Drivers TBS6981 & TBS6281SE

Meindert Oldenburger

For a couple of years I'm happy with two TBS6981 cards, where the driver is already in the kernel.

I like to experiment with DVB-T2 and DVB-C so I bought a TBS6281SE where the drivers are not in the kernel already.

What is the best approach? The following possibilities I have?:
- TBS driver package;

- Open Source Drivers for TBS cards (ljalves).

Both methods are replacing the "media" directory in the kernel library tree /lib/modules/<kernel version>/drivers/media

After one try of the open source drivers it seems that it is not that easy to get it working (binary version mismatch).

Does someone have experience with two different cards and one of the above media replacements?

Jonathan Thomson

You should have no problems running two cards from the same manufacturer - I use two different TBS cards (6984 and 6284) which have DVB-S and DVB-T tuners and they work fine under Ubuntu 16.04.

I have tried the official drivers and those from ljalves and for my mixture of cards, the official drivers work better (less continuity errors and noloss of muxes which was a real pain with the open source drivers).

You may need to blacklist the kernel driver (on Debian/Ubuntu this means editing /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist or /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf and adding the correct kernel module to the blacklist) but I would try installing the drivers first and see if the kernel and userland modules get on with each other and if not, blacklist the kernel module so both cards use the userland drivers.

I've written guides dealing with both closed and open source drivers for TBS on my blog - posts below:
"Closed source drivers from TBS" "Open source drivers"

Meindert Oldenburger

Thanks I used the TBS drivers and it worked after removal the media directory.

Because of the extra hardware, the adapter configuration in TVheadend was lost ?!

Meindert Oldenburger

Hmmm now my remote control is not working anymore. Has to do with lirc?, but that is weird because I use inputlirc

I have also a media directory: /lib/modules/4.6.0-1-amd64/kernel/drivers/staging/media/lirc/

Jonathan Thomson

Meindert Oldenburger wrote:
> Thanks I used the TBS drivers and it worked after removal the media directory.
>

> Because of the extra hardware, the adapter configuration in TVheadend was lost ?!

I had this when I switched from closed to open source drivers - TVH see's new devices for some reason.

Jonathan Thomson

Meindert Oldenburger wrote:
> Hmmm now my remote control is not working anymore. Has to do with lirc?, but that is weird because I use inputlirc
>

> I have also a media directory: /lib/modules/4.6.0-1-amd64/kernel/drivers/staging/media/lirc/

In your lircd.conf are you referencing /dev/lirc0 or similar as it may just be that the lirc device number has changed and you need to change it to /dev/lirc1 or /dev/lirc2 etc. Again I had this when switching from open source (which doesn't support the remote on my cards) to closed source (which does) and it knocked my USB receiver out because the lirc device number had changed.

Meindert Oldenburger

I did not install lirc so no lirc deamon and /etc/lirc directory

I use inputlirc
http://kodi.wiki/view/HOW-TO:Set_up_an_MCE_remote_control_in_Linux#Alternative_Installation_method_using_InputLirc

I made an udev rule to get always the right device for inputlirc.

TBS driver breaks something but I don't know what

Jonathan Thomson

Doesn't inputlirc use the kernel drivers for the IR receiver? As you've now switched to userland drivers, I would not expect inputlirc to work without reconfiguration if indeed at all.

Was there a reason you chose inputlirc over lircd, perhaps because your original card had all its drivers in the kernel?

Meindert Oldenburger

Jonathan Thomson wrote:

> Was there a reason you chose inputlirc over lircd, perhaps because your original card had all its drivers in the kernel?

In the past, at the time the driver was not in the kernel, I always struggled with lirc to get it work again after a tbs driver/kernel upgrade. That is the reason I started using inputlirc, I don't know if it was after the driver was included in the kernel.

Well I have to find out where inputlirc depends on or try to get lirc working :(

Jonathan Thomson

I'm assuming it's the IR receiver on board the TBS card(s) you are using? Unfortunately my experience of getting the onboard IR receiver to work was a total failure so I now use a cheap USB Windows MCE (Media Center Edition) remote receiver instead.

Meindert Oldenburger

Jonathan Thomson wrote:

> I'm assuming it's the IR receiver on board the TBS card(s) you are using? Unfortunately my experience of getting the onboard IR receiver to work was a total failure so I now use a cheap USB Windows MCE (Media Center Edition) remote receiver instead.

I also have the cheap USB Windows MCE (Media Center Edition) remote receiver :)

Jonathan Thomson

Ah OK, in which case I would just switch to using lircd instead of inputlirc and ensure the correct lirc device number is referenced in /etc/lirc/licrd.conf (trial and error is how I got mine to work).

Meindert Oldenburger

I stop trying to get lirc working I dislike it to must. So I revert the media drivers back to original and wait with the new TBS T2/C card. I saw a Pulse eight USB - CEC Adapter and that is probably a better solution for me.

I also dislike that inpulirc is not working so if someone has an idea why inputlirc stops working in combination with TBS drivers, please tell me!