MeTV down?

[Dee_Ann]

My Ku setup on 125W does the same thing. I don't get it either.

Are you using an Openbox S9 by chance?

No, I have a pc theater setup with a tuner card. It's a hauppage brand with S2 band.
The Openbox S9 I had here briefly belongs to my folks and it's now at their house.

I do have a Coolsat 6000 though, I suppose I should hook it up and see if during these outages, if the coolsat can tune MeTV when the pc can not. If it does, then I guess that would indicate a problem with the pc tuner. But if there were to be the case, I would have no idea what to do about it.

 

[billyboy_1]

You know, that is weird because for instance, the other day we had some really hard core rain, big storms dumped a LOT of water. ALL of the ku satellites were completely dead, zero signal on every single one of them. Nada. But on C band, 87 was coming in like a champ. MeTV, ThisTV, everything. It never skipped a beat.

I just can't figure out why, in the middle of the night with a clear sky, no rain, no storms, (I checked weather radar) that JUST MeTV would quit working for 2-3 hours.
One second it's perfect, the next, it's totally gone, zero signal. ThisTV was coming in just fine, nary a single glitch. I moved the dish back and forth because sometimes about 8:40am it gets real flaky for 15-20 minutes and if I bump the dish a little it helps a lot. Last night, ~nothing~....

Makes no sense to me at all..

Maybe one of Svengoolies rubber chickens stopped up your coax...

 

[Dee_Ann]

Well. I just had an interesting experience.

I was watching the untouchables on metv and at midnight i jumped over to tuff and rtv to see what they were running these days. Nothing worth my time.

So I went back to metv and boom! Zero signal. Metv was gone and just a minute before it was working fine.

Huh??

So I figured that the signal from rtv had sent my pc tuner into brain freeze somehow. So I changed to a dozen or so other assorted channels on various satellites then went back to metv. Boom! Signal back. BUT, the picture was all jerky like robots and unwatchable.

I ended up rebooting the pc and that cleared it up.

There is something about tuff tv and rtv that my pc tuner freaks out about.

First off, the sound usually is off by several seconds and I have to use the video skip ahead button to bump it so the sound will sync up. And lately it's even worse than it used to be, now when I change to one of the channels the sound is just not there until I force it to sync with the skip ahead button.

My folks openbox s9 doesn't have these sound problems. I haven't checked to see of the coolsat does that buy I don't think it does.

Luken has such a horrible picture quality, the sound gives me trouble 100% of the time and now I strongly suspect it's messing up my pc tuner where it kills metv.

Come to think of it, the last time I had major loss of metv was last Saturday right after I checked rtv/tuff to see what sort of silly B movies they had playing. Not finding anything of value I went back to metv to watch Svenghoolie and found the signal was 100% gone.

The program changes they made, stink.
And if this really is what's messing up my tuner, I'm going to say goodbye to Luken stuff. There is almost zero on there anymore with the exception of possible Saturday night stuff. And I can live without those. But metv has far too much GOOD stuff going to ignore. Metv is my main #1 staple now.

I'm going to do some deliberate tests later to confirm my suspicions.

This is another reason I want a set top tuner. The pc is just not all that good at this stuff.

But really Mr. Luken, what's up???

Posted from my JB'd iPhone 3GS using the SatelliteGuys app

 

[Dee_Ann]

Pardon my typos. Darn autocorrect on my iPhone and my fingernails don't play well together. And the SG app doesn't allow you to edit posts.

Posted from my JB'd iPhone 3GS using the SatelliteGuys app

 

[Mr Tony]

youre right....RTV picture does look like hell

On my commercial receiver (7150) there is an option to see the resolution.
Some channels are 704x480
I know Shaw Direct is 528x480
RTV/Tuff TV is 352x480

translation..its bandwidth starved

 

[Dee_Ann]

youre right....RTV picture does look like hell

On my commercial receiver (7150) there is an option to see the resolution.
Some channels are 704x480
I know Shaw Direct is 528x480
RTV/Tuff TV is 352x480

translation..its bandwidth starved

Even the S2 channels for them look bad. They look like they are just scaling the ku signal up to standard size. So the bad picture is amplified.

Posted from my JB'd iPhone 3GS using the SatelliteGuys app

 

[Larry1]

So I went back to metv and boom! Zero signal. Metv was gone and just a minute before it was working fine.

Huh??

So I figured that the signal from rtv had sent my pc tuner into brain freeze somehow. So I changed to a dozen or so other assorted channels on various satellites then went back to metv. Boom! Signal back. BUT, the picture was all jerky like robots and unwatchable.

I ended up rebooting the pc and that cleared it up.

There is something about tuff tv and rtv that my pc tuner freaks out about.

If you are still using MyTheatre, after changing channels, I have found that I have to move the timeshift buffer to the far right or the picture is jerky like you describe. The Timeshift buffer is at the bottom of the window. You may try adjusting the settings of MeTV up or down by 1 or 2 (Frequency, symbol rate etc) as I have had tunner cards that would lock if changing from a higher frequency but not if changing from a lower frequency and adjusting the setting helped. Also One tuner card I have will not lock if the frequency is off by 1. The jerky picture may also be due to a codec not liking the changing from one parameter to another. The codecs can be a little difficult to get working, it a reboot solves the problem, it is probably easier than trying new codecs. (i.e create new graph... main menu, settings, graphs)
Even more bad news for RTV is yesterdays showing of Movin' On was the first repeat. They are missing a lot of episodes.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Ok, I can confirm with absolute 100% certainty that the simple act of tuning in RTV on AMC9 ~KILLS~ MeTV (C-band)..

I was watching MeTV. All day, perfect reception. I changed back and forth to several other channels and MeTV, no problems. Working fine.

Then I tune to RTV for 30 seconds and see some stupid show named "Intelligence".. BLAH! So I tune back to MeTV and guess what? ZERO SIGNAL.

MeTV was completely vacant. No signal at all.

I tune to MeTV2 (not MeToo) and still nothing at all.

I tune to ThisTV and all is well. I tune back to MeTV, still nothing.

I jump over to one of the PBS channels then over to RT on 97 and around to a few others.

I checked back on MeTV and still nothing..

So I killed the theater app and restarted it, changed channels a few times then went back to MeTV and there it was, back working again!!!

What the heck is going on with this? Beyond all doubt, simply changing to RTV or Tuff for 30 seconds freaks my pc tuner card out to where it can not or will not tune in MeTV.
No other channel causes this problem! And also, viewing RTV / Tuff doesn't cause any problems tuning in any other channels.

Something really freaky is going on here!

At least now I know why sometimes I lose MeTV when I mindlessly surf the channels looking for things. As long as I stay of the RTV / Tuff channels, all is well.

 

[Magic Static]

I remember a couple years a go I had an issue with RTV/Tuff not coming in. It was a corruppted channel database file in MyTheatre. Took a reinstall and rescan of all channels to fix it. I usually save my channel file and drop it in a new install so I don't have to rescan.(takes forever). If you are experienced in installing and setting up MyTheatre, give that a try. Make sure you have the latest version v4.0.130

 

[Tron]

Sounds like it could be a switch-sticking issue, either that or software bug (not switching back properly)...

 

[trinidex]

Does rebooting the PC fix the issue?

What about disconnecting the LNB feed from the card - presumably this will kill the power to the farm, effectively resetting the setup.

 

[Dee_Ann]

I remember a couple years a go I had an issue with RTV/Tuff not coming in. It was a corruppted channel database file in MyTheatre. Took a reinstall and rescan of all channels to fix it. I usually save my channel file and drop it in a new install so I don't have to rescan.(takes forever). If you are experienced in installing and setting up MyTheatre, give that a try. Make sure you have the latest version v4.0.130

I know pretty much nothing about my theater short of the very basics. I'm not sure what version is installed either.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Sounds like it could be a switch-sticking issue, either that or software bug (not switching back properly)...

Well, this does not happen at all with any other satellites or channels except when going back and forth between RTV (or Tuff) and MeTV.
I can change channels back and forth to any other channels and MeTV and there is no problem at all.

Something about those two Luken channels is freaking out my tuner card or the pc.

And 1000% of the time, when I change to a Luken channel the audio is messed up and I have to force it to sync up by pressing the fast forward button, every single time. Either the pc, the tuner card or the theater app (I have no way to know which) can not lock and sync the video and audio signals on ONLY those two Luken channels.

My folks Openbox S9 has no problems at all with audio sync on the Luken channels. Even the Luken S2 channels on 87 are flakey. It's just RTV or Tuff. Nothing else does this.

That considered, I would bet that the tuner is having a stroke trying to deal with the flaky signal and goes off into La-La-Land..

 

[Dee_Ann]

I hooked up the coolsat in the middle between the dishes and the pc. When I turn the coolsat on the pc loses the signal so you can not have both on at the same time. I did a blindscan of AMC 9 and the numbers it found match the numbers in the pc.

However, I have found in many, many, many instances, that the info I find online to enter into the editor is off by several points.

I am starting to wonder, could that be because my dish(es) aren't aligned properly? Would that cause me to have different numbers than the websites list?

Here (attached) for instance is what my coolsat found for RTV and Tuff on a blind scan.

In the theater app on the pc, those channels have the same numbers as the coolsat found on a blindscan.

I don't know if the coolsat will play the sound right on RTV/Tuff because I only have the video connected, I don't have the sound wires connected as I do not use the coolsat for anything other than a testing tool for figuring out stuff. I guess I should hook the sound up too huh?

 

[Bongu]

The different numbers are probably due to the local oscillator frequency of your lnb or lnbf. Nothing to really worry about. Your problems sound like a software corruption or a failing piece of hardware, such as your tuner card. I would think the software is the most likely candidate. Do you have what you need to restore or reload the MyTheatre application and database?

Sent from my Timex Sinclair using SatelliteGuys

 

[stanleyjohn]

Hmmm!! I may of had a Dee problem last night!I watch hogans heroes on MeTv then switched on RTV on 4080 for awhile then before bed switched back to MeTv and found it not there!! Unless MeTV went off after 10 last night! I may of seen the same problem that dee has been seeing.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Hmmm!! I may of had a Dee problem last night!I watch hogans heroes on MeTv then switched on RTV on 4080 for awhile then before bed switched back to MeTv and found it not there!! Unless MeTV went off after 10 last night! I may of seen the same problem that dee has been seeing.

MeTV was not off last night. I've been watching it for days now and as long as I don't tune to RTV, no problem. Tune to RTV then back to MeTV? BOOM! Channel gone!

No other channel causes this to happen except for Luken channels, IE RTV or TUFF..