WinTV-HVR-2200

The built-in ARGUS TV recorder for digital TV
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Reg
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Joined: Wed Mar 17, 2010 11:04 pm

WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by Reg » Sun Nov 25, 2012 8:32 am

Not sure what forum I should be posting in, but is ArgusTV meant to work well with an WinTV-HVR-2200 card?

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andrewNZ
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Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by andrewNZ » Sun Nov 25, 2012 8:54 am

Welcome Reg. I've moved your post for you and tweaked it. :)

I have a Hauppauge 2200 card, it is working 100%

If you are having trouble, we need a little more info:
What are you trying to receive with it?
What problems are you having?
You can fix it, or you can fix it until it's broken. I usually choose the latter.

Server: WHS 2011. Hauppauge HVR 2200. Avermedia A835. ArgusTV Server. EPG Collector.
Clients: Win7 64bit. MediaPortal. ArgusTV Client. StreamedMP.

Reg
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Joined: Wed Mar 17, 2010 11:04 pm

Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by Reg » Sun Nov 25, 2012 10:56 am

andrewNZ wrote:Welcome Reg. I've moved your post for you and tweaked it. :)

I have a Hauppauge 2200 card, it is working 100%

If you are having trouble, we need a little more info:
What are you trying to receive with it?
What problems are you having?
Hi thanks for that, I think my problems are now multiple, so am just trying to eliminate some of the possible causes for very jittery playback and pixiliation problems. Also use a Nova-T 500 card that is less jittery on playback than the 2200. Recorder is Argus 2.01 with MediaPortal 1.2.3 as front end Was using Alpha 1.3 but went back as thought that was maybe the cause, but problems still exit. Was just wondering if the fact that 2200 is actually hybrid that is causing more problems. Main problem with playback is with TVNZ's TV ONE. Don'ty need any analog at all as Christchurch will be full digital next April, I just want digital HD to record and playback well.

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andrewNZ
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Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by andrewNZ » Sun Nov 25, 2012 11:38 am

I don't think there are any issues with the card being hybrid. It's a very popular card for NZ.

Stutter and pixelation could be several things. The prime suspects are signal quality or codec issues. It could also be CPU/GPU/HDD.

I'm going to ask a lot of questions so we can get a good idea of what might be going on.

So some questions about the problems.
  • • Are the glitches always in the same place in the file? So if there is a glitch, and you go back to play that section again do you get the same glitch in the same place.
    • If you use VLC to view a stream and/or a recording, how does it look?
    • Is the problem only with HD programs?
And some questions about your setup.
  • • What GFX card are you running?
    • What codecs are you using for Video, AAC & AC3?
    • What are you recording to and where? Is it an internal hdd on the same machine, or something funky.
    • Are you using a single seat setup or something else?
You can fix it, or you can fix it until it's broken. I usually choose the latter.

Server: WHS 2011. Hauppauge HVR 2200. Avermedia A835. ArgusTV Server. EPG Collector.
Clients: Win7 64bit. MediaPortal. ArgusTV Client. StreamedMP.

Reg
Posts: 25
Joined: Wed Mar 17, 2010 11:04 pm

Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by Reg » Sun Nov 25, 2012 1:09 pm

OK I will answer as best I can, gets kinda complex :-)

Yes it was a Kiwi that reccomended the 2200 a few years back as an additional card to my Nova when I wanted another card, but I have always got a tiny bit of pixillation with it and not on the Nova. Pixilation is quite bad now. In MP I used to have it configured as hybrid, but cant seem to find any settings to do so in Argus. If I dont want analog does that mean I just ignore the fact it is in fact a hybrid card or do I have to configure something special?

The glitches are mostly in the same place, its not just wee glitches, often the sound keeps going and picture eventually locks up altogether, sometimes skipping 15 secs back and foward brings it right for a while but not always.

Playback in VLC is pretty well impossible now with anything recorded or with live TV in Argus using the 2200 and although better with the Nova its still nowhere near as good as it should be.

YES the main problems are with recorded HD programs especially TVNZ News and NZ has got talent etc. So bad I have to watch live on TV and not Media Portal or else on demand via the www. I notice that almost anything I record on the new Choice channel is fine (mainly I record their British gardening programs which could be SD I don't really know.)

My living room PC for playback is a dell 3.2ghz dual core with a Saphire Radeon HD 5450 1GB gfx with Argus client and MP client. (I have tweaked so many settings on it now I have no idea what defaults are LOL) Have LAV codecs selected for all playback at present, tried many others still with crap results. At one stage LAV worked like a charm.

A second playback PC in spare room is a HP core 2 duo with 3gb RAM and onboard GFX. Was working fine at one stage, but playback is now crap too, it has similar sort of setup ir Argus client and MP front end.

All recording is on a separate IBM Thinkcentre used as server / Recorder. It is hyperthreaded PC (bit like a dual core I think) with 1gb ram. It has internal 500GB WD hard drive. It has a 256MB Nvidea GTX card that was playing HD content fine, but server doest have any front end at moment.

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andrewNZ
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Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by andrewNZ » Sun Nov 25, 2012 10:46 pm

It seems to me you have signal issues. You may have issues with your Graphics card also, but we'll worry about that later.

You have two Tuner cards, so I assume you use a splitter. What happens if you remove the splitter and feed only the 2200? You'll need to disable the other card in the ARGUS TV Recorder Console.
Splitters degrade signal. Televisions are extremely tolerant of bad signal, TV tuners are not.
Test it using VLC for now and we'll work on MP later. Also make sure you are using a wired network, wifi isn't up to the task.


ARGUS TV only does Digital (not an problem for you). You can use Analog if you use MP TV Server to manage the card, ARGUS TV can act as the middleman and still manage the TV Server. You'll need to do that if you want FM, but last I read, FM on the 2200 didn't work with MP anyway.

Working out what is HD and what isn't can be tricky. In MP you can press Shift+1 to bring up debugging info, it tells you what codecs are being used, how many dropped frames and lots more.
Choice, Prime and the +1 channels are SD channels, a lot of the rest switch between HD and SD.

Some more questions I've thought of. :D
Are you using one of the experimental TS readers?
Are you using a wired network?
You can fix it, or you can fix it until it's broken. I usually choose the latter.

Server: WHS 2011. Hauppauge HVR 2200. Avermedia A835. ArgusTV Server. EPG Collector.
Clients: Win7 64bit. MediaPortal. ArgusTV Client. StreamedMP.

Reg
Posts: 25
Joined: Wed Mar 17, 2010 11:04 pm

Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by Reg » Mon Nov 26, 2012 11:51 am

Removing the splitter doesnt make any difference as I have a new aerial and its now pointing straight at the transmitter, I think the wind must have shiften it a bit so I have tightened bolts and this has improved signal, but I see my Nover T is only working on one tuner again, have had that problem on and off for years, but with the 2200 being dual also plus all the different mux's I can still record 7 or so channels at once LOL so that is way more than enough.

Graphics cards should be good on two computers at least, not sure about the onbord in the HP computer.

After installing Argus client on server computer VLC played back recorded TV great.

All my desktops are connected with ethernet.

Never heard of a TS reader, so assume I are not using one LOL.

Will test sever out a bit now and later look at Media Portal.

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andrewNZ
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Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by andrewNZ » Mon Nov 26, 2012 11:43 pm

If you can playback perfectly on the server through VLC then ARGUS TV and your Tuner probably isn't the issue :)

You're definitely using a TsReader, just not an experimental one :D It's what MediaPortal uses to decode the TS files and play them. The original TsReader is notoriously picky.
Have a look at the MediaPortal thread here. I've had good results reducing stutter with the latest 63b.
TsReader.ax is in Program Files\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\. Rename or copy the existing one so you can go back to it, then copy the new one in.

The other thing I'd suggest trying is unticking "Prefer RTSP" in the MediaPortal plugin config. It might help it might not.

Let us know if you find anything interesting, or have any questions.
You can fix it, or you can fix it until it's broken. I usually choose the latter.

Server: WHS 2011. Hauppauge HVR 2200. Avermedia A835. ArgusTV Server. EPG Collector.
Clients: Win7 64bit. MediaPortal. ArgusTV Client. StreamedMP.

Reg
Posts: 25
Joined: Wed Mar 17, 2010 11:04 pm

Re: WinTV-HVR-2200

Post by Reg » Tue Nov 27, 2012 12:03 am

Yes now that I have fixed the aerial problem and reinstalled MP client and Argus on my server it is working there great and in MP too. It also plays back fine now in MP in my living room. The final test of course will come later today when I get to record something I know is definitely HD and not SD.

I have already unticked "Prefer RTSP" in the MediaPortal plugin config on all clients. I learned that trick a couple of years back :-)

My current remaining problem is that in my spare room on my HP core2 duo I have two monitors connected and if I extend desktop to both the Aero peek wont work which is giving me a video / audio delay / stutter. It works fine if either monitor is disabled. (Which aint any use as I like to watch tv out corner of my eye on second monitor while browsing net etc.

I will look into TsReader.ax at later stage if problems persist on spare room computer.

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