Help again - WAS Re: [ILUG] cheap linux compatible tv tuner cards

[Gavin McCullagh]

Hi,

On Tue, 12 Sep 2006, Pangurban wrote:

> Has anyone got the card from Maplin - Mercury ( www.kobian.com ->
> http://www.mercury-pc.com/product-detail.php?link=p-addcards&subtitle=Add-On%20Cards&productid=97)
> card to work.
> 
> I have been trying.  It is on Dapper Drake and with Compiz - and My
> various attempts have only gotten TvTime to produce a screen with a few
> slanted bars of "interference" - with no menus.

Judging by dmesg/lspci linux has correctly detected the card and set up the
driver.  

You may need to tune the channels in.  I'd recommend using xawtv's scantv
or tvtime's tvtime-scanner to do this.  Obviously you need an aeriel hooked
up while doing that.

I generally used xawtv to test the card was working, but tvtime should work
much the same.  If you try it with xawtv, pay particular attention to the
devices you point it at (ie make sure they exist, are the correct ones and
you have rw permission to them):
  
       -c, -device device
	      set video4linux device (default is /dev/video0).  This option
              also disables Xvideo support.
              Resource: xawtv.device (string).
       -C, -dspdev device
              set audio device (default is /dev/dsp).
              Resource: xawtv.dspdev (string).
       -vbidev device
              set vbi device (default is /dev/vbi).
              Resource: xawtv.vbidev (string).

When I use scantv, I use the command 

	scantv -C /dev/vbi0 >.xawtv

then am prompted for a country (Ireland) and tv system (PAL) at which point
it goes into scanning, giving the output below while writing channels to
.xawtv.  
	
	scanning channel list ireland...
	A0   ( 45.75 MHz): no station
	A1   ( 48.00 MHz): no station
	A2   ( 53.75 MHz): no station
	A3   ( 56.00 MHz): no station
	A4   ( 61.75 MHz): no station
	A5   ( 64.00 MHz): no station
	A6   (175.25 MHz): no station
	A7   (176.00 MHz): no station
	A8   (183.25 MHz): ???
	A9   (184.00 MHz): no station
	A10  (191.25 MHz): no station
	A11  (192.00 MHz): no station
	A12  (199.25 MHz): no station
	A13  (200.00 MHz): no station
	A14  (207.25 MHz): Network 2
	A15  (208.00 MHz): ???
	A16  (215.25 MHz): no station
	A17  (216.00 MHz): no station
	A18  (224.00 MHz): no station
	A19  (232.00 MHz): no station
	A20  (248.00 MHz): no station
	A21  (256.00 MHz): no station
	A22  (264.00 MHz): no station
	A23  (272.00 MHz): no station
	A24  (280.00 MHz): no station

It's a reasonably good test to see if it's able to tune channels.  If you
start xawtv and right/left click on the screen there are options to browse
channels.

Gavin