Pinnacle PCTv Problem in Windows Xp SP2

[rudra_chowdhury]

This is a long and severe problem disturbing me over a period of a time .My computer configuration is as follows :

p4 3.0 GHz, intel D915GAV motherboard, Creative 7.1 24-bit Live Sound card, 512 MB DDR 400MHz Ram, Pinnacle PCtv Pro 5.90 (with PCtv Vision 2.76) using Creative Inspire 5200 5.1 Speakers. 160GB Samsung 7200 rpm HDD, Frontech external USB modem


Now the on board 7.1 sound provided a good a performance, but while connecting the line out of the TV Tuner to it , i could not use the 3 output jacks for an effective 5.1 output.So I opted for the 24-bit Creative 7.1 Live Sound Card. Now this card is working fine everywhere barring the Tuner app, viz. PCTv Vision, so there's no sound from the line in input. Then I connected the audio cable between the TV tuner and the sound card. But the auxillary input although detected gives no output.Only the line in input from the tuner is detected as microphone input, and at best gives a harsh distorted noise.

My problems regarding this are as follows:-

i) Is there any WinXp SP2 compatible update for the Pinnacle Pro Card and the PCTv vision application in particular

ii)Although i have updated the Creative card to its latest drivers it doesn't resolve the problem

iii)Is there any other 3rd party PVR software(s) available that can be used with the Pinnacle PCtv Pro card, and can resolve the problem.

iv)Is there any configuration changes in the audio settings which can resolve the problem

I have tried disabling the onboard audio and other few things, but nothing worked. Also whether the modem audio is causing any disturbance.

Hoping for a positive response

[Keith Sebastian]

Originally Posted by rudra_chowdhury

iii)Is there any other 3rd party PVR software(s) available that can be used with the Pinnacle PCtv Pro card, and can resolve the problem.

This should work as a good substitute -
http://virtualvcr.sourceforge.net/

Excellent software for viewing -
http://www.dscaler.org/ --> Get version 4.x

Lots of info and tools here -
http://www.tv-cards.com/

Regarding your original problem, try running the card on a frnds pc to check if it's faulty.

Keith

Not sure about PCTV pro drivers for XP SP2, PCTV stereo drivers are available

[rudra_chowdhury]

Originally Posted by gxsaurav

Not sure about PCTV pro drivers for XP SP2, PCTV stereo drivers are available

Can u give me the links for the updates,particularly that of PCtv vision.


THANKS A LOT to both of you,Keith Sebastian and gxsaurav for taking pains to provide me with some help.Thanks.

[Sourabh]

If you arent aware of the official site, you can get all the updates for the card from here

for PCTV Vision patch check here

1. Well there was a compatibility issue with the PCTV stereo and Win XP Sp2 , so the default drivers wouldnt work. So you had to use the sp2 fix provided by them. Since your cards works in SP2 without any probs, so i dont think its the same issue with PCTV Pro cards or you have probably installed the newer drivers.

2. Make your your default playback device in Control Panels Sound and Audio devices. the problem may be just with the connections or some Audio settings. Trial n Error helps most of the times if you are confused. So its not much of a driver issue from Creative.

3. As keith suggested do have a look at tv-cards.com for the alternative PVR softwares. Personally i used Chris-tv along with my PCTV stereo and it sure works great. Its a lil buggy and does take a while to get used to but blive me you will not like anything else, if you get used to it. You dont need to use your keyboard, remote to swap channels, control brightness,contrast , sound - everything can be done by a normal scroll mouse. And the best thing about it is its so light. It even supports the Pinnacle Remote and provides files to enable remote for the same. It supports all the features of the card. sad thing is Pro Version is not Free, You can try the 21 days trial from their site or shld i say his. www.chris-tv.com

There are other alternatives like mediacenter, they consume a lot of system resources.

[rudra_chowdhury]

i installed Chris-Tv 4.7 .it's simply great, and in the help menu i found this,

2. Why was ChrisTV created ?

ChrisTV was created due to a need for a better software, than the one delivered by Pinnacle Systems with their PCTV (Pro) Tuner card. Their software had no features like: On-Screen-Display, Channel Settings for each channel, Advanced Scheduler, MSP Settings & other necessary features.

[Sourabh]

Sorry to say, do not double post for new things, edit your previos post if you want to ask anything. Asking for cracks/serials/keygens is not allowed in the forums and please read the forum rules before posting.

[rudra_chowdhury]

Originally Posted by Sourabh

Sorry to say, do not double post for new things, edit your previos post if you want to ask anything. Asking for cracks/serials/keygens is not allowed in the forums and please read the forum rules before posting.

sorry there, and i was not asking for a crack/keygen stuff.The showcenter 1.7.1 is legally provided to me as an update to the pctv vision. So all I asked is that whether there are any willing member ready to provide me a showcenter key so as i can install the update. Also why can't i post an altogether different topic in a new thread ????


Legal Upload

[Sourabh]

I just said dont make repeat posts in a matter of minutes in the same thread, instead edit the previous post and add what you wanted to say. You have got my point wrong. Anyways, Lets get back to the topic in discussion. If the key is posted in the forum, it would be piracy anyways since anyone who doesnt have the pinnacle card can use it. Forget whether they would actually be able to use them, but all the serial keys and related things are generally kept away from posting them in the forums.

[rudra_chowdhury]

Thanks a lot Sourabh for giving time to solve the problem.Regarding Christv i have the following problems :-

i) it says i can enable MSP (with a Pinnacle Pro Card), with the bt8x8 drivers, which i downloaded from the chris tv site. Now after i enable it, sound gets jarred.Now what is MSP.And what effect will i have enabling it.


ii)the pctv pro card has stereo output capability. But in the sound "AUTO" mode all channels are played as "MONO", although i can't detect it's effet as it is processed and played via the 24-bit Creative live and 5.1 speakers.But whenever i change this to "STEREo" or "DUAL A+B" the sound is hazy at first and gets stable after a while.Also when i change channels with different sound settings, the sound starts to be get distorted once again.

iii) Although radio playback through pctv pro is good enough (and the radio channels are auto detected as "STEREO") the capture in wav format is incompatible with all players.Although i have xp codec pack installed

iv) The chris tv can't work with the K-lite codec pack.Also after the install of the ffdshow-20020617 filter christv generates error and crashes.


What are the solutions ???
How should i configure the audio of tv channels ???

[thadhanihemant]

i was facing the same problem but after installing a patch available for sp2 the problem was solved u just have to update the existing drivers with these drivers try this url

ftp://ftp.pinnaclesys.de/driver/pc/p...P_SP2_WHQL.exe
download and install this should help u