Unable to install Twinhan 3250 ATSC TV card ?!!!

[ccoleman]

Hey everyone,

I need your help because there seems to be nothing else I can do to get this card to work right.

I just got the Twinhan 3250 ATSC D+A PCI card fom Sadoun.

I have installed the newest April 2007 DirectX from Microsoft. That went without errors.. DXDIAG shows DirectX 9.0c ( 4.09.0000.0904 ).

But when I run the Twinhan driver install program, it is totally failing to install the driver on my windows 2000 system.

Without the driver, both TwinhanDTV and MyTheatre fail to find the card !!

The reason I know the driver failed to install, is that the items appear with yellow question marks in the control panel. It gives code (1) "Driver is not configured correctly".

I have tried 3 different drivers based on reports from other users:
1. The Fujiplus driver.
2. The driver from the CD that came in the box ( Twinhan DTV 2.432 package )
3. The newest driver from Twinhan site ( 2.65 build 01-02 )

HEre are some of the error message boxes that it gives... (images attached)

Please HELP !!!!!!!!!!!!

[Corey]

You might find some interesting stuff in this thread:

http://www.sadoun.net/forums/twinhan...3250#post39489

To make a long story short, 2.65 doesn't seem to work with the 3250 card.

And you should try cleaning out all of the various drivers you've installed, and then try the disk that came with the card again.

There are instructions in that thread for removing the existing drivers.

If it still doesn't work with a clean install and the disk that came with the card, I'd suggest plugging the card into a different PCI slot.. there may be an IRQ conflict or something.

[ccoleman]

I think I may have found something...

On the box and on the Twinhan website it says REQUIREMENTS: Windows XP !!

I am running 2000...

BUT Elsewhere, Twinhan says Windows 2000 is supported also !!!

Weird.. what is the real truth ?!?!?!

Is Anyone Else running the 3250 on Windows 2000 ???

[Corey]

I also have Windows 2000, and the card does work there with v 2.432.

[ccoleman]

I tried about 10 times now to install this 2.432 in windows 2000 and it always gives the same error (see screenshots posted above).

I wrote email to twinhan in taiwan giving full details asking for help but so far no response.

While waiting for their reply, do you have any tips on getting this to install properly ?!

[ccoleman]

Update : On another windows 2000 machine, it installed !!!

WHY cant the first 2000 machine install it ?!?!?!?!?!

[Corey]

My experience with Twinhan support has not been good either. I posted several problem reports to them, and did not receive a single response. My guess is that they no longer have any tech support personnel that know English.

I did not see the error that you are seeing. I only got a hang condition when I used any driver except 2.432.

My only suggestions:

1) Completely clean out any vestiges of other versions of the driver, as detailed in the other thread. I don't know about the Fuji driver, but see if you can get rid of all that too.

2) Try a different PCI slot (you didn't mention if you tried that or not).

[ccoleman]

One huge problem.

I am getting absolutely NO reception on ATSC stations... but there are supposed to be several Digital TV stations broadcasting in this city (montreal)... ?!?!

Any tips for getting better reception ??!!!!!!!

Anybody else in Montreal ???????

EDIT: I should note that I'm using an indoor VHF / UHF combo antenna which allows the Twinhan to receive the analog NTSC versions of the stations just fine.

From what I hear, many of these analog stations are also broadcasting simultaneously in digital... BUT WHY DOES MY TWINHAN CARD RECEIVE NOTHING in digital ?!?!?!?!

[wejones]

Originally Posted by ccoleman

One huge problem.

I am getting absolutely NO reception on ATSC stations... but there are supposed to be several Digital TV stations broadcasting in this city (montreal)... ?!?!

Any tips for getting better reception ??!!!!!!!

Anybody else in Montreal ???????

EDIT: I should note that I'm using an indoor VHF / UHF combo antenna which allows the Twinhan to receive the analog NTSC versions of the stations just fine.

From what I hear, many of these analog stations are also broadcasting simultaneously in digital... BUT WHY DOES MY TWINHAN CARD RECEIVE NOTHING in digital ?!?!?!?!

Perhaps a dumb question, but are you attempting to tune the proper channel numbers? Ie the digital channels are on different channels. Check out:

http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/tvq?state...&slon2=&size=9

The digital channels aren't much harder to receive than the analog, but it does seem like you need to have a directional antenna, and it needs to be aimed carefully. I can get reception on channels that don't come in clear for the VHF analog, but if I move my antenna 10 deg in aim, then I lose reception. I think this is because most digital stations are UHF, and UHF is pretty much line of sight while VHF signals do a bit of curving around obstacles, and/or bouncing off hills and buildings, etc. Ie if you are trying to just scan for channels, it may not find them if your aim isn't correct.

Anyway, I think you'l need a directional antenna. A good uhf antenna isn't very big, and can even be mounted indoors. Mine is only about 3' long.

[ccoleman]

THanks Bill for the interesting list of fcc approved dtv stations that reach over the border into the USA.

I looked at the signal meter in the TwinhanTV software.

It is giving a signal-to-noise ratio of about 12 dB... a 2% signal strength.. and a 0% signal quality.

I suppose I should focus on raising and aiming the antenna better ?!

What software ar you using to tune your local ATSC DTV stations ?! I really wonder whether twinhandtv is best ?!

[Corey]

I use an outdoor VHF/UHF antenna pointed at the transmitting towers about 8 miles away.

It works great, and the Twinhan software had no problems pulling the digital channels out.

That said, I have not used the card at all since I found that I can't have both the 3250 and the 102g card in the same box.

Perhaps if I switch to Linux (2.6+ kernel), I'll be able to do that. Windows has problems with more than one Connexant 878 chip in the machine, and both of these boards use that same chip.

So far, though, I've been too happy with MyTheatre, and I'm afraid I'll lose too much function if I switch to mythTV. So I've been doing without OTA HDTV for the time being (perhaps until NTSC goes off the air, at which point my beloved TiVo will no longer work for local channels).

[wejones]

Originally Posted by ccoleman

THanks Bill for the interesting list of fcc approved dtv stations that reach over the border into the USA.

I'm not sure why the FCC site has Canadian info, but it does. Actually, if you go back a page to TV Query - TV Technical Information - Video Division - MB (FCC) , you can enter your lat/lon, and it will tell you stations within a radius of your location.
Looking again, at the Montreal output, it looks like there really aren't that many stations yet. The stations that are digital have DT in the 4th column, but in the 5th column most of the DT stations are listed as APP, meaning that at this point they are just applications. There are a couple that were Granted, such as ch20 and ch 27. I'd give those a try.

Originally Posted by ccoleman

I looked at the signal meter in the TwinhanTV software.

It is giving a signal-to-noise ratio of about 12 dB... a 2% signal strength.. and a 0% signal quality.

I suppose I should focus on raising and aiming the antenna better ?!

What software ar you using to tune your local ATSC DTV stations ?! I really wonder whether twinhandtv is best ?!

I don't have the Twinhan ATSC tuner, I'm using an Air2PC. I don't use the software that comes with that either. I use TSREADER. TSREADER has a Twinhan 8VSB source, which I think is for the Twinhan ATSC tuner. I'm sure that comparison of signals from different receivers doesn't mean much, but with the Air2PC through TSREADER, the S/N ratio on mine varies from around 16 where it just starts to be able to receive, up to somewhere in the low 30s where reception is strong. But anything in the 20s works fine. With TSREADER, I play the stations with either VLC or my Roku.

I'm fairly close to the local stations near me, ie maybe 32 miles away, and my local stations are pretty strong, ie 1000 KW, whereas I notice that the stations near you are much weaker. I see you have a couple listed as APP that are 1000KW, but I don't know if they are broadcasting yet or not.

[ccoleman]

I just found a Montreal station list, complete with the signal strength as received by some people here in Montreal... it looks like there are a few in-town local broadcasted digital tv channels plus 5+ dtv network stations coming in from over the US border, but they are using fancy 100 dollar channelmaster antennas to pull them in...

Anyone using a cheap indoor antenna and getting decent results ??

AVS Forum - CANADA: Montreal, QC - HDTV

[ccoleman]

Grr... still ZERO reception..

I am questioning whether I made a STUPID error in setting this up.

Please help me troubleshoot this....

I hear that the montreal CBC digital tv atsc is on physical channel 19, digital channel 6, subchannel 1.

How do you correctly enter this into mytheatre or the twinhanDTV software ?!

Is it possible that the card is receiving NOTHING because the channel info is getting scanned and/or entered incorrectly ?!???!!!!

[Corey]

I don't recall having to set anything. The software just scanned the whole spectrum. Symbol rates and frequencies are fixed, to my knowledge.

[wejones]

With the Air2PC card I have, it was similar to the above, ie it scanned the whole spectrum and came up with a list of channels, however if I hadn't been aimed right, it wouldn't have come up with anything.

When I use TSREADER, it comes up with a window where I enter the physical channel (38, 44, and 46 in my case) and TSREADER automatically fills in the frequency and pops up a display of whatever channels are there, and I can choose which one to play (with VLC).

I just got a NEW ATSC gadget today, since I'm in the market for an HDTV, and wasn't sure if I was going to get a monitor or TV. What I got is a set top box type tuner, and it worked like Corey said too, ie I just told it to scan the whole band, and it came up with all my channels. A lot more convenient that using the computer, however the computer card gives me the option of high quality saving to disk.

[ccoleman]

I scanned for channels in both MyTheathre AND in twinhanDTV and get zero channels !!

Should I conclude that either
a) the atsc receiver on the card is defective, or...
b) my antenna is defective or pointing the wrong way ?!