Passing USB drive to TVHE in Proxmox container

art-101

Hey everyone,

So pretty much as the subject says, I've recently rebuilt my TVHE system, previously I created a VM by running a Libreelec image with the TVHeadEnd Server Add on but as per my previous post, I was getting a lot of drop signal drop outs.

Now I've followed this guide and installed into a Proxmox LXC and I've managed to passthrough all four of my tuners and they appear to be working much better (Signal Strength 82% and SNR around 31.8dB).

I've had BBC running for around an hour and not had a single continuity or transport error where as before the continuity errors would be in the hundreds it not thousands. So I'm pleased with that.

But now I need to figure out how to pass through my external hard drive to this same container so I can timeshift and record.

If anyone has done the same I'd be delighted if you could share how to do it?

Thanks in advance.

userxy79

I am not doing exact the same but this is how to mount a USB disk in Proxmox and pass it through to an LXC container.

Step 1: Create a mount point and set permissions

sudo mkdir /mnt/USB-DISK                  # Create mount point
sudo chown root:root /mnt/USB-DISK        # Set owner and group to root
sudo chmod 0755 /mnt/USB-DISK             # Set permissions to rwxr-xr-x

Step 2: Identify the disk and get its UUID

blkid /dev/sdb1                           # Replace /dev/sdb1 with your actual device

Note the UUID from the output, e.g.:

UUID=6c901h57-0j01-4f39-a4a9-be63d04233b4

Step 3: Add the disk to /etc/fstab for automatic mounting

sudo nano /etc/fstab

Add the following lines:

##
# USB-DISK Automount
UUID=6c901h57-0j01-4f39-a4a9-be63d04233b4  /mnt/USB-DISK  ext4  noatime,nofail,users,defaults  0  0
##

Make sure the filesystem type (ext4) matches your disk. For NTFS or exFAT, use ntfs-3g or exfat respectively.

Step 4: Reboot to apply changes

sudo reboot

After reboot, your USB disk should be automatically mounted at /mnt/USB-DISK.

Step 5: Pass the disk to your LXC container

Edit the container configuration file:

sudo nano /etc/pve/nodes/<NODE>/lxc/<LXCID>.conf

Replace <NODE> with your Proxmox node name and <LXCID> with your container ID.

Add the following line:

mp0: /mnt/USB-DISK,mp=/mnt/USB-DISK

You can adjust the mount path inside the container if needed.

Step 6: Restart the container

pct restart <LXCID>

Your LXC container should now have access to the USB disk at the specified path and you can Setup to use this Disk as Timeshift and/or Recording Space.

userxy79

And dont forget to create and give the Folders for Timeshift and Recordings on your USB-Disk the right owner and permissions or it will fail. The User and Group must be hts:video and Permissions must be 0700.

sudo mkdir /mnt/USB-DISK/Timeshift                  # Create Folder Timeshift
sudo mkdir /mnt/USB-DISK/Recordings                 # Create Folder Recordings
sudo chown hts:video /mnt/USB-DISK/Timeshift        # Set owner and group to hts and video for Folder Timeshift
sudo chown hts:video /mnt/USB-DISK/Recordings       # Set owner and group to hts and video for Folder Recordings
sudo chmod 0700 /mnt/USB-DISK/Timeshift             # Set permissions to 0700 - drwx------ for Folder Timeshift
sudo chmod 0700 /mnt/USB-DISK/Recordings            # Set permissions to 0700 - drwx------ for Folder Recordings

userxy79

Sorry, i made a misstake. Please use the following corrected Setup for Timeshift and Recordings Folders. 😉

sudo mkdir /mnt/USB-DISK/Timeshift                  # Create Folder Timeshift
sudo mkdir /mnt/USB-DISK/Recordings                 # Create Folder Recordings
sudo chown hts:video /mnt/USB-DISK/Timeshift        # Set owner and group to hts and video for Folder Timeshift
sudo chown hts:hts/mnt/USB-DISK/Recordings          # Set owner and group to hts for Folder Recordings
sudo chmod 0700 /mnt/USB-DISK/Timeshift             # Set permissions to 0700 - drwx------ for Folder Timeshift
sudo chmod 0755 /mnt/USB-DISK/Recordings            # Set permissions to 0755 - drwxr-xr-x for Folder Recordings

The Setup for the Recordings Folder was not correct.
Now you can Setup Timeshift and Recordings Location in TVH itself.

art-101

userxy79 Thanks for this info.
Everything from your first post worked great and I can list the contents of the drive fine from the container so I'm off to a good start there so thank you.

The issue I'm getting now is from your ~~2nd~~ 3rd post, I can create both directories fine so we're good there.
The problem comes when I try to chown the folders.
I've tried from both the proxmox shell which gives this error (understandably)

and then if I try to chown from the container shell I get this error:

I'm logged into both the shell and the container as root so not sure where to go next.

Thanks for your help so far though, very easy to follow.

userxy79

No Problem, first things first.

If you are logged in as root wich you are on both systems as shown "root@pxx" and "root@TVHE-PVR" then you dont need to use "sudo" in front of the commands, this can lead to errors, so as root try without "sudo" in front.

And Secondly, you are trying on your proxmoxsystem to "chown" the Folder /mnt/tvhe-pvr/timeshift to user hts and group video, wich gives error because on your proxmoxsystem the user and group dont exist wich is normal because they only exist in your TVH LXC.

The Steps from my 3rd Post are all to be executetd inside your TVH LXC. But as i mentioned, as root without "sudo" in front.

So please start again clean and remove the Folders inside /mnt/tvhe-pvr you created from inside your proxmoxsystem with:

root@pxx: rm -ri /mnt/tvhe-pvr/timeshift                        # this will delete the folder timeshift inside tvhepvr
root@pxx: rm -ri /mnt/tvhe-pvr/recordings                        # this will delete the folder recordings inside tvhepvr

Then switch to your TVH LXC and start over with my 3rd post, create the Folders, set owner and give permissions but all without sudo in front because you are just root. Afterwards you can check if everthing is setup correctly with:

root@TVHE-PVR: ls -l /mnt/tvhe-pvr

This should show something like following as example:

total 2
drwx------ 2 hts video 4096 Nov 01 14:07 timeshift
drwxr-xr-x 2 hts hts 4096 Nov 01 14:08 recordings

If everything okay, you can continue to setup the Folders for Timeshift and Recordings in TVH itself.

art-101

userxy79 Fantastic.
Definitely made progress here.
Inside the container shell I can see this now:

Now in TVHE I go to the recording/timeshift portion of the interface and I've tried both /mnt/tvhe-pvr/recordings and /recordings to try and get it set for recording but the storage space indicator at the top of the screen shows 0/0/0 for either setting. I've also tried with and without the trailing / just in case.

When I try to record it fails instantly and in the failed recordings tab it shows everything as file missing:

Also please don't judge me for those shows, they were purely for test purposes ;-)

Where would logs be stored in the LXC and I can check there to see what's going on and share that info also?

Thanks,

art-101

userxy79

I've cracked it!

I found this thread with someone having a similar issue.

The solution was to change the containing folders permissions to 777 which for me was chmod 777 -c -R /mnt/tvhe-pvr and I can now record and timeshift.

Thanks for all of your help, I was totally stuck without your mini guide.

Really appreciate it, WAF at home has improved.

userxy79

No Problem 😉

Giving full rights to everyone with 0777 for /mnt/tvhe-pvr/ is a little bit too much in my opinion.

Instead i would just have give the correct rights for the folder /tvhe-pvr with:

chown hts:hts /mnt/tvhe-pvr
chmod 0755 /mnt/tvhe-pvr

But this is up to you, it should also work if i am not wrong.

userxy79

I forgot that /mn/tvhe-pvr has root:root and we have setup 0755, so readonly for everyone else.

So let it 0777 like you have it setup now, So everyone else is able to rear/write/execute into /mnt/tvhe-pvr wich is your USB-Drive.