Hauppauge WinTV-quadHD Quad Recording

[AndyM]

I have got mythtv running on Ubuntu server 20.04.1 with a Hauppauge WinTV-quadHD card.

My issue is I can record on all 4 TV tuners. I have set up the card 4 times in the back end, this must not be the correct method to allow quad recording. Can anyone help?

I used th instructions at https://hauppauge.com/pages/support/sup ... ml?#ubuntu
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:b-rad/kernel+mediatree+hauppauge
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install linux-hwe-mediatree
sudo apt-get install linux-mediatree
sudo apt-get install linux-firmware-hauppauge

[kmdewaal]

I suggest to start with the Channel Scanning Wiki, in https://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Channel_Scanning.
Summary: set up 4 capture cards, one for each tuner on your quad card; configure one video source; connect all 4 capture cards to that video source; do a channel scan with mythtv-setup; start the backend and live happily ever after!

[blm-ubunet]

PPA:
I don't think you need the Hauppauge PPA since before 18.04 except as a source of potentially later firmware.
Their media tree builds were incompatible with Nvidia graphic drivers (or any other kernel module).
Way back you needed to get the latest dvb5-tools to be able to scan & zap this tuner on dvb-t2.

Strangely, I've never been able to get more than 3 tuners recording in MythTV.
Originally, I used one outside of MythTV BE to be able to record trial broadcasts of HEVC on dvb-t2.

Watching with interest.

[gnurocks]

Using Ubuntu Mate 20.04 / Mythtv 31: I can record off of all four tuners by using the Hauppauge PPA (yes, you need it) and by the scan process described by kmdewaal.

[kmdewaal]

If you happen to have a latest&greatest Ryzen CPU then you might need a PCIe bus setting for the card to work properly, please read this:
viewtopic.php?f=36&t=4081&p=20358&hilit=Ryzen#p20361

[AndyM]

Hi I tried the process described by kmdewaal and it work. I have been able to record 3 TV programs at the same time and view another.

Under
TV -> System Status -> input status It lists the following inputs
Input 1 input 1:4 available
Input 2 input 2:1 available
Input 3 input 2:1 available
Input 4 input 2:1 available

As input 1 seems to have 4 available, I guess that input 2,3 and 4 are not required.

I don't think I have set it up perfectly but its working so I am happy. I don't want to play with the system too much and break it again.

Thanks kmdewaal

P.S I am running an old intel CPU and Mythtv 31

[kmdewaal]

Great that it works!
About your inputs, each input of your card can receive one transport stream multiplex. One multiplex has a number of TV channels and if you want to record two programs that are on the same multiplex this only takes one tuner. Your 3 recordings and one live TV must have all been from the same multiplex, hence the number of inputs has been automatically increased to 4.
Because you have four tuners you can always record at least four TV channels, each on a different multiplex; additionally you can record all other programs that are present on these four multiplexes.
Enjoy!

[blm-ubunet]

Looking at some recent changelogs for Brad Love's Hauppauge PPA there is mention of DKMS.
That suggests it could be compatible with Nvidia drivers.

But you are getting (potentially) a complete kernel from an untrusted third party source.

[gnurocks]

Another way of stating it is that (I think) every tuner on this card has a maximum of 2 recordings.

So, I can record 8 total programs simultaneously (4 on main channels and 4 more on available mutiplex stream channels). For example, a local channel from here is 2_1 but the very same tuner can simultaneously record channel 2_2.

My capture card is setup like the following:

Input 1 Input 1: 2 available
Input 2 Input 2: 2 available
Input 3 Input 3: 2 available
Input 4 Input 4: 2 available

By the way, I only had to scan for channels on the first tuner. Hope this helps.

[kmdewaal]

The default number of recordings per tuner is 2.
If the "Schedule as Group" option in "Input Connections" / "Interactions between inputs" is selected (it is by default) then there are additional entries created when needed, so that you can record all channels on a single multiplex using only one tuner.

About scanning only with the first tuner, that is correct because all four tuners are connected to the same video source and share the same channel list.