for the more popular devices by following the links.

VBox TV Gateway summary of current models
Standard Model Geographic area supported Broadcast standards Number of tuners MythTV multi-rec capable
Satellite XTi-3332 Australia & Europe DVB-S/S2 2 tuners Yes
Combi Satellite & Terrestrial XTi-3340 Australia & Europe 2 x DVB-S/S2 2 x DVB-T 4 tuners Yes
Combi Satellite & Cable XTi-3350 Australia & Europe 2 x DVB-S/S2 2 x DVB-C 4 tuners Yes
Terrestrial XTi-3342 Australia & Europe DVB-T/T2 2 tuners Yes
Terrestrial Pay-TV XTi-3342CI Australia & Europe DVB-T/T2 2 tuners Yes
Cable TV XTi-3452 Australia & Europe DVB-C 2 tuners Yes
Cable Pay-TV XTi-3352CI Australia & Europe DVB-C 2 tuners Yes
Terrestrial Pay-TV XTi-3442 Australia & Europe DVB-T/T2 2 tuners  ?
Cable Pay-TV XTi-3452 Australia & Europe DVB-C 2 tuners  ?
VBox Android TV Gateway XTi-4144 Australia & Europe DVB-T2/C/ISDB-T 4 tuners  ?
VBox Android TV Gateway XTi-4134 Australia & Europe DVB-S/S2 4 tuners  ?
VBox Android TV Gateway XTi-4174 USA ATSC 4 tuners  ?

Installation Instructions

Important.png Note: You need software version 2.50 or later installed on the VBox

Compile or install a version of MythTV with VBox support enabled

Vbox support doesn't require any external dependencies and is enabled by default so if your version of MythTV is current enough you should be able to use the VBox support out of the box. Initial support was added in [a3eb10d07f0] on July 14 2015.

Using mythtv-setup to add a VBox as a recorder

This page is a summary of the configuration and channel scanning process especially for VBox tuner devices. A more extensive description of the configuration and channel scanning process can be found in Channel Scanning.

Capture Card

On the backend machine you want to handle recording from the VBox first stop any mythbackends running on the same machine then run mythtv-setup.

VBox Card Selection
VBox Card Setup
VBox Card Selected
Input Connection
Channel Scan
Channel Scan Results

Click '2. Capture Cards' then '(New capture card)'. In the 'Card type' selection box choose 'V@Box TV Gateway networked tuner'. You will then be presented with a screen similar to the one on the right.

mythtv-setup will search the network using UPnP to find any active VBoxes and interrogate them to find what tuners they have and populate all of them in the Available devices selection box. Choose one of the VBox/tuner combinations and click Finish. If you have a 2 or 4 tuner model you will probably want to add further capture cards for other VBox/tuner combinations.

The Available devices selection box shows the VBox/tuner combinations found by UPnP followed by a "Manually Enter IP Address" choice. Unfortunately configuration via manual IP address input does not work; select a device found by UPnP.

Add Video Sources

You must add a separate Video Source for the VBox tuners although tuners of a similar type i.e. all DVB T/T2 tuners can share a video source. If you have a 4 tuner version you must have separate Video Sources for each tuner type supported. So if you have 2 x DVB-T and 2 x DVB-S2 tuners since the channels available on the different tuners will be different you need to create a Video Source for each tuner type and do a Channel Scan on each so Myth then knows what channels are available on what tuners.

Connect the Input Connections

On the Input Connections screen you attach a tuner to a Video Source. You will be presented with a screen similar to that on the right. Choose MPEGTS for the Input Name (should be the only option). Enter a Display name for this input if you do not like the default value. Please note that the last two characters of the Display name must be unique. Select the Video Source that you want to use for this card/tuner.

Channel Scan

In the Channel Scan page the channel scan options can be selected. The Scan Type option should default to the VBox Channel Import option. This will use the VBox API to download a list of available channels direct from the VBox. Once the list of channels has downloaded the next screen will show the progress of adding/updating the found channels.

Scanning

Select the scan options and start the scan by pressing Scan. The scan will be completed very quick because the scan has already been done by the VBox and this action transfers the already found channel list from the VBox to mythtv-setup

Channel numbers

The channel numbers in mythtv are the same as configured in the VBox. It is therefore a good idea to edit the channel numbers with the web interface of the VBox before doing the scan.


Important.png Note: It is essential that a valid starting channel is set after a channel scan. The default is 0 which is almost always an invalid channel number and causes all sorts of problems for the backend

Multirecord

Since [d4c0f13aede] on February 19 2017 the VBox recorder can record more than one channel using one tuner so long as they are all one the same multiplex. You need to uncheck 'Limit single channel streaming per UPnP device' setting on the Vbox for this to work and firmware >= 2.53 is recommended.

Myth needs to know which channels share a multiplex so a retune of the Vbox recorder in Myth is necessary in order to populate this information into the database.

Each VBox contains a processor (CPU) and it is possible to overload this processor by setting MythTV Max Recordings (mythtv-setup->Input Connections->Interactions between inputs) to the maximum value of 10 (MythTV 0.29 and higher). As a general rule the total number of Max Recordings over all the tuners in a specific VBox should not be greater than 20. The "Schedule as group" option should be unchecked.