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Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Mon Sep 30, 2013 10:29 am
by tony_park
apbms1 wrote:I have found now though that yes it wakes from sleep, but it was still running this morning. the event log says the recoding event woke it, but not sure now what would prevent it from going back to sleep?? :?:
Try MCE Standby, that solved a lot of sleep problems for me, originally.

Re: RE: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Mon Sep 30, 2013 12:40 pm
by holidayboy
^ +1. Great tool.

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 7:22 am
by CyberSimian
apbms1 wrote:One thing I dd find was that if it was recording, and then press the sleep button, the pc goes to 'away' mode where it kills sound and video output but remains working and recording.

I have found now though that yes it wakes from sleep, but it was still running this morning. the event log says the recoding event woke it, but not sure now what would prevent it from going back to sleep?? :?:
Have you set the sleep timeout to a suitable value in the power plan? (Start -> Control Panel -> Power Options -> Advanced Options (or some sequence like that)).

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 7:26 am
by apbms1
Hi. Checked this and it s set to never sleep which would explain things. Will. Change to 10 mins and test again. Thanks for the info. I thought it would manage the sleep/wake itsekf if requested to sleep by the user.

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Wed Oct 02, 2013 7:54 am
by apbms1
Good news. Just changing the never sleep to 10 mins now works. Manual or timed out sleep wakes for scheduled recording ( 4 tuners still present) then back to sleep 10 mins after recording has finished. Still asleep this morning. Many thanks for the info.

So the TBS6285 seems to be the answerall to the quad hd freeview tuner question.:grin:

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Wed Oct 02, 2013 11:04 am
by CyberSimian
apbms1 wrote:Good news. Just changing the never sleep to 10 mins now works. Manual or timed out sleep wakes for scheduled recording ( 4 tuners still present) then back to sleep 10 mins after recording has finished. Still asleep this morning.
Excellent! However, there is one quirk of Media Center that it is worth knowing.

When MC is recording, playing live TV, or playing recorded TV, MC turns on a flag that prevents sleep or hibernation (this is what you want). MC turns off this flag when not recording, and when not playing live TV or recorded TV. But MC also turns off this flag when live TV or recorded TV is paused.

Consequently, if (say) you pause live TV and go and make a cup of coffee, and it takes longer than your sleep timeout, MC will sleep the system, and you will lose the contents of the live TV buffer. Similarly for pausing playback of recorded TV -- MC will sleep the system after the sleep timeout has expired (but you don't lose the recorded content, obviously).

I found that 10 minutes sleep timeout was too short for my use of MC; far too often I would come back to the HTPC to find that it had gone to sleep. If you use a much longer sleep timeout (30 minutes, say), this irritation is less likely to occur. The cost though is that the HTPC will run for up to 30 minutes after a recording has ended before the system sleeps (precisely what happens depends on the circumstances, which is why it is "up to 30 minutes", rather than "exactly 30 minutes"). So the choice of sleep timeout is a compromise between these two effects.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Wed Oct 02, 2013 11:40 am
by apbms1
So its probably worth setting it to 40 mins the same as the live buffer. Cheers

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Mon Oct 07, 2013 10:36 pm
by irrotational
Hi, new to the forums, but long time user (and sufferer) of MCE :-)

Silly question but is the 6285 definitely for terrestrial freeview? It seems to have different connectors on it?

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Tue Oct 08, 2013 6:08 am
by apbms1
Hi yes. It has f connectors ( which are supplied with it ) but works with uk freeview inc hd (dvbt/t2) see the pic in post 35. and would recieve un encrypted cable (dvbc) with the different drivers from the tbs website.although there is no unencrypted cable available in uk. There are both terestrial and cable drivers for windows and linux.

TBS 6285 with PCI adapter

Posted: Sun May 25, 2014 12:29 pm
by IT Troll
For anyone looking for a PCI DVB-T2 tuner solution I have the TBS 6285 working with the StarTech PCI to PCI Express Adapter Card (PCI1PEX1). I previously used the same adapter card with the BlackGold BGT3620 which served me well for several years. The PCI1PEX1 is completely transparent to the operating system and so does not require any additional drivers. I just needed to install the regular TBS 6285 drivers and then setup the TV signal in Media Center in the normal way. My 7-year old Sony Vaio VGX-XL201 can now record 4 simultaneous Freeview HD streams!

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Re: TBS 6285 with PCI adapter

Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 11:06 am
by CyberSimian
IT Troll wrote:For anyone looking for a PCI DVB-T2 tuner solution I have the TBS 6285 working with the StarTech PCI to PCI Express Adapter Card (PCI1PEX1).
Very interesting! Does it work OK with Windows sleep mode (power state S3)? Which version of Windows are you using?

On my Dell XPS420 HTPC, two of the three PCI-E slots do not work correctly with sleep mode, but the three PCI slots seem to work OK with sleep.

Mmm, tempting.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

Re: TBS 6285 with PCI adapter

Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 11:56 am
by IT Troll
CyberSimian wrote:Very interesting! Does it work OK with Windows sleep mode (power state S3)? Which version of Windows are you using?
I'm afraid I haven't tested sleep. I run my HTPC 24/7 as it acts as a household and remote media server. I know others have reported that the 6285 works OK with S3 and so in theory it should work as the adapter is invisible to the O/S. I am using Windows 7 32-bit.

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Sat Jun 21, 2014 6:30 pm
by Flying Kiwi
That's an innovative solution to running out of PCIe slots IT Troll :D

Since installing my Asus GT630 Graphics card on my Intel DG45ID motherboard, one of my PCIe x1 slots is now hidden away under the heatsink of the Graphics card - although I reckon there's still enough room to get the right PCIe x1 Riser cable through the gap and off to beside the (microATX) motherboard where I could relocate my card. For now though my USB 3.0 adapter card is in storage and my TV Tuner is using the other PCIe x1 slot. Has anyone successfully used a PCI Riser cable for such a task in the UK and if so, where'd you source it from?

I've tried the Startech PEX1RISERF 'Left Slot' cable but on receipt, a check revealed what I needed was a right slot version - wouldn't you know it, they don't do those....

Further investigation revealed these appear to be made by Ably-Tech Corp in Taiwan and they do a GH-PESX1EX-C7RD for running in the opposite direction but I've had trouble finding local suppliers willing to supply just one of these. Other than using the PCI slot with an adapter such as IT Trolls arrangement (quite possible with my system as I have a PCI slot free but I'm worried if it would cope with bandwidth and sleep requirements correctly), what else have the more industrious among you tried?

PS Now that the 6285 has been out for a while and is discussed here, how about including it in the thread title please (to those who can make such an amendment)?

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2014 9:56 am
by IT Troll
Can you not use one of the basic flat flexible ribbon cable type extenders? They are low cost and can be bent and twisted as required.

With regards to bandwidth, I haven’t seen any problems with my setup. PCIe x1 cards have a very similar bandwidth to PCI cards which have a theoretical maximum of 133 MB/s. A Freeview HD stream uses on average 1.5 MB/s. So even allowing for some conversion loss, four streams should be well within the capabilities.

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Sun Jul 06, 2014 9:09 am
by Flying Kiwi
IT Troll wrote:Can you not use one of the basic flat flexible ribbon cable type extenders? They are low cost and can be bent and twisted as required.
Been there and tried that but alas the one I bought (and others I've seen along this line) require to much vertical space above the PCIe x1 slot to fit in under the Graphics card heatsink. It's a tight squeeze in there and I estimate only around 10 mm of clearance is in there - maybe less. Effectively this means a 'low profile' riser cable with the cable exiting at a right angle to the inserted PCIe x1 slot 'finger' is needed.

Thanks for confirming you've had no bandwidth problems with your setup.

Re: TBS 6220, 6280, 6284 DVB-T2 Tuners - Owner's Thread

Posted: Sat Feb 14, 2015 10:05 am
by joecrow
I finally got round to replacing my old dual Teratec tuner with a TBS 6285, it was not a real necessity more a nice to have 4 tuners but I am, so far, very pleased, should have done it ages ago! I particularly like the antenne in and out option as this removes the need for a splitter for connection to the TV.(We get HBBTV here which works on the TV but in MCE) The Teratec suffered with interferance and low signal strength on occaisions which was agrevated by the splitter (powered splitter made it worse). I use an indoor ariel in an appartment block so my signal may not be the best but the TBS works really well 100% on everything. I purchased it direct from TBS here in Germany (it was not listed in Amazon , Germany), it was deliverd in 2 days and installed problem free. Bit pricey but well worth it. :thumbup: