2017-03-07, 08:42
(2017-03-07, 06:01)rpcameron Wrote: I'm chiming in here after the head's up from nickr. My troubles with HDHR tuners and DHCP aren't really relevant to the OP's concern (the Dual's lack GbE, and the DHCP issues seem to be tied to a gigabit connection), however I have learned a few things that might help.
For many months I successfully ran a situation similar to what the OP is acking about: HDHR devices with self-assigned APIPA addresses (169.254.0.0/16). If the computer you are using has 2 NICs, you can set one to have a static IP of 169.254.1.1/16 (actually, anything in the 169.254.0.0/16 subnet should work). Then connect this NIC to a switch that is shared with your HDHR devices. When the HDHR devices cannot contact a DHCP server, they will self-assign themselves APIPA addresses in the 169.254.0.0/16 subnet, allowing you to discover and interact with them on the NIC that you gave the static IP to.
Then, keep the other NIC (ethernet or wifi, doesn't particularly matter) to get its connection for your main network, however that may be.
There are a few caveats with this situation, though. Firstly, if your devices cannot talk to the internet (which will be the case in this situation) you cannot rely upon SiliconDust's servers to give you guide data. The reason for this is that part of the boot process for HDHR tuners is to talk to SD's servers to obtain a "DeviceAuth" token. SD's software (HDHomeRun View, including the Kodi video addon version) using this token to authenticate whether a device/request for guide data is authorized; no token, no data, and therefore no guide. (I believe the pvr.hdhomerun addon, which integrates the HDHR devices into Kodi's native PVR interface, also uses this token and method to obtain guide data.) Short answer, if you run your HDHRs without access to the internet, you cannot use SiliconDust's guide data.
If you use a third-party PVR this is not a problem. I have successfully done this with both Tvheadend and MythTV. Since you are running Windows you would probably have to look at NextPVR or MediaPortal. I don't run Windows on any of my machines, so I can't really help you with that part.
The second part of your question may be a problem. Because of the way APIPA works, devices with self-assigned addresses cannot communicate outside of their subnet. Streaming from HDHR devices is generally a 3-step process: first tune the HDHR to the desired channel or frequency/program; second, the receiving device (such as your computer) opens a port and starts listening for a connection from the HDHR; and finally, the HDHR starts streaming its feed to the address and port requested in the previous step. Since the HDHR cannot see outside its subnet with a self-assigned APIPA address, it cannot stream to computers on your regular LAN.
If you are interested in maintaining your HDHR mini-network in this way, go for it. Just know that you are going to need some software on the computer that interfaces with the HDHRs to handle the streaming to the rest of your network. From my personal experience, MythTV and Tvheadend have worked great with this. With Windows, your mileage may vary.
Hope this helps some.
Thanks, I'll mull over your comments later tonight when I have my head clear. I'm not limited to a Windows solution, in fact it was just a bit easier to use my Windows 10 laptop initially but I had planned on using these devices with Kodi and possibly Tvheadend in the longer term. FWIW, the LAN isn't gigabit capable. Whilst the actual router is, there is a 10/100 switch in the system
