Difference between revisions of "User:SlicerDicer"

Revision as of 01:35, 21 April 2006

Contained in this is information on how to get a fully working firewire setup going either with a single set top box or using daisy chain.

I will be moving this over to the firewire page once I get it cleaned up.

Rough Guide enough to get anybody started. Needed tools and what they do below.

advised kernel setup

I would highly advise doing the kernel with the 1394 built in not modules to eliminate issues with modprobe. Kernels are quite easy to build and its never a bad idea to learn how.

• Location of Firewire Support in the Kernel

> device drivers > IEEE 1394 (FireWire) support

  │ │ ---   Subsystem Options                                             │ │
  │ │ [ ]   Excessive debugging output                                    │ │
  │ │ [ ]   OUI Database built-in                                         │ │
  │ │ ---   Build in extra config rom entries for certain functionality   │ │
  │ │ ---     IP-1394 Entry                                               │ │
  │ │ [*]   Export all symbols of ieee1394's API                          │ │
  │ │ ---   Device Drivers                                                │ │
  │ │ ---   Texas Instruments PCILynx requires I2C                        │ │
  │ │ <*>   OHCI-1394 support                                             │ │
  │ │ ---   Protocol Drivers                                              │ │
  │ │ <*>   OHCI-1394 Video support                                       │ │
  │ │ < >   SBP-2 support (Harddisks etc.)                                │ │
  │ │ <*>   Ethernet over 1394                                            │ │
  │ │ <*>   OHCI-DV I/O support                                           │ │
  │ │ <*>   Raw IEEE1394 I/O support                                      │ │
  │ │ <*>   IEC61883-1 Plug support                                       │ │
  │ │ <*>     IEC61883-6 (Audio transmission) support                     │ │

plugctl

Various switches include -n -p and options to use are oMPR, iMPR, oPCR[n]

• Below is my plugreport "I removed some data due to it being bogus"

Host Adapter 0
==============

Node 1 GUID 0x00159afffeccac5f
------------------------------
oMPR n_plugs=1, data_rate=2, bcast_channel=63
oPCR[0] online=1, bcast_connection=0, n_p2p_connections=1
        channel=0, data_rate=2, overhead_id=0, payload=376
iMPR n_plugs=0, data_rate=2

Node 2 GUID 0x00159afffeccbf56
------------------------------
oMPR n_plugs=1, data_rate=2, bcast_channel=63
oPCR[0] online=1, bcast_connection=0, n_p2p_connections=1
        channel=1, data_rate=2, overhead_id=0, payload=376
iMPR n_plugs=0, data_rate=2

As you will notice in the above you have options to set oMPR, oPCR, iMPR

If you wish to modify these values as I have for my current daisy chain you can do so. Before I go further I will explain how each thing is done in my config above that should be more than enough to get you going. As per my settings I was unable to use broadcast or bcast_connection so I was forced to come up with a solution for Point to Point or n_p2p_connections, If you notice they are both set to a value of '1' this gives me a very reliable and stable connection but setting them both to '1' would cause the transmission to overlap and corrupt the video files. This is where the idea of using seperate channels came into play. As node '1' is set to channel '0' node 2 is set to channel '1' this prevents transmission overlap. This means you can run 2 independent boxes by daisy chain. If your running a single box this should not be needed.

As by default your n_p2p_connections will be set to '0' and this causes a problem with all of my dct6200's, this makes it so I am unable to watch livetv with any form of reliablity nor am I able to record. You will want to change these settings with the following commands. They can be issued in your /etc/init.d/ script by creating a new one as I did or you can add it to your current one. These commands cannot be issued by cron as it will cause it to give values that are not correct.

To explain what the switch's do for plugctl, -n will allow you to specify your node and -p will allow you to specify your host adapter. If you are using host adapter 0 then there is no need to use the -p switch.

Onto the commands to enter to the terminal or your /etc/init.d/ scripts. Keep in mind with these you must modify them accordingly if you are using node '0' change to '-n 0' and if you are using host adapter 1 and node 1 change to '-n 1 -p 1' and it should work

> plugctl -n 1 oPCR[0].n_p2p_connections=1

This will allow you to set it so you maintain a stable connection. If you are running a single set top box this is all you will need. If you are doing a daisy chain I cannot stress this hard enough but things are required to be done in a special order or it will not work. To daisy chain the dct6200 just plug the firewire cable into the back of one port and into the computer then the second free firewire port plug from one set top box to the other.

> plugctl -n 1 oPCR[0].channel=0
> plugctl -n 1 oPCR[0].n_p2p_connections=1
> plugctl -n 2 oPCR[0].channel=1
> plugctl -n 2 oPCR[0].n_p2p_connections=1

This should conclude the plugctl configuration and you can chose how you wish to do it, I would highly advise against cron as it lead me to nothing but trouble.

test-mpeg2

This tool is very simple to use and at first glance is never a good idea to assume things are working. As said above with plugctl you can have your n_p2p_connections=0 set and it may work the first 3-5 trys but then it will start to fail. It would be a good idea on your part to test it at least 10 times. I tested it myself 50 times total to verify it was reliable.

If you wish to use test-mpeg2 you can by invoking the command I find it makes it easier to use it with .mpg vs .ts

> test-mpeg2 -r 1 > test.mpg

mythtv-setup

When running mythtv setup you will want to set your capture device to firewire. Once you do this you should notice that you have options you can set. It should be pretty self explaining in regards to this. It seems that the default host adapter settings are 0 and node is set to 2. You will want to modify this to match your plugreport settings. Once modified you should have a working firewire system that should be very reliable.

raw1394 udev

I ran into permissions issues with raw1394 and adding read permissions was just not enough. I had to specify that /dev/raw1394 be owned by mythtv:mythtv. To do this I did a custom udev rule.

Open a terminal and do the following

> nano /etc/udev/rules.d/10-raw.rules

Then enter the following information into the file you are creating.

> KERNEL="raw[0-9]*",     NAME="%k", GROUP="mythtv", MODE="0666" OWNER="mythtv"

closing notes

I hope this will answer any questions you have about using firewire with mythtv. It should be pretty simple as this is a collection of my 3 days of working on mine. If you should run into any issues you can ask me in #mythtv-users about the firewire but I am quite confident if you follow this you should have a fully functonal firewire/mythtv setup. I am very prone to PEBKAC errors myself so double check everything you have done if you have issues. It could be a very simple typo that occured :)