Aaron Ledger

[Aaron Ledger]

Perhaps you should try eliminating any 3rd party codecs altogether until you get the issue sorted out just to rid yourself of those easy targets first.

[Aaron Ledger]

Definitely an odd problem.

1. Tune to a non-AC3 (Dolby Digital) audio program. These will have MPEG audio and WMC will decode to stereo PCM. Is the result the same? It may actually work properly because you may have not been bitstreaming to the TV as they often only accept PCM.

2. It is possible that perhaps there is some strange HDCP event happening so you could go on trying different cables as well as trying the video out to TV and audio out to AVR using separate cables. I’m not sure the exact capabilities of the board you have so you may actually require a second test GPU to try the dual cable approach.

3. Have a backup plan of getting a different vendor’s AVR or system if all else fails. Sometimes there are strange incompatabilities with HDCP if that is what the cause ends up being. 

[Aaron Ledger]

The difference in cable length for HDMI that you are refrencing is typically to account for HDCP negotiation which doesn’t sound like the issue you are having. Does the issue occur with bitstreamed audio (e.g. sending Dolby Digital audio direct to AVR for decoding) as well as with PCM audio (this is audio that’s already been decoded by the PC)? Can you plug the HDMI cable direct to your display and still get the issue?

[Aaron Ledger]

DTB has a configurable value that allows you to set the location of the Commercials Xml folder location. You will need to make sure permission to access the folder is configured properly and then it should work.

[Aaron Ledger]

No. Digital audio is processed in your AVR where it will convert to analog and amplify the signal for your speakers. The fancy sounding audio features on the motherboard will not be utilized.

[Aaron Ledger]

I can’t speak for the Hauppauge tuner, but I know the Ceton InfiniTV 4 USB can be used on the Mac Mini in the manner you describe. In theory, the Hauppauge tuner should work.

[Aaron Ledger]

HDCP can be one cause. If you would like to try some things, it would be worth swapping out your HDMI cable. In some cases, a longer cable such as 10-15′ might actually help. If you are connecting through an AVR, you could bypass it for a bit to see if connecting directly to the display alleviates the issue.

TWC typically has everything but the local affiliates using tuning adapters so I am afraid you may be out of luck trying to shed the TA. For the black screen with audio, the TA will not hurt/help the issue. The TA is only involved in actions involving tuning.

[Aaron Ledger]

If the picture goes completely black but still has audio then this is most likely something to do with the broadcast itself or the video card/driver or connection to the display. Typically, errors at the RF level or in the transport stream chain would never manifest in this fashion.

RF signal statistics are always useful to determine the state of the line and at least try to rule out anything that could obviously be happening. Of course, sometimes things do happen which are not so obvious which can make problems difficult to trace down.

[Aaron Ledger]

Don’t worry, it’s not a bother. That sounds like the right place to install the filter. Have you noticed the glitching only since you installed MoCA or was it happening before then? Has your cable modem service been okay?

To monitor your frequency, signal level and signal-to-noise you can take a look at it through the Tuner status web page or using the Ceton diagnostic tool which installs a section in WMC to monitor the information. You’ll need to refresh the page to watch it over time. You’ll want to make sure the signal level is no worse than -15dBmV. If the signal-to-noise is not at least in the thirties, there will likely be glitching.

Here’s an example of the web page which can be easily accessed by opening Windows Explorer, Click on “Network” in the left pane and then under “Media Devices”, right-click on the InfiniTV of interest and select “View device webpage”:

Your description of the video card issues does seem like a possible culprit. Maybe you can try completely uninstalling the driver and then reinstalling it. It would be best to keep ESVP checked.  Verify your card is not scaling the video to some resolution other than your display native resolution.

[Aaron Ledger]

The filter is a great idea. There’s no need to pass frequncies over 1 GHz into or out of the home and pollute the spectrum at which MoCA will operate. SJMaye’s units also do not support encryption from what I recall.

I am surprised though with the result. Can you explain how the filter is connected in your coax network? Also, for a channel that you are experiencing an issue with, can you monitor the signal level and signal-to-noise both with and without the filter applied to see if you can notice the difference in that reagrd? What frequncy (or frequency range) is the channel you are seeing troubles with? Are you sure that the filter is the cause? Was the issue happening so frequently that you can tell with certainty that removing the filter immediately solved the issue or could it be intermittent such that you may need to wait some amount of time to determine the effect?

[Aaron Ledger]

I thought one of the big reasons for 4k was that currently 3d displays get the 1080 p resoultion cut in half so going to 4k would bring the resolution back up to around 1080P.

It is a reason though anyone seriously wanting 1080p per eye could go with an active 3D tech currently.

[Aaron Ledger]

The argument for 4k is a bit more dubious than it was for 1080p. With 1080p, we actually have native content and 1080i which can scale perfectly to 1080p with static images. Even if technically the eye can’t resolve pixels at some viewing difference, it can still make plenty of sense to get a 1080p display if you care about the effect of scaling artifacts.

Since we don’t have too much native 4k content yet, the scaling argument goes out the door. Don’t get me wrong, I’d still take a 4k display in a heartbeat if it scaled typical content well. There are always times when I am sitting closer than my normal viewing position for some reason and 4k would help in those times. I would also be in the market if I had a closer viewing distance and large display area e.g. closer than 9′ distance with a 65″ or greater display.

[Aaron Ledger]

Try a newer Catalyst driver. Perhaps they screwed something up.

[Aaron Ledger]

That’s great. What meter did you get?

The problem you will find now is looking at every display that isn’t calibrated! Don’t forget, you can also use the meter for creating color profiles for your desktop or laptop PCs as well.

[Aaron Ledger]

If the Define XL is anything like the Define Mini that I reviewed or the Define R3 that Andrew reviewed, I think you’ll be satisfied with your purchase as money well spent. Stay tuned for a review of the R4…

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