Jump to content

LiveTV on Roku


moviefan

Recommended Posts

moviefan

Does anyone have this working?

 

I ordered a Roku3 for some testing mainly around this aspect.

 

Just installed it today and it works okay to play regular videos with but when I select LiveTV, I get a channel listing, am able to pick a channel, but then just receive a blank gray screen and nothing ever loads.

 

If I play the same channel through the browser it works fine.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

When I click on preferences it says version 1.23.  Is that what you are looking for?

 

I really would love to get this to work.  Any troubleshooting or further detail I can provide please let me know.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

I will donate $50 to MB (or any specific developer) if someone helps me figure this out....     :D  -_-  :blink:    Please :-)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

Just some real quick extra aspects of my setup:

 

- Win Server 2012 R2 on ESX 5.5 MB Server running 3.0.5309.26857 and Beta level release

- Win7 Ultimate x64 Desktop running Server WMC version 1.0.0.36, build: 1154

- Roku3, just installed and updated today and added the channel.  It is connected via WiFi but has a good 802.11n signal in this location.

 

Would a MB server log help in this case or is there some way of debugging on the client side?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

TheWave

I have the same issue myself.  Been working on it this evening and have progressed further.  In Roku, when I click on a channel in Live TV the screen is blank and nothing happens.  It'll just leave you hanging there.  What I figured out is its trying to retrieve the program guide for the channel.  So I went back into NextPVR and completely setup my program guide using XMLTV EPG using:

 

http://mc2xml.hosterbox.net/

 

Follow the instructions for NextPVR.  

 

Once I had every channel setup (mapped correctly) in the program guide I went into MB Server and clicked "Refresh Guide Data" from Live TV. 

 

Now went I click on a channel in MB via Roku the guide for that channel appears instead of it hanging up.  I click on the current channel program in the guide (marked with a *) and now a new screen appears with options to Play/Record and some basic information about the show.  But when I click Play the retrieving bar appears with the Quality indicator and it just hangs (this time it eventually it kicks you back out to the Play/Record screen).

 

I'll work on this some more tomorrow night but I'm thinking I'm running into a transcoding/codec or firewall issue.

 

Cheers!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

TheWave

LOL - Well I had both tuners of my Homerun actively recording shows.  Once a free tuner became available this worked!  

 

The key for you will be to setup the Program Guide in NextPVR.  That is why you are hanging up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

Does Roku require NextPVR instead of ServerWMC?  I am using ServerWMC and it definitely is downloading guide data.  I can see it via the browser.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

roku works with serverwmc here at least

 

@@Spaceboy can you go over your setup any more?  Is there anything special you did to get this working?

 

ServerWMC is registered fine for me and I am able to play live TV both locally as well as remotely when I open up my firewall via browsers.

 

MB for Roku seems to work fine for me as well and I am able to play movies and TV episodes fine.

 

Just no LiveTV.  :-(

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Spaceboy

nothing special about my set up i'm afraid. my roku is also wirelessly connected but i presume you have tried hard wiring it to see if it makes any difference?

 

other than that i'd suggest posting in the live tv section and trying to get krustyreturns attention. serverwmc is all his work and he may be able to help you out with the technical side of things.

 

i get the feeling we are in the minority using live tv at the moment, mostly because there's not many clients that support it and i guess we have to accept problems?

 

good luck!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

krustyreturns

Also posting the serverwmc log (see debug tab in serverwmc) after a live stream fails will be helpful. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

I am hoping to obtain assistance in debugging this functionality.  I described my issue in this thread for Roku and @@Spaceboy suggested possibly posting here to obtain the assistance of @@krustyreturns.  Others also seem to indicate having similar problems.

 

I would GREATLY appreciate any assistance in getting this to work.

 

Thank you!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

I am attaching a server log to this post when replicating the issue.

 

When I look at the ServerWMC log it doesnt even show it seeing a request for the attempt to play.

 

I just updated to newest beta version before running this test, rebooted the server, enabled advanced debugging, deleted exiting log file.  Then went to Roku, turned on , hit live Tv and selected the channel.

 

Let me know if this is of any help?

 

Thanks!

Edited by moviefan
Link to comment
Share on other sites

krustyreturns

I can only help (or attempt to help) if I can see the serverwmc log - after you have tried to start a live stream. 

 

Can you play recorded tv files?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

I can only help (or attempt to help) if I can see the serverwmc log - after you have tried to start a live stream. 

 

Can you play recorded tv files?

 

I can show you the serverWMC log but it doesn't change or add any additional information when I try to play the live stream so I don't think it would be helpful.

 

I don't have any recordings but I will try to set one up and play that way to see if I have any more success or can at least generate some more logs.  Will report back.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

I can only help (or attempt to help) if I can see the serverwmc log - after you have tried to start a live stream. 

 

Can you play recorded tv files?

 

@@krustyreturns I went to go to some more testing with this today to try and produce more logs and I noticed something I missed the other day.... ServerWMC doesn't appear to be generating any logs at all for anything.

 

When I click on the current logfile the timestamp and the last entries are from 2/27/14.

 

I have clicked around the menus but I am not seeing how to force it to start logging.  I dont think I ever disabled it.

 

When I click on the debug tab everything looks pretty normal:

 

 53d7efaba1dec_mb.png

 

But I also noticed that I don't have the checkbos for "Keep a Log File" like they show in the ServerWMC help like this:

 

53d7efebc9d8d_mb.png

 

Is this just a recent change in one of the newest versions or do I need to reinstall to get that setting back or is there some other way to force ServerWMC to start logging again?

 

Thanks!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

krustyreturns

That's weird.  We have changed things since that debug page - now the logger is always enabled.  If for some reason the logger couldn't be started it notifies you with a popup when swmc starts up - but I assume you aren't seeing that.  Consider deleting the old log files in the swmc directory (but probably not the config.xml file unless you don't mind swmc rebuilding it from defaults).  Then reboot your server machine, if you still don't get a log, post the path swmc is opening when you click 'Log Directory'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

Thanks for the suggestion.  This did work and ServerWMC started creating logs again.  I went back to do soem more testing and here is what I did....

 

- Enabled Advanced debug logging in MB.  Deleted existing log.

- Went to Roku and turned on.  First played regular Movie.  Then played regular TV show.  These both started successfully.

- I then clicked on LiveTV and tried to open a channel.....

- This time the behavior was slightly different than I've seen in the past.  Initially the Roku showed the channel bar on top like normal, with a gray area on the bottom, but this time it actually said "Retreiving" in the middle of this screen for a while.  This is the first time I've seen that. After about 10-15 seconds of it being in the "retrieving" state it looked like MB on Roku crashed and I was returned to the Roku home screen.

- At this point I opened MB up and selected a different channel, and the behavior returned to what it had been doing this whole time:  blank gray screen, no "retrieving" status, and just sits there indefinitely.

 

Attaching MB and ServerWMC log to this post.  Hope this can help some!

 

Thanks!

 

 

Edited by moviefan
Link to comment
Share on other sites

there don't appear to be live tv playback attempts in that log. right now we might just be sending krusty on a wild goose chase that he has no ability to solve. Please see post 13 regarding all of the information that is required to diagnose playback issues.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

krustyreturns

yeah there aren't any streams starting there.  thanks for the pointer Luke.

Edited by krustyreturns
Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

there don't appear to be live tv playback attempts in that log. right now we might just be sending krusty on a wild goose chase that he has no ability to solve. Please see post 13 regarding all of the information that is required to diagnose playback issues.

 

Hi Luke.  I am trying to follow the instructions from that post but I don't see exactly what I am missing.  I will try to go through that post line by line to make sure it is all there.....

 

- Sever version keeps changing so I didn't post that but I am now running  3.0.5323.459.  Roku MB version is 1.23.

 

- I tried to explain as best I could in the previous post what exactly I did.  I know I used the word crash which it says isn't helpful but I wasn't sure how else to describe what I saw on Roku.  It was in the LiveTV screen, saying retrieving, and then the screen went black for a second and I was looking at the Roku home screen again.  I can attempt to take a video of this if you think it would be useful?  All the other times it just shows a gray screen with the channel bar on top and nothing happens.

 

- I uploaded the only logs showing in the MBS log directory.  I did delete the log prior to testing but I thought that would be helpful in trying to isolate where the problem was occurring.  I can do a complete log including a reboot of the server if that is preferred?

 

- There is no transcoding log appearing anywhere

- MB Classic is not involved.

- No FFMPEG log created

 

Have I missed something?  Please tell me what I am doing wrong and I will try to update it.  I played the normal movie and TV files prior to attempting the LiveTV play to show the client working. Do you see these requests in the log but just not the LiveTV request?  I see a lots of stuff referencing LiveTV in the log but really don't know what I am looking for.

 

Edited by moviefan
Link to comment
Share on other sites

moviefan

Well, I did more testing this morning but I am not very hopeful that this is going to help with the debugging aspect.....

 

- Reboot ServerWMC system
- Enable Advanced Debug Logging in MBS.  Reboot MB Server.
- Open MB via browser, Wait for Scan Media Library task to complete.  took quite a bit longer than usual.  I guess maybe due to the logging?
- click on LiveTV in browser, Play channel successfully.
- Open Roku.  Play normal TV show successfully.
- Click on LiveTV.  Select channel.  Screen goes gray with the channel bar.  No "retrieiving" message like the one time yesterday.
- Clicked back and on a few more channels with the same result each time.
 
 
I have examined the logs myself and I can clearly see the request from the browser in the ServerWMC log but I do not see any additional requests similar to that beyond the one from the browser.  The server definitely does NOT seem to be requesting the stream when Roku is clicked to request it.
 
When I analyze the MB Server log I see lots of requests from the Roku to update the channel listing, which makes sense, but I don't really see a request to play.  Not sure exactly what it is supposed to look like so I may be missing it, but it just seems like it keeps 
 
If my analysis is correct, however, and you are not seeing the request in the server log again than clearly something is wrong on the client side and it is not properly requesting from the server?
 
@@im85288 are you able to help with client side debug at all?
Edited by moviefan
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...