[ATrpms-users] DVB-T USB stick OK under FC5, not under CentOS 5

[John Pilkington]

Hi again: after a personal relocation that is dwarfed by Axel's I have
just replaced an old FC3 installation with CentOS 5.  The box still has
FC5 and XP in non-virtual form.  

The 'clean' installation went smoothly but I had a few anxious (grubby?)
moments before I could boot again into FC5.  I've updated C5 using
Smart; again that seems to have worked well, although the channel
locations in the config package didn't all work and I may not yet have a
good set.  I haven't yet found packages for several of the multimedia
apps that work for me in FC5.

But my main problem is that the DVB-T stick that works quite well in FC5
seems unusable in Centos.  I have Axel's v4l and its kmdl of 20070731
installed and maybe the problem will go away when the more recent
releases arrive (and I get back to the system).  If the new build only
adds newer hardware then I shall keep FC5 in use - or perhaps go
shopping.

The stick is by Freecom, bought July 2006.  It works well in FC5 on all
except one multiplex (BBC4 and BBC Radio), on which it times out during
scanning with no tables found.  In Mythtv, after some manual tweaks to
the database, the EIT data for that multiplex appears in the Program
Guide, but I haven't been able to record from it.

In Centos, dvbscan lights the device's green light but then says it is
'unable to query frontend status'; the light goes back to yellow and
dvbscan gives up.  Mythtvsetup (0.21) doesn't recognise the device
(unlike in FC5), although dmesg says it has been correctly
initialised.  

This may not be the best forum for getting this problem fixed, but I'm
not sure that there's one that would be better. Perhaps the DVB-T list?
I hope someone will find the info helpful.  The Freecom stick is still
advertised, and quite cheap, and advertisers seem keen to sell laptops
that might use it! 

John Pilkington