XBMC with PVR Support

Revision as of 11:15, 8 December 2012

Latest news: 2012-12-08: Frodo Beta 3 is out by today. If you want to use it, select the LATEST PVR build (as per 2012-12-03) - updates will follow! Frodo Beta 2 was out as per 2012-12-02. We currently still recommend to use this Beta 2 version together with the ARGUS TV PVR Client plugin as per 2012-12-01.

Prologue - Some words about Eden & Frodo

For those of you knowing already, what XMBC is about and for, we'd like to share some words about the upcoming XBMC 12.0 (Frodo), which is as per beginning of December in its After-Beta-2 phase.
Again, the XBMC developers seem to want to make us a Christmas gift - as 2011 with V 11.0 (Eden).

It's always a bit of a challenge to write a Wiki article about latest builds within a development phase, as it is outdated already the day it is published.

Therefore it's not about discussion advantages or disadvantages of Eden, Frodo or even other clients, it shall give a helping hand to those of our ARGUS TV users who want to know roughly what we're talking about, how to install - knowing about hurdles and maybe restrictions.

Warnings: Once moved to Frodo, your database will get updated and thus it will not be backward compatible anymore. Moving back from Frodo to Eden is not covered in this article; you might have to re-setup Eden entirely. Please read the section Frodo: Restrictions that you currently may encounter below before updating. We give no warranty that the following description is valid for all systems or that it will run on your system; Frodo and the ARGUS TV PVR Client are still in Beta stage!

Until Frodo has come to its release, please watch carefully to which version/build of Frodo and PVR Client the text refers. This first permutation of the article refers now to Frodo Beta 2 or later nightlies and PVR build as per 2012-12-01 (or later). Start from reading section XBMC 12.0 Frodo below if you consider installing Frodo instead of Eden.

Recommendation: Nevertheless we come to this recommendation (as per Frodo Beta 2): Early Movers - are probably already with Frodo ;) Users who like technical stuff and already used XBMC - safe to move to Frodo (Beta 2 or a later Nightly after 2012-12-02) Safety-first users and households with wives or children ;) or new users of XBMC - Please stay with Eden for the moment. If you are new to XBMC, consider installing EDEN with PVR functionality first, get this up & running, then move to Frodo. This reduces complexity of the task and helps in identifying and classifying potential setup from PVR issues

XBMC

XBMC is a free and open source media player application developed by the XBMC Foundation, a non-profit technology consortium. XBMC is available for multiple operating-systems and hardware platforms, featuring a 10-foot user interface for use with televisions and remote controls. It allows users to play and view most videos, music, podcasts, and other digital media files from local and network storage media and the internet. (see Wikipedia and XBMC Website for a complete description)

The current stable release is XBMC 11.0 "Eden". The following first sections of this article refer to this version of XBMC.

XBMC 11.0 Eden with PVR Support

Warning: If you want to have PVR support, do not use the official builds from XBMC Website, they currently do not support PVR functionality and it can't be enabled through adding add-ins. Use the prebuild packages' download link in the next section instead.

XBMC itself can not record or stream live TV or handle TV cards in its current stable release, but as XBMC is open source and expandable through plug-ins, a development branch of XBMC emerged and is kept updated closely with all upcoming releases and betas of main XBMC development.

To use XBMC as a front-end for ARGUS TV, you will need to use this branch, called "XBMC with PVR Support". It adds Live TV & Radio streaming and a (for the time being very limited) ARGUS TV Scheduling to XBMC. Through various PVR plug-ins, it can be used with a variety of TV server software. Please note, that the PVR support is in a beta phase, although it is working already very stable. As the time of writing, client-side pause/timeshift of live streams is not yet possible and scheduling a recording is possible only in a very limited way (only one-time recordings so far).

Downloads Complete prebuild packages and versions with PVR support can be found under Prebuild Versions For those who always want to stay on the edge of latest development, the PVR binaries - more often updated - can be found under PVR Binaries

Warning: Current version is XBMC 11.0 Eden, the next version XBMC 12.0 Frodo is in an early Alpha Stage and the use of it can only be advised to experienced users who are willing to accept errors and dysfunction for the time being - if so, please read XBMC 12.0 Frodo below.

Both of the above can freely installed over an existing Eden installation without loss of any configuration. Vice-versa, also the Eden stable version can be installed (back) over the installed PVR (Eden) installation without any harm to move back to the main branch.

For more information about this build and development, please visit the PVR Build section of the XBMC-forum under XBMC PVR-Forum

Configuration & Activation of the PVR

To use the PVR functionalities within XBMC, you have to configure it in two simple steps: activate it and configure the PVR add-on for ARGUS TV properly. If you follow the steps to first configure the PVR add-on and then activate PVR functionality it avoids to quit and re-start XBMC to load all ARGUS TV channels, EPG data etc. But it's of minor importance, just keep in mind to re-start XBMC once, if not.

Configuration of ARGUS TV PVR add-on

Move to the PVR Clients under System / Settings / Add-ons / Installed Add-ons / PVR Clients

• Deactivate all PVR Clients except "ARGUS TV PVR Client" (if you're using XBMC with ARGUS TV only.
  
• Configure the ARGUS TV PVR Client to your needs:
  
• The most important fields to configure
  • ARGUS TV Hostname: set the IP address or server name of the machine on which your ARGUS TV Core Services are running. Keep 127.0.0.1 for a single-seat installation (XBMC and ARGUS TV are running on the same machine).
    You may enter also a dynamic DNS entry, if you registered a dynamic DNS service and set up dynamic DNS and NAT / port forwarding on your router.
  • ARGUS TV webserver port: set to 49943 if you used the default settings when installing ARGUS TV
  • Windows User Account: set the username of the above mentioned machine, that should be used. Usually best choice is the same user, under which ARGUS TV Core is running as well. It doesn't matter, if this user is existing on the machine on which BMC is installed, if it's a different one.
  • Password: enter the password of this user that you just entered to be used on ARGUS TV Core's machine.

• Activate ARGUS TV PVR Client.

Activating PVR functionality

System / Settings Live TV and go to the tab General

• Activate "Enabled"
  

• Adjust other settings to your needs, they're self-explanatory.
  

You will now see the PVR starting up, connecting to ARGUS TV, importing recordings and finally also the EPG Now you will find in the main menu also the entry "Live TV" as shown in the pictures above.

Please keep in mind, that the PVR functionality as a whole is in beta stage, the ARGUS TV PVR client is even named to be in alpha stage. Not all functions are yet supported, but absolute stability is given.

Enjoy the combination of these two marvelous software packages: ARGUS TV & XBMC.

Troubleshooting

Network and connectivity problems may cause XBMC with activated PVR Support (both, Eden & Frodo) to crash. If you encounter this, e.g. if you're connecting to remote shares or PVR server or reside in an unreliable network, temporarily disable the PVR functionality in System / Settings / Live TV

• Thus, most troubles come from network issues:
  • First check please, if ARGUS TV and XBMC both have full access to incoming and outgoing connections in your firewall
  • If you installed / added XBMC already earlier and selected only some ports to be opened, add the ports 49941 through 49943 to be open as well
  • Check if your port just configured in PVR Client is correct
  • If you're using dynamic DNS, check
    • that your dynamic DNS service is properly set up and active (check with your dynDNS service provider)
    • that port forwarding or NAT is set up correctly for ALL new ports (49941 through 49943)

XBMC 12.0 Frodo with PVR Support

Warning: All I want to say (again): Current stable version is XBMC 11.0 Eden, this next version XBMC 12.0 Frodo is in Beta Stage and the use of it can only be advised to experienced users who are willing to accept errors and dysfunction for the time being. We don't know everything, but we made some experience - if you want to avoid some of them, please follow the steps described below.

The good news is, that the PVR functionality has found entry to the "official XBMC Frodo Repository". This means actually for us ARGUS TV users, that the PVR Client Add-on has the basis as others, too. As for now,. ARGUS TV PVR Client is NOT part of the distribution and as such, has to be installed by ourselves. This is not a big thing, and we nevertheless profit out of the fundamental decision of XMBC-Tteam to support PVR functionality.

Download & Installation Instructions

Download & install of Frodo with PVR funtionality - recommended way:

Prerequisites

1. First of all & if you want to have an as smooth installation as possible, please follow those steps - explanation mentioned with the individual steps):
   1. XBMC: Disable "Update library on start-up" (a parallel scan of new videos with the parallel start-up of ARGUS TV may expand the runtime of that from 1-3 up to 15 minutes (even on powerful systems)) → go to System / Settings / Video / Library and deactivate "Update library on startup"
   2. XBMC: Disable Live TV → go to System / Settings / Live TV / General and deactivate "Enabled"
   3. XBMC: Disable (maybe already existing) PVR Client For The Record or ARGUS TV → go to System / Add-ons / Enabled Add-ons / PVR clients, select the existing ARGUS TV or still Fortherecord client and hit "deactivate"
   4. Now exit XBMC and start it up again to be sure the changes have been saved. Exit it again after all initialization has been finished.

Download & Installation

Download ARGUS TV 2.0.1 or later has to be installed. ARGUS TV 2.0 or earlier will not work properly with this description. Get it here Download of XBMC If you want to stay with the public Beta: download Frodo Beta (Beta 2 or later) under XBMC Downloads If you want to stay with nightly builds of XBMC later than Beta 2: download Frodo Nightly from XBMC File Repository - Mirror List. Attention: Frodo (XBMC 12.0) Beta 1 or builds prior to 2012-11-27 are NOT new enough! Download of ARGUS TV PVR Client If you decided above to use a public Beta (2 or later only!) above: download NOT just the latest ARGUS TV PVR Client (zip) file, but a version with a date not later than the build date of the Frodo Beta from XBMC - Windows & Linux PVR Addon Builds - e.g. Frodo Beta 2 is built on December 2nd, 2012. Choose then the ARGUS TV PVR Client as per December 1st, 2012, which is available If you decided to go with the Nightlies, download the latest ARGUS TV PVR Client (zip) file from XBMC - Windows & Linux PVR Addon Builds - also read carefully the release notes that may require a "latest" or "later than" XBMC nightly build!

Installation

1. Install ARGUS TV 2.0.1 or later. Check that ARGUS TV is properly configured.
2. Install the downloaded Frodo (XBMC 12.0) nightly build. Start it and wait until all databases are properly updated.
3. Install ARGUS TV PVR Client: go to System / Setup / Add-ons / Install from zip-file and select the downloaded file. You should shortly get a small message on bottor right, that the PVR Client is activated (which it isn't yet ;) )

FYI: What is a "Nightly" or "Nightly Build"? "Nightlies" are builds that are run automatically during the night. All (ready-to-test) contributions or changes have before been added to the main development branch and will automatically be incorporated. The keyword is "ready to test" here. These changes normally have been tested on on a subsystem or component level and only few as an incorporated part of the whole system. Thus, every user using "Nightlies" have to be prepared, that the system may be unstable, maybe even (worst case) not run at all.

Get it started

To configure & activate the PVR Client respectively the PVR functionality, please follow the steps described above as for XBMC 11.0 Eden under Configuration & Activation of the PVR.

Frodo: Restrictions that you currently may encounter

Of course, we all may expect, that those issues & hurdles will be eliminated in the upcoming builds until release.
Nevertheless they're right now immanent and part of the beta phase. The following list may not be complete and maybe already outdated again.

If you encounter additional issues or find, that some of them have been fixed, please add your experience for other users. This ARGUS TV article or section needs your support. Please help us to create, correct or extend it. You may want to refer to "Contribute to our Wiki".

• Experienced issues with Beta 2 or Nightly & PVR Client as per 2012-12-02:
  • Startup of PVR Client → if you select to exit Frodo again during startup & load of the PVR it may lead to a complete freeze of XBMC and you may have to kill the task / program
  • Sometimes the start-up of the ARGUS TV PVR Client hangs when loading recordings from ARGUS TV core machine. Either you choose not to use PVR functionality in this session or you quit XBMC (will probably mean to kill the process - see next issue) and restart it.
  • Startup time of PVR CLient → when you start XBMC and have the setting enabled to "Update library on start-up" in the video settings, the start of the PVR Client can take very long - we experienced startup times of upto 15 minutes instead of 1-3.
  • Thus decide, if you want to use XBMC Frodo as a live TV front-end or to schedule recordings, then leave the option disabled as described above in the Prerequisites above. If you use XBMC Frodo mainly as a media center for recorded shows, you may leave this active.
• Resolved issues of recent versions (subjective):
  • Beta 2 & PVR Client now speeds up the start & ending of the program, nevertheless, the restrictions above are still valid.
  • Stuttering of live TV after a certain runtime were not experienced anymore
  • PVR Client dosn't start up automatically → seems to be resolved

Differences of PVR functionality between XBMC Frodo and XBMC Eden

Please add your information, your experience and latest news here! This ARGUS TV article or section needs your support. Please help us to create, correct or extend it. You may want to refer to "Contribute to our Wiki".

This section shall reflect only the ARGUS TV PVR-related functionality, differences but also commonalities, enhancements and restrictions.

We must consider, that in the past, most of the ARGUS TV-related functionality is directly linked to the PVR Client plug-in, not to XBMC itself. Nevertheless, XBMC 12.0 (Frodo) since Beta 1 comes with mutual support of PVR Clients and thus will bring new features that (at least indirectly) also affect the ARGUS TV PVR Client plug-in.

Also, although Frodo runs much more smooth than Eden, we may expect far more: currently, Frodo Nightlies are build with the /DEBUG compiler switch, that means, the application still wears a lot of overhead and code that is needed for error analysis & investigation. This probably will lead to a "sudden boost" as soon as we get the XBMC Frodo release. So let's live with that for now...

Some obvious differences in Frodo / Eden behaviour

1. Timeshift: Frodo now supports timeshift (pause & resume) of live TV - one of the directly usable new features. Eden wasn't.
2. Channel switching times: the channel switching times of Frodo are much shorter than with Eden
3. Sound quality: we encounter real HD sound of live TV thanks to the new sound engine of Frodo

Of course, this list is only a few headlines, please refer to below mentioned ARGUS TV thread and especially also to the site and forum of XBMC - please feel free to add points that are important to you, us and all our users.

Further Information

Please read & follow the ARGUS TV Forum http://www.argus-tv.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=60. The "Development Progress" thread covers PVR functionality in detail, especially under Frodo. You will also get latest news concerning PVR functionality there.

Credits

Our credits go to the ARGUS TV-Users Margro, Red_F, Glenn 1990 and many other contributors of the ARGUS TV Forum.