Prof 7301, 7500 and 8000 Tuners
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I ordered mine on Nov 17 and got it Dec 4, a little over 2 weeks. I was concerned at the 2 week mark and sent an e-mail, I received a reply but it was through a translator, very hard to understand. Anyway they did deliver but it took a while.
I placed the order December 7th and received it today. I opted for DHL expedited shipping...costed about 11 bucks more but I wanted to see where it was. You should have got an email from Prof with a login and password when the order was processed.
I went the cheapo route, 10 day shipping, it was a few days over. I didn't get any info after ordering, no login or password although there was reference to that being done.
Not sure, but I dug around awhile back.
http://www.turbosight.com
TBS Technologies|Q-Box|DVB-S2|DVB-S|PCI-E
QBox DVB
Prof Tuners Group DVB-S DVB-S2 6200 7300 1100 7500 8000 7301
MatchBoxPro Pictures
and probably more.
All have almost identical products. The matchbox driver works with my Qbox DVB-S USB. ;-)
Regardless what their websites claim, all above products are designed and manufactured by TBS China under different labels, some with different chipsets or somewhat customized drivers depending on the product label. Contribution of the label owners vary a bit.
I've been playing around with the Prof today and found I have no DiSEqC control with DVBViewer. Tuner is fast in tuning but initial tests show the TT 3200 is beating it by a bit. Detuning the dish to the point of errors shows the Prof with errors on all PIDS while the TT hangs on with a scant few errors. I don't have any way of attenuating the signal with any control so it could be that the TT can handle noise better than the Prof. But to be able to use it as the main tuner in the computer it must be able to control a DiSEqC switch.
The latest beta of DVBViewer sends DiSEqC commands through my Prof units. I wasn't able to get the release version to work, if that's what you're using.
I'm using the beta as well, 4.3.1.45 Beta, DiSeQc works fine. What OS are you using?, Windows XP Pro here.
Edit: Just tried Diseqc with Dvbviewer 4.2.1.0 and it works ok. Have you tried TransEdit?
Edit: Just tried Diseqc with Dvbviewer 4.2.1.0 and it works ok. Have you tried TransEdit?
Transedit doesn't switch either. I can switch back to the TT and Transedit works fine. I tested 3 different switches (Spaun. EMP-C and a 10 way uncommitted). I did a fresh install of 4.2.1.0 today...OS is XP Home with SP3. I tried the Prof beta driver and that didn't work either. I'll test it more tomorrow.
***UPDATE*** DiSEqC works fine now in DVBViewer but still a no go in Transedit.
***UPDATE*** DiSEqC works fine now in DVBViewer but still a no go in Transedit.
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Your mention of the Spaun switch made me remember the Prof would not reliably switch mine either. I changed it out for a cheapo no name Diseqc switch and it works fine now. I had forgotton about that. I put the Spaun SAR 411F back in this afternoon and its the same behaviour, switches occasionally but not all the time and once in a while it re-boots the computer, the Spaun might be taking a bit more power than the Prof is delivering, it seems to work fine with my other cards.
Re: TransEdit, are you using the latest 3.51.0? That one has been fixed so the Prof 7301 is recognized as vendor.0=13 in Transedit.ini. I'm also using Prof 7301 beta drivers 1.1.2.0
Re: TransEdit, are you using the latest 3.51.0? That one has been fixed so the Prof 7301 is recognized as vendor.0=13 in Transedit.ini. I'm also using Prof 7301 beta drivers 1.1.2.0
I'm getting old and forgetful, at least that's what my wife tells me. I had changed the transedit.ini to .0=13, but I forgot to change the version back to 3.5.1.0...now it works! ...at least what I can test as we got 14 inches of snow today and some of the dishes are full of snow.
well its a simple question ? should i buy a BLSA or 3 prof cards and concentrate on the same drivers as this thread. im a year out of driver development but i would be willing to work on something useful. and i have a big hardon image of 35 of my BIG dishes all blindscanning s2 static. i need enthusiasm if anyone asks.
crackt out,.
crackt out,.
If you want and can do something useful, don't follow the crowd. Buy the latest model of DVBWorld PCI-e or USB sat tuner, based on Montage DVB-S2 tuner and demod that also supports Blind Scan, and try add this capability to DVBWorld Windows drivers. Ask DVBWorld by PM, if they can provide you with required docs to access the chipset's capabilities. They were quite happy to support Linux driver development for their product line.
Simple questions sometimes have complicated answers. It does depend on what you want: a spectrum analyzer or a blindscanning receiver. They are completely different animals.
Spectrum analyzers can be useful for blindscanning to a point, but their utility more covers system design, tuning, optimization and troubleshooting. I would have a hard time living without a bench SA. It is far more important than any blindscanning receiver to me. Does the BLSA do the job? I don't know but a number of people have been very happy with them. However it is rather dated technology and one cannot expect it to be a drop in substitute for a real SA.
The Prof cards need to be viewed as what they can do today. They are the highest performing PC tuners I have tested, and can lock signals under difficult conditions where the others can't. The Prof tuners have the potential for hardware blindscanning, but for the moment this has not been demonstrated. The shortest path I see for Prof blindscanning is on Linux. When I started this project some weeks back, the Linux drivers were barely usable. I took some time out to work on other projects, and there has been good progress made in the interim with basic driver functionality. I'm now taking serious steps forward, but don't expect any imminent announcements from me.
The DVB World devices may also be good candidates for blindscanning as zamar points out. I waited and waited for them to become available here, but that only happened very recently. For me personally, the train left the station a couple of months ago. I have been investing time figuring out how the STV0903 demod works and until something demonstrably better comes along, I plan to stay for the ride.
Actually, Montage DVB-S2 chipset has better published specs than the one above of STMicro. STV0903 has however well hidden DSS Legacy signal decoding capability similar to older Twinhan 1020A, which is not activated in Prof drivers. I guess, the only way to find if something better already came along in terms of signal locking is for someone well equipped (in a broader term) to test the new DVBWord devices rigorously. 
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I'm not aware of any published specs of either chipset that say anything meaningful about signal performance. For example, perhaps BER vs. CNR for a variety of SRs. Or at least maybe minimum acquisition of lock CNR vs. SR. Instead we get almost no specs at all, and what we do get is window dressing of no consequence. STB receiver spec sheets do exactly the same thing. This is a standard technique in the world of electronics that has been a pet peeve of mine for nearly 40 years - find some technical claim that makes the herds of sheep believe they have the better product.
I guess, the only way to find if something better already came along in terms of signal locking is for someone well equipped (in a broader term) to test the new DVBWord rigorously.
Precisely. I did a number of head-to-head competitions between the previous generation DVB World and TechnoTrend products vs. the new Prof tuners to see if there was any improvement. It was substantial and verifiable. If one had just looked at the spec sheets, it would have been easy to conclude there was no point of even doing the tests.
Without useful specs, we are reduced to third party testing. Unfortunately in the world of FTA, people tend to lack the resources and or the knowledge (or both) to perform fair tests. I have a lot of test equipment and a long history of professional signal processing/RF work, but I am painfully aware that I could do a lot better with more resources. For my part I try to directly and simultaneously compare products under the same, solid signal conditions. But I see a lot of anecdotal advice offered on forums and even professionally that makes me cringe because it is rarely backed by scientific evidence.
Talking about particular specs you mentioned, the result also depends in part on how artfully a driver developer exploited known to him fine tuning programming options of a selected chipset, and where co-operation with the chipset manufacturer went to at that point of discovery of chipset weaknesses and improvement opportunities.
Frankly as a consumer I should not care how well the driver developer and chip manufacturer cooperate or not, or whether they extract the best possible results from a hardware and software design. If specs like I suggested were published, all companies involved in a particular product would be incentivized to do their best and work together, and we could choose the best of the fruit.
But this will never happen in the current climate, and many products are rushed to market with serious design flaws and drivers that are never finished before the next generations are released. The best I can hope for is people who have the equipment and skills to directly compare the options will publicly differentiate the wizards from the charlatans. I do my part as best as I can, but I will not play Don Quixote.
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