[docwra]

Are there any cases about right now that can utilise this already? I so want to try it out, but this is my only concern!

I can confirm the standard raspberry pi starter pack clear case does not fit. Its just too big with the new tuner hat. I'm sure someone will make one pretty quick though.

[noggin]

My TV uHAT arrived today.  Installation in stock Raspbian on a Pi 3B+ was a breeze. It happily streams three HD H.264 1080i25 streams simultaneously from the UK PSB3/BBCB HD mux over cabled ethernet to different clients. I haven't tried to stream all 5 HD channels on that mux yet - but will try tomorrow.

Swapping the uSD card for a relatively recent Milhouse LibreElec install and installing TV Headend from the LibreElec Addons Service section - again it all 'just works'.  The Pi 3B+ works fine - as expected - as a combined TV Headend back-end and Kodi + TV Headend PVR Client front-end.

Very neat solution.  Impressed.  We just need a neat case solution - either using the supplied adaptor or an SMA->Belling flying cable?

[noggin]

Have also now tested with a Pi Zero.  

First I tired running a full Raspbian Pixel desktop with the same image I tested on my Pi 3B+.  With my Chromecast PSU+OTG Ethernet adaptor combo (a neat solution for Pi Zeros that combines power and network connectivity) I was able to stream 3 Freeview HD services simultaneously - just as with the Pi 3B+.  Looking at 'top' - it reported 30-40% CPU utilisation doing this.  I wasn't making any recordings, and without a USB/Ethernet hub solution you would need to make recordings to a uSD card in the Zero I guess (and I don't know who hard we can push it) - but it's a very neat solution.  I suspect you'd be better off with a lightweight Raspbian install without bothering with a desktop to minimise any other drains on CPU or bandwidth.

Now - contrary to Pi Foundation advice - I'm trying LibreElec with TV Headend Front and Backends on the same Zero

It's a bit sluggish - but in video quality terms BBC One HD looks OK with no dropped frames, but deinterlacing looks to be maxed out at MMAL Bob on 1080i25 content even when MMAL Advanced is selected judging by the quality of on-screen text on news output - though I may b wrong.

[tjay260476]

Now - contrary to Pi Foundation advice - I'm trying LibreElec with TV Headend Front and Backends on the same Zero :Smile:

Living dangerously then!


Seriously though, it’s incredible now what we have as ‘HTPCs’ than what we did have way back. My first, a decade ago was well over £600 and was limited to one room. Amazing that just for 10% of the price (hard drive not withstanding) you have the same features and hardware taking up the same surface area as a credit card!

It’s not just kudos to the Pi Foundation, it’s to the FOSS community in general too. This is definitely on my Christmas present list now! (For 10 year old me... I know 32 years too late!)

[noggin]

Now - contrary to Pi Foundation advice - I'm trying LibreElec with TV Headend Front and Backends on the same Zero :Smile:

Living dangerously then!


Seriously though, it’s incredible now what we have as ‘HTPCs’ than what we did have way back. My first, a decade ago was well over £600 and was limited to one room. Amazing that just for 10% of the price (hard drive not withstanding) you have the same features and hardware taking up the same surface area as a credit card!

It’s not just kudos to the Pi Foundation, it’s to the FOSS community in general too. This is definitely on my Christmas present list now! (For 10 year old me... I know 32 years too late!)  

 Yes - was thinking just the same. In the early 00s I built a DVB-T Athlon based HTPC with Radeon video card outputting 1024x576i25 interlaced via a VGA->SCART custom cable with custom video modes in Powerstrip.  

Now I have a Pi 3B+ and TV uHAT receiving 1080i HD, deinterlacing it in good quality, and outputting it with 5.1 audio. For a lot less than I paid for individual components in the HTPC 15 years ago...

The Pi Zero + TV uHAT combo is incredibly neat, and the added bulk to the Pi 3B+ is negligible. I do hope someone designs a neat case (ideally with a flying SMA to Belling-Lee RF connector rather than using the short adaptor)

[noggin]

Interesting. The Sony CXD2880 DVB-T/T2 tuner used on the Raspberry Pi TV uHAT appears to have a Linux driver written by Sony themselves.  There are various driver updates from at least as far back as April 2017, with reasonably regular updates to the driver after that.  They even mention testing it on a Raspberry Pi 3

I don't see many references to this chip being used elsewhere either. I wonder if this is a Pi Foundation/Sony development?

https://lwn.net/Articles/720054/

https://lkml.org/lkml/2018/4/26/45

Perusing some of the postings from the Sony team, it appears the chip can do PID filtering too, to allow for low bandwidth SPI bus compatibility, but the Pi looks to not need to use this.

[docwra]

After a fair bit of testing, this works really well once I setup a static IP address using SSH to my raspberry3b+.

I do find channel switching a little slow compared to my old NUC but once the video starts its perfect.

Has anyone been able to get BBC 1 HD, TWO HD, ITV HD and Channel 4 HD EPG guides working? It seems to work out of the box for the other SD channels but I still have no EPG for the main UK HD Channels.

[noggin]

After a fair bit of testing, this works really well once I setup a static IP address using SSH to my raspberry3b+.

I do find channel switching a little slow compared to my old NUC but once the video starts its perfect.

Has anyone been able to get BBC 1 HD, TWO HD, ITV HD and Channel 4 HD EPG guides working? It seems to work out of the box for the other SD channels but I still have no EPG for the main UK HD Channels.

 You need to enable the "Over-the-air UK : Freeview" grabber module in the EPG Grabber Modules config in the TV Headend web interface. By default it only installs the DVB EIT grabber - which only works for the SD channels (which use an open EPG), but not for the HD channels (that use a Freeview HD specific, proprietary, EPG)

Configuration->Channels/EPG->EPG Grabber Modules

Click on "Over-the-air UK:Freeview" (which is probably marked red), then in the right hand panel tick to enable it, and click save top left. The mark next to it should have turned green.

If you want accurate recordings then in the Recordings config tick the 'Use EPG Running state' or similar tick box and that will use the EIT p/f flags in the DVB stream to signal the start/end of recordings.  The main broadcasters are good at triggering this accurately (it's controlled by their Playout area)

Configuration->Recording->Digital Video Recorder Profiles and it should open the default "pass" profile (which records with no processing - so identical quality to watching live).  In the Parameters panel on the right you should see a tick box for 'Use EPG Running State' - which enables the EPG Now/Next (aka Present/Following) changes to trigger recordings.

If you want UK channel numbers in Kodi - then in Kodi go to PVR/Live TV in System settings, and enable 'Use channel numbers from backend' - otherwise Kodi will allocate its own numbers to each channel.

In the UK, by default, TV Headend correctly detects the "LCN" (i.e. logical/local channel number) for each service that Freeview allocate.  You CAN override these numbers in the TV Headend configuration, and you can also disable channels should you wish. (If you want to avoid the Adult or Shopping channels clogging up your EPG in Kodi) I think you can do this either in the SERVICES config menu or the CHANNELs config menu.

[docwra]

Great thanks! at last someone who understands the TVheadend user interface and its 10,000 config options

I had to change General >> User interface level>> Expert and click save to see any of those.

Last question I promise, but is there any easy way to replace the HD channels with SD in the number order?

[noggin]

Great thanks! at last someone who understands the TVheadend user interface and its 10,000 config options

I had to change General >> User interface level>> Expert and click save to see any of those.

Last question I promise, but is there any easy way to replace the HD channels with SD in the number order?

 
Yes - I think you can overwrite the entries in the Number column (you may need to drag the column wider to see it - it's between Name and User Icon) in Configuration->Channel/EPG->Channels. When you have changed a channel from the default - you'll see a little red flash top left in the number box. You need to click SAVE at the top left of the screen for each page of channels you edit (you can't edit all the pages and then click save ISTR)

I know some people swap 1 and 101, 2 and 102 etc. to put the HD channels at 1-5 and the SD versions in the 100s.  Personally I don't because I'm so used to the Freeview numbers!

[docwra]

Thanks, works perfectly!

[noggin]

Thanks, works perfectly!

 Great ! Glad to help.

[docwra]

Is anyone else getting an annoying green glitch on the bottom half of the screen every couple of mins on live TV?

I see it come up quite noticeably when using Kodi nightlies, enough to make this not a sustainable solution

[noggin]

Is anyone else getting an annoying green glitch on the bottom half of the screen every couple of mins on live TV?

I see it come up quite noticeably when using Kodi nightlies, enough to make this not a sustainable solution

 Haven't seen it on H264 1080i Freeview HD stuff on a Pi 3B+ in the UK - and I was watching for multiple hours last weekend. I was using a very recent Milhouse LibreElec build from his sticky thread in the Raspberry Pi forum.

Are you seeing it on SD MPEG2 or HD H264 stuff?  Do you have MPEG2 licence?  Are you using OMX or MMAL?

[docwra]

I'm using android shield to view, from the raspberry pi server.

Seems to be on all Freeview channels.