Does anyone have any knowledge/experience of commercially available Linux PVRs, such as http://www.darkbox.co.uk http://www.dreambox.org.uk
A customer asked me about them as his "Linux guru" (a title I really don't live up to!) and I'd not heard of either of them.
Mark Rogers mark@quarella.co.uk wrote:
Does anyone have any knowledge/experience of commercially available Linux PVRs, such as http://www.darkbox.co.uk http://www.dreambox.org.uk
I have some knowledge of them, but no experience yet. The Dreambox is reputedly the luxury one, but German and expensive, while DarkBox and EagleBox are UK-centric similar systems. They vary in connections, facilities, user interface and so on.
I'm pretty sure you can upload whatever system you want to the Dreambox, but I'm a lot less clear about the Dark and Eagle.
Myself, I'm still intending to add a silent/low-power PSU and DVB-S hardware decoder card to a PC when I get a quiet holiday, mainly so I can hack the user interface until it doesn't suck... so I'd be interested to know if the Dark and Eagle are hackable and render my plan obsolete!
Regards,
I was interested in the Dreambox 7020 but I don't know if it is me but the website isn't very consumer friendly. There is a list of comprehensive specifications and technical info but all I really want to know is will it work with the BBC/ITV Freesat service and receive all channels that service offers. Does it cope with the freesat EPG etc.
FTA is a bit ambiguous as I presume that is the same as I get in a sky box without the sky pay once viewing card. What is different about Freesat exactly ?
Note this is different to the Sky Subscription free pay once service and should give me the complete freeview channel selection without the Sky paid for channels cluttering the EPG. Also Freesat is HD capable (not that the dreambox appears to be)
Wayne Stallwood wrote:
I was interested in the Dreambox 7020 but I don't know if it is me but the website isn't very consumer friendly. There is a list of comprehensive specifications and technical info but all I really want to know is will it work with the BBC/ITV Freesat service and receive all channels that service offers.
I must admit that this is why I've not done this. What I really want to know is: - What do I need on my wall in terms of a sat dish - What do I need between it and the Dreambox - Which Dreambox do I need to do a broadly similar job to Sky+
My girlfriend has just moved in and is tied into a contract in her old house which she will be moving to mine. Apparently the dish stays where is is but she's free to move the Sky+ box, so my interest is mostly curiosity for my own use - but that said I'm tempted to get a local dish installer to install a new dish rather than Sky, if by doing so I get something more functional for the future (multiple LNB's, for example).
Then again, as I mentioned at the start of the thread I have a client asking me about them so I'd like to have something to tell him. So far I've worked out that Dreambox seem to be much better than the others, and that if I buy a cheap dreambox I'm probably buying a cheap fake.
I must admit that this is why I've not done this. What I really want to know is:
- What do I need on my wall in terms of a sat dish
Just the standard sky dish if all you want is freesat/sky tv. I have yet to see them cheaper than they are on ebay. The only real gotcha is making sure you get the bracket that is suited to where you intend to mount it.
- What do I need between it and the Dreambox
Just the standard foil screened Sat Co-Ax. Runs over 30 Meters and you need to start paying special attention to the quality of cable you use. There are grades but generally I say 20 meters and above look for copper screened. The cable connects to the dish and the receiver via F connectors which require no special crimping tools etc..However the dish end should be sealed with self amalgamating tape.
- Which Dreambox do I need to do a broadly similar job to Sky+
Dunno MJR has shed light on this for me..still working out what exactly I need.
My girlfriend has just moved in and is tied into a contract in her old house which she will be moving to mine. Apparently the dish stays where is is but she's free to move the Sky+ box, so my interest is mostly curiosity for my own use - but that said I'm tempted to get a local dish installer to install a new dish rather than Sky, if by doing so I get something more functional for the future (multiple LNB's, for example).
To be honest if the desired dish location isn't dangerous to access I would do it yourself. No special tools are required (although a signal meter does make life easier..I have one you can borrow if you are near Bury) I set my elevation on the ground and then bolted it up and pointed it in the same general direction as my neighbours. Once connected it was pretty much spot on. There is an additional skew setting on the LNB but this is set by geographic region so should need tweaking once up a ladder. Multichannel wise, Quad LNB's are cheap on ebay (although make sure it has the right mount for your dish) and you can even get octal ones now (at a price)
Wayne Stallwood wrote:
[..snip lots of useful info..] To be honest if the desired dish location isn't dangerous to access I would do it yourself. No special tools are required (although a signal meter does make life easier..I have one you can borrow if you are near Bury) I set my elevation on the ground and then bolted it up and pointed it in the same general direction as my neighbours. Once connected it was pretty much spot on. There is an additional skew setting on the LNB but this is set by geographic region so should need tweaking once up a ladder.
Sky apparently will install a dish for £50, but I'm inclined to DIY not least because there's an old dish on the side of the house anyway which would need replacing but may be a good starting point. It will depend on the type of dish I should be looking for, which I have no idea about. Are we talking Maplin parts or something more specialist?
Multichannel wise, Quad LNB's are cheap on ebay (although make sure it has the right mount for your dish) and you can even get octal ones now (at a price)
If I'm doing this myself the only real incentive would be to go for a quad LNB. Can I upgrade a standard Sky dish if I go that route?
I watch about 1hr live TV a week so why I'm interested I have no idea, I'll lose interest once I've got it working and have even more "choice" bombarding me!
Mark,
If you really want to play, you should also get a diseqc rotor. They are suprisingly easy to set up, no additional power wiring required and give you access to the whole sky, rather than just the limited choice available at 28.2 deg east. If you are going up the ladder anyway....why not!! Especially if you are going down the dreambox route, it would be a shame to waste its potential. You can get the motors suprisingly cheaply online, and with a slight premium in maplin.
Set up is a breeze really, you just point south until you pick up the signal for Thor 3 at 0.8w, and based on your long/lat the box should be able to calculate where all the other sats are.
Ricky
Mark Rogers mark@quarella.co.uk wrote:
Sky apparently will install a dish for £50, but I'm inclined to DIY not least because there's an old dish on the side of the house anyway which would need replacing but may be a good starting point. It will depend on the type of dish I should be looking for, which I have no idea about. Are we talking Maplin parts or something more specialist?
I've missed the reason for replacing the dish, but pretty much any standard parts should work. I think the key words are offset dish and Ku band, but there's not as many places selling the other sorts (centre-focus and C band). All Maplins stuff should be fine but it's usually a little more expensive, a limited range and without in-shop advice/experience.
I've DIY'd both my installations and so did my brother. Four bolts and hanging a dish isn't that complicated. It's the motor which I usually mess up!
[...]
If I'm doing this myself the only real incentive would be to go for a quad LNB. Can I upgrade a standard Sky dish if I go that route?
Yes, but Sky dishes use oddly-shaped/fixed LNBs, so look at ranges like http://www.satcure.com/accs/page1.htm
A Linux-based DVB-S receiver won't care whether it's circular or Sky-shaped, but reception is worse if you mismatch the LNB and dish and Sky dishes aren't that great to start with.
Hope that helps,
MJ Ray wrote:
I've missed the reason for replacing the dish, but pretty much any standard parts should work.
Maybe I don't need to replace the dish, it's an old (analogue) dish but presumably that's largely irrelevant as long as its pointing in the right place and has a suitable LNB (which I'm thinking of replacing anyway)? It's bigger than the current Sky offerings but that's probably an advantage from what I've just read at satcure.com.
[In case its not obvious I don't have a clue what I'm talking about in this field!]
Since it looks like I can even give it a new coat of paint, I should experiment with what I have first by the sound of things? I do have a Freeview satellite decoder bought cheap in a Maplin sale that's never been out of its box, presumably that would be a good place to start too.
I've DIY'd both my installations and so did my brother. Four bolts and hanging a dish isn't that complicated. It's the motor which I usually mess up!
If I'm not investing in a dish now, then I guess I can leave the motor side of things for another day.
A Linux-based DVB-S receiver won't care whether it's circular or Sky-shaped, but reception is worse if you mismatch the LNB and dish and Sky dishes aren't that great to start with.
OK, so maybe I just need a new LNB and some time to play?
This started out as a query to assist someone else but I'm getting more and more inclined to experiment myself now. I've played with stuff like MythTV in the past (not with satellite though) and never got very far, but I've always wanted to achieve something in this area and I do have some spare PC kit that's just been freed up which would be fairly cheap to turn into a MythTV or similar box.
Mark Rogers mark@quarella.co.uk wrote:
MJ Ray wrote:
I've missed the reason for replacing the dish, but pretty much any standard parts should work.
Maybe I don't need to replace the dish, it's an old (analogue) dish but presumably that's largely irrelevant as long as its pointing in the right place and has a suitable LNB (which I'm thinking of replacing anyway)? It's bigger than the current Sky offerings but that's probably an advantage from what I've just read at satcure.com.
Subject: 5. Can I use my old Sky/Premiere analogue dish?
Analogue (PAL, NTSC or Secam) and digital receivers differ, but can use similar antennas. If you have an analogue set, you don't need a new "digital dish", but maybe a modern LNB and re-aiming. See http://www.selkirkshire.demon.co.uk/analoguesat/raihelp.html
(from http://mjr.towers.org.uk/blog/2006/astefaq and elsewhere)
Since it looks like I can even give it a new coat of paint, I should experiment with what I have first by the sound of things? I do have a Freeview satellite decoder bought cheap in a Maplin sale that's never been out of its box, presumably that would be a good place to start too.
Yes, that's a good place to start (but it's probably not Freeview - that's a brand of DTV Services Ltd who run the DVB-T transmissions).
[...]
OK, so maybe I just need a new LNB and some time to play?
Maybe not even that, if the dish has a universal LNB that hasn't fallen prey to insects or the weather.
"Ricky Bruce" rickybruce@gmail.com wrote:
If you really want to play, you should also get a diseqc rotor. [...] If you are going up the ladder anyway....why not!!
Main reason not to do it is that it's harder to aim at the Clarke belt than a single satellite, especially given how poorly-marked most dish and motor brackets are.
Hope that explains,
Since it looks like I can even give it a new coat of paint,
I don't have any experience of this, but i would assume as long as the new coat doesn't have a different level of reflectivity, that should be fine.
Main reason not to do it is that it's harder to aim at the Clarke belt than a single satellite, especially given how poorly-marked most dish and motor brackets are.
I may have been lucky, or perhaps my dreambox is very forgiving to weak satellite signals, but i was able to get my motorised kit up and running inside a couple of hours . Really all the magic is done in the box thanks to USALS and providing you can get a good lock on one of the major satellites, and your dish is mounted true, the rest should ...hopefully... fall in place.
Anyway good luck Mark, there is a lot of info to trawl through on the subject, but i think it is a rewarding hobby.
Wayne Stallwood ALUGlist@digimatic.co.uk wrote:
[...] Does it cope with the freesat EPG etc.
FTA is a bit ambiguous as I presume that is the same as I get in a sky box without the sky pay once viewing card. What is different about Freesat exactly ?
Note this is different to the Sky Subscription free pay once service and should give me the complete freeview channel selection without the Sky paid for channels cluttering the EPG. Also Freesat is HD capable (not that the dreambox appears to be)
As I understand it, Freesat is a collection of free-to-air (not ambiguous at all - it's a well-known term for unencrypted DVB streams) channels and an EPG which is pretty standards-based but all the data is broadcast on one or two transponders, instead of being distributed across transponders like the German broadcasters do. That method has the advantage that you download all channel schedules together instead of waiting for it to populate when you switch to a channel for the first time in a day or two, but the slight disadvantage that the receiver has to tune to an EPG transponder that has no TV channels at least once a day and then remember that data until the next EPG snort.
I think non-freesat receivers should be able to support the freesat EPG (particularly Linux-based receivers - unlike Sky's iOpen one) but my current Digiquest receiver doesn't (not enough EPG memory) and I've not tested or heard about any others. There's some info on http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~klee/freesat.html but I've not been watching closely recently (many websites to do!).
The text services are reportedly MHEG-based, so should "just work" but again, I've not tested or seen reports on it.
There are a few HD channels on freesat and HD has been a major reason for it. There are both HD and SD receivers available, including Linux HD Dreamboxes like the DM8000.
Hope that informs,
Thanks MJR that was just the info I need and has cleared up a few questions which frankly should have been answered on the dreambox site. How ordinary people are supposed to cope with the information (or lack thereof) is beyond be.
-
Mark Rogers -
MJ Ray -
Ricky Bruce -
Wayne Stallwood