TVHeadend on the Raspberry PI

Tvheadend

Tvheadend is a linux service which converts a dvb-t feed into a network stream.  This  enables you to stream live tv feed from your raspberry pi to any device on your LAN.  The aim of this tutorial to set up a Tvheadend streaming server on the Raspberry PI, then watch it via an XBMC client on the Nexus 7.

Pre-requisites - Hardware

1) Raspberry PI  (I've got the newer 512MB version)
2) Powered USB hub (New Link 4 Port USB Hub with Mains Adaptor from modmypi )
3) USB DVB-T Tuner (Hauppauge WinTV Nova-TD)
4) USB WIFI adapter (Edimax EW-7811UN Wireless)
5) Memory card (Lexar class 10 32GB micro SD inside an SD card adapter)
6) Keuboard and mouse (I've got a wireless "MINI ULTRA SLIM DESIGN LAPTOP USB KEYBOARD MOUSE COMBO" from here)

Pre-requisistes OS

The operating system of choice is Raspbian (Wheezy), available from here.  Expand the root partition to fill up the SD card, otherwise you''ll run out of space.

--------------

so lets begin....

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install libcurl4-openssl-dev git

Set up the NOVA-TD DVB-T TV tuner

Plug in the tv-tuner then run
dmesg

You will see something along the lines of:

[ 1138.657011] usb 1-1.3.2: new high-speed USB device number 7 using dwc_otg
[ 1138.758550] usb 1-1.3.2: New USB device found, idVendor=2040, idProduct=9580
[ 1138.758581] usb 1-1.3.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
[ 1138.758599] usb 1-1.3.2: Product: NovaT 500Stick
[ 1138.758611] usb 1-1.3.2: Manufacturer: Hauppauge
[ 1138.758624] usb 1-1.3.2: SerialNumber: 4027809413
[ 1138.865068] IR NEC protocol handler initialized
[ 1138.896509] IR RC5(x) protocol handler initialized
[ 1138.929688] IR RC6 protocol handler initialized
[ 1138.957795] IR JVC protocol handler initialized
[ 1138.968073] dib0700: loaded with support for 21 different device-types
[ 1138.968456] dvb-usb: found a 'Hauppauge Nova-TD Stick/Elgato Eye-TV Diversity' in cold state, will try to load a firmware
[ 1138.991871] IR Sony protocol handler initialized
[ 1139.025138] IR MCE Keyboard/mouse protocol handler initialized
[ 1139.026512] dvb-usb: did not find the firmware file. (dvb-usb-dib0700-1.20.fw) Please see linux/Documentation/dvb/ for more details on firmware-problems. (-2)
[ 1139.026723] usbcore: registered new interface driver dvb_usb_dib0700
[ 1139.057895] lirc_dev: IR Remote Control driver registered, major 251
[ 1139.062582] IR LIRC bridge handler initialized

The problem here is that the dvb-usb module failed to find the nova-td firmware file (dvb-usb-dib0700-1.20.fw)  A quick google reveals that the best place to find tv tuner firmware for linux is here

cd ~
wget http://linuxtv.org/downloads/firmware/dvb-usb-dib0700-1.20.fw
sudo cp dvb-usb-dib0700-1.20.fw /lib/firmware

or more elegantly ...

sudo apt-get install firmware-linux-nonfree

Pull out the tv-tuner, and push back in.

demesg

[ 1660.721801] usb 1-1.3.2: USB disconnect, device number 7

[ 1663.006468] usb 1-1.3.2: new high-speed USB device number 8 using dwc_otg

[ 1663.107981] usb 1-1.3.2: New USB device found, idVendor=2040, idProduct=9580

[ 1663.108013] usb 1-1.3.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3

[ 1663.108029] usb 1-1.3.2: Product: NovaT 500Stick

[ 1663.108042] usb 1-1.3.2: Manufacturer: Hauppauge

[ 1663.108054] usb 1-1.3.2: SerialNumber: 4027809413

[ 1663.118347] dvb-usb: found a 'Hauppauge Nova-TD Stick/Elgato Eye-TV Diversity' in cold state, will try to load a firmware

[ 1663.173435] dvb-usb: downloading firmware from file 'dvb-usb-dib0700-1.20.fw'

[ 1663.378063] dib0700: firmware started successfully.

[ 1663.886683] dvb-usb: found a 'Hauppauge Nova-TD Stick/Elgato Eye-TV Diversity' in warm state.

[ 1663.889868] dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.

[ 1663.890139] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-TD Stick/Elgato Eye-TV Diversity)

[ 1664.159908] DVB: registering adapter 0 frontend 0 (DiBcom 7000PC)...

[ 1664.201931] MT2266: successfully identified

[ 1664.373180] dvb-usb: will pass the complete MPEG2 transport stream to the software demuxer.

[ 1664.373438] DVB: registering new adapter (Hauppauge Nova-TD Stick/Elgato Eye-TV Diversity)

[ 1664.552728] DVB: registering adapter 1 frontend 0 (DiBcom 7000PC)...

[ 1664.557289] MT2266: successfully identified

[ 1664.766474] Registered IR keymap rc-dib0700-rc5

[ 1664.767378] input: IR-receiver inside an USB DVB receiver as /devices/platform/bcm2708_usb/usb1/1-1/1-1.3/1-1.3.2/rc/rc0/input3

[ 1664.767916] rc0: IR-receiver inside an USB DVB receiver as /devices/platform/bcm2708_usb/usb1/1-1/1-1.3/1-1.3.2/rc/rc0

[ 1664.769460] dvb-usb: schedule remote query interval to 50 msecs.

[ 1664.769497] dvb-usb: Hauppauge Nova-TD Stick/Elgato Eye-TV Diversity successfully initialized and connected.

That was easy enough!  This could easily have been a nightmare, but by the looks of it Raspbian has the correct kernel modules loaded.   Now that the tv tuner has been detected and initialised we can proceed with building tvheadend. 

Building tvheadend from source

cd ~
git clone -b release/3.2 https://github.com/andoma/tvheadend.git
cd tvheadend
./configure
make
sudo make install


This will install the tvheadend binary: /usr/local/bin/tvheadend
This targets release 3.2, but by leaving off -b release/3.2 you can target the bleeding edge!

Make it auto start at boot

Create tvheadend user home and group

sudo groupadd tvheadend
sudo useradd -g tvheadend -G video -m tvheadend


Create file named /etc/init.d/tvheadend



#!/bin/bash

TVHNAME="tvheadend"
TVHBIN="/usr/local/bin/tvheadend"
TVHUSER="tvheadend"
TVHGROUP="tvheadend"

case "$1" in
  start)
    echo "Starting tvheadend"
    start-stop-daemon --start --user ${TVHUSER} --exec ${TVHBIN} -- \
                -u ${TVHUSER} -g ${TVHGROUP} -f -C
  ;;
  stop)
    echo "Stopping tvheadend"
    start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --name ${TVHNAME} --signal 2
  ;;
  restart)
    echo "Restarting tvheadend"

    start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --name ${TVHNAME} --signal 2


    start-stop-daemon --start --user ${TVHUSER} --exec ${TVHBIN} -- \
                -u ${TVHUSER} -g ${TVHGROUP} -f -C

  ;;
  *)
    echo "Usage: tvheadend {start|stop|restart}"
    exit 1
esac
exit 0

Set the permissions to make it runnable:

sudo chmod 755 /etc/init.d/tvheadend

Enable start during boot process

sudo update-rc.d tvheadend defaults

Finally start it manually so we can configure it:

sudo /etc/init.d/tvheadend start 

Configuration

Navigate to http://<rasppi_ip>:9981

Configuration -> General : Set the language (and hit 'Save Changes')

Configuration->TV Adapters: Select the Adapter 

Hit Add DVB Network by location and select Generic->auto_Default 

Now wait while the Muxes have been scanned for services.  This will take a long time.  The right hand panel will update as channels (services) are discovered.

Hit Map DVB services to channels (once it becomes enable) and wait.  In the meantime hit the services tab, to see what's been found.  If everything is working as it should, there should be a list of TV and radio channels.

Select Configuration->Channels to view mapped channels

XBMC On the Nexus 7

All that's left to do is to install XBMC on the nexus 7.  The easiest way to do this, is by installing the 'nightlies' from the XDA forums (for the nexus 7 it's the non-neon build you need).  

To connect to TVHeadend, add the "Tvheadend HTSP Client" Addon:

System -> Settings -> Add-ons -> Search  

Type: Tvheadend

Enable and Configureas follows:

Tvheadend hostname or IP address :  <RaspPI+IP>

HTTP port:  9981

HTSP port: 9982

System -> Settings -> Live TV -> General    : set to Enabled

That's it... Go to Live-TV -> TV Channels

The XBMC tvheadend client is not the finished article.   The EPG looks a bit screwed up, as do some of the channel names.  Also not all the channels appear to be present.  Apart from the above niggles, the XBMC client looks amazing and seems to fit the bill.

TVHGuide

Available from here.  It's not in the google play store, so you need to  download it and install it by hand. In comparison to XBMC, this seems to be the more finished product although the interface could do with some polish - its fairly basic!  The EPG works, although is a bit industrial.  The configuration is intuitive, and as a bonus it can use an external player like the amazing MXPlayer

Until the bugs in XBMC can be resolved, I'll be sticking with TVHGuide.