Digital Television DTV

[Jan Panteltje]

Hi Jan,

Paul's point is, I guess, that most consumers would want a set top box
that simply enables them to keep watching TV on their usual sets when it
all goes digital. Some have invested considerable money into their large
screen analog sets and they don't want to let that go to waste.

A PC is not really a solution for many. There is no PC in the living
room and they don't want to place one there. Neither do they want to
have that PC crash in the middle of a football game. Plus it's noisy
with all that fan buzz and hard drive activity.

Regards, Joerg

Crash?????????????????? In Linux?????????????????? has not happened here
in the last years...
Did you read what I wrote? Put PC somewhere else if need be.
In EUROPE at least all modern TVs (after the seventies) and other video
equipment have a SCART connector, and that is composite and RGB.
So and for HDTV they would HAVE to buy a different 'display device' anyways.
But my DTV card has composite out too, so you can connect your old round tube
color set.....
And it is not always true (very often not true) that the PC is in an other room.
Poor windows user, poor poor windows user, poor poor poor poor windows user.
CRASH snif sniff, woaaaahahaoooaoaoa so sorry for you, why not erase that
virus and install Linux.
JP

 

[Joerg]

Hi Jan,

Agree than Linux is better than Windows. But again, think consumer here.
If they can buy a PC that does all the stuff they want with Linux, ok.
But currently most of them can't. Placing the PC in another room? Drill
holes in the wall? Then hear that hiss from the water pipe your drill
just hit? Regular consumers are not going to do that. In our case there
even is no room next to where the TV is located. It would sit in the
rain and snow.

We don't have SCART here but most TVs are equipped with RCA jacks for
audio and video. And no, people do not want to buy a new TV for HDTV if
some program only airs in that format. They will want a box with some
gizmo in there that converts from HDTV to SDTV. And they don't want to
know how that works, just that it can be bought cheaply at Walmart and
gets the football game onto the TV. This is how many consumers think and
engineers have to please them by developing that stuff.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Joel Kolstad]

Plus it's noisy
with all that fan buzz and hard drive activity.

There's more attention paid to 'quiet PCs' these days than you might
think... it's a concern for business users as well (people with $$$) and
many PC 'enthusiasts' have joined the bandwagon. There's no difficulty in
finding a PC that makes no more noise than a stereo amplifier (many of these
also have fans) and a TiVO (contains a hard drive) combined.

 

[PaulCsouls]

Not exactly sure I get your point here?
As far as settop (standalone) box versus PC(I) card goes, I use a PCI card
for DTV, and the PC is always on as server anyways... RGB out for those
that need it... recording directly to harddisk, can watch on monitor too,
if the noise is a problem you could put the PC in a cabinet or other room even,
I know in Europe many people have networked (ethernet) computers, and a cheap
old box for the DTV (Linux VDR), something to do with decrypt too, nice to have
the PC, can write your own soft, new PC take card with you if need be...
JP

Interesting. How does that work? When you want to change the channel,
do you have to type at the keyboard?

Paul

 

[Joerg]

Hi Joel,

This would be nice. If you have some links these may be useful to many
here in this NG.

Some day there needs to be a silent PC in the affordable "Walmart
category". That's what really drives technology into the living rooms.
Even TiVo didn't quite make it. Our neighborhood with quite a few
retirees (disposable income is there in many cases) hasn't seen one yet.
But everybody except us appears to have a couple thousand or so invested
in a huge TV. Analog ones. They will not part with these, meaning
anything that is going to be sold either as technology or as media
content needs to play on these large analog screens.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Joel Kolstad]

This would be nice. If you have some links these may be useful to many
here in this NG.

Some of the hard-core guys hang out here: http://www.silentpcreview.com/ ,
as well as the various forums on, e.g., forums.anantech.com. You'll notice
that SilentPCReview there concentrates on the cases, since the power supply
fan and any additional case fan are usually the biggest offenders. Building
PCs with just 'one big fan' (120mm is popular) is a good start, and after
that the goal is biiig heat sinks for the CPUs so that slow fans work,
paying some attention to which CPUs draw how much power (sometimes die
shrinks don't always correspond to a decrease in power since meanwhile
Intel/AMD will simultaneously crank the clock or add features), and finding
a graphics card and motherboard with passive heatsinks.

'Quiet' and 'high perfornance' are definitely somewhat at odds with one
another when building a PC, but for a living room computer most people don't
need anywhere near cutting edge PC performance anyway. (Indeed, some of the
'super high performance' freaks who overclock their machines to insane
values are very proud of the fact that their PC makes more noise than an M1
Abrams...)

My mother has one of these:
http://usa.asus.com/products/desktop/pundit/overview.htm ...that's very
quiet. Recent Dell 'business' class machines are too (we had them where I
used to work). I have one of these cases:
http://www.antec-inc.com/us/pro_details_enclosure.php?ProdID=15130 ... and
it's about the quietest case I know of for a standard microATX moatherboard.

Some day there needs to be a silent PC in the affordable "Walmart
category". That's what really drives technology into the living rooms.

Yes, good point.

Even TiVo didn't quite make it. Our neighborhood with quite a few
retirees (disposable income is there in many cases) hasn't seen one yet.

Don't those folks ever venture to a Best Buy or Circuit City? Shocking!

Seriously, though, Wal*Mart has just started selling ATI's 'All In Wonder'
series of video cards, which are the ones integrating audio/video input and
output: http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=2054 . I like the
mention of how -- unlike the typical ATI box -- the Wal*Mart versions will
have clear plastic windows so that customers will know what they're getting
without having to rip open the box first.

But everybody except us appears to have a couple thousand or so invested
in a huge TV. Analog ones. They will not part with these, meaning
anything that is going to be sold either as technology or as media
content needs to play on these large analog screens.

Fair enough; I do expect that HDTV converter boxs will qiuckly hit $99 and
eventually sink to $49 or less, just as (cheap!) DVD players have.

---Joel

 

[Jan Panteltje]

Interesting. How does that work? When you want to change the channel,
do you have to type at the keyboard?

There is a remote control LIRC you can use.
Have a look at this link:
http://www.cadsoft.de/vdr/
and for some about the IR remote
http://www.cadsoft.de/vdr/features.htm
There are many programs around for this, I wrote for example xcha
http://ip51cf87c4.direct-adsl.nl/panteltje/satellite/
It does some nice things, has a GUI, and could decode too, but that is
no longer on the website, so as to protect you from the DCMA.
It does not have IR remote, but it can be added.
For the more sophisticated stuff, such as multiple languages recording,
and making DVDs see
http://ip51cf87c4.direct-adsl.nl/panteltje/dvd/
JP

 

[PaulCsouls]

http://www.cadsoft.de/vdr/
and for some about the IR remote
http://www.cadsoft.de/vdr/features.htm
There are many programs around for this, I wrote for example xcha
http://ip51cf87c4.direct-adsl.nl/panteltje/satellite/
It does some nice things, has a GUI, and could decode too, but that is
no longer on the website, so as to protect you from the DCMA.
It does not have IR remote, but it can be added.
For the more sophisticated stuff, such as multiple languages recording,
and making DVDs see
http://ip51cf87c4.direct-adsl.nl/panteltje/dvd/
JP

Cool. I wonder if the direction technology is going is our TVs are
going to be whole lot like our PCs. Microsoft would love it, but maybe
that could be Linux's Killer Ap.

Paul

 

[Jan Panteltje]

Cool. I wonder if the direction technology is going is our TVs are
going to be whole lot like our PCs. Microsoft would love it, but maybe
that could be Linux's Killer Ap.

Paul

Well, the fun thing is of cause (and I am proud of this) that we started in
Linux several years ago with digital TV on the PC (www.linuxtv.org) and at
that time it was totally unknown (most you had was a digitizer, then xawtv).
When the Technotrend (Germany) company came out with the first DVB-s card,
that caused a huge demand for that stuff.
(Hauppauge is the same card, and sold under different names in many places)
Because processor speed had just reached (I did it on a 400MHz K6) a point
where you could do real time video on a PC, the momentum was created.
Much much later Billy The Gates woke up, and of cause wanted some (if not all)
part(s) of it.
The question is indeed: Should we make the PC the 'home entertainment solution',
or will we have a thousand boxes in our house - for example a settop box for
satellite, one for cable, one for VOIP, so one for each service....
I am not a big fan of this, as many people have their own server and website,
VOIP wil require a constant connection to the internet, so in many places there
simply will be no PLACE for all these gadgets (think if you are young, lived
in a simple bedsit 1 room+kitchen, no way can you have all that stuff).
So a 'mainframe' solution is not a bad idea at all (not the mention the
interconnect problems you'd have with separate units (people do not like all
these cables).
So in my view a powerful computer can take care of all that advanced stuff,
can be updated over the internet...
But it will require stability, and not a 'reboot to activate this change you
just made' (is this still in Xp?) so that rules MS windows out then ;-)?
IBM is now a big promoter of Linux, and I think there is a good market here,
have the PC as 'media mainframe'.
The place for MS will be competing with RedHat and Suse with MSwintux hehe.
As for that trojan virus Xp, well, it seems to have infected most computers
in the world, and it should be outlawed of cause
JP

 

[Joerg]

Hi Jan,

This mainframe solution you mentioned has already been tried. I forgot
the company but it was in Silicon Valley. They crammed whatever video
stuff was available into a PC and the whole thing cost around $1000. Not
so low noise though. But it could do everything except play VCR tapes.

There is a market and as you said it will be younger people. But it must
be marketed in one fell swoop. Think big here. Plenty of advertisement,
available in large local stores and so on. Ideally at discounters where
people by food, clothing etc. Otherwise it won't catch because people
tend not to buy niche products when it comes to household stuff.

Of course, no crashing allowed or folks will return that product by the
droves and render the manufacturer bankrupt. I don't know about Linux'
stability but Win is too risky here. A simple gray box saying nothing
more that "A communications error has occurred" will lead to angry
customers, and that leads to returns. Same for "this program cannot be
closed, it is being debugged" and so on. The max wait time for any
response to an entry on the remote must be 1/2 second or less. For
channel changes that needs to be 100 milliseconds or so. Because they
are used to that.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Tue, 01 Jun 2004 17:24:40 GMT) it happened Joerg

response to an entry on the remote must be 1/2 second or less. For
channel changes that needs to be 100 milliseconds or so. Because they
are used to that.

Very difficult to get 100ms zap time on satellite!
Sometimes here it locks in, goes out, locks in goes out, locks (China CCTV),
maybe takes a second.
But I have an old card.
JP

 

[Joerg]

Hi Jan,

Very difficult to get 100ms zap time on satellite!
Sometimes here it locks in, goes out, locks in goes out, locks (China CCTV),
maybe takes a second.
But I have an old card.

That sounds like something is wrong. I have never seen a difference
between Sat , cable and terrestrial when it comes to zap time. Always
nearly instant. It has to be or people would cancel the respective
service, at least out here.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Jan Panteltje]

Hi Jan,

That sounds like something is wrong. I have never seen a difference
between Sat , cable and terrestrial when it comes to zap time. Always
nearly instant. It has to be or people would cancel the respective
service, at least out here.

Regards, Joerg

It has nothing to do with the service, it has every thing to do with the tuner
PLL in the card.
JP

 

[Jan Panteltje]

And, BTW, if the channel is encrypted, it will take even a MUCH longer time for
the decode to start and the screen to change from black to whatever.
Not to mention you chaning smartcard etc..
So, get a digital system and get some hands on experience, my advice.
JP

 

[Joerg]

Hi Jan,

It has nothing to do with the service, it has every thing to do with the tuner
PLL in the card.

Yeah, I really hate some PLLs. The "new" car radios are similar. You
have to press and hold a button to change stations. Even the ones with a
knob have a lot of delay. The "old" radios were so much better since you
could change stations the instant that commercials came on. But at least
the preset buttoms work faster.

Some of it has to do with the fact that few design engineers seem to not
be capable of designing multi-loop PLLs. One noisy loop that is fast and
gets to the station right away, then a slower one to lock precisely and
lower in noise.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Joerg]

Hi Jan,

So, get a digital system and get some hands on experience, my advice.

I will but only under two conditions. First, the programming must be
worth it. Can't really say that for many of our current TV channels.
Second condition, it must be at reasonable cost. If a DTV set top box
comes for under $100, then I'd give it a shot if I'd miss something
worthwhile without it.

HDTV? I am not a great sports fan and, quite frankly, I don't see much
value in it for regular TV consumption such as newscasts or an old movie
(those seem to be the only good ones).

Regards, Joerg

 

[Jan Panteltje]

Hi Jan,

I will but only under two conditions. First, the programming must be
worth it. Can't really say that for many of our current TV channels.
Second condition, it must be at reasonable cost. If a DTV set top box
comes for under $100, then I'd give it a shot if I'd miss something
worthwhile without it.

HDTV? I am not a great sports fan and, quite frankly, I don't see much
value in it for regular TV consumption such as newscasts or an old movie
(those seem to be the only good ones).

Regards, Joerg

As for HDTV, well, I just posted in dvdtech
'If you are bothered by the lines in your 800x600 progressive monitor display, THEN you want HDTV'.
My view.
As for channel change when encryption (here in Europe, pretty sure US is the same)
a new challenge is send every TEN seconds to the conditional access module (CAM),
and the smart card inserted decrypts that (with a slow clock and a slow baud serial
link), and provides the CW (code word) used to decrypt the transport stream
the NEXT 10 seconds.
So, worst case, if changing (zapping) from a non-encrypted to an encrypted channel
you may face TEN seconds black.
I zapping between encrypted channels of the same group (provider), the CW
will still be valid and likely you get pic really fast.
If zapping between different encryption standards you may have to manually
change your smartcard. If zapping between encrypted - non encrypted - encrypted
with the same system within 10 seconds you may be lucky and not have to wait.
It is all in the game.
Theoretical maximum.
Some receivers have slots for 2 smartcards, so you can zap systems without having
toget up from your chair and change cards.
JP

 

[Joerg]

Hi Jan,

As for channel change when encryption (here in Europe, pretty sure US is the same)
a new challenge is send every TEN seconds to the conditional access module (CAM),
and the smart card inserted decrypts that (with a slow clock and a slow baud serial
link), and provides the CW (code word) used to decrypt the transport stream
the NEXT 10 seconds.
So, worst case, if changing (zapping) from a non-encrypted to an encrypted channel
you may face TEN seconds black.
I zapping between encrypted channels of the same group (provider), the CW
will still be valid and likely you get pic really fast.
If zapping between different encryption standards you may have to manually
change your smartcard. If zapping between encrypted - non encrypted - encrypted
with the same system within 10 seconds you may be lucky and not have to wait.
It is all in the game.

That I have never seen at neighbors who have Sat TV or cable. I guess it could be done smarter technically. Why not download all decryption schemes that the subscriber has paid for at the beginning of the session? That way they are all stored in the box.

Pay TV is another matter. Most units here have to dial out on the phone line after three free minutes of snooping or so.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Jan Panteltje]

Hi Jan,

That I have never seen at neighbors who have Sat TV or cable. I guess it could be done smarter technically. Why not download all
decryption schemes that the subscriber has paid for at the beginning of the session? That way they are all stored in the box.

The challence is only send in the transport stream every 10 seconds.
So for anything to be decoded, the card must get it, decode it, and send back
to the system, (I just checked, counted 8 seconds before pic unlock).
Then wait for the next group that uses that CW to have a picture.
(and that may take up to a little less then 10 seconds).

Pay TV is another matter. Most units here have to dial out on the phone line after three free minutes of snooping or so.

Eh, perhaps, but that is only for charging, nothing to do with teh basic
DTV satellite system.
JP

 

[Joerg]

Hi Jan,

The challence is only send in the transport stream every 10 seconds.
So for anything to be decoded, the card must get it, decode it, and send back
to the system, (I just checked, counted 8 seconds before pic unlock).
Then wait for the next group that uses that CW to have a picture.
(and that may take up to a little less then 10 seconds).

That sounds like a pretty antiquated scheme. Why can't they send a
common code for all channels and then the card only lets those be active
that the subscriber has paid for? Could be rotated regularly to avoid
cheats, like the rotating code on garage door openers.

Pay TV is another matter. Most units here have to dial out on the phone line after three free minutes of snooping or so.


Eh, perhaps, but that is only for charging, nothing to do with teh basic
DTV satellite system.

Actually out here it is also for enabling viewing. Without paying up you
will not see anything but an allowed preview time.

Regards, Joerg