Really Weird HDHomeRun / WMC issue

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McGary

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Really Weird HDHomeRun / WMC issue

#1

Post by McGary » Sat Jun 18, 2022 12:57 am

I posted this thread under Windows Media Center, but perhaps someone here may have some idea about what could possibly be going on. viewtopic.php?f=5&t=13944&p=148269#p148269

Read the first post in the thread for a summary of this really strange problem.
Bottom line: WMC is working fine; the HDHomeRun Primes are working fine; but MANY channels can't be played or recorded, although they were working perfectly until early last year.

McGary

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#2

Post by McGary » Sat Jun 18, 2022 1:40 am

The thread I referenced notes this, but just to be crystal clear, this is the observable behavior when you select a channel in Media Center:

When you "click" on the program you want to play, a tuner light illuminates on the HDHomeRun Prime (so clearly it's tuning a channel). If you look at the status for that tuner in Explorer, it will show that one of the tuners is tuned to the correct channel for what you just selected. If it's a channel that's working, then it properly plays in WMC. But for MANY channels, nothing displays, and the message I noted in the first post of the thread I referenced is displayed after a fairly long delay (10 seconds or so). The message is:

Service is unavailable
There is currently no TV signal detected for this channel. The channel may be temporarily off the air. Try again later.

The thread I referenced notes the many things I've tried to resolve this -- everything from restoring an image from when the system worked perfectly; completely reinstalling W7 & WMC on a new disk on a different computer (resulting in the same behavior); and many other things that I either thought of or were suggested by others.

I even tried replacing the router just in case there was something strange going on in the router [Used a trusty old Cisco E2000 as the replacement].

NOTHING works -- and I can't think of ANYTHING that could explain this really weird behavior.

unclebun

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#3

Post by unclebun » Sat Jun 18, 2022 3:24 pm

This may be totally out of the blue. I don't use HDHomeRun tuners; I have a Ceton. But when I get that message, the only thing that fixes it is restarting the computer. Then it will work.

McGary

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#4

Post by McGary » Sun Jun 19, 2022 7:41 pm

System has been restarted dozens of times, and I've tried an amazing number of things to resolve this. It is a REALLY strange issue. For a variety of reasons ...

=> First, it's only SOME channels that don't work -- and many others do. It is NOT a CC issue .. there's no correlation between copy control status and whether the channels work or don't work.

=> Clearly the HDHomerun tuners are correctly tuning to the requested channels. Regardless of whether a channel will display/record in WMC, the HDHomerun tunes to the requested channel when it's selected. A tuner light comes on on the HDHomerun and logging into the HDHomerun and looking at the tuner status info shows it's tuned to the correct channel.

=> It REALLY blows my mind that restoring an image from two years ago, taken after we had originally switched everything to EPG123 and everything was working perfectly, STILL has this issue !! That pretty much confirms it's not an issue with the OS, but at the same time the HDHomeruns are clearly working well; and you can tune ANY channel with the HDHomerun app in Windows without issue.

=> My friend has had numerous discussions with Silicon Dust and his local cable provider to see if anyone has an idea about what's going on, but nobody really has a clue. This issue started about 15 months ago -- I tried to help him remotely via TeamViewer for several days, but couldn't resolve it. We're on an extended road trip this month, so I scheduled a visit with him for a couple days, thinking I could probably resolve it if I was actually there; but no joy. I can't think of anything that would cause this, but it's clearly happening.

=> I even brought an extra computer with me, with a clean load of Windows 7 Pro; and configured WMC for his setup on it -- and STILL exhibits the same problem. This seems to prove the issue is external -- but NOTHING in his setup has changed; and the HDHomeruns are clearly working. I even tried using a different router, in case there was some really weird issue being caused by the router his cable company provided. NOTHING helps -- but there HAS to be some solution.

I'm no longer there, but can always connect via TeamViewer or talk my friend through changes that can't be done remotely. if anyone has seen this issue and found a solution I'd really appreciate your input.

Space

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#5

Post by Space » Mon Jun 20, 2022 2:48 am

Did you check the codec being used like I suggested in the other thread?

stuartm

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#6

Post by stuartm » Mon Jun 20, 2022 6:12 am

It might be a codec problem, Checking the codec info via 411-info is a good data point to grab. As well as resolution of the stream, etc. Also when I suggested in your other thread asking in the Silicon Dust forum. I meant the totally seperate (non green button) support forum that Silicon Dust maintains. If you have interacted with SD have they had him turn on remote diagnostics and recreate the problem so they can see what their tuner is providing?.

McGary

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#7

Post by McGary » Sun Jul 03, 2022 11:57 pm

He's spent a LOT of time talking with Silicon Dust in the past year, and they have no idea what's going on. As I noted, the tuners are working just fine -- you can watch anything you want with the HDHomeRun software -- but Media Center simply doesn't think there's a signal on some of the channels. I'm home now (1500 miles away from the issue), and we're essentially given up on this. He's spent a lot of time with both Silicon Dust and his local provider (who has swapped cable cards; run diagnostics; etc.), but the really strange issue persists. Not a giant deal -- he simply watches those things he can't record either live or via streaming after the fact. But it's really weird.

boii5

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#8

Post by boii5 » Wed Nov 23, 2022 11:04 pm

This sounds similar to an issue I have but it's with over-the-air channels. If I play HDHomeRun VIEW and WMC Live TV simultaneously (side-by-side windows), the Live TV picture improves. If I play get all tuners on a channel (by recording shows) the picture vastly improves. As each tuner goes offline (because WMC stops recording) the picture on the remaining tuners degrades. But as long as all four tuners (4 in WMC or 3 WMC + 1 VIEW) the picture is near perfect... but this workaround not so much.

Note 1: VIEW and Live TV have a delay between them. Using the network card's Configure > Advanced settings, I disabled Rx & Tx Flow Control to remove that delay.

Note 2: VIEW uses HTTP to stream the TV signal while WMC Live TV uses RTP to do the same. VIEW displays a near-perfect picture even with remaining tuners off.

Note 3: My HDHR Connect Quattro got a firmware upgrade in between the time it worked perfectly and the time the condition described above began.

I don't know if this helps. Maybe someone here figures it out.

boii5

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#9

Post by boii5 » Sun Nov 27, 2022 2:51 pm

I'm so tired of this.

boii5

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#10

Post by boii5 » Fri Jan 13, 2023 6:36 am

RESOLUTION. If anyone has the aforementioned issue, check to see if your Ethernet goes through an Uninterrupted Power Supply unit's Ethernet pass-through. Apparently, this disrupts WMC's Live TV signal.

CZ Eddie

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#11

Post by CZ Eddie » Sat Aug 05, 2023 6:50 pm

Just to add to this thread since it's one of the first which pop up on when keyword searching "prime" + "no tv signal" + "there is currently no tv signal detected for this channel" ...

I put my computer & Prime on their own cheap $5 router that wasn't connected to the Internet.
Then, I re-added my Prime to WMC since I guess it got removed due to a new IP address.
And about 5% of my usual channels (I didn't count) suddenly would not work.
To name a few, ESPN, USA, History, TruTV.

The resolution was to re-connect this setup to the Internet.
Then, the broken channels immediately started playing again.

I disconnected the Internet from the router and so far, the problem channels are still playing.
I have rebooted and they're still playing.

CZ Eddie

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#12

Post by CZ Eddie » Sat Aug 05, 2023 6:52 pm

Btw, there is apparently a way to connect the Prime directly to the computer without needing a router.
You can specify a static IP on the Prime. I haven't tried it yet though.
Someone posted this as the way to do it----->

quote: Static IP assignmentA static IP address can be configured using the following command (the quotes are required as shown):Format: hdhomerun_config <old ip> set /sys/ipaddr "<new ip> <subnet> <gateway>"Example: hdhomerun_config 169.254.34.98 set /sys/ipaddr "10.10.20.43 255.255.255.0 10.10.20.1"

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