Tivo losing sound - comes back after reboot

[zollymonsta]

Sounds like you have faulty blocks on the HD (won't be picked up via a Windows scan, but the TiVo sees them and doesn't like it).

I have this problem also. I got around it by keeping recordings (I have two) that show this behaviour. Set them to 'keep until i delete' and renamed them to 'Do Not Delete'. This means these 'bad blocks' in the TiVos eyes are in use and won't be re-used (unless you delete these files).

I haven't seen this behaviour again since I did this (3+ months ago).

Cheers,
ZollyMonsta

Hi guys,

I've posted here before about sound cutting out on my TIVO.
I am still having this problem, even though it has been less and less, but it seems completely random when it occurs.
Also, when in occurs in my recordings, i hear a little sound as the sound dissapears...a little 'clonk'....and after that the video of the recording starts having problems as well with some artifacts and sometimes jerky playback.

When sound has cut out, it dosent help to change channels ( I think,,,,,,tried it once and as far as i can remember it didnt work, wil try again next time...but i normally only discover the sound is gone when I am watching a recording, and the tivo may already have rebooted o the sound is back on in live tv...)

I've tried doing the grep PALMOD from the kernel log, but I get nothing...but I am restarting every night at 2am,so that might effect the log.....I will try my best to do a dump of the log when I discover that the sound is gone.

Also, I am only using a Austar Digital STB for input, no FTA tuner.

I would just love to know what causes this issue, as I am really starting to get into my tivo's possibilities, i only want to rely on it as well

Thanks

Regards

Arve

[sikkie]

I have exactly the same sound problem in South Africa (PAL-I) after doing a PAL conversion with the Micronas chip replaced as well.

The fix was implemented by Keith Wilkinson to the Australian version of palmod and the relevant new palmod package with some other cosmetic changes is available on the oztivo website.

The Palmod files in the software area seems to be older than this post.
Where can I get hold of the software to see if I can make it work for PAL-I?
Any support will be appreciated.

[petestrash]

I don't have a copy of the current source, but I have attached the latest palmod.o

Peter.

[Darren King]

Current executables for Aus/NZ versions of palmod won't work properly for South Africa. Although the South African sound standard is (like NZ) NICAM, the sound carrier offset is different for them at 6.0MHz rather than Aus/NZ of 5.5MHz.

[T1voZA]

Current executables for Aus/NZ versions of palmod won't work properly for South Africa. Although the South African sound standard is (like NZ) NICAM, the sound carrier offset is different for them at 6.0MHz rather than Aus/NZ of 5.5MHz.

Based on the NzStereoSupport wiki page, I was of the impression that "Australia use Zweiton Stereo (5.742MHz offset) whereas New Zealand use NICAM (with a 5.85MHz offset)"?

Would it be a complex operation to add support for the 6.0MHz offset? At present palmod is able to receive sound for the South African channels, it's just that it tends to drop out in some instances.

[Darren King]

You're referring to the stereo offset frequencies. I'm referring to the base (mono) offsets.

As far as I am aware there is already a modded palmod for South Africa which works the PAL tuner fine. There is no point adding any code to reprogram the 3410D micronas because people in South Africa need not swap the existing 3430G micronas for the 3410D given you have NICAM and not Zweiton stereo sound standard. The best you are going to achieve with the PAL tuner mod is mono sound via the tuner with or without a 3410D chip for the same reasons NZ people can only get mono too.

This is outlined on my webpage regarding what a PAL tuner is, and I will be updating the how-to documentation shortly to reflect this because when the document was written there was no PAL tuner in use in South Africa and there was some hope that NICAM could be supported which has been since, unfortunately, ruled out.

[T1voZA]

As far as I am aware there is already a modded palmod for South Africa which works the PAL tuner fine.

There is no custom version of palmod for South Africa, we use the standard oztivo palmod. The problem is that some users are experiencing sound drop outs?

[Darren King]

I did not know that. I had an email from someone who said they had distorted and/or no sound through the PAL tuner using the OzTiVo palmod and found there was a modded version for South Africa on the TiVoZA image which fixed things

If there is no modded version then at a guess (remember I am not a software guy) is you are going to have to find the instructions in the existing palmod source files that instruct the tuner to instead of using 5.5MHz as the sound carrier to instead use 6.0MHz. The technical documents for the PAL tuner show that it can be set for 5.5, 6.0 and 6.5MHz. User "Thompson" on these forums should be able to help you out.

[thomson]

There is no custom version of palmod for South Africa, we use the standard oztivo palmod. The problem is that some users are experiencing sound drop outs?

I am not aware if the source code is available for the OzTivo palmod, but the code I run will default back to Zweiton Stereo if a sound standard could not be found. This could cause sound drop-out's in bad-coverage NICAM areas.

If you have a look at line 470 (palmod.c) of the attached code (in particular the few lines commented out before it) then you will see what could be done to fix the situation. There are basically two options... we could sit in a loop trying to autodetect, or default to NICAM.

I think the whole PAL-B/G (5.5MHz offset) versus PAL-I (6.0MHz offset) is a red herring as this is only required for the RF Output support. Although if you wish to have a PAL-I (6.0MHz offset) RF Output signal then a change on line 714 (palmod.c) from 0x8a480004 to 0x8a500004 would be required.

I can recompile the source with these changes if required.

[petestrash]

To make version control easier, would it not be possible just to have the one palmod for all regions with the offsets controlled by palmod_config ?

Peter.