[mythtvnz] Haupauge Nova-TD500

[Johan Schuld]

Hi All,

I'm pretty convinced I've reached the end of my efforts to make this card
work, so just thought I'd plunk all my findings here and see if there are
others that were in the same position.

I'm located in New Zealand (h264 encoding on HD Terrestrial TV) and ever
since I have got hold of this card, it's giving me problems with reception.
As we have always been in a rental with questional aerials, I have always
blamed that and kept using DVB-S freeview. In our last place I did actually
go through the trouble of installing a new masthead amp, which helped, but
still signal quality issues. We have recently purchased a home, and now I'm
committed to make it all work and get a good setup.

Basically what I'm seeing is corrupt signals (artifacts). When I "re-wind"
and play the same piece of recording again it's the same which indicates to
me it's a receiving problem, not playback.

So I've been searching the net and forums and I have found other people
with the same issue, most not being able to fix it and simply going for
another card. Apparently the card needs a really strong signal. Also, the
internal low noise amplifier has been reported to be a problem (mine was
off). Chaning it to "on" (options dvb_usb_dib0700 force_lna_activation=1)
did not appear to make any difference.

I have borrowed a separate freeview set top box, which gets excellent
picture. Also Prime (an analog channel from the same transmitter) is
crystal clear. So my feeling is that I have exhausted all things I can do,
apart from installing a higher gain antenna and possible a mast head amp.
Although I'm not convinced as the stb works fine.

One thing I don't understand yet is the "Diversity" mode, which seems to
connect the 2 antenna connectors together so only 1 antenna cable is needed
(i always had 2 connected). No Idea how to control that in Linux, and what
the correct setting is anyway.

There are also reports that this card just does not do h264 with high
bitrate properly and not to be used in NZ, and that there are versions that
are faulty or slightly different hardware that makes it not work in all
situations.

So put all these variables together and I'm thinking... not worth the
effort anymore. Has anyone had similar issues with this card? And managed
to fix it?

So thinking of switching to a HVR-2200, or maybe another one that is
recommended. I have an HVR-4400 isntalled too, which I want to use for some
satellite channels.

Oh.. running on Opensuse 12.1

Cheers
Johan (Auckanld, Te Atatu Peninsula Area)
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