Aver MediaCenter 3d black screen

[JMH]

Question about the aver media:
I have been trying to make the AVerTV Volar Hybrid Q work with Windows 7. This one should be supported out of the box, but I have some problems with it.
The Aver MediaCenter 3d starts up nicely when using the external app/capture component. However, sometimes it just starts and displays the main menu and doesn't start the live TV (using coax atm). I asked chat support and a way to workaround should be opening live tv, than exit the software and whenever it reopens it should start live tv. This is looking promissing, because whenever the software starts (I use common channel btw) I get a black screen. After that I have to manually enter the screen division playing the avermedia software, change to S-video and than back to analogue again. After that, the live tv plays.

The situation above is not very stable and not user friendly. I want the avermedia to start and than use a remote control to be able to switch channels. Does someone encounter this problem before and have a fix for me? That would be great!

Just one of my thoughts:
Because I didn't get the avermedia software to run properly, I tryed the Windows Media Center (just add it as a custom external app) as follow: app name: C:\windows\ehome\ehshell.exe command line: /mcesuperbar://tv?live=true. This command line makes sure that the Windows Media Center opens whithout showing the splash screen and starting in the live tv option :-D.
It is working, however I have a black screen and sound for like 1 second and only black screen without sound afterwards. Again, I have to enter the screen devision with my cursor and switch channel to make it work. This makes it work (the tv quality is also a lot better using windows media center in comparison with the avermedia), however it also makes Windows Media Center go in full screen, the digital signage is playing in the back. When I quit Windows Media Center and restart the player (esc, stop -> start) it opens windows media center again, in a smaller screen division (like i have programmed it to do), but again with a black screen...

I tried this with an AMD e350 player (I know, it's a bit slow, but just testing). Gonna try it with an i3 NUC, similar to the mediabox soon because I expect it to be a driver issue.
I am just wondering now, why do we HAVE to use the avermedia software? Windows media center looks very promissing to me and with the external app/capture component we are able to launch practically every software (what makes VLC and Avermedia different from for example WMC?).

I am curious about your experiences playing live tv. Thanks for reading this post hehe 

[westbourneswansea]

Having the exact same problem.

Avermedia seem to be shipping a new software Avermedia 3D.

We have just bought a mediaBOX-300 and MS-117 mediaTV USB direct from digital signage but are having the same issue as above.

Signage player just loads the whole Avermedia 3d program which takes over the whole sceen with the menu.

Struggle to get it to fit its assigned screen division or load anything but the menu

Any ideas?

[JMH]

I built a new player based on an Intel i3 processor (with build in graphics). It is comparable with your mediaBOX-300. After that, I got it working the way I wanted to. I am really amazed that you bought the hardware sold by MS as 'plug and play' and working 'out of the box', but it DOES NOT work  ... I think it is a video driver problem (before I used a machine based on the AMD E-350). Hopefully MS has a fix for your problem and will react on your question very soon. In my opinion it is intolerable to sell hardware as plug and play, but it doesn't work like that after all. 

Try loading the live video manually with a mouse attached to your mediaBOX-300. When the player stops while playing live TV, it should load the live TV automatically on start up. The Avermedia software tends to work that way.

[ANOOP]

In my 4 years of working with MS i have never been able to get the Avermedia software to work. I still use the good old virtual dub
The quality is bad but it works . If some one can help the people out here in getting this avermedia center to work i am sure lot of people would be happy.

[JMH]

Well... As I said, I got it to work. But now I am afraid it won't be very stable. I got a major customer who will sell lots of these in the near future as I stated above, but it is VERY, VERY important that this solution will be stable (they are testing with a stable one at this moment though). Ofcourse I have tested it a lot and I am even able to view tv on different resolutions. For example: 1 minute on 640x360 and than switch the other minute to a 1280x720 without any problem. I made an image of my player, so I can reproduce them. Because I am based in Europe and am able to build my own players with better performance, based on simular hardware than the MS players for a lower price, I do not use MS players. So unfortunately I can not say why it doesn't work on the MS players.

Besides, it is possible to load different programs like Windows Media Center using the external app/capture plugin in the studio. I will try to look into the steps how I fixed the Avermedia software (version i'm using etc.), but at the moment I am very busy so I don't know when I will get back on this.

Anyway. I believe it is really unacceptable that MS sells a 'working' live tv solution that DOES NOT WORK! We are paying customers and we pay MS for contuining development. So saying that because Avermedia updated there software, it will not work and it is not Media Signage's fault is just an excuse. This community is very willingly to help in development and providing very usefull feedback. I have read waaaaay too many complains about features not working anymore (features where business got their customers for!). MS should really focus on their paying customers instead of launching new useless buggy features all the time...

I switched to MS because I believed in this software and its developers and I still do (so excuse me for my frustations), but I think they should work on a solution for these problems...

I have never used virtual dub. Can you shortly explain what it is and what it does (are you able to use other hardware than the Avermedia Volar Hybrid Q)? Why do you have bad quality?

[ANOOP]

Virtualdub is an opensource product , unfortunately no owner for that product and does not work on windows8 > I have tried with few other cards and it works. If you want i can help you on that mail me.

[admin]

Not sure what kind of issues you are having with Aver Media 3D, we tested this quite a bit on our hardware and didnt run into any issues with it, below you will find a video of it going thru different screen size changes with no issues. Weird you are having issues with it, we have a lot of users using that solution that havent encountered any issues after setting up the correct path in the EXTAPP capture component. Also make sure you are running the same resolution as your campaign is designed for.

Steps needed was
1. Open aver media center 3d. disable wizard.
2. Configure aver media TV and scan for all channels.
3. Set Aver Media to TV mode and click on screen so it goes full screen.
4. Close aver media center 3d.
5. Load signage controller.
6. Done.

http://screencast.com/t/jYkEsv1lSfq

[JMH]

Hi Admin, thanks for your response. I eventually had it working pretty much out of the box using an i3 based player. At the moment I am also able to make it switch to a screen layout where the live tv part has a different resolution than the screen layout before (without restarting or other issues). At this moment I am very happy with the Avermedia solution (that's why I recently ordered some more from you guys  ). But, reading others having difficulties made me worry, because I have a major deal mostly based on this feature at the moment, so it is very important that it will keep on working.

My experience so far, is that any problems (especially the black screens) I experienced with the Avermedia was driver based. I couldn't run it stable on AMD based devices. On my player based on an Intel i3 3227u using the built in GPU it is working fine. This makes me wonder on what device you weren't able to make it run ANOOP?

westbourneswansea, have you been able to make the Avermedia run stable now? Perhaps you could check for any driver updates for your Intel GPU. If you use the steps posted by admin above it should work (it did for me).

[westbourneswansea]

We have finally got it to work by load avermedia3d as an external app in signage studio. Not ideal as you still have to manually select the source each time the time line changes but its working for now (ish)

[JMH]

Glad to hear you've got it working! What do you mean by manually select teh source each time the time line changes? With my setup, it will always play the last viewed channel. Just hook up an universal USB (WMC) remote to switch channels. That way it is possible to give each player its own remote so the viewers can switch channels inside your digital signage setup. It's very easy to use and works great.

[ukdigital]

Could anyone post how they got this working as an external app, I have TV working  with a different stick but only in media centre, the screen size is a guess as I cant work out the exact size parameters to use?

I have had it start in the wrong size and take up half the screen a few times but generally it works OK, but not really a solution for my customers?

I purchased a new type of avermedia stick which supports TVB-2 (UK HD TV) but this stick is not recognised in the old avermedia player, even with the new drives loaded?

the man reason for purchasing MS hardware is to use TV?

[justadsguy]

Avermedia says that automatically during on the TV is no longer supported in their latest version of the software.
They have no intention of supporting this going forward.

That means that you could use an older version of the software (not supported under w 8.1) or you can use another product.

If you update to their latest drivers, you will lose the ability to automatically start the TV. The application will start -- just not the TV.
Then the screen will go black.

[admin]

tx for the heads up, for now please use previous version and we will be releasing a new version of SignagePlayer that will work with their new SDK.

[JMH]

Thanks for looking to this issue

[hoppingturtle]

Hey guys,

Do any of you have the Aver media center 1.7.8?  I believe this is the version that still starts up the Analog TV option automatically on load.