Note: This is a technical guide aimed at a specific audience. If you happen to read this blog and have no interest in Linux and TV cards, skip this post.
Note 2: This guide is obsolete! Use at your own risk. This guide is a lot better!
My father and I recently bought a Hauppauge Nova-T 500 TV card to extend the functionality of our current TV computer. The nice thing with this card is the fact that it contains two tuners in one card, allowing two simultaneous TV recordings or watchings at the same time.
We unpacked the box and plugged the card in to our computer. The manual recommended the card to be put in PCI slot #1 or 2 for unknown reasons, but it felt best to comply. When we booted, however, I got confused.
We had indeed installed a PCI card, but there was no TV card in the PCI listing (given by the ‘lspci’ command). We thought there was something wrong with the card at first.
When inserting the card into a Windows computer, we understood where the problem was. At first, Windows recognized a new USB root hub on the computer, and only after that came the TV card. Hauppauge had made the ingenious decision of having two USB TV receivers on the card, controlled by an internal USB hub. The reasons for that I can guess is to save costs using the same chipset for both their external USB cards, and the internal what-seems-to-be-PCI cards.
So, back with the card to the Linux box, and discovering that there actually were a lot of new entries in the PCI listing, USB controllers. A quick glance on the USB listing (‘lsusb’ under Linux), showed a happy Hauppauge card.
After discovering the inner workings of the card, it was time to configure it. Apparently, the drivers were not included in the Linux kernel before version 2.6.19, and the most recent stock kernel for the Ubuntu system was 2.6.17. Time to go back and compile your own kernel from kernel.org.
If your system has at least kernel version 2.6.19, there is no need for compiling your own. The kernel version is checked with the command ‘uname -r’. In the kernel, you need to enable modular support for the “dib0700″ chipset, which is somewhere under Device Drivers > Multimedia. Make sure the dialog says “(M)” and not “(*)” for the specific driver.
After compiling and installing the kernel (providing those instructions is outside the scope of this document) you must reboot and then find a firmware file for the kernel to use. For this specific card I needed the file “dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw”, which I couldn’t find anywhere on the net at first. The primary mirror for this file was offline, but after one hour of searching I luckily found an RPM containing several firmwares, along with this one.
To make the path easier for everybody else, I here provide these files on my server here.
NOTE: The above files are very obsolete, and should not be used. linuxtv.org has newer files.
So, extract the file named “dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw” and copy it to the directory /lib/firmware. Then load the module dvb-usb-dib0700 using the following command:
modprobe dvb-usb-dib0700
(many systems require that you add “sudo” to the command line before the “modprobe” command.
You just loaded the driver into the kernel. Felt something? That was just the feeling of being one step closer to a working dual TV tuner card. Note that the “modprobe” command should return nothing if it works. If you get outputs like “FATAL: Module dvb-usb-dib0700 not found.” you have to make sure that you compiled in support for the TV card into the kernel.
If modprobe worked, check the output of the command ‘dmesg’. If it works, you should have something like this in the last few lines:
[ 47.706381] dib0700: loaded with support for 2 different device-types
[ 47.755845] dvb-usb: found a 'Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T' in cold state, will try to load a firmware
[ 47.831894] dvb-usb: downloading firmware from file 'dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw'
[ 48.004945] dib0700: firmware started successfully.
[ 48.106970] dvb-usb: found a 'Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T' in warm state.
[ 48.107568] dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.
[ 48.107929] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 48.191285] DVB: registering frontend 1 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)...
[ 48.192903] MT2060: successfully identified (IF1 = 1220)
[ 48.657038] dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.
[ 48.657373] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 48.661165] DVB: registering frontend 2 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)...
[ 48.663158] MT2060: successfully identified (IF1 = 1220)
[ 49.129041] dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T successfully initialized and connected.
[ 49.129071] usbcore: registered new interface driver dvb_usb_dib0700
Basically, what it says is that the firmware gets loaded (“dib0700: firmware started successfully“) and that the frontend gets registered (“MT2060: successfully identified“) and finally gets the card to work (“dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T successfully initialized and connected“)
If this is your case, you can happily go on and set up MythTV or <insert your favorite PVR system here>.
Otherwise, let’s do some debugging. Most often, you forgot to provide the system with the correct firmware file. Extract the file “dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw” to /lib/firmware, nothing else. Make sure you got support for your dib0700 in the kernel configuration and that the kernel is really 2.6.19 or higher. If you get stuck, post a comment in the form on the bottom of the page, and I or one of my many readers will probably help you.
Your TV card should show up in the directory /dev/dvb (might vary on other systems than my Ubuntu installation) as two entries; adapter0 and adapter1 (This might also vary if you have more TV cards in the computer).
Now, configure the DVB card as you would with any card. I use MythTV, and those instructions can be found here. I don’t feel like writing another MythTV guide here, there are so many out there already.
Happy tuning!
Note that I never tried connecting the remote control, many readers have commented that the remote doesn’t work yet. You will need a third-party remote or do as I am doing and use another card with a remote control.
As a conclusion, I find the Nova-T 500 an excellent card with good support under Linux except for the remote control. The driver seems pretty new, though, so there are probably improvements and bugfixes on the way in new Linux versions. Still, with our computer, a 1.8 GHz with 768 MB of memory, we can now record three DVB-T streams simultaneously (using one Nova-T 500 and one older Nova-T card) without any problems at all.
I can only recommend this card, although it still requires some compiling to get working. I believe Ubuntu Feisty Fawn (in beta at the time of writing) has support for the card out of the box (but you still need the firmware).
If this guide was helpful, I would appreciate you leaving a comment here. Also comment if something doesn’t work or if you have additional suggestions. Thank you!
85 Comments
ah nice guide, im just about to make a little mythtv box to record educational tv shows, and stream them over the network, as i work at a school. I wasnt sure about the nova-t 500 card, but this doesent look that bad…
cheers
@wil:
Glad you liked the guide. Hope you like mythtv, it might be quirky to setup from time to time, but it is a killer application.
I brought this card as well and it is amazing. I used to have a ATI card and a PVR-150, but the picture on this card is much better – nearly as good as my Telewest TVdrive box. Better than most Sky installations though.
http://www.connectedinternet.co.uk/2006/10/21/993/
I have this TV-card running under Ubuntu Edgy (2.6.17). I found a driver from linuxtv.org and the firmware somewhere…
But I haven’t got the remote that belongs to the 500-card working yet. According to the wiki under linuxtv.org it will not work (and there they also report some oops while tuning. I have noticed this also – Mythtv hangs when changing channels too fast?)
You don’t say anything about the remote in your howto. Do you have it working or are you using some other remote?
Och så samma på svenska
Yes, sorry I haven’t written anything about remotes. I use my old Hauppauge for the remote, so I don’t know anything about it. I would guess that the process is quite the same.
Make sure your kernel has support for input layer support (event devices), and then check whether any of the files in /dev/input/event[1,2,3,4] reacts on your remote. Then configure lirc to use that file as input and the “dev/input” driver.
One thing about hauppauge cards, make sure the remote connector is really inserted. Those cards have a tendency to put the connector too far on the left side, making it difficult to insert fully. Wiggle the connector while pushing to make it go in.
I got the card running under ubuntu edgy(with the feisty kernel 2.6.20-5), but after I upgraded the kernel I can’t seem to get my nvidia drivers to work… got any advice on getting them up and running again?
Thanks for posting this. I’m thinking about building a Linux media box to try a new OS. I have been a long time user of windows but I’m beginning to grow tired of the increasingly buggy software and drivers and with the release of Vista not showing signs of improvement I feel it is time to explore other options. I am a power user and enjoy customizing thing to suit the way I use them and therefore Apple is out. My father told me to try Linux long ago but I did not real have the time or interest for it but now I feel it is time. It was till recently that I realized that a lot of the software I use and love on Windows was first on Linux (Firefox, Azureus, Power ISO to name a few).
I have some spare cash and don’t mind spending money on good equipment so I’m looking at a new system.
Asus Motherboard P5B Deluxe/WiFi-AP
Intel E6300 core 2 duo
1g 667mhz RAM
seagate 250g sata HD
Nvidia 7900GS 256mb video card
Hauppauge Nova-T 500 tv tuner
Logitech Cordless Desktop LX710
DVD burn
I going to use a Sony digital Projector as the monitor (1500 lums XGA) great for movies and games.
I’ve looked at the current version of Linux and Ubuntu 6.10 looks easy to learn (for a windows user).
At the moment I’m doing my research to check that all the hardware is supported (hence finding your page).
Any help or suggestion to a new Linux user would be appreciated.
Thanks again Mate (I’m Australian)
Hi Jonathan,
Great guide, has helped me get further than any other so far. Though I’ve still come to a stop.
After downloaing and untaring the firmware, this creates anonther firmware folder under /lib/firmware – was sondering if that was correct?
I have looked around (googled) for a way to “load the module”, since I’m not very Linux savvy, I came accross a suggestion to use modprobe. Then issuing the command # /sbin/modprobe dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw I get an error message of FATAL: Module dvb_usb_dib0700_01.fw not found.
I’m wondering where I went wrong. Do you have any suggestions for me?
Thank you.
Pete.
System:
Fedora Core 5 on a Pentium D 2.8 and a Hauppauge WinTV Nova T 500 PCI
uname -r
2.6.15-1.2054_FC5smp
lsusb
Bus 006 Device 002: ID 2040:9941 Hauppauge
pete you need to upgrade your kernel, i used this nice guide: http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=311158
its for ubuntu however.
The modprobe command is: modprobe dvb-usb-dib0700-01 as that is the name of the module, the module is only present in the new kernel however. kernel.org may also help you.
@Morten:
): https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BinaryDriverHowto/Nvidia
Documentation for your problem can be found at the following guide (that I have helped to write, by the way
@Toby:
. The Nova-T 500 card is still quite new, so the Linux support for that hardware does not seem to be perfect yet, although it seems to work quite well for me (don’t know about the remote).
Great that you are moving from Windows as your TV setup! I have also got the feeling that there are many questionable things going on in the Windows world of TV systems. Installing and setting up a Linux/MythTV system still requires a lot of patience, so don’t enter that path without mentally preparing
Looking at your hardware, it seems that your system would be able to cope with MythTV, although I am not sure how fast your CPU is. Trust me, MythTV requires a lot of CPU for the more exotic functions like commercial flagging and transcoding and mytharchive.
I wish you the best luck! Write back here if you got additional questions.
@Peter:
You must put the file “dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw” directly under /lib/firmware. Then load the module “dvb-usb-dib0700″ with modprobe. @wil is not completely correct at this point. Also make sure you have kernel version > 2.6.19
The kernel throws me this when ive updated it, and it all looks okay?
43.596535] dib0700: loaded with support for 2 different device-types
[ 43.651881] dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in warm state.
[ 43.652022] dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.
[ 43.652572] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 43.756415] DVB: registering frontend 0 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)…
[ 43.912536] eth0: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex, lpa 0×45E1
[ 43.925728] MT2060: successfully identified (IF1 = 1220)
[ 44.504139] dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.
[ 44.504599] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 44.507657] DVB: registering frontend 1 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)…
[ 44.509885] MT2060: successfully identified (IF1 = 1220)
[ 45.084450] dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T successfully initialized and connected.
[ 45.084483] usbcore: registered new interface driver dvb_usb_dib0700
[ 45.269549] NET: Registered protocol family 10
[ 45.269725] lo: Disabled Privacy Extensions
[ 45.755560] device-mapper: table: 253:0: linear: dm-linear: Device lookup failed
[ 45.755569] device-mapper: ioctl: error adding target to table
[ 45.758472] device-mapper: table: 253:0: linear: dm-linear: Device lookup failed
Then when i do scan (chanel list)
i get…
WARNING: >>> tuning failed!!!
ERROR: initial tuning failed
Im near several antennas, and am using a huge list, but i just cant tune into anything!
@wil:
I believe I had the same problems a long time ago when I first set up my MythTV box. If you use MythTV to scan for channels, try entering more information about the transport (i.e. frequency etc.). This information can probably be found on the homepage of your TV service provider’s homepage.
ive been using scan, from the dvb utils package, the pid scanner doesent work either! im from the UK and my areial is pointing to crystal palace, or hemel hempstead. What do i do? just install myth tv and see how it goes?
@wil: I don’t know how to continue, try to install MythTV and see if that can give more information.
Hi Wil! I have exactly the same problem. Everything looks fine in ‘dmesg’. But tuning failed (although my antenna is fine, tested with another DVB-T card in the same computer).
Please tell me when you solved your problem. Thank you!
PS: I have Fedora 6 with 2.6.19 and latest v4l-dvb.
im still stuck, post someting here when you find a fix, and il do the same thing…
Hi Jonathan,
Can you help me to configure mythtv?
I have installed kernel 2.6.20, on DEBIAN etch. The lib-dvb from v4l is installed. Firmware is correct loaded and the modul too.
Mythtv means “Can not connect to master backend, is it startet? Is the IP adress correct?”
I have tried the command “mythtv-setup” in a console, answer is: mythtv-setup: cannot connect to X server.
What is going wrong. My wm is KDE 3.5.
Regards
Martin
hi Jonathan!
thnk u very much 4 this howto. i was looking a tv card to my new linuxbox and this seems to be a nice one, but its important for me that the remote works…
has anyone configured it?
@Martin
–Mythtv means “Can not connect to master backend, is it startet? Is the IP adress correct?”
it seems that the backend is not started, try typing –mythbackend– in a console before starting mythtv
i cannot help u with the second error.
In reference to UK tuning problems, I’ve had these too and just sorted it out last night.
What I had to do was find out the EXACT parameters for a multiplex and use that for a tuned scan. I mean exact, I couldn’t lock onto anything if I used any auto settings. Perhaps there’s a driver problem with working the correct values out.
So, in my case I worked out that on Sandy Heath, MUX1 (BBC1) is on 640MHz. The tzap frequencies are 166.666KHz down from there, so I used their value of 639833334 for the base frequency. You’ll have to find out this either from one of the dvb-t examples or from a channel list from your transmitter. If you get the result in UHF channel numbers, you can find a map here: http://www.blake-uk.com/serv_trade_industry_info_analchannels.aspx
Then you need to find out some parameters for the signal. I used Simon Blackham’s DTT Page to find out the details for this MUX. It’s running on 16QAM with an FEC code rate of 3/4.
So the parameters you must use are , 8MHz bandwidth, no inversion, 3/4 for both FEC fields, 2K transmission mode, an initial guard of 1/32 and no hierarchy.
With these settings I was able to get a lock although I didn’t find the channels straight away – I presume that the channel table is only broadcast occasionally.
Good luck chaps, it took me ages to work this out.
This guide is damn perfect! Thank you for helping me get my card to work.
Note that your collection of firmware is actually named ‘linux-firmwaretar.gz’, missing a period before “tar.gz”. It might be misunderstood to be a gz and not a tar.gz. It works fine to untar it anyways, though.
@Arla:
Yes, the firmware files got a strange name (seems like Wordpress changed the name or something). Now it is too late to change the URL, Google has already indexed it.
Keep on using MythTV!
Did anyone get the remote control working?
Hi,
You mention that the nova t 500 uses USB, I was wondering what the CPU usage is like when you are capturing from both tuners.
Could you post any results of the ‘top’ command when capturing?
Any feedback is much appreciated.
Dean
@Dean:
I am not at home right now, but as far as I remember cpu usage for my box (ca 2.6 GHz P4) is around 70-80% when using both tuners on the 500 card as well as my older Nova-T card, capturing three streams simultaneously.
Jonathan
Chris: Thanks for the info about the Transmitters, I think I would have been working on this for weeks if I hadn’t read that.
That on top of the other hassles I’ve had getting a new Kernel to boot properly could have sent me over the edge!!! And although I know I’ve got a tone of work ahead to get MythTV up and running properly at least I’m one step closer.
After reading through the info on the transmitter sites I didn’t have to change the Freq., all I had to do was change the fec_hi, fec_lo & mod values in the default scan transmitter file (uk-BlackHill).
It was set to:
T 634167000 8MHz 2/3 NONE QAM64 2k 1/32 NONE
Changed to:
T 634167000 8MHz 3/4 3/4 QAM16 2k 1/32 NONE
And thanks Jonathan for having such a helpful page, I’m off to watch an actual TV picture on my new LCD.
Hi,
I have installed kernel 2.6.20 with the correct support compiled in. But I still get the message: FATAL: Module dvb_usb_dib0700 when trying to install the module. Nothing seems to work to get it going?
This on on Ubuntu 6.10 with kernel upgrade to 2.6.20.
I can see the card loaded when I do lsusb, but I have none of the devices available for use.
Any help appreciated!
Thanks,
James
Fixed it… Something seemed to go wrong in the Kernel re-compile and it wasn’t loading the module properly. I had to blow away my box (luckily I had just started building it!) and re-compile the kernel afresh and it all came right. I can now see the dual tuners.
Thanks for this HowTo though… I don’t think I would have spotted it as a USB device or realised so soon I needed to install a new kernel if it wasn’t for this article. Linux needs more articles like these to help people out who are plodding along like me!
I find the Ubuntu community very good for this. I will be writing up my MythTv PVR construction experiences and publishing them on the web for people to follow as well.
Thanks again for taking the time to write this article up! Most helpful
James
@JGA:
Please write another guide and post the URL here to allow users to find it. I still get very bad results on Google to this guide, so all help to make people find these instructions seems essential for the PVR community.
Thanks!
Will do!
I am now struggling to get the remote working! So if anyone has any idea’s there, would be good to hear…
I have the the IR port running, it just wont recognise anything from the remote itself.
Thanks,
James
Hej Jonathan.
As I mentioned in a previous comment, the card works. That is, it’s found and initialised at startup. However, I have never managed to get it to tune.
You live in Sweden like me, I suppose. Did you have to tune your channel search? I get “no signal” on regular channel scan, and I don’t know any of the values for a tuned scan. Do you know where I can get them, or if it’s even needed? I live 40 minutes from Stockholm city.
Thanks!
@Arla:
I never tuned anything with my Nova-T 500 card, so I am sorry I cannot help you. I already had my channels tuned in from my old card, and MythTV happily used these settings for the new card as well. I remember having some initial problems finding the tune the absolutely first time I set up the computer(that was more than one year ago, with an old version of Myth). Then I tried to enter some transport information I got from Teracom.
You say you live close to Stockholm (40 minutes). I don’t know in which direction of the city you live, but my computer is in Västerås, 60 minutes west. I therefore use data from the Lillhärad transmitter.
I don’t really know what to do for you, since I never have tuned any channels from that card. It should work right away in mythtv-setup, though.
Jonathan
I also had initial tuning problems when setting up MythTV for the first time with a Nova-T-500 dual o an FC6 system (2.6.19-1.2911 kernel). I found the best solution was to generate a channels.conf file using the instructions here and then importing the generated file instead of scanning with MythTV. (Choose the ‘import channels.conf’ option.) This will generate unhelpful channel numbers however (starting at 501). After channels.conf is imported, delete all the stations from MythTV (!) and try the MythTV channel scan. This time it should work OK, and with correct channel numbers. (My aerial is pointed at Crystal Palace in the UK.)
I have not managed to get the remote control working though. I cannot see the Hauppage remote listed in a
cat /proc/bus/input/devices. Kernel module is loaed OK. I have tried with both the lirc_i2c and the dev/input devices. Running irw crashes lircd with the message “Could not open device”. Reading the Linuxtv.org wiki, I read that the remote control is not supported yet in the card’s driver.Has anyone made any progress?
Hi!
Thanks for great guide! I got module loded, firmware to, got same problem as most with scanning channels (live in U-Väsby so tink i use se-Stockholm_Nacka).
dvbscan -a 0 /usr/share/dvb/scan/dvb-t/se-Stockholm_Nacka > channels.conf
then used the “Import channels.conf” option, see this site: http://emerson.id.au/mythtv/myth/conf.html
Im just intrested in how your Card Setup looks like, in mythtv-setup? Cant find any rel information with se and dvb-t card. Mythtv-setup finds the card but need to know how you configured it?
Is it possible to get the same configure from you as the AU site?
//Fredde
Just a quick question, I assume from the P4 CPU you’re using an i686 kernel. On your travels have you seen anything about x86_64 and the Nova’s?
Sarah
Hi!
Got it working now, dvbscan didnt fint mux 1 and 2, han to do freq scan in mythtv-setup to find all channels. Thanks again for good guide. If any one figure out how to get remote to work please add it to the guide
@Sarah:
I only know about x86, never used an x86_64 system before…
@Fredde:
Glad to hear you got it working. Honestly I don’t really remember how I did the initial scan, it was so long ago. You did make me refresh my memory a bit
Thanks for the info, can you expand on how to enable dib0700 when there is no need to compile the kernel. You say its under ‘Device Drivers > Multimedia’, but what/where is this.
thanks
@Andrew:
Sorry, you need to recompile your kernel if it doesn’t have the dib0700 module loadable already. ‘Device Drivers > Multimedia’ means the configuration step when you compile your kernel “make menuconfig” or similar.
How do you know that you don’t need to compile the kernel? I think you do…
lol probably
when I try uname -a I can’t tell if it says 18 or 19 because the tv resolution is too small.
I’ve just installed knoppmyth, and when choosing a capture card it says “Probed info: Failed to open”. (I have the same card you mention).
@Andrew:
Try uname -r or uname -a | less
The “|” is a vertical bar, not the letter “I”.
For the driver, make sure it is loaded by checking through the output of dmesg by typing:
dmesg | less
Good luck! (don’t post the whole dmesg output here…)
Very good notice ! THE reference for this card !
It works perfectly.
Only one bad point : no remote control configuration.
Thank you very much.
About the remote control, will it ever work? If not, I’m gona get another card.
@Sarah:
My MythTv setup is on x86_64 and have found no problems with the Nova-T-500 specifically relating to 64 bit Linux – I am using Fedora Core 6 x86_64.
On the subject of remote controls: I have given up waiting for remote control support for the Nova-T-500 – I think the USB disconnects problem will take priority for the driver folk, so I have an MCE remote arriving tomorrow from eBay. I have no more PCI slots available so I’m going to stick with the card. I considered briefly soldering up a receiver to the serial port, but life is too short to devote time to both MythTv and amateur electronics! I’ll also try to get the display on my Antec Fusion case working at the same time.
By the way, there is a guide here with some howto’s for the Nova-T-500 which has been quite helpful.
Looks like its Windows Media Center then :’(
@Chris and for everyone else that want a remote control:
I am, as I said, using another TV card (Nova-T PCI) with a single TV tuner that has a working remote control. I have never got the 500 remote to work, and seems like it will take some time to get it working.
I do like the feeling of being able to record three TV streams at once…simply awesome.
Posted a slight update of the guide. Enjoy.
Thanks for all the information.
I was about to buy a new Nova-T card since my old one broke, but after having found this I went for the 500 instead.
Slightly more expensive but definitely worth it with the dual-tuner instead. And the installation was a cinch after reading this guide!
A hint though for people with tuning problems -
I could only tune in half the mux’es I used to get with the Nova-T and the other half suffered from artefacts.
It’s turns out that the input RF-level to the Nova-T 500 has to be increased quite a lot to receive the same mux’es that the Nova-T did.
I added an RF-amp with 12dB gain at the other end of my 30m cable-feed and then I’m still slightly below the level my old setup had.
An excellent post that I found very helpful,
I don’t know about you but I was in a bit of a panic with those initial lspci outputs! ;P
Anyway, thought I would mention: gentoo users, get your firmware from the following ebuild:
media-tv/linuxtv-dvb-firmware
If when you do modprobe dvb-usb-dib0700 nothing appears to happen, and nothing is added to dmesg, then I found I needed to remove the module, and then re-add it after I’d put the firmware in place. This is easy. Just do modprobe -r dvb-usb-dib0700
Thanks for the guide. Much appreciated. I’ve hit a problem that might be related to the firmware. If I run dmesg | grep Nova I get the following;
[ 17.539646] dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in cold state, will try to load a firmware
[ 18.290215] dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in warm state.
[ 18.290554] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 18.386145] dvb-usb: no frontend was attached by ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’
[ 18.386293] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 18.386880] dvb-usb: no frontend was attached by ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’
[ 18.386888] dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T successfully initialized and connected.
It looks like a problem attaching the front-end. If I look in /dev/dvb/adapter0 there is no frontend0 device, unlike /dev/dvb/adapter2 which has the frontend0 for my USB Twinhan Tuner.
For reference I am using one of the OEM rather than retail card, and I have seen mention of different version of firmware, but haven’t been able to find it.
Any help or suggestions anyone can offer will be gratefully received.
Dave MacLeod
I’m having problems with this card in feisty.
Having downloaded the firmware, placed it in the appropriate folder and modprobed dvb-usb-dib0700, I get no errors. Unfortunately I also get no /dev/dvb/.
When I look at dmesg, I can see a couple of generic messages that say everything’s ok, but I don’t get the “dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in cold state, will try to load a firmware” message and associated start-up messages from the other modules.
Any idea what could be going wrong? I’m fairly sure I have the appropriate modules loaded…
Jon C,
What do you get if you try “sudo modprobe -v dvb-usb-dib0700″? Any change in the dmesg?
Dave MacLeod
I’m at work at the moment, so can’t answer that question, but it “randomly” started working yesterday for no discernible reason. I have been reading that sometimes the nova-t 500 doesn’t like being started from a warm boot, although I wasn’t getting any messages at all.
One thing I would like to note is that the “force_lna_activation” option for the dvb-usb-dib0700 module is recommended for this card, as before activating this I wasn’t able to tune any channels.
@Jon C:
Maybe you need to recompile your kernel with options HOTPLUG (General Setup/Support for hot-pluggable devices) and FW_LOADER (Device Drivers/Generic driver options/Hotplug firmware loading support). The locations may vary, depending on your kernel version.
Both options are enabled by default on most distributions, though.
Hello Jonathan.
Thank you very much for this guide. Gave me some very useful pointers on firmware and kernel. Also Chris’s comments on tuning in the UK were spot on! Almost everything works, still have to tune some missing channels and sort out an annoying video glitch in kaffeine.
Cheers guys,
Marko
–
Mandriva 2007-spring, linux 2.6.21
Asus N4L-VM with Core Duo @2GHz
@Dave MacLeod:
Have you enabled the neccessary frontends in the kernel configuation?
@Jon C:
The drivers are still not fully stable for this card. You might be experiencing the mysterious “USB disconnect” as discussed on the LinuxTV mailing list. Look in dmesg for disconnects.
@Marko:
(not sure of the spelling)
Thank you! Or as we jokingly tell each other Elida: добрий попа!
Jonathan
Thanks you for an excellent site Jonathan, it got my Nova-T 500 running just fine under Fedora Core 6.
For users in the UK I’d echo other people’s comments on the frontend gain; I have an extremely strong signal (measures 100% strength and quality on my other digital TV kit) but the NOVA only registers about 50 – 60% at best, even with the amplifier switched on, but it’s good enough for perfect audio and video.
NOTE: To switch the amplifier on in Fedora do this:
Add the following line to /etc/modprobe.conf :
options dvb_usb_dib0700 force_lna_activation=1
Then reboot and check /sys/module/dvb_usb_dib0700/parameters/force_lna_activation now contains 1 rather than 0.
I see some comments about a problem with USB disconnects; I had these and eventually tracked the problem down to the way Linux seems to deal with the PCI bus; After shuffling cards around physically and reconfiguring my networking to use onboard devices rather than PCI cards the USB disconnects went away.
I’d also echo comments on MythTv channel setup – an absolute nightmare – use scandvb to generate channel information and import it into MythTv rather than trying the autoscan way.
On the subject of scandvb : files (at least for the UK) in /usr/share/dvb-apps/dvb-t and countless other places on the web contain transmitter information and many are wrong. Here’s an example for my local transmitter in /usr/share/dvb-apps/dvb-t/uk-Heathfield :
# Heathfield, South-east England
# T freq bw fec_hi fec_lo mod transmission-mode guard-interval hierarchy
T 538000 8MHz 3/4 NONE QAM64 2k 1/32 NONE
That last line should read:
T 578000000 8MHz 3/4 NONE QAM16 2k 1/32 NONE
You can put those corrected values into Myth and do a successful scan but I found it easier to use scandvb, edit the channels I wanted and then import them into MythTv.
Also note: if you use the -t 1 option (get TV channels only) with scandvb it misses some kosher tv channels (BBC3 and BBC4 at least) – no idea why – maybe ‘cos they’re shared with CBBC possibly?
Am currently investigating LIRC and /dev/input/eventX, will report back if I can get anything working.
I got a slight problem with a fail message in dmesg.
**WARNING** I2C adapter driver [DiBx000 tuner I2C bus] forgot to specify physical device; fix it!
what does that mean, and how do I fix it?
Rather than make a list of all the correct transmitter frequencies, the following may be useful to discover the values for yourself, this worked for me using the Nova-T-500 against the Ridge Hill transmitter that serves Tewkesbury-Worcs area, so it may work for others…
To find your local transmitter frequencies in the uk, you can use this link:
http://www.ukfree.tv/txlist.php
then:
To convert the channel number into a frequency that can be used by various Linux apps (including mythtv):
First calculate 306 + 8*N MHz, where N is the channel number. Then add or subtract 167 kHz
depending on the + or – in the tables above.
e.g. Crystal palace BBC(Multiplex 1) is shown as “25 -”
306 + 8 * 25 = 506MHz = 506000kHz
Apply the “-” offset:
506000 – 167 = 505833kHz
So the frequency line for the Crystal palace transmitter is 505833.
Thanxs for the accurate info. Once I got kernel 2.6.21.1 to actually work {opps on sis900 which required patching and libata is now history – another story as they say} I followed your instructions and got it running in sub 5 minutes. Working nicely with Mythtv.
Hi,
I just have changed my PC to a Core 2 Duo on a GA-965P-DS3P Gigabyte motherboard, with my previous Suse 10.2 system running on a kernel 2.6.20 (The TV worked fine). But now, the loading driver is ok (no error message), but the dmesg command return only :
dib0700: loaded with support for 2 different device-types
usbcore: registered new interface driver dvb_usb_dib0700
And no device was added into my /dev/ directory. And so my TV not work.
I have compiled my kernel and rewritten the firmware file, but nothing.
Anybody can help me?
Thanks for your help.
Thanks again Jonathan for this good notice.
Tryphon
Hi,
I’m running Ubuntu feisty AMD 64 bit version (2.6.20-16-generic) using a Hauppauge Nova T 500 card. I’ve followed the steps in your guide but can’t for the life of me get anything to show relating to the Hauppauge card up in dmesg. The only relevant output I do get from dmesg is the following:
1017.285395] usbcore: registered new interface driver dvb_usb_dib0700
I have copied the firmware to the /lib/firmware directory and set the permissions and ownership to match all existing files:
ls -al /lib/firmware/
total 48
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 2007-06-14 19:05 .
drwxr-xr-x 16 root root 4096 2007-06-06 20:29 ..
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 2007-06-06 20:19 2.6.20-15-generic
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 2007-06-14 18:34 2.6.20-16-generic
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 29955 2007-01-06 13:20 dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw
sudo modprobe dvb-usb-dib0700 gives no errors.
I have read that I should see a /dev/dvbt folder is the card has been correctly found, but I don’t.
Finally, lsusb shows the following:
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 003 Device 002: ID 2040:9951 Hauppauge
Does anyone have any idea what I could be doing wrong? I’m tearing my hair out trying to understand this.
Many thanks,
Edd
I’d like to get a NOVA-T-500 as well, but the “USB disconnect oops” problem bother me (as well as the lack of remote control support). I’m searching for a dual DVB-T card for use with MythTV (running on a VIA platform). But none of the two cards listed at linuxtv.org seems to work properly. Is there really no reliable card available? Would it be safer to bay two single-tuner NOVA-T cards instead?
If it’s any help, I think the kernal oops is only a serious/regular problem caused by using EIT (over the air listings), I have them disabled (using the rt grabber to populate the database) and everything works fine.
@Jon:
Interesting! I will disable EIT as soon as I get home to try this out.
I’m getting the same problem as Ed above. New AMD64 mATX box with a Nova-T 500. I’ve even tried putting it in my desktop (also AMD64) but I get the same results. lspci lists the card as Hauppage but not with the same details as posted and mentions ‘unknown device’. It’s not in front of me at the mo otherwise I’d have the full details.
Am probably going to RMA the card assuming that it’s a hardware problem and not my setup(s).
Hi Jonathan, thanks so much for this guide. Perhaps it’d be good to contribute this info directly into to the MythTV Nova-T wiki rather than be linked to from it?
Before reading the guide I had tried upgrading to Feisty, installing a new kernel binary 2.6.20-16-386, compiling the dvb drivers and swearing a lot but I hadn’t got anywhere.
After reading the guide I was able to get my adapters to appear in /dev/dvb:
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 120 2007-07-23 16:03 adapter0
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 120 2007-07-23 16:03 adapter1
modprobe didn’t report any errors, but running dmesg didn’t report any TV cards at all which confused me. I only realised later that running dmesg is different from viewing /var/log/dmesg with more/less. My fault! It’s there.
Anyway, the bit I didn’t get working was the GUI-based bit. I have no idea where to find “Device Drivers > Multimedia” and still can’t imagine where it fits into the kernel upgrade. Does this have something to do with installing it as a binary?
Thanks again, I’m so close I can smell it. (and thanks to everyone for the tuning guides – I would probably have given up there)
crouchingbadger
Hi,
I am having exactly the same problems as edd and george. Can i ask if you guys have the ‘diversity’ model, which has two aerial inputs on the card?
If so i think that this card has a different hardware configuration. I have posted a request for some help on ubuntu forums
Jonathan, i would be very grateful if you could have a look at it as i have posted the outputs of, lspci, lsusb, lsmod and i think it isn’t that far off working.
Thanks for any help or advice
toby
Good news everyone!
There has been a flurry of activity on the mailing list to do with disconnects/oopses and remote control support. From what I can gather the disconnects are *nearly* fixed and remote control support is also pretty much there (I would test the patches out but my mythbox is the other side of the country atm). The info on the patches required to the current hg repo is on the linuxtv wiki page for the nova 500 here. Instructions on installing from the repository on ubuntu are here
If possible can you please test these patches to see if they do fix the problems, also watch the mailing list for any other information/updates (archive is here).
Hopefully all of the problems should be fixed soon and the nova 500 will become one of the best dvb cards for linux
http://linuxtv.org/hg/v4l-dvb
“Add remote control support for the Hauppauge Nova-T 500″
d/l dvb source, make install ( http://www.linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/How_to_install_DVB_device_drivers ) and enjoy
i’m at work and i can’t test before saturday
Many thanks, that was most helpful, though I had a small problem.
I got to here:
“So, extract the file named “dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw” and copy it to the directory /lib/firmware. Then load the module dvb-usb-dib0700 using the following command:
modprobe dvb-usb-dib0700″
but the dmesg said it could not find the firmware file. I found that all items in /lib/firmware belonged to root except for dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw which was owned by mythtv, so I chownED it. No better. I tried making a symbolic link in /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware since I found several such links to firmware items there. No better. However, after a reboot:
dib0700: loaded with support for 2 different device-types
dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in cold state, will try to lo
ad a firmware
dvb-usb: downloading firmware from file ‘dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw’
dib0700: firmware started successfully.
dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in warm state.
dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.
DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
DVB: registering frontend 0 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)…
dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.
DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
DVB: registering frontend 1 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)…
dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T successfully initialized and connected.
usbcore: registered new interface driver dvb_usb_dib0700
and now at last dev/dvb exists:
[root@f764 dvb]# pwd
/dev/dvb
[root@f764 dvb]# ls -l *
adapter0:
total 0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 4 2007-09-09 14:48 demux0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 5 2007-09-09 14:48 dvr0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 3 2007-09-09 14:48 frontend0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 7 2007-09-09 14:48 net0
adapter1:
total 0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 68 2007-09-09 14:48 demux0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 69 2007-09-09 14:48 dvr0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 67 2007-09-09 14:48 frontend0
crw-rw—-+ 1 mythtv root 212, 71 2007-09-09 14:48 net0
[root@f764 dvb]#
My earlier experience was with a PVR 150, which simply delivered a /dev/video0, so I wondered for a while to know how to test the above with ivtv-tune
I found this “out there”:
“Apparently you “tune” using the frontend0 device and grab video output from the demux0 and dvr0 devices. I’m not sure what the net0 device is for.”
But now I get:
ivtv-tune -d frontend0 -f 218
ioctl VIDIOC_S_FREQUENCY failed
Anyway, I will struggle on from there and if I still have a brain, report more.
@Nick:
I have never used anything else than MythTV to tune for channels. Perhaps you can try to use Myth to see if the card works or not.
Jonathan
@Nick:
I just read about firmware loading. To reset your card and load another version of firmware, you have to do a cold reboot of your computer. Power off, pull the plug for a few seconds, and then power it back up again.
After a completely unplugged cold reboot, no different (:=((
I used a bash loop to run through:
ivtv-tune -d frontend0 -f 220.000 thru 229.875 in 1/8MHz increments, which should have caught the Australian ABC digital on 226.5
Zippo.
By the way, the card works well under (please excuse the phrase) Windo$e MCE.
RE: “try to use Myth”
I have run Myth before on a previous card (PVR 150) and the ivtv-tune was good. As the Myth install includes ivtv I would have thought that Myth is using ivtv-tune. But perhaps it is doing so in a correct way and I am not. I’ll try, but with low expectation!
Next: I went to http://www.linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/Testing_your_DVB_device
and installed the dvb-apps package easily on Fedora 7,
made sure (dmesg) the card firmware had installed OK, then did:
/usr/bin/scandvb /usr/share/dvb-apps/dvb-t/au-Sydney_North_Shore
with a perfect result. it started with:
scanning /usr/share/dvb-apps/dvb-t/au-Sydney_North_Shore
using ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/frontend0′ and ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/demux0′
and then ran through lots of frequencies and found the same 42 channels that MCE had found.
Then I tuned the card using dvb-apps tzap:
tzap -c /usr/share/doc/dvb-apps-1.1.1/channels.conf-dvbt-australia -r “ABC HDTV”
which said:
using ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/frontend0′ and ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/demux0′
tuning to 226500000 Hz
video pid 0×0903, audio pid 0×0000
status 03 | signal 97d3 | snr 0000 | ber 001fffff | unc 00000000 |
status 1f | signal 97e7 | snr 0000 | ber 000008c0 | unc 000008ea | FE_HAS_LOCK
the last line of which repeats every second till you CTRL C, but I left it going, and in another window:
mplayer /dev/dvb/adapter0/dvr0
which gave out a heap of good and bad reports, but WHEHEY I am now looking at a (mute!) ABC programme!
Some feel TV is best seen and not heard (:-))
Much progress! I’ve documented it here in the hope it helps others.
On with the mythtv build; will it now work for me?
Finally cracked the mute HDTV issue, thanks to others on great blogs & forums
The earlier-mentioned scandvb gave me (in Sydney) 42 lines like these:
SBS HD:571500000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:102:103:768
where the last three numbers are the video pid (102 here), the audio pid (103 here) and another number (768 here) which I do not know about. Here’s NINE HDTV though:
NINE HD:191625000:INVERSION_AUTO:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_3_4:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:0:5
Note that the audio pid is 0. scandvb has on this occasion failed to pick it because it is AC3. Hmmm? Seems most Aussie HDTV channels use AC3 for the audio.
Never mind. Here’s the trick. First, tune to NINE HD
# tzap -c /usr/bin/channels -r “NINE HD”
using ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/frontend0′ and ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/demux0′
tuning to 191625000 Hz
video pid 0×0200, audio pid 0×0000
status 03 | signal b59b | snr 0000 | ber 001fffff | unc 00000000 |
status 1f | signal b5c2 | snr 0000 | ber 00000000 | unc 00000438 | FE_HAS_LOCK
and while that is running, in another terminal:
# scandvb -c ie just scan the currently tuned frequency
using ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/frontend0′ and ‘/dev/dvb/adapter0/demux0′
0×0000 0×0001: pmt_pid 0×0100 Nine Network — NINE DIGITAL (running)
0×0000 0×0005: pmt_pid 0×0101 Nine Network — NINE HD (running)
0×0000 0×0006: pmt_pid 0×0102 Nine Network — NINE GUIDE (running)
dumping lists (3 services)
NINE DIGITAL (0×0001) 01: PCR 0×0087 V 0×0207 A 0×02d0 (eng) TT 0×0247 AC3 0×02d1
NINE HD (0×0005) 01: PCR 0×0080 V 0×0200 TT 0×0240 AC3 0×028a GOTCHA!!!!!!!!!!
NINE GUIDE (0×0006) 01: PCR 0×0085 V 0×0205 A 0×02bc (eng)
Done.
So now you know that NINE HD audio pid is 0×028a a.k.a 650, so edit that in to the end of the correct line in the channels file:
….HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:5
And it works!
One remaining challenge: find anything worth watching on NINE sigh (:=((
Final note: from the above it looks like some standard digital channels are offering both mpeg and AC3 eg NINE on audio pid 0×02d0 (720) AND on AC3 pid 0×02d1 (721) so altering the NINE digital channel audio pid to 721 gets you AC3 if you like that more than mpeg2. Haven’t a clue myself yet!
Hope this helps someone! And thanks again Jon for your work and site.
I have tried to record svt-hd with this card, partly succsessfully. i.e. i get picture and sound but the picture stutters (works fine for a couple of seconds) then freezes. The cpu load is about 10%.
//Björn
Hey,
Thanks for the great guide it helped me get the 500 installed. Unfortunatly I had to re-compile the kernel which is always fun
In reply to Nick Sharp.
You posted
—————————————
“So, extract the file named “dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw” and copy it to the directory /lib/firmware. Then load the module dvb-usb-dib0700 using the following command:
modprobe dvb-usb-dib0700″
but the dmesg said it could not find the firmware file”
——————————–
rename your firmware from dvb-usb-dib0700-01.fw to dvb-usb-dib0700.fw and re-run the modprobe. (remove the -01 from the end !)
Hello!
Great guide and I got my card up and running in no time.
But still havn’t got the remote to work…but according to this site it probably should work…
MythTV wiki
Anyone who managed to follow this guide and gotten the remote to work??
The information from “dmesg | grep DVB” should be something like…
…
[ 34.224298] DVB: registering frontend 1 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)…
[ 34.787147] input: IR-receiver inside an USB DVB receiver as /class/input/input4
[ 34.787308] dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T successfully initialized and connected.
…but I don’t get the “…input: IR-receiver…” row when I grep.
Any ideas folks?
Live long and free!
Tada!!
Did a clean installation of Ubuntu Linux and followed the guide above again and everything worked just super.
Both TV-Card and remote control is now working flawless on my Ubuntu mashine.
It took a lot longer time to create a good xorg.conf though and the nvidia-new-drivers playing tricks with me.
But solved that too. I wanted to have the normal Linux desktop on my monitor but output MythTV-frontend to my TV (connected by composite cable to my graphics card).
Works great on Ubuntu 7.10 – just needs the firmware
I can’t find the dib0700 driver when using “make menuconfig”, is there something i need to enable to be able to find the driver?
I have the sourcefiles anyway..
/usr/src/linux-2.6.21.3/drivers/media/dvb/dvb-usb/dib0700.h
/usr/src/linux-2.6.21.3/drivers/media/dvb/dvb-usb/dib0700_core.c
/usr/src/linux-2.6.21.3/drivers/media/dvb/dvb-usb/dib0700_devices.c
Under the 2.6.23 kernel, in order for menuconfig to give you an option for the dib0700, one needs to also enable i2c and usb higher up in the menu chain. Then under multimedia devices select DVB for Linux (you know that) and DVB/ATSC adaptors, lo and behold, the DiBcom DiB0700 option appears. Hope this helps, took me a couple of hours to find. — bb
Just wanted to say “good work” and drop some credits! Great information, this helped me (togather with another article) to build a HTPC running MythTV under Ubuntu. And I’ve never even used Linux before.
@ Mattias Sjöblom
How did you achieve this? I’ve been trying to switch between three different firmwares, the oldest one being the one uploaded on this page and the newest on http://linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/Hauppauge_WinTV-NOVA-T-500#Firmware.
None of them gives anything similiar to “[ 34.787147] input: IR-receiver inside an USB DVB receiver as /class/input/input4″.
I just get:
“[ 38.296185] dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in cold state, will try to load a firmware
[ 39.060961] dvb-usb: found a ‘Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T’ in warm state.
[ 39.061389] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 39.190806] DVB: registering frontend 0 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)…
[ 39.779489] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T).
[ 39.786412] DVB: registering frontend 1 (DiBcom 3000MC/P)…
[ 40.424725] dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-T 500 Dual DVB-T successfully initialized and connected.
”
Nothing about the IR thing…
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