Thread: Multiple Prof Cards on the same PC

The advice received from Prof tech support on using two or more Prof PCI, PCI-e or USB tuner devices of the same model simultaneously in Windows (XP SP3 suggested for testing) with Prof BDA-Driver:

- install first Prof card into a motherboard slot or connect to a PC's USB port, and install its driver
- duplicate the card's BDA driver under a new name in its installation directory (usually C:\Windows\System32\Drivers)
- correct the driver file name in its .inf file located in .inf files depository (usually C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository)
- install second Prof card, reboot the PC and point Windows "Add New Hardware" Wizard to the edited .inf file to install second driver
- find available and change IRQ Interrupt Request number for the 2-nd card in Device Manager making it different from the 1-st card
- run both cards with AltDVB, DVBDream or ProgDVB to watch 2 different Sat TV channels simultaneously

Some points above may need correction or details. Anyone wants to check the validity of this method and add some beef to it in terms of details or a Picture Tutorial?

I guess evil minds think alike. I just sent three problem reports to Prof support, including one on this subject. You are a step ahead of me, but I do have two 7301 and two 7500 units to test. Perhaps when I have a moment I can try this out and add details if necessary. Thanks for the information!

You're still ahead when it comes to get these things done. Having hardware around is always handy. Don't expect regular Prof support staff to be extremely helpful though.

Originally Posted by zamar23

Don't expect regular Prof support staff to be extremely helpful though.

You're not kidding. I've sent several rounds of support requests and only got one response back. Today I sent three emails to "support at ..." and got three bounces back. It might have gotten delivered but their mail server got into a SMTP loop. So I tried sending the same three emails to "dong at ..." because that was the address shown for the delivery when their mail server looped. I got three more bounces back.

Do you have a better access? One of my problems is fairly serious in that both of my 7500 units hang DVB Dream every few hours, requiring the USB box to be power reset. The 7301 units work fine.

Support requests are routed depending on language used. Don't expect loaded questions to be answered any time soon from the address you used. The above Prof cards and drivers were developed in Russia. Design is pretty good, and they're manufacturer by HK Tenow, where TBS and some other brands are made, hence production quality is good. "Limited" English support is provided by CN office, as you found. AltDVB is recommended and fully supported. Check your PM.

Thanks, I've sent a PM to you. I've thought of trying AltDVB for some time and may give it a go. At the moment I'm somewhat restricted to using DVB Dream and My Theatre on my production media server because those apps have plug-ins that make them network encoders for SageTV. I also use DVB Viewer sometimes and I believe it has a Sage encoder, too, but I haven't tried the latter.

Regarding your problem with Prof USB 7500 card, one of explanations is that occasional errors in channel PID typical for feeds cause some MS filters in the card's BDA driver created graph to hang, resulting in DVBDream hang. Another reason may be defective card power supply, but I doubt this. My suggestion is to wait for a more mature Windows BDA driver. Its a known issue in Win XP, and it doesn't seems to show up for Prof USB tuners in Windows Vista or 7, based on available stats.

Its also suggested to use ProgDVB with multiple sat. tuner devices of different manufacturers, including Prof cards, installed in one PC. There may be also a resource conflict, curable by changing IRQ number for one of the devices with the same IRQ, or changing sequence of PCI slots they occupy, or using other similar techniques to change IRQ number assigned to a device by MoBo BIOS or Windows.

Originally Posted by zamar23

Regarding your problem with Prof USB 7500 card, one of explanations is that occasional errors in channel PID typical for feeds cause some MS filters in the card's BDA driver created graph to hang, resulting in DVBDream hang. Another reason may be defective card power supply, but I doubt this. My suggestion is to wait for a more mature Windows BDA driver. Its a known issue in Win XP, and it doesn't seems to show up for Prof USB tuners in Windows Vista or 7, based on available stats.

This problem happens with two of my 7500 tuners (USB) but not with the 7301 tuners (PCI) on the same machine/feed. In DVB Dream I can disable the codecs and tell it to go into "Renderless Mode" and the problem still happens. So there is no graph created. If I look at the crash dump, it appears as though DVB Dream is trying to query the tuner status when it hangs. The tuner itself is completely locked - unplugging and replugging the USB does not reset it. I have to pull the 7500 power to get it back.

Its also suggested to use ProgDVB with multiple sat. tuner devices of different manufacturers, including Prof cards, installed in one PC. There may be also a resource conflict, curable by changing IRQ number for one of the devices with the same IRQ, or changing sequence of PCI slots they occupied, or using other similar techniques to change IRQ number assigned to a device by MoBo BIOS or Windows.

Unfortunately neither ProgDVB nor AltDVB have the necessary plug-ins to serve as network encoders for SageTV. DVB Dream, My Theatre and DVB Viewer can do that part. I think the problem with DVB Dream is in Prof's bda.dev module for DVB Dream. The crash dump shows the problem is in that code. DVB Viewer works fine with the identical Prof and other units that cause DVB Dream to fail.

Originally Posted by zamar23

The advice received from Prof tech support on using two or more Prof PCI, PCI-e or USB tuner devices of the same model simultaneously in Windows (XP SP3 suggested for testing) with Prof BDA-Driver:

- install first Prof card into a motherboard slot or connect to a PC's USB port, and install its driver
- duplicate the card's BDA driver under a new name in its installation directory (usually C:\Windows\System32\Drivers)
- correct the driver file name in its .inf file located in .inf files depository (usually C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository)
- install second Prof card, reboot the PC and point Windows "Add New Hardware" Wizard to the edited .inf file to install second driver
- find available and change IRQ Interrupt Request number for the 2-nd card in Device Manager making it different from the 1-st card
- run both cards with AltDVB, DVBDream or ProgDVB to watch 2 different Sat TV channels simultaneously

Some points above may need correction or details. Anyone wants to check the validity of this method and add some beef to it in terms of details or a Picture Tutorial?

I tried this with two 7500 USB units and didn't have any luck. Neither one would work. I also tried some further hacks to the .inf files and registry but never made any progress. There is no IRQ for USB units, and I'm concerned that both devices still have some indistinguishable parts in common with the OS. This was a XP SP2 system, so I currently have it updating to SP3 and will try again. I will also try two 7301s when I have a spare moment and can raid my Linux box.