...
Post

Vu+ Duo4k is STB or media player? Some video files are not working anymore!?

I recently acquired top of the line Vu+ satellite receiver. Before that I was struggling with Duo2 which was partly damaged, it was also randomly freezing which indicated motherboard problem.

I then decided for Duo4k which has ARM type of CPU and should have superior media support. I was wrong. There is not much info on English forums (more info available on German ones – here for example) because receiver is quite new and also not cheap. Not a popular choice by SAT and IPTV enthusiasts.

Here is table from vuplus-support.org forum which indicates what was changed between BCM chipsets regarding video codec support (ARM64 is the one which is used by Duo4k):

As you can see, latest BCM chipset used in Duo4k does not support old codecs. More information about these codecs:

  • VC1: Designed for Windows Media Video 9 from Microsoft 2003
  • WMV and WMA are Microsoft implementations of VC1
  • MPEG-4 Part 2: developed from 1999, used in DIVX, XVID, QuickTime and others, h263 compatible.
  • VP6: developed in 2003, is mainly used in Flash video.
  • VP8: developed around 2008 as successor of VP7.
  • SPARK: h263 implementation, developed around 2002.

The most problematic is lack of old DIVX/XVID support, because there are many older movies and especially series which are only available in this format (.avi container). Avi container can still work fine, but it depends on codec used. You can also have .mkv files that wont work properly!

What about audio support? Well, even here there are problems. DTS downmix for example doesnt work. I do not know about DTS passthrough because I only use stereo speakers. This is the biggest problem regarding audio support, because DTS is widely available. There might be other not supported audio codecs.

What is the conclusion? Price cutting of Broadcom sadly affected our newest ARM based Vu+ receivers. At the end of the day, these receivers are really only STBs and not media players. It is just a bonus and for better support you need to use dedicated media player.


Post

Vu+ Duo2 becomes slow or stuck in standby, is there a solution?

I havent post in a long time. Too much real life work and nothing interesting on the sat part. Well there are new 4k receiver but only Vu+4 cought my eye recently. Lets continue with the main story of my post. Vu+ does have problems with quality of capacitors that are used in Vu+ receivers. I have hoped that they learned the lesson with Vu+ Duo but apparantly the same is happening with 2nd version.
My Duo2 does not experience signs of capacitors dying but I do have dead LAN and HDMI ports. HDMI went dead on me for the 2nd time 🙁 This is called bad luck!

Well, there is an user on the web that is apparantly repairing Duo2 receivers. Check out his website. Apparently you can get your Duo2 fixed by sending receiver to him. I havent done this myself, so it is on your own risk. There is also probability that you wont receive any response from him. Try it anyway.

I will probably buy Vu+ Duo 4k edition due to interesting new capabilities like FBC support on DVB-C tuner. This means 8 different channels on different frequencies with only 1 tuner. Finally someting useful from E2 receiver.

Post

How to manually create SWAP file in Enigma 2

Here is short tutorial about creating swap file for your older E2 receiver with small or low memory. I assume you already know how to connect to your receiver using telne or ssh. Lets proceed.

Copy and paste these commands:

… First: …
dd if=/dev/zero of=/media/hdd/swapfile bs=1024 count=524288
… then …
mkswap /media/hdd/swapfile
… then …
swapon /media/hdd/swapfile
… and then …
vi /etc/fstab
… add: …
/media/hdd/swapfile swap swap defaults 0 0

Swap should be created on your hdd. If you want to use USB (better), then just replace hdd with usb. If you get confused with vi text editor, you can just open fstab file using FTP and add required line. Do not forget so save properly.

This should be it. Lets test is now 😉 If you do not want to tinker with these commands, you can also use “Swap manager” plugin if your image has it on feed. With this plugin its very easy to set up swap on usb stick.

Post

M3U to Enigma 2 Converters

My M3U to E2 converter is sadly offline, I need to fix php code. Meanwhile, you can check alternatives.

First alternative is Enigma-TV IPTV converter. You can download it here. You need to click on HDD picture on the bottom. Webroot didnt detect any malware with this package – I think you can install it safely. Here is small tutorial based on rapidiptv website.

Open the program and open your m3u list in the “M3U File Channels” tab. List should populate with channels in m3u file. If you do not see any channels than there is something wrong. If you see channels than just click on Generate Channel list! You should get message that channels file is generated. It won’t be generated in the same folder as your m3u file but elsewhere. Please check second picture for explanation where this file is located.

[​IMG]

Open folder (check picture below) on your C: drive and you will find the file userbouquet.xxx.tv in it. Rename that file to userbouquet.favourites.tv [​IMG]

Third step is using DreamboxEdit. Download your existing channels list from satellite receiver in a folder and copy the file userbouquet.favourites.tv in it.
Close Dreambox EDIT and open it again, open the channel list you downloaded previously. You should see your IPTV list in bouquets selection. Upload the files to the receiver. You are done!

Second alternative are these converters (not my work): IPTV converter – 101 (1:0) and IPTV converter – 4097 (4097:0)

Just open HTML in your browser and copy/paste your m3u file into it. These convertors are basic but they might be helpful to you.

Post

Dreambox and OpenPLi images

Recently new website emerged where you can get unofficial images for newer Dreamboxes. OpenPLi does support older models, but newer ones does not support. Here is maybe already incomplete list of newer models:

DM 900 ultraHD

DM 7080HD

DM 520HD

DM 520/525HD

Here is link: http://www.pli-images.net/index.php

I do not approve such unofficial images but some might be happy to use OpenPLi on newer machines. If website will go offline, please do not spam on official forum, as there will be no help due to using unofficial images. I warned you!

Powered by moviekillers.com.com

Seraphinite AcceleratorOptimized by Seraphinite Accelerator
Turns on site high speed to be attractive for people and search engines.