SkyStar USB 2HD CI + DVBViewer (s) - first thoughts.

[petrev]

Hi

Just got a SkyStar USB 2HD CI and would like to share my initial experiences . . .

Firstly the hardware is great :thumbsup:

There is a note on the packaging that the latest drivers and software need to be loaded from the TechniSat website and that is completely necessary.

The bundled disk has the pdf version of the manual but the Viewer and drivers are not of any use.

The printed instruction manual is actually for the card versions of the SkyStar tuners and has no mention of the USB versions - also refers to a non existant chapter 5 -only 3 chapters in the printed version and the relevent chapter in the .pdf is actually chapter 4. PDF is also for the card versions but contains enough info to be very useful.

It is best to install the drivers and software from the downladed package first and then attach the USB cable and follow automatic installation of the drivers (under XP for me.)

There is also a Beta version of the DVBViewer TE2 software on the dowload site and that is also pretty much a necessity too !

The standard DVBViewer TE software works well on SD satellite but will not playback recorded .ts files (works during timeshifting but the saved file fails to load the video drivers on playback so you have only audio HD ????)
DVBViewer TE2beta will still not playback saved .ts files from ITV-HD but works with BBC-HD files. The ITV-HD stream seems to be very non-standard to have lots of bad/zero?? blocks-headers things and this stops the codec from loading ! ! or something ?

The channels.dat file included with both versions is hoplessly out of date so a full scan is needed to get all the channels working properly.

The new Beta DVBViewer TE2 is mostly a good improvement over std. TE version but the old standard (downloaded version) is still needed because there seems to be no way to edit station info in TE2beta so you have to do the manual editing inside TE (eg. to get ITV-HD) and then copy the channels.dat file to the TE2 directory (eg.c:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\CMUV\DVBViewer TE2)

Hopefully this is just a beta problem and editing will be added to the next version of TE2.

The current beta TE2 is very good in many ways and includes a neat Favoutites/Channel-list side bar that pops out on mouseover at the right of the window. This has a small problem that means that on reloading DVBViewer TE2b the last used channel loads but it is the first one in the full channel list with the same name and that may not be the one that you want to use ! The only way I could get round this was to edit the name slightly (possible inside TE2b) and use that as the favourite.

I have a 3.2GHz Quadcore and an NV8800GT system but in HD on the TE2beta software there was an irritating shear effect when viewing or playing HD with lots of motion eg. panning shots (TE version had no shear but had jerkier image with panning shots)

So . . .

I decided to spend €15 on the full DVBViewer Pro v4.
Possibly the best €15 I have spent in a long time.
Plays back all my .ts files
No Shearing effects with fast pans.
Lots of upgraded control and playback features for other media.
Pan Scan Position Zoom Brightness Contrast Hue + + + lots of picture control.
Better user interface generally - although the popout favourites are missing everything else is either as good, or better.

Overall I really like the neat USB hardware and with the full DVBViewer Pro v4 software this is a really great bit of kit.

Cheers
Pete

 

[Llew]

Transedit (from the DVBViewerPro members' site) is a worthwhile plugin, as it will give you loads of information on scanned channels. Somewhat similar to Coolstf's TSReader, even a quick snapshot of any selected channel scanned.

Llew