[plug] Foxtel Digital via analog input with MythTV

[nigel at dubh.id.au]

Thanks for the reply Bill.

On Wed, Jan 25, 2006 at 07:13:37PM +0800, William Kenworthy wrote:
> 
> I suspect then that you may be having resolution problems (causing
> aliasing) as you are using 800x600 - try a higher resolution in X and
> see if that helps.  

I changed it to 1024x768 and that helped a lot. BTW, this is only
connected to a TV. I was reading that connecting to a monitor at
the same time can reduce the quality. 

> Also try using v4lctl to trap an image directly from
> the v4l device instead of a screen dump to try and narrow things down a
> bit.  

Ok, I did a series of dumps. They are interesting as when I am
watching it live you can't series those lines. Plus the
colour/contrast looks quite good in the screenies as when I am
viewing it the video looks washed out.


I would record a movie but for some reason xawtv has now decided
not to display anything (gives a black window) and isn't giving
me an error message.

The dumps can be found at http://dubh.id.au/images/

> Also, is it possible that you are using the wrong Foxtel output -
> some of the connectors don't follow the standard pinout diagrams I had
> which gave me crappy B&W pictures until I realised what was wrong.

The cable is Foxtel supplied. It goes from a scart connector at
the STB to 3 RCA connectors. I have connected those to 3 RCA
connectors which change into a s-video plug that goes in the back
of a Geforce 6200.

> 
> Lastly, try hitting the "w" key to change displayed screen size in myth
> to see if if that gives a clue - it seems "stretched" in the Y direction
> in the screendump.

Yes, "w" changes the aspect ratio but doesn't really improve the
quality. Increasing the screen resolution has almost made it
watchable.  

Below is part of my xorg.conf. I originally got it from this
MythTV How-To:
http://www.users.on.net/~jani/dvico-mythtv-12.html#ss12.1


The commented DisplaySize was the original and the highest mode
was set to 800x600. It almost seems if I could increase the
resolution again that would fix the washed out look of the
picture, but 1024x768 is as high as it will let me go.

Thanks again for the help.

Nigel 

Section "Monitor"
   Identifier "Monitor0"
   VendorName "TV"
   ModelName "Palsonic"
   HorizSync 30.0 - 50.0
   VertRefresh 50.0 - 70.0
   #DisplaySize 672 378 # this is for a 16:9 tv
   DisplaySize 1024 768
EndSection
Section "Device"
   Identifier "Videocard0"
   Driver "nvidia"
   VendorName "Videocard vendor"
   BoardName "NVIDIA GeForce FX (generic)"
   Option "RenderAccel" "1"
   Option "HWCursor" "1"
   Option "NoLogo" "1"
   Option "NvAGP" "1"
   Option "TVStandard" "PAL-B"
   #Option "TVOutFormat" "SVIDEO"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
   Identifier "Screen0"
   Device "Videocard0"
   Monitor "Monitor0"
   DefaultDepth 24
   SubSection "Display"
      Depth 24
      Modes "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
   EndSubSection
EndSection