AZBox Blind Scan Feature
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Originally Posted by Smith, P. Quote from Tele-satellite:
"Another AZBOX box highlight would be the DVB-S2 blind scan feature although Hugo concedes that this would be more of a brute-force blind scan method. “A real blind-scan feature for DVB-S2 will probably never exist”, says Hugo who has spoken to many tuner manufacturers on this subject, “the market is simply too small.” A blind scan compatible receiver must not only handle Auto FEC and Auto SR, it must also be able to deal with Auto-Pilot signal and Auto-modulation. The relatively few satellite DXers that are out there make it too expensive to develop this full blind scan feature. TELE-satel-lite plans to test the new AZBOX receiver with IP-TV, Arabic menu and soft blind scan in the next issue."
Smith, P.
I might wish to renew my subscription to TELE-Satellite magazine to read the future articles regarding the AZBox and the issues on Blind Scan. I allowed my subscription to lapse as I wasn't sure that it was worth the annual sub price. Maybe I will rethink that for one more year.
Also, trust me from my point of view, I have been highly interested in the BLSA that you mentioned in other threads. However, this hobby is demanding upon my play money account and so I haven't really gotten around to contemplating a new "toy" such as this just yet.
I always get sidetracked with another adventure (like the buck deer that just ate the front clip of my car!) There is always something else to spend my money on that is more important or critical, so I will simply have to wait, even if the thing is rather inexpensive. I am sure that you know what I mean.
Your information does not fall upon deaf ears! Thanks for the information. Please trust me, I am following and keeping notes!
RADAR
"Another AZBOX box highlight would be the DVB-S2 blind scan feature although Hugo concedes that this would be more of a brute-force blind scan method. “A real blind-scan feature for DVB-S2 will probably never exist”, says Hugo who has spoken to many tuner manufacturers on this subject, “the market is simply too small.” A blind scan compatible receiver must not only handle Auto FEC and Auto SR, it must also be able to deal with Auto-Pilot signal and Auto-modulation. The relatively few satellite DXers that are out there make it too expensive to develop this full blind scan feature. TELE-satel-lite plans to test the new AZBOX receiver with IP-TV, Arabic menu and soft blind scan in the next issue."
Smith, P.
I might wish to renew my subscription to TELE-Satellite magazine to read the future articles regarding the AZBox and the issues on Blind Scan. I allowed my subscription to lapse as I wasn't sure that it was worth the annual sub price. Maybe I will rethink that for one more year.
Also, trust me from my point of view, I have been highly interested in the BLSA that you mentioned in other threads. However, this hobby is demanding upon my play money account and so I haven't really gotten around to contemplating a new "toy" such as this just yet.
I always get sidetracked with another adventure (like the buck deer that just ate the front clip of my car!) There is always something else to spend my money on that is more important or critical, so I will simply have to wait, even if the thing is rather inexpensive. I am sure that you know what I mean.
Your information does not fall upon deaf ears! Thanks for the information. Please trust me, I am following and keeping notes!
RADAR
Either which way, I am happy with my AZBox Premium. I know how to work-around not having the blind scan built-in to the box. It is such a nice piece of equipment (even without it) that I truly cannot complain.
RADAR
RADAR
THe azbox is still the best one out there
I can use the CS5000 to blind scan....with very little S2 on KU I'm not missing much
I can use the CS5000 to blind scan....with very little S2 on KU I'm not missing much
So what's the Pansat 9200 with the 8PSK board doing then? Are they only doing a software blind scan for S2?
And the article also seems to be implying that the reason that they're not worried about a blind-scan is the low number of people they think are looking for S2 feeds. But what about people who want the AZbox to blind-scan DVB-S? Do they think everybody wants to have two boxes set up all the time? And manually transfer information all the time?
The company seems like they're trying to blame everyone but themselves for everything. Take the sudden revelation that the first two models won't support two satellite tuners for example. Why did they not make that clear from the beginning? Were they not familiar with the limitations of the tuners they chose to use?
And the article also seems to be implying that the reason that they're not worried about a blind-scan is the low number of people they think are looking for S2 feeds. But what about people who want the AZbox to blind-scan DVB-S? Do they think everybody wants to have two boxes set up all the time? And manually transfer information all the time?
The company seems like they're trying to blame everyone but themselves for everything. Take the sudden revelation that the first two models won't support two satellite tuners for example. Why did they not make that clear from the beginning? Were they not familiar with the limitations of the tuners they chose to use?
There are only a few recognized DVB chipset makers in the world. How then he managed to talk to "many"? Chip makers are the best to optimize this feature, since they are qualified enough to invoke adaptive optimization algorithms to perform fast blindscan. Brute force on a chip level - that sound quite primitive. If the chipset blindscan instructions are indeed basic, driver and firmware coders still can invoke these chipset routings in an effective way. Its a typical task, many STB makers accomplished in the past. May be Hugo needs to invest some cash into qualified coders instead of paying ad magazines. If he complains that the market is small for AZBox, what can other companies possibly say?
Btw, choosing an optimization algorithm for signal blindscan is a typical task, irrelevant to STB model, and solved many times in the past, so its hard to believe, chip makers are ignorant to it.
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I can't imagine how long a blindscan would take with auto SR and modulation, sounds like BS marketing
A Vantage 1100S takes about 12 Minutes for a full Ku Scan. It does DVB and DVB-S2 at the same time. C Band seems a bit faster.
For the purposes of discussion I will assume the AZboes) employ the CX24116 demod chip as others have stated. If true, any rapid blind scanning capability is going to be quite hard to execute. I don't have an AZbox, but I do have some DVB World PC tuners that use the CX24116, and I have read the Linux driver for it quite thoroughly.
In terms of DVB-S, my experience is this chip can lock signals even if the commanded frequency and SR are fairly far off. That's helpful for software blind scanning because one has fewer steps to search for both parameters, particularly because the CX24116 has auto-FEC capability for DVB-S signals. Unfortunately the driver suggests that obtaining the values of frequency and SR used for locking cannot be done directly. That would make even DVB-S blind scanning a potential nightmare.
DVB-S2 blind scanning is far worse for this chip. It apparently has no auto-FEC for DVB-S2, meaning one would have to scan for each permutation of FEC, pilot and possibly roll-off. So even if there is a solution to querying the demod for frequency and SR, to accomplish a full blind scan, one might have to scan once for DVB-S, and then 10-20 times for DVB-S2.
As zamar23 points out, newer demod chips like the STV0903 appear to implement a very complete hardware blind scan. In reading the two Linux drivers for it, it looks like one can load search parameters into the chip itself, and it will report back what it finds. This demod seems to have the full auto-FEC, pilot, roll-off derivation for both DVB-S and DVB-S2, and there is an easy means for the commanding processor to pull these values from the chip. When I get some free time I hope to work at improving the Linux drivers so at least PC tuners may be able to perform hardware blind scan in the future.
es) employ the CX24116 demod chip as others have stated. If true, any rapid blind scanning capability is going to be quite hard to execute. I don't have an AZbox, but I do have some DVB World PC tuners that use the CX24116, and I have read the Linux driver for it quite thoroughly.In terms of DVB-S, my experience is this chip can lock signals even if the commanded frequency and SR are fairly far off. That's helpful for software blind scanning because one has fewer steps to search for both parameters, particularly because the CX24116 has auto-FEC capability for DVB-S signals. Unfortunately the driver suggests that obtaining the values of frequency and SR used for locking cannot be done directly. That would make even DVB-S blind scanning a potential nightmare.
DVB-S2 blind scanning is far worse for this chip. It apparently has no auto-FEC for DVB-S2, meaning one would have to scan for each permutation of FEC, pilot and possibly roll-off. So even if there is a solution to querying the demod for frequency and SR, to accomplish a full blind scan, one might have to scan once for DVB-S, and then 10-20 times for DVB-S2.
As zamar23 points out, newer demod chips like the STV0903 appear to implement a very complete hardware blind scan. In reading the two Linux drivers for it, it looks like one can load search parameters into the chip itself, and it will report back what it finds. This demod seems to have the full auto-FEC, pilot, roll-off derivation for both DVB-S and DVB-S2, and there is an easy means for the commanding processor to pull these values from the chip. When I get some free time I hope to work at improving the Linux drivers so at least PC tuners may be able to perform hardware blind scan in the future.
A spectrum analyzer can be quite helpful for rapid searching, but one has to understand its limitations. I have a full-blown bench spectrum analyzer sitting next to my FTA scanning setup and normally have it turned on when I'm hunting feeds. I can read off the the center frequency of a new signal that pops up in a matter of seconds. Determining the SR takes a little more time as I have to center tune an analog receiver and search for the SR peak on the SA off the baseband output. That can take a minute or two at best for one signal.
I could improve this in a number of ways and even automate it, but in the end all I have is the frequency and SR. I don't know the modulation type, the FEC, pilot or any roll-off settings. To find those I have to punch up the basic parameters on a DVB-S(2) receiver and start manually searching. This is time consuming and impractical unless I know the signal is what I want or the CNR is so low I can't get it any other way.
In the time I can manually identify and measure a few signals on the SA I could have done a full blind scan on a receiver and found nearly everything. The real utility of a SA is to take a quick look at a satellite with a known spectrum and see if anything has changed. That takes only a couple of seconds. After that a directed blind scan is more efficient.
I'm sure the BLSA is a useful tool for those who do not want to make a major investment, but it is a very simple tool lacking many capabilities of the real McCoy. You get what you pay for.
There is always opportunity to write your own SW for implement a research of those signals revealed by BLSA.
And more - you could add such daughter board to newest sat-tuners with DVB-S2 after done some homework.
And more - you could add such daughter board to newest sat-tuners with DVB-S2 after done some homework
.There is always opportunity to write your own SW for implement a research of those signals revealed by BLSA.
And more - you could add such daughter board to newest sat-tuners with DVB-S2 after done some homework
Frankly I wouldn't start a project like this with the BLSA. It was a nice technical trick in its day, but it is still a one-trick pony. After all it is nothing but a fixed 60 kHz LPF sampled at a very low rate and scanned by a tuner that is no longer manufactured. This can mimic a true spectrum analyzer in a very narrow domain, in the same manner a scooter can mimic a Ferrari. We are way OT.
Of course the ideal way of doing it would be in close contact with the tuner chipset maker, as the guys who coded the chip know a lot more tips, tricks and workarounds than can ever be reflected in accompanying docs and others' drivers. Plus such exchange usually results in the chip improvement as well. However, in real FTA world such "business as usual" thing probably doesn't work well.
Hi there I am a feed hunter in the UK nice site
The spectrum analysers have been replaced by blind scan receivers for over a decade here
I use the AZBox with a Technomate TM6900HD blind scan receiver that is similar to a Clarke Tech,
Feed hunters use a various software & hardware blind scan receivers such as Manhattan Plaza & FortecxStar Ultra
I run a feed hunters forum for live feeds in Europe & the quality of the feeds is excellent in SD & HD
From reading through this thread the conclusion is that the AZBox Elite & Premium will in the not too distant future have a slow blind scan & the yet to be released Premium + will do it by Hard Ware this means it will be much faster, but Elite and Premium will do it via a Soft Ware blind scan,
I as much concluded this a couple of days ago so it looks like we will have to wait a bit longer for one receiver that can it all.
I as much concluded this a couple of days ago so it looks like we will have to wait a bit longer for one receiver that can it all.
I wouldn't draw any conclusions at all from what you've being hearing or reading on the subject. People red about AZBox ATSC tuner 3 years ago, and its still "available" only on ad papers. I guess the main reason for this is that AZBox devs don't have presence in NA except a few people shipping boxes, and can't catch and play with ATSC signals thus making the whole thing actually work.
I guess the main reason for this is that AZBox devs don't have presence in NA except a few people shipping boxes, and can't catch and play with ATSC signals thus making the whole thing actually work.
