TBS 6903-X useable with scanning apps?

Llew

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Just installed a TBS6903-X on a Win7 Pro.

Attempted a scan with CrazyScan and EBSpro, with no luck on either. CrazyScan whites out and shuts down, EBSpro RFScan not supported.

I understood that only Blindscan 2 was unsupported?

The card has a heatsink rather than a fan, and is printed Version 12, whatever that means. Since It's not marked version 2, I assume it's version 1, therefore I'm using the TBS Windows driver V2001_1108 in TBS 6903-X in the Windows downloads section.

Card works fine with viewer apps (DVBViewer for instance).

I haven't tried a Linux scanning app yet, just wanted to see if it's useable for spectrum scanning on Windows.
 

Llew

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Just checked a post on the TBS forum - seem I needed CrazyCat's test build for the 6903-X's tuner chip. Creates a scan doing an FFT sweep.

Working with that, slow though.
 

satesco

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Satellite reception between 100.5E-50.0W
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Just installed a TBS6903-X on a Win7 Pro.

Attempted a scan with CrazyScan and EBSpro, with no luck on either. CrazyScan whites out and shuts down, EBSpro RFScan not supported.

I understood that only Blindscan 2 was unsupported?

The card has a heatsink rather than a fan, and is printed Version 12, whatever that means. Since It's not marked version 2, I assume it's version 1, therefore I'm using the TBS Windows driver V2001_1108 in TBS 6903-X in the Windows downloads section.

Card works fine with viewer apps (DVBViewer for instance).

I haven't tried a Linux scanning app yet, just wanted to see if it's useable for spectrum scanning on Windows.
There is no difference between the two versions,11 with fan,and 12 with heatsink. And it should work with Crazyscan and EBS applications.It is true that I did not use the card on Win 7,but only under Windows 10 and I had no problems.
Try using Crazyscan from here, which I use.For tbs6903X there's only one driver from the beginning,the one you mentioned.
I use also the card on Ubuntu,only with w_scan and other common applications.
Regards
 
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Llew

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There is no difference between the two versions,11 with fan,and 12 with heatsink. And it should work with Crazyscan and EBS applications.It is true that I did not use the card on Win 7,but only under Windows 10 and I had no problems.
Try using Crazyscan from here, which I use.For tbs6903X there's only one driver from the beginning,the one you mentioned.
I use also the card on Ubuntu,only with w_scan and other common applications.
Regards
I'm using Crazyscan version 1.0.2.165 satesco, which works fine. Available here - CrazyScan - Browse /test at SourceForge.net
Yours is 1.0.2.160, which I assume is a variant of the same TBS6903X build?
The Streamreader that was available with the test build is version 1.2.4.99.
 

satesco

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Functionally, there's no difference between the two versions, because I'm using also the latest version of StreamReader,1.2.4.99.For I don't know why you're having trouble with Crazyscan under Win 7, I thought the older version might help.I have been working with this version for a year or so.That's why I sent you v.1.0.2.160.
Maybe @CrazyCat will read this topic and give you an appropriat answer.
My 6903x card is v 12 but with fan.I must admit that with this version of the 6903X card I noticed a slight instability to heavy use,when I used it for streaming TV simultaneously,over a long period of time. And this has to do with the demodulator.Due to high sensitivity of the StiD135 demodulator (which is available into DVB cards such as TBS6909X TBS6903X) to electromagnetic interferences and certain currents tensions I have managed to add and solder an extra 22uf capacitor to bridge the 13D and Y1 pins.
This small workaround will help and stabilize much more exact locks on different transponders on heavy load conditions ,will solve some of the continuity errors and most important it will solve i2c errors reported by dmesg in Linux and few more other issues.
The credit for this workaround/fix belong to a friend of mine which happens to work with Dektec and they managed to successfully stabilize as well their StiD135 based ultra professional DVB pcie tuner card.
After I tested the workaround successfully on couple of TBS cards I have shared with TBS crew the results. They agreed with what I did and that it's good to share it with others.
Here's the solder I made to my card.This is the capacitor specification :X5R;0805;+-20%;6.3V;22uF.
Regards
 

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Llew

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Thanks for the tip :) Soldering iron beckons.

I'll check the v.102.160 too.
 

deeptho

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I have a tbs9603x card and (like others above) I can confirm that it works with Crazyscan (I had to
look for the right version) I also have several 6909x card (most V1, one V2) and I noticed at one point that the V2
card did not work under crazyscan. The only difference on the software side is that the V2 board
has a different board id. My V2 card was an experimental version, so it might explain why it did not work
with crayzscan (or ebspro). I did not try recently. Perhaps the problem was solved.

My experience with the V1 cards (tbs9603x and tbs6909x) is that they work well in general, but there is
a weakness which can cause some multistreams to generate CC errors. It really varies from card to card
and from transponder to transponder, but for me one or two multistreams with high symbol rates (30k-35k) had problems
and all others worked fine (even 45kSymbol transponders). The channels with problems were still watchable but with
glitches from time to time.

So the V1 card I bought worked very well in general but was not perfect. Some other people had more problems, but
that could have other reasons. The trick with the extra capacitor made little difference for me, but it might help for other people.
In any case the weakness of the V1 card was fixed in the V2 board, which as a more interference resilience design.
It also has an additional RF amplifier.

I tested a tbs6909xV2 extensively for many hours even to the level of comparing the occurrence of CC errors to another card, both running in parallel on different dishes. The conclusion was that the number of CC errors was very low and the few that were still there occurred also on the other card (not a tbs6909x card) on the other dish. So they must be reception problems.
In fact, the other card had a few extra cc errors...

Of course I use the card under linux mostly, with tvheadend. And I have developed my own blindscan software (see elsewhere on the forum). Last time I tested crazyscan on this card, there were significant distortions in the spectrum and the driver sometimes
seemed to lock up. This may have been fixed already.

Recently I have been testing an experimental card with 16 tuners, and yes, it is possible to stream 16 channels from 16 transponders
over (Gigabit/second) WIFI simultaneously. The main problem was finding enough transponders with FTA channels. It required careful
planning. Pretty cool as an experiment and pretty noisy as all channels had audio on. In the screenshot the channels were selected from 5.0West and 28.2East. Testing is still going on.
 

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satesco

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Satellite reception between 100.5E-50.0W
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Thanks for the feedback and the excellent short review about,you mean,tbs6903x,and not 9603!And I agree with what you say that the weaknesses of the V1 card are fixed in the V2 board,the ones with heatsink cooling.
My kind regards
 

Llew

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Thanks for your observations deeptho. I have yet to put my TBS6903-X v.1 card through testing of multistream TP's for any signs of lost frames/random glitches. I will post here if anything of the kind found.

Also I will try the card with various Linux tools and apps in due course.

As the card is new (and expensive), I will hold off with satesco's capacitor fix for the time being in case I have to return it if it develops a fault.
 

deeptho

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@satesco
Yes I meant tbs6903x

@Llew
I think is is indeed best to not start soldering if the card is still under warranty. Also, there is always a risk of
damage. Especially be careful if you would try to remove the added capacitor again because it is easy to damage
the existing components and the card is not cheap.
 

satesco

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...

As the card is new (and expensive), I will hold off with satesco's capacitor fix for the time being in case I have to return it if it develops a fault.
I completely agree with @deeptho,he is right about warranty.It would be a big problem if something doesn't work the way you want it to.
In fact you have a problem with EBS and Crazyscan apps under Windows 7.And I have to admit that's why I'm curious to reinstall Win 7 to understand why you have issues with these applications and not with 6903X card,if it works with your dvb players(i.e. DVBViewer)?
And let's not forget one thing,I think it's important,that some of the developers of dvb applications,for reasons that I miss,fail to adapt them to work with the STiD135 demod.For example,I can't use the 6903X or 6909X card under Win 10 with the ProgDVB player,because it crashes when I activate it.Maybe some of them don't have this card,and they probably haven't adapted their app for this demod!?
Who knows,but definitely,since I've been using these cards for a long time,the demod stid135 poses problems for application developers to exploit it to the maximum capacity it has.
 

Llew

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I completely agree with @deeptho,he is right about warranty.It would be a big problem if something doesn't work the way you want it to.
In fact you have a problem with EBS and Crazyscan apps under Windows 7.And I have to admit that's why I'm curious to reinstall Win 7 to understand why you have issues with these applications and not with 6903X card,if it works with your dvb players(i.e. DVBViewer)?
And let's not forget one thing,I think it's important,that some of the developers of dvb applications,for reasons that I miss,fail to adapt them to work with the STiD135 demod.For example,I can't use the 6903X or 6909X card under Win 10 with the ProgDVB player,because it crashes when I activate it.Maybe some of them don't have this card,and they probably haven't adapted their app for this demod!?
Who knows,but definitely,since I've been using these cards for a long time,the demod stid135 poses problems for application developers to exploit it to the maximum capacity it has.
DVBViewer is fine, but I often have to wait a minute for it to start. Sometimes I also need to disable and then enable the 6903X driver to get it working (this also applies to Crazyscan).

I don't have ProgDVB on the PC that has the card, and SmartDVB doesn't recognise the 6903X - I get "Error Starting Device TBS6903X Tuner 0"

When Crazyscan decides to start - sometimes after a couple of minutes - I did a scan of 500MHz of 28.2E to compare the 6903X against the plain vanilla 6903. Blindscanning 10.7 - 11.2 GHz takes 0.5 minutes with the 6903 and 6 minutes with the 6903X. About as expected I suppose.

On 27.5W, comparing the two cards, the 6903X found a couple of feeds, but missed out the BBC SatTrack feed on 11.495V. Same with EBSPro. Ignore the blindscan times on Crazyscan there, I started the scan way too early, 10.450!

28.2E TBS6903 10.7-11.2.JPG

28.2E TBS6903X 10.7-11.2.JPG

TBS6903_27.5V.JPG

TBS6903X_27.5V.JPG

TBS6903_27.5W_ EBSPro.JPG

TBS6903X_27.5W_EBSPro.JPG
 
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satesco

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Satellite reception between 100.5E-50.0W
My Location
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For the first time I use Crazyscan,version 1.0.2.165(thanks for info) for 6903X card. As you see below,I scanned at 27.5 W also with Crazyscan.
I must say that the Intelsat 901's beam is well outside my reception area,which means that the signal is not as strong as I would have liked.Even though the signal is weak,Crazyscan has scanned and memorized all the transponders on this satellite,the ones listed on sites known to all.
Of course it's no secret that the scan time is not as fast as other,as tbs6983/6903,but this is no secret for those who have tried 6903X,or 6909x,because the manufacturer of the demodulator has not implemented ultra fast scanning,which displeased some of the users,with all of Crazycat's efforts to make his application work as well as possible and fast.
And yet,as you can see below, I've done tests with Crazyscan, EBSpro,SmartDVB,TSReader for IP-over-Sat applications. Except for the scan time,which is slower than the other cards,the 6903X card works well with each of them.
Tbs6903X found the same number of transponders as tbs6983 at 27.5W.There's also no problem with the EBS scan.For SmartDVB,I used bda device, and not CrazyCat BlindScan.
My OS is Window 10 Pro,64bit,ver.1909.
Regards
 

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satesco

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Satellite reception between 100.5E-50.0W
My Location
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Hi Llew,

Test with 6903X card with IQmonitor app at 27.5W.
If you think it helps,I'll send you to my review about 6903X/6909X on the RDI forum.I apologize to the admin for posting a link.Also because I don't have time to translate it into English,but I hope the images say better than the translation :)
Regards
 

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Llew

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Hi Llew,

Test with 6903X card with IQmonitor app at 27.5W.
If you think it helps,I'll send you to my review about 6903X/6909X on the RDI forum.I apologize to the admin for posting a link.Also because I don't have time to translate it into English,but I hope the images say better than the translation :)
Regards
Thanks satesco, I'll investigate that app.

At present, I'm doing some repeat tests using Crazyscan on various satellites using the 6903X, as I am having random dropouts during a scan. It doesn't happen with the 6903, so I think maybe it's the card. I'll post a typical spectrum sweep soon showing .the effect on the scan.
 

Llew

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@satesco

An example of the scan dropping out between 11.100 and 11.200. Sometimes it will happen where there are TP's.
 

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satesco

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Satellite reception between 100.5E-50.0W
My Location
Romania
Drop out also depends on the scan steps.It also depends on the signal strength.But anyway,even if you have drop out on the spectrum,Crazyscan will lock the signal.You'll get used to it.
On "Style" tab,uncheck "signal width",when there are several transponders close,parameters are seen/read better on the spectrum.
 

Llew

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OK, perhaps nothing too serious :)

I did try IQ Monitor some time ago, it took me a little while to get used to it. I 'll have to give myself a refresher course :D
 

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@satesco

An example of the scan dropping out between 11.100 and 11.200. Sometimes it will happen where there are TP's.
This is just a bug in the drivers. Wrong register setting.
 

Llew

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@satesco

Setting up IQ Monitor with a TBS 6983 for testing.

It's not scanning 27.5W. Just flat lining. Am I missing something in menu box? The HR spectrum mode shouldn't be red?




IQmonitor.JPG
 
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