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Will Windows 7 Media Center support DVB-C in Europe?
Will Windows 7 Media Center support DVB-C in Europe?
- At the moment this is the only thing that is missing in this fantastic feature. Thanks for answer.
- Changed TypeMark L. FergusonMVP, ModeratorWednesday, February 25, 2009 4:08 PM
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- It is not a matter of the OS supporting this. The TV Tuner Card must support it. There are several available that does. I believe Terratec has a Card that supports DVB-T, DVB-S and DVB-C all in the same Card.
I have Terratec Cinergy C PCI HD TVtuner. In media center it is recognised, but none TV channel can be found. I read somewhere that at the moment media center doesn't support DVB-C, that's why i'm asking that...
- Same here, also the Terratec Cinergy C with CI Slot with alphacrypt card and smartcard. Mediacenter recognizes de tuner card, downloads regional information about provider, gives 3 digital options and 2 analog but when scanning (which takes ages!) no channels are found.
When i run the terratec home cinema software and scan all frequencies it can find the channels and i can view them only the home cinema software on windows 7 is not stable and stops working a lot of times.
Then I tried MediaPortal (the freeware product) and it found all the channels in less then 10 minutes, another 5 minutes before i found how to view the scrambled channels but then all was working..
so if anyone has more information regarding dvb-c and mediacenter 7 then.. please let us know..
regards
Jack - i'm also using mediaportal now. It finds all programs from my provider and the program is getting more stable every time it is released.
- Same here.
2 Terratec Cinergy PCI are found as tuners, but no channels are found. - Same here, tried to get this card to work both in Vista and in Windows 7, no luck.
- Same here, KNC ONE DVB-C, recognized, download channel lists and so on but no channels found.
I read somewhere that it is just a problem of the channel list. Only US channel lists for DVB-C are available and supported. So the problem is not that big... it's just a small service missing in this awesome media center :-(
If only this list could be added manually... but no...
Hope there are some more hundreds of tuner card users posting here, perhaps we'll get a reaction :-) - After you search for channels w7 says "0 channels found."
But if you go to "Kanäle bearbeiten / Edit Channel" there should be about 100-300 channels.
So W7 finds all tv stations that are on (european) channels matching the frequency of a CATV-channel.
Is there no way to change the frequency of digital channels in W7 MediaCenter? - Well, I swiched back to my old FireDtv (www.digital-everywhere.com) and connected it to a Firewire PCI card i got from a friend of mine and now the TV Experience is really great with Mediacenter 7. Switching Channels is fast and all channels are found quickly (when you adapt the frequency list a little for your provider).
I can really advice to switch to the Firetv/floppydtv cards. You can use the CAM Modules from the terratec card in the Floppydtv so that part of your investment is not gone..
They had 2 versions of the floppydtv, one that fits in a 3.5 inch slot and one that can be used in a pci/pci-e slot.
If you have questions let me know..
regards
Jack - And what about the new "Common Interface Plus" (CI+) standard for HDTV?
Here in The Netherlands the largest cable provider (Ziggo) will start selling CI+ based CAM's for CI+ compatible TV sets at the end of July 2009. They claim to be the first in Europe. Furthermore they state that they leave support for PC's to hardware manufacturers and Microsoft. So I really hope Windows 7 will (perhaps not before SP1?) provide support for CI+ HDTV.
L8r, Henk - You may not like it if it would be supported. CI+ will result in losing the ability to record content on your hard drive as your provider will be able to block or timebomb your recordings (i.e. only able to watch your recording 3 weeks or other predefined length of time).
The reason for that is controlling copyright issues by the content provider. Althought I understand the concept and the attempt to avoid piracy but this 'feature' is again blocking key features for common users.
-= Maarten =-
Software Engineer * MVP-Visual Developer-VSTO - If anyone ever finds a way to add DVB-C channels to MediaCenter, please let everyone know.
I do understand the consequences of implementing CI+. But at the moment cable providers here do not support any CI slot adapters at all. If it works you’re lucky if it doesn’t too bad!
As I understand it with CI+ you may record (or time shift) for your own purposes and as long as the recording stays on the same system (i.e. a TV set with hard disk or a Media Centre) you will be able to view the recorded material. It is encrypted for that system, so you can not copy it for someone else or to websites like YouTube.
- It is (in not so many words) supported by Ziggo (Dutch provider) and the reason for that is that right now there are thousands of CI users in existing hardware (Both TVs and HTPCs) that would be cut off when this is dropped. With CI+ each program or show can be blocked inidividually or added a 'timebomb' (only to be viewed for a limited time). So it could well be that your fav show didn't make it on your recording device no matter if it is stored on the recording device itself ...
The only way to overcome limitations like this is to collectively boycot products like this. Providers need to see that they can earn a lot more money by providing rights free distribution at low cost instead of annoying your real customers with all sorts of DRM limitations.
Once the first subscription video service will be available I will be the first to pay and buy a subscription. My only requirement will be that it's DRM free and providing up to date materials.
-= Maarten =-
Software Engineer * MVP-Visual Developer-VSTO I've KNC ONE DVB-C and same problem with this card.
Scan find nothing but I can remember directly after installation of OS I've see one ZDF channel only.
Then I've check the ID for this channel, before I start searching for channels, and see ID was 2.28006
So now I try to put this in channel list but the problem is that you can put 3 char before and after the point only. Like xxx.xxxSo my proposal is to find the configuration file and change them by hand. If anybody/MS Staff knows this file please give us the information.
- Isn't there anybody who knows how to change the frequencies of the digital channels??
Isn't there anybody who knows how to change the frequencies of the digital channels??
I'm also stuck at this point. As far as I can guess the channel frequencies are used for ClearQAM, and thats not in use in europe.
So if anyone have any idea of how to add the DVB-C channels to MCE it would be very nice.
Testing DVBLink from DVBLogic at the moment, but stuck here on some memory-issues.
Using DVBViewer for showing at the moment, but that program doesnt show my analogue channels.
MCE is showing my DVB-T channels very fine
Thorvald- Hi,
After I heard from Technisat, that my Skystar 2 PCI (not Skystar HD2) will not work with Windows 7 Media Center, I bought a KNC One Cable Star +. After several trials, I found a way to get some channels but no real channel list ....
1. You have to search for channels under Signal ... Windows MCE will say no channels found ...
2. Go to the setting where you can change the channels and thick each channel you see in the list ...
The problem is there are not all channels and you will not have a EPG :-(
Is that a bug in W7 MCE or is that coming from the driver of the DVB-C card? Pls. answer me soon that I can send back my card. So I will look to get a Hauppauge HVR-4000 there I know it is working well with W7 MCE ... onliest problem there it is a satelite card ...
Edit:
In the meantime I have contacted the support of KNC One and they told me it is a problem of the Windows 7 Media Center. It supports right now only the US Channels.
If anybody from MS is reading the message ... Will there be an patch in the future for the Media Center to support DVB-C and also EPG in DVB-C or not? If yes when do you think it is finished?
Thanks,
Carsten
Hi,
Still a "no go" on Terratec Cinergy C PCI HD tuner card, as reported in the top >long time ago<
Kobo3, you asked MS a question. Actually I think it is strange that Microsoft is so quit. A small hint like "yes we do expect" could be enough to keep a lot of people wait for the update. But with the silence they force people to find alternatives and I guess it is much harder to get people back to the MCE again.
If only MediaPortal was supporting Win7, I would stay there, but unfortunately it does not run stable on my Win7. But it did find all my DVB-C channels, fast and easy. On a drop down box I selected the country (Denmark) and the provider (YouSee) and quickly it found all the channels.
Earlier in this thread somebody asked if it is possible to add a channel list manually. Please see the link below, maybe some of you have the knowledge and guts to try the experiment, and see if it is possible with DVB-C also.
http://forums.techarena.in/mediacenter/1197400.htm
Let's all hope that Microsoft on day will respond, until then I would be grateful if anybody could tell me if the "perfect" Media Center software is out there ready for windows 7 and the Terratec Cinergy C PCI HD tuner card.
Thanks,
Peter- Hi,
For those that have problems using DVB-C in Windows 7 (or Vista for that matter), try to see if DVBViewer works on your system.
If you can get DVBViewer to show the channels, get DVBLink to send the channels to Mediacenter. I've used it on Win7 for months (since RC1) and it's very stable, effective and fast.
Basically the software can get any channel that displays correctly in DVBViewer to show in Mediacenter. You can choose which channels are passed through, which channel number they will get in Mediacenter, and to which guide listing they should be mapped. It also has some more advanced features should you wish more possibilities.- Edited bySelcal Thursday, November 12, 2009 11:45 AMMistyped software name
- DVBLogic have released yesterday DVBLink TVSource, based on their own sat/cable/terrestrial engine. It does not require anymore external application (like DVBViewer) to run.I am using it since beta to get my satellite channels into MediaCenter with SkyStar HD2 card.I have also seen on their forums that quite a number of people are using it to watch cable TV in MediaCenter.From my own experience it is easy to setup and quite reliable. Will be buying it soon.
- To fully understand it, let's recap a bit. In the text below I'm talking about the situation in Europe, as I'm not well versed in the whole US television situation.Originally, MCE only had support for analog signals, either from antenna or analog cable installations.Then, in Windows Media Center 2005 (the XP version) roll-up 2, support for DVB-T was added - I believe pressure came mostly from the UK market where Freeview (a non-encrypted free DVB-T service) was launched. In other countries, the DVB-T offerings often carry encrypted signals. There is no official support for encryption in MCE, so the drivers of the card had to sort support for a CI-slot out by themselves. Several cards appeared on the market that could do this. The behaviour of MCE is a bit weird though when it comes to encrypted channels - it will not report finding them during a channel scan, but if you go to the config page where you can add/remove channels, you will see them listed as deactivated. Simply activating them will work. The DVB-T card should use some proprietary software to decrypt each channel as you select it for watching or recording.Of course, people wanted to use DVB-C and DVB-S(2) cards on MCE as well. Without any official support, the drivers of these cards had to be clever and present themselves to MCE as DVB-T cards. That's easy enough, but the drivers also have to translate frequencies. MCE will scan the typical DVB-T frequencies. The driver has to translate these frequencies into values that are meaningful for cable or satellite. The popular Digital Everywhere tuners (now sadly unavailable) work this way. There's a table in the registry, listing the DVB-T frequency and the target frequency (or transponder, polarisation etc. combination for satellite) that you want this particular frequency translated to. That works fine. Of course, the whole encryption thing also needs to be active.In Vista, the situation continued unchanged - no support for anything but unencrypted DVB-T. Talk about progress! The release of the TV Pack changed this, but this was done so late in the game that Windows 7 was already around the corner.In Windows 7, there's official support for DVB-T and DVB-S(2). The latter even supports DiSeqC, so you can use a dish with up to 4 LNB's to receive four satellites at once. I do believe encryption is still unsupported so the manufacturers still need to provide proprietary solutions for that. The support for DVB-C is still missing. A bit weird, with all the other stuff in place supporting that standard would be trivial. But it's not there so you still need the old "pretend to be DVB-T" trick. On my machines, the Digital Everywhere DVB-C tuners work fine that way, HDTV and all - they're also carrying AlphaCrypt CAMs to decode the encrypted signals. Windows 7 supports my 4-LNB satellite dish just fine.It should be noted that apps like DVBViewer support all forms of DVB cards with CI-slots. I always have that software installed to check whether the cards are working properly. You can even see the "pretend" drivers in action, as my DVB-C tuners report themselves as DVB-T. It's easy to get confused...If you have problems with DVB-C in MCE, be sure to check the following:- Do you have MCE-aware drivers installed? As you can see, some trickery needs to be performed.- Do you have software installed to handle encrypted channels if necessary?- If you have the right software installed, is the frequency translation table properly configured? Can you alter the frequencies?- Does the frequency translation table list the correct symbol rate and QAM value? If these are incorrect you won't find anything.- If MCE still reports finding no channels, have you checked the guide/channel configuration page for encrypted channels that have been found?- Does your cable provider encrypt all channels? If yes, do you have the right CAM/smart card combination?I hope this helps. Of course, the suggestion made by Florisel is good too. However, you will need one DVBViewer installation for every virtual tuner in MCE.
- Today I've read an article at www.firedtv.nl that there is a new method of receiving cable tv in mediacenter with HD channels which seems to work great (according to their test) and it is the anysee E30C Plus. I did not test it myself yet but plannign to order 1.
Regards
Jack
