Support for Ceton (4 and 6 tuner) PCI and Ethernet

Feature Suggestions
41

I recently needed to switch from WMC when they threatened to shutdown the guide and desperately wanted to keep using my InfiniTV6 Ethernet for TV. I wanted the PRIME 6, but that’s still vaporware. So, I wrote a little app to make my Ceton appear like an HDHomeRun PRIME. It’s very similar to tvhProxy/telly, but for Cetons. I really only intend to use it with NextPVR v5, but I decided to get it working with Plex, too.

So for any of you out there still holding onto your Ceton device, feel free to give this a try: https://github.com/craigmox/cetonproxy

5 Likes
42

I followed your link above but could’t fine the file cetonproxy.exe that you specify. I would like to implement this solution but I am uncertain how to proceed. Please advise, I would be grateful for your your help.

43

Click the “Releases” tab on the page to find cetonproxy.zip. I’ve updated the main page with a link to download the zip directly.

44

I downloaded and installed your brilliant program (cetonproxy) but I’m having some trouble getting everything to work. I have a Ceton InfiniTV 4 PCIe card that appears to be working fine. The Ceton diagnostic tool says it’s working but not setup for media center (which is true). Your Cetonproxy program identified my channels correctly when I scanned for them and I was able to go to the web page you specified and see my channels. Also, Plex recognized it as an HDhomerun and I was able to setup my channels. However, I cannot tune to the channels. When I try, I get an error message stating that it could not tune to the channel. I suspect that I have one of the IP addresses specified incorrectly in cetonproxy. Also, while I have a 4 channel card, cetonproxy identifies it as a 6 channel card. I tried to follow the directions you provided but must be doing something wrong. If you could provide some help, I’d be most grateful.

45

So this thread has been going on for a while now. I have Ceton still with WMC but as a lot are looking for alternatives. What is the current solution for doing live TV with Plex? I do not wan to use any custom proxy. Would prefer it’s all integrated and just works. Like Channels app says they only support SiliconDust products but even they dropped their 3 tuner cable card solution and chances are the 6 tuner version is not coming out. No clue why they would discontinue a product if they are planning a new one years later so basically what I can tell, there is no answer anymore for CableCard users. Is this true?

46

Yeah I’m in the same boat. I recently installed Plex and tried to use that custom proxy but was only able to get about 28 channels and all the rest wouldn’t work. I just recently found another possible solution which is EMBY. It has a Windows Media center server plugin. I will try it out and update.

47

I recently installed Plex and tried to use that custom proxy but was only able to get about 28 channels and all the rest wouldn’t work.

If you have any interest in helping me work through why you can’t see other channels, send me message. I haven’t seen any channels that don’t work with my setup (InfiniTV6 ethernet, comcast), but if I did I’d be fixing it.

I understand not wanting to use a hacky proxy setup, though. I’m usually in the same boat.

48

I just found out about the Cetonproxy and had a couple of questions

  1. Where does it save the channels I selected? If there is a file, I would like to back it up

  2. Anyway to use it with multiple Ceton devices? I have a 6 channel PCI and 6 channel ETH. I’m trying it with the PCI version ( don’t have a cable card for ETH), but would possibly like to use both

  3. How does it detect which channels the device has. On initial config, I used the ETH, which has no cable card, no coax, only ethernet and it was able to find my channels.

So far the app seems to be working. Thank you for taking the time to create this

49

Where does it save the channels I selected?

It saves everything in a JSON file at C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\cetonproxy\config.js

If you want it to save somewhere else, you can run it with a command line parameter: cetonproxy.exe -config "c:\your\config\folder"

Anyway to use it with multiple Ceton devices?

Short answer no – I’ve never tried. I’d suggest running cetonproxy twice and then changing the listen port on one of them, but I think that might only work in Emby and NextPVR. Running two of them will cause only one to be automatically discoverable via UPnP, and Plex seems to require that to work, so it might be a headache. Or run them on different computers. This might be
something I can bake into the app some day.

How does it detect which channels the device has.

It requests them from a URL on the Ceton, specifically http://yourcetonip/view_channel_map.cgi?page=0&xml=1. I think the devices store their channels for a while, even after no longer having a cablecard.

Thanks for trying it out!

50

I am assuming this only works for PMS running on W10. I am running PMS on FreeNAS. Any possibility you can write a plugin for that?? I am still using my Ceton Eth6 on WMC but I know that won’t hold out much longer and I am going to need to find an alternative.

51

I am assuming this only works for PMS running on W10

Currently, the cetonproxy app can only run on Windows 10. I plan to mess around with porting it to other OSs at some point. But it shouldn’t matter what operating system Plex server is running on. I would guess they all support HDHomeRun equally and would be able to detect the cetonproxy app as one.

52

OK. Could you just please verify that what I am thinking will work. I have a small always-on Celeron based W10 laptop that runs my LP radio station. I can put your CetonProxy app on that, configure it to look for my Ceton Eth6 & my FreeNAS based PMS will detect the Ceton Eth6 thru the laptop & CetonProxy-app as an HDHomerun tuner. Is that correct?? My PMS currently detects and works fine with an old HDHomerun dual.

53

Barring any other problems, I would think that should work. As long as your laptop is plugged into ethernet, too.

54

Yes. All my media PCs/servers/tuners are hardwired to a 24port GigE switch. Thanks for the reply. Will advise of the progress.

55

st0rmcat,
I have been able to get the proxy to work but only on channels with no copy protection what-so-ever, even if the channel has a COPY FREELY (00) tag, playback on Plex or VLC fails. I have also noticed that some HD channels with no copy protection sometimes fail on the first attempt in Plex, succeed on the 2nd while others will seem to downshift to the SD channel, I don’t know if this is a Plex bug or not. I am on VZ Fios and am restricted to watching mostly only the OTA channels that are carried on Fios, there are very few cable channels that have no copy protection at all. Is there a way to strip or alter the COPY FREELY(00) to no protection at all or is this a bug in Plex and VLC not playing COPY FREELY (00) programs?

56

Hey how’s it going? Sorry I didn’t get back to sooner but work has been crazy. My setup (InfiniTV4 ethernet, Verizon) I was trying to run it on Windows 7 and I just upgraded today to Windows 10 to see if that would resolve the issue but the same problem continues. Any help would be greatly appreciated. And just for everyone’s information I reached out to Silicondust about the status of the HDHOMERUN PRIME 6 and there reply was it is still in the works so the project has not been abandoned.

57

I noticed that Music Choice channel wouldn’t play. Below is a few entries from the log

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 0 (Video: h264 ([27][0][0][0] / 0x001B), none): unspecified size
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 1 (Audio: ac3 ([129][0][0][0] / 0x0081), 0 channels, fltp): unspecified sample rate
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 3 (Unknown: none (ETV1 / 0x31565445)): unknown codec
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 4 (Unknown: none (ETV1 / 0x31565445)): unknown codec
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 5 (Unknown: none ([192][0][0][0] / 0x00C0)): unknown codec
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 6 (Video: h264 ([27][0][0][0] / 0x001B), none): unspecified size
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 7 (Audio: ac3 ([129][0][0][0] / 0x0081), 0 channels): unspecified sample format
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 8 (Audio: ac3 ([129][0][0][0] / 0x0081), 0 channels): unspecified sample format
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 10 (Unknown: none (ETV1 / 0x31565445)): unknown codec
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 11 (Unknown: none (ETV1 / 0x31565445)): unknown codec
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

[2020-03-29 03:23:57.969] Client 0 tuner 0 video converter: [mpegts @ 103f8640] Could not find codec parameters for stream 12 (Unknown: none ([192][0][0][0] / 0x00C0)): unknown codec
Consider increasing the value for the ‘analyzeduration’ and ‘probesize’ options

58

You’ll see those errors because the Ceton sends a bunch of empty channels within the video stream along-side the channel you’re intending to watch. They will probably show on every channel even if they work correctly.

if you look above that part in the log file, what does it say for “CopyProtectionStatus”? Only those with copy protection statuses of “None” or “Copy Free” have a chance of playing… anything else probably won’t work.

59

St0rmcat, I have tried your ceton proxy and it is great, but I have a question, can it stream more than one live channel? I configured with Plex and if I am watching a live channel on one device and try to watch a different channel on another device, it breaks. I tried the same with VLC to rule out Plex. As soon as I tune a second channel from a second device, it stops the streams on one if the streams… Thank you!

60

I configured with Plex and if I am watching a live channel on one device and try to watch a different channel on another device, it breaks.

This was a problem in one of the versions, but it should be fixed in the latest release. I just downloaded the latest version, tried two different channels at the same time on my Plex server, and it was working. If it still won’t work, can you please post to the issue related to this on the github page. Thanks!