Hauppauge WinTV-soloHD - only some channels found

[BZD 0]

For years I have been using the Terratec Cinergy HTC Stick on Windows 7/8 computer and using DVBViewer Pro without issues, however moving to a new computer with Windows 10 I could not get the Cinergy HTC Stick drivers to work so I acquired the Hauppauge WinTV-soloHD.

 

Unfortunately the WinTV-soloHD / DVBViewer combination is giving me grief. Through the forum I learned that there was a Hauppauge service which I needed top stop running as it blocked DVBViewer from using the WinTV-soloHD, however having solved that I now find that the only a fraction of the TV channels available are found and no radio channels at all(list is included).

 

What to do?

 

I'm located in Denmark and using cable with Yousee as the cable provider. If I run the WinTV V10 software that came with WinTV-soloHD there is no problem accessing all the usual channels, same ones I also had with the Cinergy HTC/DVBViewer combination on my old computer. A list of those channels as they shown with the WinTV is attached. Needless to say, apart from finding all the channels WinTV is a program that is severely lacking.

support.zip

[Adrian_ 0]

What was the service that needed to be stopped?  I'm somehow in similar shoes with a Terratec product that works with it's shipped software (Arcsoft) but finds no channels in DVBViewer.

[BZD 0]

42 minutes ago, Adrian_ said:

What was the service that needed to be stopped?  I'm somehow in similar shoes with a Terratec product that works with it's shipped software (Arcsoft) but finds no channels in DVBViewer.

 

Not sure this will help with a Terratec, but maybe you can find something similar named looking at services running on your machine.

 

The service I stopped is called 'Hauppage TV Server' only as I went to look up the name right now I actually found it to be running again, only with no effect on DVBViewer accessing the hardware. Maybe it is just it running, but that it also had to be activated by the WinTV software for it to be causing the DVBViewer not to connect to the hardware.

 

Also since the 'Hauppage TV Server' was actually running now it means that it is being reactivated ie. set to start automatic since I did set it to manually when I closed the service.

Edited July 5, 2020 by BZD
Added a blank line for ease of reading.

[Adrian_ 0]

Indeed, if the tuner is active in the other software  it will not be accessible in DVBViewer.

[Griga 679]

vor 4 Stunden schrieb BZD:

I now find that the only a fraction of the TV channels available are found and no radio channels at all(list is included).

 

Which transponder list are you using for the channel search?

 

Regarding cable reception, it has to be considered that besides the frequency there are two other important reception parameters: The symbolrate and the modulation. Some devices/drivers are able to detect the modulation automatically by trying one after the other. They don't mind if it is set up wrongly in the application. The only side effect is that channel switching takes longer. Other devices are not able to auto-detect the modulation. If you change to one of them, you may find that channels don't work anymore because the modulation in the channel list is wrong (see DVBViewer Channel Editor for details). Or channel search does not yield results, because the modulation is specified wrongly in the transponder list.

 

For trying different parameters I strongly recommend to use the scanner & transponder list editor TransEdit (see members download area). It may even be able to automatically create a transponder list tailored for your needs, based on information that I found here in the "Anden digital boks" section. I don't understand Danish, but I guess that are the parameters for the home frequency that provides information about all other frequencies in its Network Information Table (NIT).

 

For using it, try the following in TransEdit:

1. Store TransEdit.exe in the DVBViewer program directory (where DVBViewer.exe is).
2. Click New List -> Cable on the left side.
3. Enter the parameters from the YouSee site (the frequency as 450 MHz) on the right side and Click Add
4. Click Update on the left side. This should start a scan - not for channels, but for other frequencies and their parameters in your cable network. TransEdit will also try to read the NIT from other newly found frequencies. However, in cable networks this usually doesn't yield additional results, so you can stop the scan after the 450 MHz are done.
5. If you are lucky, your transponder list will now be populated with all active frequencies in your cable network. Give the list a name on the left side, click Apply and save it. It should be stored in the Transponders subdirectory of the DVBViewer configuration folder.
6. You can also use TransEdit for a channel search. Just click Scan All or Scann Selected, if you only want to try a single frequency. The scan results can be exported to DVBViewer - see TransEdit Manual.

I hope this helps...

 

[BZD 0]

19 hours ago, Griga said:

 

Which transponder list are you using for the channel search?

 

<SNIP>

 

I hope this helps...

 

 

Thank you for getting back to me. I can get TransEdit to find the missing channels and they also work in Preview, but sill no luck in DVBViewer.

 

I have been using the Denmark-Yousee -DVBC transponder list as it came with the latest DVBViewer version. I have attached it here for easy access, it is the one named DVBC_den_YouSee.ini

 

Just to try TransEdit while looking at the Yousee website I made do a scan using the Yousee file as stock, it not only found all the channels including those I have been missing, but testing  using the Preview function they also work fine. So thinking I this was it I saved the channel list and imported it to DVBViewer only to find that the channels doesn't work there. So all good in TransEdit and no good in DVBViewer.

I have attached the channel list that I made using TransEdit, it is the one named Denmark YouSee cable_Channels_TransEdit_Succes.iniDVBC_den_YouSee.ini

 

I also had a good look at the Yousee website btw. impressive you found what you did when not reading Danish. On it I found the following information(I goes with the basic channel package I have):

 

Network-id:	100
Frequency:	450000 kHz
Symbolrate:	6875
Modulation:	64

 

Using the info from the Yousee website and your description I had TransEdit do the Update thing which seemed to work, after which I had transEdit do a channel scan and this then went really quick as it did so using a much narrower search area than using the stock Yousee file. This search then found all the channels again and as before they work with preview, but once imported to the DVBViewer there is again no joy. For the files see the DVB-C_Denmark_Yousee_Custom ones attached.

 

I also tried using the custom transponder file created using transEdit to do a scan with DVBViewer, but doing so it find no channels. It seems DVBViewer is somehow using the hardware differently than TransEdit, my DVBViewer hardware setting can be seen from the image I have attached.

 

Denmark YouSee cable_Channels_TransEdit_Succes.ini DVB-C_Denmark_Yousee_Custom.ini DVB-C_Denmark_Yousee_Custom_Channels.ini

[Griga 679]

vor 2 Stunden schrieb BZD:

It seems DVBViewer is somehow using the hardware differently than TransEdit,

 

Tick "Use internal Network Provider filter". The default is "on". That may be the crucial difference between TransEdit and DVBViewer.

 

[BZD 0]

4 hours ago, Griga said:

 

Tick "Use internal Network Provider filter". The default is "on". That may be the crucial difference between TransEdit and DVBViewer.

 

 

Nope, that wasn't it. It did not change anything, however it made me look and try the other check boxes and I found a magic one 🤩

 

The WinTV-soloHD is listed as two devices, one for DVB-T and one for DVB-C and apparently one needs to uncheck the "Use device" check box on the DVB-T one for the DVB-C scan to find all the channels. I am wondering if perhaps the few channel I could find earlier is actually found as terrestial. I'm glad to now have all my channels, but it was a time consuming journey 😒

Thank you for the assistance.

[Griga 679]

vor 4 Stunden schrieb BZD:

and apparently one needs to uncheck the "Use device" check box on the DVB-T one for the DVB-C scan to find all the channels

 

The point is, the reception type of your DVB-T tuner is wrongly set to DVB-C! I can see the problem now in the hardware.xml from your support.zip. That's why DVBViewer tried to use it for DVB-C, because the first device from the top has the highest priority.

 

It's obviously a misconfiguration. I didn't check it, because I didn't expect that a user would do something like this. That's a lesson for me too! I think we should consider to disable the tuner type selection for physical (hardware) tuners with a fixed tuner type and only allow to change it by tweaking the hardware.xml.

 

[BZD 0]

4 hours ago, Griga said:

 

The point is, the reception type of your DVB-T tuner is wrongly set to DVB-C! I can see the problem now in the hardware.xml from your support.zip. That's why DVBViewer tried to use it for DVB-C, because the first device from the top has the highest priority.

 

It's obviously a misconfiguration. I didn't check it, because I didn't expect that a user would do something like this. That's a lesson for me too! I think we should consider to disable the tuner type selection for physical (hardware) tuners with a fixed tuner type and only allow to change it by tweaking the hardware.xml.

 

 

Either a change in the hardware.xml or a clear indication of the type of signal searched would be good, the later would have told me on the first search something was up. It would also be good if DVBViewer and TransEdit worked in the same way, although had they done in this case I would likely have given up on the Happauge or maybe even on DVBViewer.

 

I think there are a few basic problems that could be addressed while I am not sue of the amount of work required. Here is my thinking:

• DVBViewer could do with an "easy" wizard mode that guides the user through the config process. One that asks the user what sort of connection they have, if they want TV and Radio and then does the search for them. After the search there could be the offer of a troubleshooter if the result was not as desired, maybe even an automatic offer to troubleshoot if no channels was found. I know a little of the technical stuff, but not enough and imagine for someone knowing even less that DVBViewer has one really steep learning curve.
• Same as with the config process an easy mode for when setting up ones channel list, as it is now there is "Channel list", Channel Editor" and "Reception settings/Channel Search" and while I as a long time user get it for a new user it can be somewhat daunting. Maybe there could be a channel wizard that guides the user a bit.

Do not get me wrong. I am a big fan of DVBViewer, the functionality being much better than what I see from the software that comes with the hardware. Only i imagine some potential customers are maybe scared away by the technical aspects, to a degree I think many expect it to be much more plug and play.

[Adrian_ 0]

The main problem with DVBViewer is that some settings do not work without letting you know they don't work. In my case the tuner was selected as DVB-C in the hardware setting (and appeared to accept the setting) , the hardware file (for the Terratec version it's an ini not xml) showed it as being set on DVB-C but it was actually trying to tune on DVB-T because the tuner was not in the hardware database.