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+HOWTO: Get An Avermedia DVB-T working under Linux
+-------------------------------------------------
+
+February 14th 2006
+
+.. note::
+
+ This documentation is outdated. Please check at the DVB wiki
+ at https://linuxtv.org/wiki for more updated info.
+
+ There's a section there specific for Avermedia boards at:
+ https://linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/AVerMedia
+
+
+Assumptions and Introduction
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+It is assumed that the reader understands the basic structure
+of the Linux Kernel DVB drivers and the general principles of
+Digital TV.
+
+One significant difference between Digital TV and Analogue TV
+that the unwary (like myself) should consider is that,
+although the component structure of budget DVB-T cards are
+substantially similar to Analogue TV cards, they function in
+substantially different ways.
+
+The purpose of an Analogue TV is to receive and display an
+Analogue Television signal. An Analogue TV signal (otherwise
+known as composite video) is an analogue encoding of a
+sequence of image frames (25 per second) rasterised using an
+interlacing technique. Interlacing takes two fields to
+represent one frame. Computers today are at their best when
+dealing with digital signals, not analogue signals and a
+composite video signal is about as far removed from a digital
+data stream as you can get. Therefore, an Analogue TV card for
+a PC has the following purpose:
+
+* Tune the receiver to receive a broadcast signal
+* demodulate the broadcast signal
+* demultiplex the analogue video signal and analogue audio
+ signal. **NOTE:** some countries employ a digital audio signal
+ embedded within the modulated composite analogue signal -
+ NICAM.)
+* digitize the analogue video signal and make the resulting
+ datastream available to the data bus.
+
+The digital datastream from an Analogue TV card is generated
+by circuitry on the card and is often presented uncompressed.
+For a PAL TV signal encoded at a resolution of 768x576 24-bit
+color pixels over 25 frames per second - a fair amount of data
+is generated and must be processed by the PC before it can be
+displayed on the video monitor screen. Some Analogue TV cards
+for PCs have onboard MPEG2 encoders which permit the raw
+digital data stream to be presented to the PC in an encoded
+and compressed form - similar to the form that is used in
+Digital TV.
+
+The purpose of a simple budget digital TV card (DVB-T,C or S)
+is to simply:
+
+* Tune the received to receive a broadcast signal.
+* Extract the encoded digital datastream from the broadcast
+ signal.
+* Make the encoded digital datastream (MPEG2) available to
+ the data bus.
+
+The significant difference between the two is that the tuner
+on the analogue TV card spits out an Analogue signal, whereas
+the tuner on the digital TV card spits out a compressed
+encoded digital datastream. As the signal is already
+digitised, it is trivial to pass this datastream to the PC
+databus with minimal additional processing and then extract
+the digital video and audio datastreams passing them to the
+appropriate software or hardware for decoding and viewing.
+
+The Avermedia DVB-T
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+The Avermedia DVB-T is a budget PCI DVB card. It has 3 inputs:
+
+* RF Tuner Input
+* Composite Video Input (RCA Jack)
+* SVIDEO Input (Mini-DIN)
+
+The RF Tuner Input is the input to the tuner module of the
+card. The Tuner is otherwise known as the "Frontend" . The
+Frontend of the Avermedia DVB-T is a Microtune 7202D. A timely
+post to the linux-dvb mailing list ascertained that the
+Microtune 7202D is supported by the sp887x driver which is
+found in the dvb-hw CVS module.
+
+The DVB-T card is based around the BT878 chip which is a very
+common multimedia bridge and often found on Analogue TV cards.
+There is no on-board MPEG2 decoder, which means that all MPEG2
+decoding must be done in software, or if you have one, on an
+MPEG2 hardware decoding card or chipset.
+
+
+Getting the card going
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+In order to fire up the card, it is necessary to load a number
+of modules from the DVB driver set. Prior to this it will have
+been necessary to download these drivers from the linuxtv CVS
+server and compile them successfully.
+
+Depending on the card's feature set, the Device Driver API for
+DVB under Linux will expose some of the following device files
+in the /dev tree:
+
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/audio0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/ca0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/demux0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/dvr0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/frontend0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/net0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/osd0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/video0
+
+The primary device nodes that we are interested in (at this
+stage) for the Avermedia DVB-T are:
+
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/dvr0
+* /dev/dvb/adapter0/frontend0
+
+The dvr0 device node is used to read the MPEG2 Data Stream and
+the frontend0 node is used to tune the frontend tuner module.
+
+At this stage, it has not been able to ascertain the
+functionality of the remaining device nodes in respect of the
+Avermedia DVBT. However, full functionality in respect of
+tuning, receiving and supplying the MPEG2 data stream is
+possible with the currently available versions of the driver.
+It may be possible that additional functionality is available
+from the card (i.e. viewing the additional analogue inputs
+that the card presents), but this has not been tested yet. If
+I get around to this, I'll update the document with whatever I
+find.
+
+To power up the card, load the following modules in the
+following order:
+
+* modprobe bttv (normally loaded automatically)
+* modprobe dvb-bt8xx (or place dvb-bt8xx in /etc/modules)
+
+Insertion of these modules into the running kernel will
+activate the appropriate DVB device nodes. It is then possible
+to start accessing the card with utilities such as scan, tzap,
+dvbstream etc.
+
+The frontend module sp887x.o, requires an external firmware.
+Please use the command "get_dvb_firmware sp887x" to download
+it. Then copy it to /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware or /lib/firmware/
+(depending on configuration of firmware hotplug).
+
+Receiving DVB-T in Australia
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+I have no experience of DVB-T in other countries other than
+Australia, so I will attempt to explain how it works here in
+Melbourne and how this affects the configuration of the DVB-T
+card.
+
+The Digital Broadcasting Australia website has a Reception
+locatortool which provides information on transponder channels
+and frequencies. My local transmitter happens to be Mount
+Dandenong.
+
+The frequencies broadcast by Mount Dandenong are:
+
+Table 1. Transponder Frequencies Mount Dandenong, Vic, Aus.
+Broadcaster Channel Frequency
+ABC VHF 12 226.5 MHz
+TEN VHF 11 219.5 MHz
+NINE VHF 8 191.625 MHz
+SEVEN VHF 6 177.5 MHz
+SBS UHF 29 536.5 MHz
+
+The Scan utility has a set of compiled-in defaults for various
+countries and regions, but if they do not suit, or if you have
+a pre-compiled scan binary, you can specify a data file on the
+command line which contains the transponder frequencies. Here
+is a sample file for the above channel transponders:
+
+::
+
+ # Data file for DVB scan program
+ #
+ # C Frequency SymbolRate FEC QAM
+ # S Frequency Polarisation SymbolRate FEC
+ # T Frequency Bandwidth FEC FEC2 QAM Mode Guard Hier
+ T 226500000 7MHz 2/3 NONE QAM64 8k 1/8 NONE
+ T 191625000 7MHz 2/3 NONE QAM64 8k 1/8 NONE
+ T 219500000 7MHz 2/3 NONE QAM64 8k 1/8 NONE
+ T 177500000 7MHz 2/3 NONE QAM64 8k 1/8 NONE
+ T 536500000 7MHz 2/3 NONE QAM64 8k 1/8 NONE
+
+The defaults for the transponder frequency and other
+modulation parameters were obtained from www.dba.org.au.
+
+When Scan runs, it will output channels.conf information for
+any channel's transponders which the card's frontend can lock
+onto. (i.e. any whose signal is strong enough at your
+antenna).
+
+Here's my channels.conf file for anyone who's interested:
+
+::
+
+ ABC HDTV:226500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_3_4:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:2307:0:560
+ ABC TV Melbourne:226500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_3_4:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:561
+ ABC TV 2:226500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_3_4:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:562
+ ABC TV 3:226500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_3_4:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:563
+ ABC TV 4:226500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_3_4:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:564
+ ABC DiG Radio:226500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_3_4:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:2311:566
+ TEN Digital:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1585
+ TEN Digital 1:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1586
+ TEN Digital 2:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1587
+ TEN Digital 3:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1588
+ TEN Digital:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1589
+ TEN Digital 4:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1590
+ TEN Digital:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1591
+ TEN HD:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:514:0:1592
+ TEN Digital:219500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:650:1593
+ Nine Digital:191625000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:513:660:1072
+ Nine Digital HD:191625000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:512:0:1073
+ Nine Guide:191625000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_3_4:FEC_1_2:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_16:HIERARCHY_NONE:514:670:1074
+ 7 Digital:177500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:769:770:1328
+ 7 Digital 1:177500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:769:770:1329
+ 7 Digital 2:177500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:769:770:1330
+ 7 Digital 3:177500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:769:770:1331
+ 7 HD Digital:177500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:833:834:1332
+ 7 Program Guide:177500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:865:866:1334
+ SBS HD:536500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:102:103:784
+ SBS DIGITAL 1:536500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:161:81:785
+ SBS DIGITAL 2:536500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:162:83:786
+ SBS EPG:536500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:163:85:787
+ SBS RADIO 1:536500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:201:798
+ SBS RADIO 2:536500000:INVERSION_OFF:BANDWIDTH_7_MHZ:FEC_2_3:FEC_2_3:QAM_64:TRANSMISSION_MODE_8K:GUARD_INTERVAL_1_8:HIERARCHY_NONE:0:202:799
+
+Known Limitations
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+At present I can say with confidence that the frontend tunes
+via /dev/dvb/adapter{x}/frontend0 and supplies an MPEG2 stream
+via /dev/dvb/adapter{x}/dvr0. I have not tested the
+functionality of any other part of the card yet. I will do so
+over time and update this document.
+
+There are some limitations in the i2c layer due to a returned
+error message inconsistency. Although this generates errors in
+dmesg and the system logs, it does not appear to affect the
+ability of the frontend to function correctly.
+
+Further Update
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+dvbstream and VideoLAN Client on windows works a treat with
+DVB, in fact this is currently serving as my main way of
+viewing DVB-T at the moment. Additionally, VLC is happily
+decoding HDTV signals, although the PC is dropping the odd
+frame here and there - I assume due to processing capability -
+as all the decoding is being done under windows in software.
+
+Many thanks to Nigel Pearson for the updates to this document
+since the recent revision of the driver.