Last Update: 16/07/2006
This FAQ refers to the latest design for the Nova-t which is sold as Nova-t PCI 909, Nova-t MCE and Nova-t USB2. The Nova-t 90002 is identifiable by Nova-t 90002 on the tuner module, RF passthrough in addition to RF In and an LED above the tuner (see image). If you have the older model (TechnoTrend Budget DVB-T PCI) please consult this FAQ instead. Note: the old model was also called 909 in addition to 928 so you should go by the card layout as shown below.
General
What is the current software version?
Why can't I install version 2.17?
Can I listen to Audio Described programmes?
I get a garbled image but sound is fine
I'm getting really high CPU usage when viewing TV
I get popping/clicking/squeaking sounds with my nForce2 motherboard
Why is the antenna passthrough quality so poor?
Why do I only have 4 devices not 7 indicated in the manual?
How can I connect my PS2/GameCube/X-Box/VCR to the Nova-t?
Can I tune analogue broadcasts?
Do you have detailed information on the hardware?
System Requirements
Does this card work on Windows 98 or Windows ME?
What operating systems are supported?
Can I use the Nova-t 90002/USB2 in Windows XP MCE?
Can I use the Nova-t USB2 on a USB 1.x port?
Does the Nova-t USB2 require a power adapter?
I get a BSOD (or reboot) with Nova-t USB2
Is there any known bad hardware?
Is there any known bad software?
Is there any known good hardware?
Should I uninstall Sygate Personal Firewall?
Driver Problems
Resource conflict with AGP graphics card
Graphics card stuck in 16 color
Startup Errors
I get a crash in hcwTVWND.dll when starting WinTV2000 with nForce Audio
"WinTV Initialisation Error. htv=0" error on startup
I get "Couldn't Open Database" error starting WinTV2000 on other user accounts
Wales - crash in MSJTES40.DLL on startup
I installed latest WinTV2000 and now nothing works
Channel Scanning
When scanning for channels WinTV2000 crashes
How can I view Top-Up TV channels?
When scanning I only get 3 bars
Scanning stops immediately with no channels found
No channels are listed after scan but 74 are found
I don't get BBC Four/CBeebies/BBC Three/CBBC Channel etc
Why do I get duplicate channels?
System unresponsive/slow during channel scan
But my aerial is a digital aerial
Live Viewing
Why is the image distorted (stretched)?
Why do some channels have black bars up the sides?
Why is horizontal movement jerky/blurry?
How can I change subtitle languages?
Recording
My recordings have glitches at regular intervals
When recording in WinTV2000 I get stuttering and pixellation after 20 minutes or so
What file size are recordings split at?
After a few hours recording WinTV2000 crashes
When I try to record a radio station it says it's not supported
When I try to record Mux A (Five, QVC, abc1, bid-up.tv etc.) I get an error message
How can I record in DivX/XviD/MPEG4/AVI for better quality?
How can I reduce/increase the bitrate for smaller filesizes/better quality?
Why can't I change the Quality Level setting?
Can I pause recording during advert breaks?
Why can't I record radio to MP3 format?
How can I record radio in MP2 format?
Which apps can playback recordings?
Pause/Time-Shifting
I can only pause 30 minutes or so and then it overwrites the beginning
File Playback/Conversion
When I try to play back recordings in PowerDVD/WMP/xxxxx they play at half speed/stutter/freeze
Can the Hauppauge MediaMVP play back recordings?
MediaMVP gives "Invalid Media Format" when playing back recordings
How can I burn recordings to DVD?
Scheduler
When I start WinTV Scheduler I get a "Couldn't initialize DLL" error
Can I schedule programmes to be recorded while my PC is in standby/hibernate?
"Error, could not create program" when adding scheduled timer
Digital Teletext
The Digital Teletext application gives a "No Supported Hardware Found" error message
Does WinTV2000 support MHEG5 interactive text?
3rd Party Software
ShowShifter DVB gives an error message when selecting the card
Can the remote control be used for other programs?
What 3rd party software supports the Nova-t?
Windows XP MCE
Can I use dual tuners under Windows XP MCE 2005?
WinTV2000 doesn't find any channels on MCE2005
I get a "Decoder Error" error message
Why don't Hauppauge include an MCE-compatible MPEG2 decoder?
Live TV freezes with Live TV and/or video playback fails to start
Can the remote be used to type letters?
MCE gives "No Tuner Available" after driver update
Can I listen to DVB-T radio in Media Center?
Can I use an FM tuner with the Nova-t in Media Center?
I get a "pop" from my speakers when I start Live TV
ITV1 and ITV2 don't have any Guide Data
It doesn't work, MCE/Hauppauge suck!
Tweaks
How can I disable the Now/Next EPG?
How can I remove the animation on record/pause features?
Can I change mouse click behaviour?
Please see the Hauppauge UK forum for the latest software.
Version 1.0
Initial Release
Version 1.1 (30/07/2004)
Fixed problems with unexpected termination of program
Fixed remote buttons not working
Fixed various aspect ratio switch problems
Added support for DVB-T radio listening
Version 1.2 (18/10/2004)
Driver Build 22285
Fixed interrupt bug (discontinuity after 65535 interrupts)
Fixed some recording start errors
Fixed some remote button mappings
Various fixes for some countries
Added Now/Next
Added Subtitle display and recording
Added DVB-T radio recording
Added Teletext (VTPlus) for European users
Added support for multiple languages
Added support for Microsoft MCE remote in IR32
Improved recordings MediaMVP compatibility
Improved channel scanning performance
MCE Drivers (13/12/2004) - Download
Driver Build 22345 (WHQL)
Add support for dual Nova-t 90002 cards under XP MCE2005
WHQL certified
Version 1.3 (18/01/2005)
Software Build 23004
Driver Build 22285
Note: Version 1.3 still includes the same 90002 drivers as v1.2 (22285). There is a separate driver package with just drivers available from here.
Support for new Nova-t USB2 hardware
Fixes for channel scanning in Australia
Fixes for scanning VHF frequencies
Fixes for channel scanning errors under XP SP2
Fixed recording errors
Version 2.0 (02/05/2005)
Software Build 23111
Driver Build 23082 (WHQL)
Support dual Nova-t PCI cards in MCE2005
Support PVR+DTT combination in WinTV2000 (e.g. PVR150/250/350 & Nova-t)
Support for new HVR-1100 hardware
Support channel re-ordering
Support wake from standby for scheduled recordings
Change "Strength" meter to "Quality"
Drivers gained WHQL certification
Improved MPEG2 writing (PVAStrumento now works)
Improved handling of multiple transmitters
Fix to workaround MCE2005 Guide problems with Nova-t USB2
Fix WinTV2000 not scanning on MCE2005
Fix crashes on channel scan
Fix crashes when running for extended period
"Fix" 3rd party apps not finding muxes on +/-167KHz (originally done for MCE2004)
Fix Italy channel scanning with Nova-t PCI
Fix Taiwan/Australia channel scanning with Nova-t USB2
Fix recording channels with long GOP size
Fix some scheduler bugs
MCE Drivers (31/05/2005) - Download
Driver Build 23151 (WHQL)
Multi-Instance support for MCE2005. This will allow 3rd party software to access the card without having to stop the Media Center Receiver service.
WHQL Certified
Version 2.1 (24/06/2005)
Software Build 23175
Driver Build 23151
Update PCI/HVR driver to 23151 (see above)
Add support for new HVR-1300
Snapshot resolution changed to match DVB broadcast resolution
Fix some DVB Recorder errors
Improve Windows multiple user accounts
Suite Manager working faster with Nova-t PCI
More changes to MPEG2 multiplexor (improve compatability)
You can download the help/resource files for v2.1 below:
Drop these into the \WinTV2K\Helps folder before installing (e.g. c:\hcw21nova-t\wintv2k\helps). I don't know which other languages are required - please let me know (Finland? etc.)
MCE Drivers (27/07/2005) - Download
Driver Build 23208 (WHQL)
Fix transport stream errors introduced with 23151 driver
Fix no audio for non-admin users with HVR-1100
Improve default comb filter settings for PAL users
Make comb filter adjustable via registry
Version 2.2 (15/08/2005)
Software Build 23224
Driver Build 23208
Add support for new Nova-S-Plus (retail satellite card)
Add support for new Nova-SE2 (OEM satellite card)
Fix DVB-T recording failures
Version 2.3
Software Build 23313
Driver Build 23208/23189/23304
Note: From now on driver builds will be listed as: Conexant 88x/Nova-t-USB2/HVR-900
Add support for new HVR-900 hybrid USB 2.0 stick
Version 2.4 (xx/12/2005)
Software Build 23354
Driver Build 23339
Update HVR-900 driver to support UK analogue text
New GUI for suite manager scanning
Resolve UK Mux D scanning problem (no channels found)
Support using DVB and PVR cards together (verified Chelsea and Dering Harbor working)
Version 2.17, 2.18 and 2.19 are for the old Nova-t PCI (before August 2004)
Please see:
No, you can only listen to the main stream OR the audio description stream at once - not both mixed together.
Some graphics card drivers have issues with VMR (Video Mixing Renderer) which is the default renderer on Windows XP. Either try updated graphics card drivers, or use the following procedure to switch to Overlay:
VIA AC97 onboard sound appears to cause higher than average CPU usage on some systems. If possible try the default Windows XP drivers or the updated VIA Stylus audio drivers from here.
Primary sets the video rendering mode used by WinTV2000 and its name comes from a long time ago when you would often need to fall back to the "DirectDraw Primary" mode from Overlay.
Some nForce2 boards behave really badly with PCI cards when using a PS/2 keyboard and APIC (note: NOT ACPI) when Spread Spectrum is enabled in that interrupts can be delayed or missed altogether, especially when typing. It isn't specific to the Nova-t 90002 and affects any PCI card to some extent. The Nova-t 90002 can now cover up the glitch (as of Version 1.2) but sound cards will still exhibit the problem if their drivers don't allow for the delayed interrupts.
The easiest and most reliable fix is to just disable AGP/PCI/FSB Spread Spectrum in the BIOS (whichever are available). This problem only appears to affect the MCP2 and MCP-T southbridges - the newer MCP-S/MCP-RAID (and later) southbridges do not have this problem which may be some kind of timer drift (and APIC may be more sensitive to this than XT-PIC). On some motherboard's BIOS it isn't possible to disable Spread Spectrum directly and must be disabled by setting "Expert" CPU settings, changing the FSB to +1MHz higher than your default (don't save yet) and then back to the normal FSB (save settings now). e.g. If you have a Barton on a 166MHz bus increase the FSB to 167MHz and then back down to 166MHz.
If that fails then the best solution is to disable APIC. You can do this one of two ways, either reinstall Windows with APIC Disabled in the BIOS, or by following this procedure (uninstall nVidia SW IDE beforehand):
Note: If you have nVidia SW IDE installed (version 2.6) you may have an unbootable system if you make this change, although it hasn't been confirmed by nVidia. Due to numerous problems with this particular version of the SW IDE driver (included with nForce drivers 5.10) I'd recommend avoiding it altogether and sticking with the Microsoft IDE drivers as there is no noticeable performance gain anyway but a good chance of weird glitches.
This only applies to retail NOVA-T PCI boards with IR. The HVR boards use a different tuner and it is an FM radio input, not an RF-Out although the connector looks the same.
A lot of people appear to have problems with quality output from the RF Out connector. The reason for this is that many motherboards cannot supply sufficient voltage to power the amplified splitter in the tuner (this only affects the splitter performance, the tuner itself works fine). The best thing to do is to split the signal before the TV card if you really need to attach other devices. If you are in a strong signal area you should be OK with a simple Y-splitter but everywhere else it is recommended to use a powered splitter.
Please note this only applies to the Nova-t PCI, not the HVR-1100, HVR-1300
This is a mistake in the documentation; there should only be 4 devices shown in device manager as shown below (Nova-t PCI):
For the Nova-t USB2 there will be one device in Device Manager called Hauppauge Nova-USB2-T DVB-T Adapter:
You can't. The Nova-t 90002 only has a digital tuner and no auxiliary inputs.
There is a new card called the HVR-1100 which is a hybrid DVB-T and Analogue design. It is suitable for connecting to a games console and should be available in Europe in May 2005.
No, the Nova-t PCI (90002) only has a digital capable tuner.
There are two new cards which are either out now or will be soon which can tune analogue as well as digital:
Subtitle support was added in version 1.2. Enable it by clicking on the "CC" (Closed Captioning) button.
Hauppauge traditionally use two model numbers for their cards. First of all is the model number that shops will refer to, and for the Nova-t PCI this is Model 909. There is some confusion here because the old Nova-t PCI (based on TechnoTrend Budget DVB-T PCI board) was also the Model 909, so most of us refer to the new card (post-August 2004) by it's specific board-type number: 90002.
The 90xxx family of boards are known collectively as "Chelsea" which is the PCB design and these come in various types (one comes with IR support, another has S-Video inputs etc.). The retail board is the 90002 and has IR support and a Thomson tuner module.
The 90002 is known as the Nova-t PCI Model 909 (see above Q&A) and by now all Nova-t PCI stock should be a 90002 board.
Yes, please see this page.
No, these End-Of-Life operating systems don't have support for BDA and so this card cannot work with them or most other modern DVB-T cards. Windows 2000 and Windows XP are supported.
If you do need Windows 9x compatibility then look for an older Philips-chipped Nova-t PCI card on eBay, or get the DEC2000-t.
Windows 98 - No
Windows 98SE - No
Windows Me - No
Windows 2000 - No
Windows 2000 SP1 - No
Windows 2000 SP2 - No
Windows 2000 SP3 - No
Windows 2000 SP4 - Yes - Working but not formally supported
Windows XP - No
Windows XP SP1 - Yes - Nova-t PCI supported, for Nova-t USB2 install KB822603
Windows XP SP2 - Yes - Fully supported - recommended O.S.
Windows XP MCE2005 - Yes - Supported in Media Center environment
Windows XP x64 - Not Officially - Conexant reference drivers can be made to work with the Nova-t PCI, HVR-1100 and HVR-1300
In all cases ensure that DirectX 9.0c is installed. If you have a pirated copy of Windows XP and hence can't install Service Pack 1 or 2 then you're out of luck.
No, use a supported 32-bit OS if you want to use the TV card.
Yes, the drivers support both MCE2004 and MCE2005.
No, the Nova-t USB2 REQUIRES a USB 2.0 port due to bandwidth requirements. As it's a BDA-compatible device, the whole transport stream is sent to the PC, unfiltered (rather than single channels), and so the bandwidth required is 18-24Mbps +overheads which exceeds the 12Mbps maximum limit imposed by USB 1.x.
No, it takes power directly from the USB port. Some laptops have problems supplying sufficient power to their USB ports however and in this case you will need to connect it via a mains powered USB 2.0 hub. It may be best to avoid some Belkin hubs however as some people have reported BSOD issues with them (when used with the Nova-t USB2).
I can pretty much guarantee that your motherboard's USB controller is at fault, particularly if it comes from either VIA Technologies or SiS neither of whom have an impressive track-record for USB stability. Either replace the motherboard with one using an nVidia or Intel chipset, or less drastic, add a PCI (for desktop) or Cardbus (for laptop) USB 2.0 adapter with an NEC chipset. Note, not all people have issues with VIA/SiS and there are tweaks and filters that can be installed.
There have been reports that Belkin USB 2.0 hubs can cause BSOD issues.
If you do get a blue screen, make a note of which driver caused it, e.g. hcwu2dtd.sys. Only use Microsoft-provided USB drivers - DO NOT use 3rd party USB 2.0 drivers.
Please see this page
Please see this page
Please see this page
No, this only applies to the old model of the Nova-t. If your card uses WinTV2000, you don't need to do this.
Some motherboards get themselves into a resource conflict between the Nova-t (or other types of TV card) and AGP nVidia graphics cards. One solution is to change the AGP Aperture setting in the motherboards BIOS from 128MB to either 64MB or 256MB. This has been reported to occur on the Abit IC7 when using an nVidia GeForce graphics card.
If you get a BSOD on bootup after installing the Nova-t PCI with:
Stop 0x1E or KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED
Ensure that the latest ASPI layer from Adaptec is installed. Some CD burning software installs an older, unsupported version of the ASPI layer. Download Adaptec Windows ASPI 4.71.2
Version 1.1 and up fixes this problem.
This doesn't appear to be occurring in v2.0 or v2.1
On some systems onboard nVidia audio causes this error, often when a Creative sound card is installed, or has previously been installed in the system.
Please check that you have installed the drivers correctly as per the instructions on this page. DO NOT download "updated" versions of WinTV2000 from the Hauppauge websites - there are separate versions for each product range (analogue, PVR, DVB). The only version which will work is the version which is included with the drivers.
This is resolved in v2.0
The installer only sets up certain registry entries for the current user account, so in order to run on secondary accounts you must duplicate these settings:
If problems occur after installing the latest software, then something is wrong with your Windows installation.
If you have Windows XP set up with Welsh localisation you may find that WinTV2000 errors out on startup. This is a problem with pin names in the Wales-localised ODBC/JET engine DLL files, but Microsoft don't provide Debug builds for Welsh (in JET 4.0) so Hauppauge are currently unable to fix it. There is a workaround however:
Making this change shouldn't affect many programs - most newer applications (e.g. MS Office, Internet Explorer etc.) are Unicode so won't care.
Do not install any "updates" to WinTV2000 - only use the versions included with a full release (e.g. DVB 2.0, DVB 2.1 etc.).
This is resolved in DVB 1.3 and later
Update: There is an issue with some of Microsoft's BDA files in Windows XP SP2. They have released a hotfix which can be downloaded from here: KB896626. This should be installed on ALL Windows XP SP2 systems regardless of whether you are having the problem now. It is not required for Windows XP MCE2005.
There appears to be an incompatibility between Windows XP Service Pack 2 and WinTV2000 DVB 1.2. You can reopen WinTV2000 after the crash and rescan. Autotune is likely to error out every time you run it so the best thing to do is to manually scan just the channel numbers for your transmitter.
There have been reports that Pinnacle's Studio Plus 9 can cause crashes in the channel scan dialog, which remain even after the software has been removed. This is being investigated.
Update: Version 2.0 software added Up/Down arrows in the Suite Manager to reorder channels.
Yes. In WinTV2000 go to Menu and click on Suite Manager. You can edit the Preferred Number by single-clicking on it once, and then typing in the desired number.
But there's a caveat. The channel manager isn't smart enough to resolve conflicts other than to prevent them in the first place. So first of all you need to move all existing channels "out of the way". I recommend giving them all numbers in the 100 range since these aren't used by Freeview LCNs. Then go through again and change them to the desired numbers. For a list of "correct" LCNs consult http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/terrestrial/epg/
If you have Microsoft Access another option is to edit the numbers in there, since the channel database is an Access-formatted database. The file you need to open is hcwChanDB.mdb in your Windows\System32 directory. Once that is open, open the Table called hcwChannels and edit the preferred_number field to suit. Try to avoid duplicating channel numbers or you will have problems typing in numbers within WinTV2000 and don't change anything else. If you need to delete channels (such as TUTV) do it through the Suite Manager in WinTV2000.
If you have a valid TUTV Smart Card you can use a Pheonix interface in conjunction with some 3rd party software (e.g. ProgDVB) to decode the channels. See relevant threads on the Haupppauge UK Forum for details.
3 bars is basically "no signal" so either your aerial is incapable of picking up digital channels in your area or you haven't plugged one in (yes, you DO need to connect an aerial). The fact that analogue works fine on your aerial means nothing.
Update: This behaviour has been changed as of Version 2.0. Now, the meter will show no bars unless it has found a signal to "lock" onto at which point the meter reflects the quality of the signal it has found.
For example, the "Autoscan" button changes to "Stop" but then quickly (i.e. after 1 second) changes back to "Autoscan". When autoscan is working it will take approx 2 minutes to scan.
This is an initialisation error usually caused by outdated graphics and/or sound card drivers. Make sure that you have the latest reference drivers (NOT drivers provided by the card manufacturer) directly from nVidia, ATI, Realtek etc. Manufacturer's drivers (ASUS, Abit, Galaxy, Gigabyte, ECS, EPoX, Biostar etc etc) are usually out of date.
That means that no channels were found. CH74 is the last channel scanned. Check your aerial and especially any connections or leads.
WinTV2000 will only find channels which are currently broadcasting an audio stream. BBC Three (19:00-04:00) timeshares its slot with the CBBC Channel (06:00-19:00) and BBC Four (19:00-04:00) timeshares with CBeebies (06:00-19:00). Rescan when the missing channels are broadcasting to find them.
Check your aerial. WinTV2000 doesn't look for channels based on specific transmitter information so if it doesn't see some channels, then the card can't see them. Cabling quality makes a big difference.
This was a feature that appeared in v2.0 software to improve handling of multiple transmitters. Previously (in 1.0-1.3) duplicate channels would get overwritten by the last "copy" of that channel found e.g. you could pick up TMF from Waltham transmitter and from Belmont - Belmont would overwrite Waltham since it has a higher frequency and so is scanned last. Version 2.0 and later will add a (1) etc to any duplicate channels it finds.
It is recommended that you don't interfere with the system whilst it is performing a channel scan.
So what. I could give a "digital aerial" (and there's no such thing as that - it's marketing jargon) to a chimpanzee to fit but I can pretty much guarantee it won't pick up any channels. There are so many factors with digital that can decide whether it works or doesn't work. And it is as simple as that - it either works or it doesn't.
These are just a few things that you need to be aware of:
By default the options to keep aspect ratios correct aren't enabled. To set them up correctly open up WinTV2000, click on the PREF button. Go to the View tab and on the Title Mode and No Title Mode sub-pages tick both the Enforce Aspect Ratio and Do Not Resize Window boxes.
The BBC broadcast all digital programming in 16:9 anamorphic with AFD signalling which tells the decoder to crop and stretch the image to fit 4:3 TVs. WinTV2000 doesn't currently support AFD so the raw stream will be shown (pillarboxed left and right).
There are MANY reasons that can be causing this, and it is nearly always reception related. The first thing to check is that you are actually receiving from the correct transmitter from your area. See here for a guide.
Incorrect graphics card settings can cause strange problems. Certain graphics chips, particularly those integrated on low-end motherboards or notebook computers, have issues with newer technologies such as VMR (Video Mixing Renderer) or DXVA (DirectX Video Acceleration). To test for this, launch the "Primary.exe" program which can be found in the Hauppauge WinTV program directory in the Start menu (Start, All Programs, Hauppauge WinTV in Windows XP). Try each of these settings one by one in the following order of preference, starting WinTV2000 after changing each time to test:
A lot of older graphics cards work fine with the Allow Overlay or Force Primary setting.
Once you've ruled out reception difficulties or graphics card glitches, then check the card for PCI-related errors (in case of Nova-t 90002 PCI or Nova-t MCE). The latest drivers include a diagnostics control panel which can be used with GraphEdit. See here for a guide.
If you have a fan controller control on a PCI backplate, try moving it away from the Nova-t (e.g. stick it in an empty drive bay temporarily) and see if interference drops. I have noticed an increase in interference when the Nova-t is in the next slot to the controller for my Scythe FCS-50 cooler (i.e. when the backplates are touching).
Update: As of Version 2.0, the "Strength" meter in the Suite Manager has been replaced with "Quality". This will allow you to see just how good your locked signal is.
This is a side-effect of converting interlaced TV content for display on a progressive PC monitor. For a quick explanation of this, a TV frame is made up of 2 fields, running at 50Hz (50 frames per second) with field 1 covering odd lines (1,3,5,...,571,573,575) and field 2 covering even lines (2,4,6,...,572,574,576). A whole "screen" (of 576 lines) updates every 1/25th of a second (25FPS). This means that neither field 1 nor field 2 contain a whole image, and hence it will have gaps in it. This isn't a problem on a TV screen since they're designed to update this way, but a PC monitor updates it's whole screen every "pass", so the resulting image will contain elements of two different points in time. If the video is shown without any deinterlacing you get horizontal lines next to any moving objects as shown below:
Here you can see the horizontal lines next to moving objects. 1 field will contain the current frame, but the other field contains the previous field, hence a difference - in other words one field shows the objects where they are and the other shows where they were.
There are ways around this. One method is to blend both fields together. This eliminates the horizontal lines, but as the image still references two different points in time you get ghosting around any moving objects. This is most noticeable on football matches when players are running across the screen or on the scrolling "tickers" on the news and shopping channels. This is the default method used by WinTV2000 since it's the least CPU intensive.
The second method is to use Bob deinterlacing. In this mode the vertical resolution is halved to 288 lines, and each field is shown in it's correct place on screen but this creates an image which "bobs" up and down in relation to each field being displayed. Using this method will give perfect horizontal movement.
The third method, which is difficult to do in software, is adaptive deinterlacing. This is commonly found on most recent graphics cards (e.g. GeForce FX, Radeon 9600 and later) and lets the deinterlacing type be determined based on what is actually going on on-screen. So where there is horizontal movement bob deinterlacing will automatically be employed but full resolution will also be possible on static images.
That final method is preferred but will require a recent graphics card. To enable it on my Radeon 9800 Pro, go into the Primary program and set Allow VMR, VMR7, Use DXVA and Use HWMC. Selecting VMR9 in conjunction with DXVA will give juddery motion so ensure that VMR7 is selected.
A lot of users have been reporting problems with instability in Finland. This appears to be a problem with some of the Microsoft-provided components (DirectX 9.0c) rather than the Hauppauge drivers themselves. The problematic files are:
mpeg2data.ax - 6.05.2600.2180 (Windows XP SP2)
psisdecd.dll - 6.05.2600.2180 (Windows XP SP2)
Update: Microsoft have released a hotfix (KB896626) for Windows XP SP2 which should fix this problem. It can be downloaded from here.
In some countries, e.g. Finland, there are multiple languages subtitle streams carried. You can choose between these by activating subtitles (CC button) and then right-clicking in the channel display panel below the video window.
No. Basic Now/Next supported is provided until full EPG is added. Some 3rd party software such as MediaPortal, DC-DVB Source, MyTheatre and ShowShifter DVB fully support the 7/8-day DVB EPG.
There was a slight bug in the driver included with Version 1.0 and 1.1 in that after a certain number of interrupts there would be a glitch. This is fixed in hcw88ts.sys build 22285, included with Version 1.2. You should check that you have updated this file by going to %SYSTEMROOT%\SYSTEM32\Drivers and checking that hcw88ts.sys is version 2.102.22285.0 with a time/date stamp of 11:30:02 13 October 2004
If you're using a virus scanner (Norton, McAfee etc.) add WinTV2000's record directory (default is C:\MyVideos) to the Exclusions list. For example, in Norton, go to Options, Auto-Protect and then Exlusions.
See above. It may not be noticeable with live TV but during recording the recorded file is displayed and WinTV2000 struggles to catch up after the interrupt glitch occurs.
WinTV2000 doesn't split recordings when using the NTFS file system (on Windows 2000/XP)
Make sure that you have sufficient disk space.
Version 1.2 and later allows radio recording.
On 6th December 2004 the multiplex operator, NTL, increased the GOP size from the DVB-T standard of 15 frames (i.e. an I-frame every 15 frames) to nearly 40 frames. This change came unannounced and caused problems for Hauppauge and Nebula on the PC DVB-T side, and various set-top box manufacturers (slow channel change, poor A/V sync, crashes etc.). Fortunately this has now been resolved by NTL so you shouldn't see this problem anymore.
Real-time transcoding from MPEG2 to MPEG4 would not give better quality and keeping it in MPEG2 is the best. If you wish to convert from MPEG2 to MPEG4 at a later date Vidomi should be capable.
No, the bitrate is set by the broadcaster and is not changed in any way by the Nova-t. The Nova-t (and similar devices) does no recompression whatsoever so the quality it gives you is the best possible.
The Nova-t (and all PC DVB-T adapters) record by dumping the broadcast stream to disk unmodified - i.e. no recompression is done. It is not possible increase quality by encoding to a "better" format such as MPEG4 because the quality is already lost at the broadcaster's end. What you get with the Nova-t is the best quality possible (your set top box may look better because a TV masks some of the poor quality of the broadcast).
No, doing this in real-time would introduce a discontinuity in the MPEG2 stream. It's recommended to edit the recordings at a later date with a tool such as VideoReDo.
The broadcast format for DVB-T radio stations is MPEG Layer 2 Audio (MP2) so by using this format there is no need for recompression which would not only take time but would also cause a considerable quality drop (by using lossy compression on an already loss-compressed source - think generation loss with analogue video tapes). If you require MP3 format, e.g. for a portable MP3 player then the free Audacity software combined with the LAME encoder can convert from MP2 to MP3.
You can rename the .MPG files created by WinTV2000 to .MP2
Media Player Classic does a good job of playing back recordings and maintains sync.
The default pause buffer is set to 1000MB and it's a circular buffer in that once it's full up it loops to the start of the file and begins to overwrite it. You can increase it by going to Settings --> Movies --> MPEG
Version 1.2 records subtitles into the file and also has a few changes from Version 1.1 to improve compatibility with Ulead software. However this seems to cause problems for anything other than Ulead! Loading into PVAStrumento reveals that there are phantom AC3 audio tracks and also some sequence errors. The easiest fix for this is to grab VideoReDo and use the QuickStream Fix feature - don't open the file in VideoReDo or it will just hang - open QuickStream Fix and then load the file. The resulting output file should be compliant with everything now (albeit without Subtitles). See here for a full walkthrough.
You may also get "better quality" files by disabling subtitle support altogether as described here.
Yes, the MediaMVP can play files from the Nova-t 90002. For best compatibility use version 1.2 or later.
If you recorded the programmes with WinTV2000 Version 1.1 or lower you may need to trim the first couple of seconds off the file with Vidomi. This is fixed as of version 1.2.
See guide here.
Ensure that the Windows Task Scheduler service is started. For Windows XP, go to Start, Control Panel, Performance and Maintenance, Administrative Tools, Services. Ensure that Task Scheduler is set to "Automatic" startup type.
Update: This has been resolved in v2.0. The "Wake Computer" box is now set automatically.
No, this isn't directly possible. You can, however edit the already-set tasks (in Windows' Scheduled Tasks) and tick the box entitled "Wake the computer to run this task"
Ensure that the recording filename is unique and that you aren't using any characters not supported by Windows' file system (e.g. :, /, \ etc)
The current version of Digital Text (1.0.1) only supports the DEC2000-t, Nova-t PCI (TT) and Nova-t USB.
Not currently. Analogue text support is provided for the HVR cards.
The Nova-t 90002 is only supported by the BDA-enabled versions of ShowShifter - versions 3.02 and 3.10. Ensure that you select the device entitled BDA: 1 Hauppauge WinTV 88x DVB-T Tuner/Demod and NOT WDM: 1 Hauppauge WinTV 88x Video Capture (which is for an unused function of the chip).
Yes, the configuration for the Hauppauge remote control is stored in a file called irremote.ini in the Windows directory.
The following versions (and later) of these software packages either have working or nearly working support for the Nova-t 90002/MCE/USB2
BDA-based support
Native support
NOTE: THE FOLLOWING ONLY APPLIES TO DUAL PCI (90002) CARDS!
Yes, please download driver build 22345 from here. Whilst they are on an Australian web site they are not region specific and are simply a newer driver build to what is included in v1.2 and v1.3 software. They have now passed Microsoft WHQL certification.
These configurations are known to work:
It is assumed that you will be using the Media Center interface if you have purchased an MCE2005 machine. If you still want to run WinTV2000 you will need to close the Media Center Receiver service prior to running WinTV2000 to free up the card's driver. The easiest way is to create a batch file with the following:
@ECHO OFF CLS ECHO Closing Media Center Services... net stop ehrecvr net stop ehsched CLS ECHO Starting WinTV2000... start /wait C:\Progra~1\WinTV\WinTV2K.EXE -cg CLS ECHO Restarting Media Center Services... net start ehrecvr net start ehsched
What this will do is stop the Media Center services, then start WinTV2000 and wait until you close it at which point it will restart the services.
"Decoder Error: The video decoder has either malfunctioned or is not installed. Please restart Media Center and/or the computer"
This error message appears when you fail to install an MCE-compatible MPEG2 decoder. This decoder is not included with either MCE or the Nova-t. Please bear in mind that only the very latest versions of the decoders will work in MCE2005:
Including an MCE-compatible MPEG2 decoder would push up the price of the card. It is assumed that the user building an MCE-machine will have done enough research to realise what they need to purchase.
The ATI drivers included on the MCE2005 CD do not work correctly in Media Center itself and will cause Live TV, DVD and Video playback to fail. The latest drivers should be downloaded from the ATI web site here.
For graphics cards based on nVidia chipsets the reference drivers can be obtained from the nVidia web site here.
Whilst genuine Microsoft remotes can use the alpha-numeric keys to type letters there doesn't appear to be any way to do this with the Hauppauge remote.
You may get a "No Tuner Available" error message when starting Live TV in Media Center if you have upgraded the driver or moved the Nova-t to a different PCI slot. To resolve this, select Set Up TV Signal from Settings -> TV in Media Center. If that fails to resolve the problem, ensure that you have set up the correct Guide settings, or go to General Settings and re-run Media Center preferences setup.
No, the live buffer feature of Media Center will only work with channels which contain a video stream. As DVB-T is a TV stream (with only an audio track) as far as Media Center is concerned it removes it due to the lack of video stream. Microsoft have not indicated that they have any plans to change this behaviour in MCE2004 or MCE2005.
Update: Hauppauge have released a beta DVB-T Radio application which can be downloaded from the US support site.
No, Media Center only supports analogue (TV/FM radio) OR digital (DVB-t). In other words there is no way to get radio on Media Center (not counting Internet Radio) if you are using a DVB-T card.
If you've just added an additional DVB-T tuner, you must tell Media Center. From the main Media Center menu, go to Settings, TV and select Set Up TV Signal. It will ask you if you want to enable One or Two tuners. You shouldn't need to rescan or re-setup the guide.
This is a bug with certain onboard audio sound and/or the way the work with nVidia's decoders (Realtek + NVIDIA gives this problem). This is not a Hauppauge issue.
This is a transmitter fault (not all UK transmitters have this issue). To correct, go to Settings, TV, Guide, Add Listings To Channel
Every time a new channel is added to that mux, the customised "Add Listings To Channel" will be lost so you have to do it again, e.g. today when Men & Motors appeared. The only solution is for the broadcasters to stop screwing around with the transmitters.
If you continue to have problems over and over again, then try deleting (or renaming) prefs.xml in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\eHome\EPG\prefs
No, but this is the reason that Microsoft didn't want "regular" users getting their hands on copies of MCE2005. An OEM system integrator will test many many devices and drivers to get a good combination. Unless you have money to waste you don't have that luxury. The Nova-t drivers have been tested and certified by Microsoft which means that the majority of Media Center errors are caused by either user error or another bad device. Contrary to popular belief it isn't possible to just slap together a random combination of components and expect to have a workable Media Center PC. So no, it's not Microsoft or Hauppauge that suck - it's you or your system (harsh but true).
Open Regedit and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Hauppauge\hcwTVWND\ and create a new DWORD valued called use_epgnownext and set it to 0.
Open Regedit and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Hauppauge\hcwTVWND\ and set CC_Connect to 0.
It isn't possible to remove the animation per-se but you can increase it's speed so that it isn't noticeable. Open Regedit and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Hauppauge\WinTV32\Preferences\ and change the value of Animate_Step to 4b (in hex) or 75 (in decimal).
Yes, the mouse click behaviour is controlled by MouseDefinition under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Hauppauge\WinTV32\Preferences in the registry:
Quantex Zone, 2005