[SGVLUG] Re: graphics mode, Really about MythTV

[Michael Proctor-Smith]

On 1/24/06, Don Saxton <dsaxton at pacbell.net> wrote:
> I got some experience finding a text terminal and I can report some sad
> news.  But first the good news! After several tries I got a modeline
> that works on my 2405fpw monitor and MSI version of the nvidia 6600.  I
> have the impression that there must be a range of modeline parameters
> that will work. I don't think my solution is optimal, but in the range
> of ok.  I  am guessing that the xvidtune might help to spruce it up.
> One of my requirements is to use this great 1920x1200 to view hdtv at
> 1920x1080 and 1280x720, So I think I need three modelines. I have
> mplayer playing the atsc stream from /dev/dvb/apapter0/dvr0 which has
> been tuned by azap, so I am someplace on the map. Concommitant problems:
> lircd won't start (serial ir device and serial driver loads)

Stupid question do you have a lircd.conf file in the right
location(that is the step I forgot last time).

>  don't know if the 6600 is accelerating mpeg2

If the binary Nvidia drivers are loaded then you are getting some
acceleration (my 2.6Ghz dual xeon system would not play hdtv smoothly
with the open source nv drivers), There is another level of hardware
mpeg acceleration, with video quality loss.

> (could that be addressed in the dvb drivers?),
Which card do you have? Unless there is a atsc out there that has a
hardware mpeg2 decoder the dvb drivers have nothing to do with
playback.

>  and my alsa config is for sure not right (sound stream
> frequently crashs mplayer on a 2.8ghz machine).

Sound is my biggest problem right now with hdtv and mythtv right now.
If I have the signal quality to get a program some times the audio
will just quits and I have beautiful video with no sound. Xine crashes
are probably not a alsa config problem. I have not used xine to
playback hdtv but are you using xine from fedora, xine from xinehq, or
xine-hd. What cpu are you using AMD or Intel

> my goal is to solve
> enough problems to get mythtv to crank up. Having fun, just my progress
> has so far been a bit soggy.

Willing to help as I am still trying to find time to make my setup reliable.

> The bad news is that it seems that if the video is stuck with a bad
> modeline, then you can't see a test terminal. Fortunately I upgraded fc4
> so that I have another kernel which seems to ignore the bad video
> config. Also you can get grub to jump to runlevel 1. sort of the 'catch
> me if you can' solution.