So, over here in the UK (but certainly applicable to other countries) broadcasters transmit “EIT PF” (“Event Information Table - Present Following”) on each multiplex.
The result of this specific bit of data is that our DVR set top boxes never miss a start or end of a recording, even if a channel is running slightly late or early against the EPG data (assuming the relevant broadcaster is keeping this up to date - some are better than others).
Given how bad Plex is at starting and stopping a recording on time (instead relying on users guessing a suitable buffer to add to the recording time) - i’m assuming they’ve not implemented this element of the DVB broadcast standard.
With Plex needing to work across so many countries, I can understand why the developers will have has to skip giving us all the functionality the DVB broadcast spec allows for, but surely using accurate recording timings is one of the most fundamental things a DVR needs to do. Hopefully one of the Dev’s will pick up on this and take a look.
Is there any official response on if/when this is going to be implemented ? ( and if not can we get one??)
In the uk sky+ has been doing this for nearly 20 years. using plex dvr’s dumb start/end times with padding feels like a real step back in time to the vhs and videoplus codes days in comparison!
It’s actually worse than than a 1990’s VHS because even that used PDC which again was broadcast alongside the video transmission to signal when to start/stop recordings. PDC went on to become AR/‘Accurate Recording’ in the Freeview+ spec.
So yeah, Plex is currently worse than a 1997 Panasonic VHS player when it comes to recording accuracy.
From my understanding during beta and such, the DVR service is relying on the EPG feed they get from their provider. They had a .ts/.mkv stream based service that connects to a HDHR device and re-used that to connect to at stream coming from an abstraction that manages the DVB stuff internally. DVR does not care what source it gets the from as I understand it.
The DVB-events are actually part of the PES/TS stream, but Plex just shifts the stream to towards their encoder (ffmpeg) to store it as a file in their structure.
So, from my personal view, the current DVR service does not foresee that it could grab the EPG (or EPG updates) from within the current stream.
@kinoCharlino can you give a view on the roadmap if EPG updates via DVB features usin the EIT-specs is planned?
I’m interested in this too, coming from mythtv that used the broadcasted EIT i can say it was defiently a better system, never seen “Unknown Airing” in the mythtv guide.
Same here, we aren’t using the Plex DVR features simply because it doesn’t support accurate recording as discussed here. Out trusty Humax PVR we’ve had for around 10 years or so supports this 100%, so it does seem a little crazy to use Plex that doesn’t.
I researched into this and a long story short have started programming a software DVR recorder. This runs as a windows service, downloads the Freeview UK EPG guide automatically and recordings can be scheduled that will start and stop using the actual signalled times, so accurately starting and ending. It supports series linking using the Freeview IDs, this means no duplicate repeats or getting confused with SD and HD versions of the same program.
Plex then becomes just a player of the recorded content like it always has been, but at last I have accurate recording again like that supported on the old PVR for the last 10 years or more but using the new networked HDHomeRun tuners
Still got some work to do as now need to create an HTML EPG Guide to set recordings easily, but it’s been an interesting project learning about the DVB system and getting at the over-the-air data.
