Re: TV Card setup (repost) - baskitcaise, help please! :-)

From: JPB (jpb_at_email.pt)
Date: 10/02/04 

Date: Sat, 02 Oct 2004 11:29:26 +0930

baskitcaise wrote:
> JPB adjusted his/her tin foil beanie and asbestos underwear to write:
>
>>I've looked at all sort sources and have several TV apps installed by
>>now. All of these work fine - i.e start up etc, except they cannot
>>tune into any channels.
>>
>>I recall baskitcaise has stated in a previous post that he got a
>>similar card to work after some trial and error. Well, any pointers
>>from those quarters will be appreciated. All I really want is the
>>standard analog TV output; the rest (radio, video capture and so on)
>>does not really matter.
>>
>>I am running SuSE 9.1 Pro with the standard kernel.
>
>
> Hi JPB,
>
> Think my power supply will be ok for the rest of the day now, so lets
> see if I can help.

Thanks for that! :-)

> First off, do you see any error messages in your /var/log/messages log
> that look like they are anything to do with the card or /dev/video?

Nothing indicating errors that I can see. This below relates to startup
of the machine yesterday and is relevant to the matter being discussed,
I believe:

Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: agpgart: Found an AGP 2.0 compliant device
at 0000:00:00.0.
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: agpgart: Putting AGP V2 device at
0000:00:00.0 into 4x mode
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: agpgart: Putting AGP V2 device at
0000:01:00.0 into 4x mode
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: Linux video capture interface: v1.00
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7130/34: v4l2 driver version 0.2.9 loaded
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: found at 0000:00:0b.0, rev: 240,
irq: 11, latency: 64, mmio: 0xcfffb800
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: subsystem: 1043:4845, board:
Proteus Pro [philips reference design] [card=1,insmod option]
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: board init: gpio is 0
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: gpio: mode=0x0000000
in=0x0000000 out=0x0000000 [pre-init]
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: dsp access wait timeout [bit=WRR]
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: dsp access wait timeout [bit=WRR]
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: vmnet1: no IPv6 routers present
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: i2c eeprom 00: 43 10 45 48 54 20
1c 00 43 43 a9 1c 55 d2 b2 92
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: i2c eeprom 10: 00 ff e2 0f ff 20
ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: i2c eeprom 20: 01 40 01 02 03 01
01 04 08 ff 00 89 ff ff ff ff
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: i2c eeprom 30: ff ff ff ff ff ff
ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: registered device video0 [v4l2]
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: registered device vbi0
Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: saa7133[0]: registered device radio0

Actually speaking of this, you may be kind enough to enlighen me of
something else here: Is there a way to limit the maximum size of the
/var/log/messages and /var/log/warn files? These two, when I checked
them this morning, were together taking up over 1.4Gb of hard drive
space! -- And most of what's in them goes like this:

"Oct 2 10:23:35 amd kernel: SFW2-INext-ACC-TCP IN=eth1 OUT=
MAC=00:40:f4:29:04:c4:00:90:1a:40:bd:ac:08:00 SRC=193.217.226.190
DST=203.122.244.179 LEN=48 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x20 TTL=103 ID=2755 DF
PROTO=TCP SPT=13673 DPT=6600 WINDOW=65535 RES=0x00 SYN URGP=0 OPT
(0204058C01010402)"

Can't see that I need to have gigabytes of this gobbledygook on my hard
drive...I reckon a hundred meg or so would be plenty sufficient! :-)

> One of the problems I found was that if you tried to use Yast to
> configure any tv card it would delete the /dev/video0 node, this was a
> node that had the /dev/video symlink pointing to it.

 From what I can see, the /dev/video0 node exists. Also the terminal
output produced when I start xawtv hardware scan seems to indicate this
part of the equation is in order (see output reproduced below). I have
added the entry in modprobe.conf as you have advised in your post (see
further below).

"This is xawtv-3.94, running on Linux/i686 (2.6.4-54.5-default)
looking for available devices
port 105-105 [ -xvport 105 ]
     type : Xvideo, video overlay
     name : video4linux

port 106-106
     type : Xvideo, image scaler
     name : NV17 Video Overlay

port 107-138
     type : Xvideo, image scaler
     name : NV05 Video Blitter

port 139-139 [ -xvport 139 ]
     type : Xvideo, video overlay
     name : NVIDIA Video Interface Port

/dev/video0: OK [ -device /dev/video0 ]
     type : v4l2
     name : Proteus Pro [philips reference
     flags: overlay capture tuner"

> Another thing to look for is that you have the right "tuner" option in
> your modprobe.conf file, you can find out which one you need by reading
> the saa7134 source doc in the kernel source:-
>
> file:/usr/src/linux-2.6.5-7.108/Documentation/video4linux/CARDLIST.saa7134
>
> ( that is if you are using the .108 version of the kernel )

You've lost me a little on this one; please let's elaborate on
that...The file in question has the following entry for my card:

" 15 -> ASUS TV-FM 7134
[PCI_VENDOR_ID_ASUSTEK:4842,PCI_VENDOR_ID_ASUSTEK:4830]"

How does this relate to your suggestion below? I can't see anything
corresponding to your entry - i.e. where is the card number (I presume
this would be "15" for my card?) and where are the options relevant to
the settings? That is, I understand the tuner option, but what about the
others?

> However even using the card No and tuner from that list did not work for
> me so I eventually found that these settings in modprobe.conf worked
> for my card ( cheap ALDI Medion/Tevion Xpert saa7134 card ):-

Did you actually use a "trial and error" approach?

Excuse yet another silly question, then: What is the command one can use
to activate any change in these settings without having to reboot the
computer? ("Where do you want to go today?" maybe? :-))

> <<snip>>
>
> #YaST2 configured TV card
> # 2_DJ.XzkttnXJLD4:Medion 7134
> alias char-major-81-0 saa7134
> alias char-major-81-1 off
> alias char-major-81-2 off
> alias char-major-81-3 off
> options saa7134 card=1 gbuffers=8 gpio_tracking=1 tuner=1
>
> <<pins>>
>
> If those do not work for you then try the other "card" No`s and
> different tuners.

I'm happy to try that, as simply using your paragraph above in my
modprobe.conf did not produce the desired result - i.e. no stations are
found on scan still.

Just explain in a slow and simple way ;-) how to use the above
information from kernel source docs in modprobe.conf, please. If it is
simply a matter of trial and error, well, then - I'm no stranger to
that! :-)

> Ps. not quite awake yet so cannot remember all the steps I went through
> at the moment, if you want more info then just holler after I have had
> more coffee :)

No worries; I feel a bit like that too. The buildup to the wet season
has started here in Darwin, so it is rather humid and I might need a bit
of a walk along the beach, as well as a coffee I've just finished, to
wake up! :-)

Cheers,

John

Relevant Pages

  • Re: TV Card setup (repost) - baskitcaise, help please! :-)
    ... >> I've looked at all sort sources and have several TV apps installed by ... >> similar card to work after some trial and error. ... Oct 1 18:16:16 amd kernel: agpgart: Putting AGP V2 device at ...
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  • Re: TV Card setup (repost) - baskitcaise, help please! :-)
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