TV Freeze and Poor Quality Picture

maic07

Hi All,

This is my first post and I am straight in with a question, hope this is ok.....I recently purchased a L250-JA7Z/AMD64+ 512MB 250GB WXPP and am having trouble with the picture. It is freezing and on most channels is very bad. This is through Sky Digital Ireland, Co. Meath area as requested by MCE. I was informed that this is due to the frequencies that MCE downloads automatically. Just in case the spec is a follows:

Multimedia Functionality:
TV Tuner Type - Analogue TV
Video Input - Video capture adapter
Analogue TV System - PAL, SECAM
Digital TV Reception - DVB-T
Video Capture Interface - S-Video, composite video

Graphics Controller:
Type - Integrated
Graphics Processor / Vendor - ATI Radeon Xpress 200
Video Memory - Shared Video Memory (UMA)
Max Allocated RAM Size - 128 MB
Digital Video Standard - Digital Visual Interface (DVI)

Does anyone know where I can get the correct frequencies for this?

Thanks,
Maic07.

SouperComputer

are you trying to watch FTA channels or Sky digital? If its sky digital, then there are no frequencies to speak of, just channel numbers as far as MCE is concerned.

If you want to watch digital you need to connect it VIA SVideo and use an IR blaster to control the digibox.

maic07

Hi SouperComputer,

Thanks for reply......

Not sure what FTA channels are. Watching through Sky digital Ireland. So can there be a problem with the channel numbers? Does this mean that the frequencies are not wrong?

"If you want to watch digital you need to connect it VIA SVideo and use an IR blaster to control the digibox" - Yes I have done this. It is conneced via a scart adapter which allows me to plug in S-Video and audio cables....

Cheers,
Maic07

8T8

maic07 wrote:

Hi SouperComputer,

Thanks for reply......

Not sure what FTA channels are. Watching through Sky digital Ireland. So can there be a problem with the channel numbers? Does this mean that the frequencies are not wrong?

"If you want to watch digital you need to connect it VIA SVideo and use an IR blaster to control the digibox" - Yes I have done this. It is conneced via a scart adapter which allows me to plug in S-Video and audio cables....

Cheers,
Maic07

FTA mean free to air channels not subscription based ones like Sky's service.

Do you know who makes the TV tuner in the HTPC maybe a driver update could help.

I could find out myself if it weren't for the fact crappy Acer's own Euro support site if offline. I think your machine is similar to if not the same as the Acer L200 Media Center.

Is UDMA enabled on your HD as well ?

Edit: Just found their FTP site and for the L200 it is either a Pinnacle or Hauppauge tuner so that narrows it down at least. You might have to do the remaining detective work to see which one is in your PC though from Google the Hauppauge kind seem to be more common.

There is also a chance that this is some sort of OEM only job and driver support could be next to nothing *if* that is the case & the issue remains unresolved I would check to see if the old one can be removed and if so chuck out that tuner and buy a decent one with proper driver support.

maic07

Well,
Answers: Do you know who makes the TV tuner in the HTPC - Hauppage Hybride Analogue TV - DVB-T - PAL, SECAM

Is UDMA enabled on your HD as well - Is this on the TV? IF directly connecting the Sky Digital to the TV the picture is perfect.

Yes there is very little difference between the L200 and the L250. Are you watching Sky digital through your L200, in other words, do these Acer machines work well? Is it working well overall?

Thanks,
maic07.

8T8

maic07 wrote:

Well,
Answers: Do you know who makes the TV tuner in the HTPC - Hauppage Hybride Analogue TV - DVB-T - PAL, SECAM

Is UDMA enabled on your HD as well - Is this on the TV? IF directly connecting the Sky Digital to the TV the picture is perfect.

Yes there is very little difference between the L200 and the L250. Are you watching Sky digital through your L200, in other words, do these Acer machines work well? Is it working well overall?

Thanks,
maic07.

Okay its an Hauppage card try downloading all the files in this folder to an empty folder on your computer and run the softmce.exe file and see if it re-installs the TV tuners drives.

UDMA = Ultra DMA mode it is a feature of your hard drive if it weren't enabled for some odd reason then that may explain some of the problems. Go it into the device manager and bring up the properties of your IDE controller under the advanced settings tab you should see if its says Ultra DMA mode is enabled or not.

I don't own one of these Acer media center's I just did a little searching to see who made your HTPC, I tend to build my own.

It sounds to me like a driver issue with the (poorly supported) TV tuner but what are you using to convert the scart output of the Sky box to the input on your HTPC, is it a straight connection with a scart-composite cable/adaptor or is there something else were not aware of just in case.


In the small chance that something else may be the cause of the problems I would recommend updating your other drivers in the system as well to the latest versions;
AMD CPU driver
ATI Graphics driver - You must .NET installed for this driver to work but you probably already have it. On the ATI page pick download 2 of 3 which is the software package you need.

maic07

hi, tried running softm.exe and getting this:

Your wintv model type can not be determined. Pease make sure your unit has the drivers installed, and is hysically pluged in (if usb). Debug info: Last _Hw_model=96559.

Do you know what ths is about? I went into device manager and this is fine.

Its a scart adapter with s-video and two audio cables. The scart adaptor is set to out. I have not tried the CPU and graphics suggestions yet.....

8T8

Well a Google search reveals that 96559 = Hauppauge OEM WinTV-HVR-1300-MCE-PAL now is that the card in your system I really couldn't say. The driver for said device can be found here but the only way to test would be to manually update the driver i think through the device manager.

The tuner in your system is an OEM affair which probably means that it got some new ID codes slapped on it which in turn means the regular drivers wont work as it is up to the OEM manufacturer to supply them in this case Acer and good luck with that!, Acer are f*cking useless.

I Google searched around and it was very difficult trying to find any concrete info about what type of card you have and what is there in terms of support so in the event that the problem is not resolved take the cover off your Acer HTPC and have a look at the TV tuner and see if it is a low profile for full height card then buy a replacement..


Try the CPU & graphics drivers (FYI they should be installed anyway as a matter of course) and see if it improves anything.

Of course one final thing is to double check all the connection are secure from each point & I assume you have tried more than one adaptor/cable if not try a scart->composite cable and see what happens.