KWorld ATSC 120

An ATSC PCI card. This device, which is also known as the KWorld PlusTV HD PCI 120, is identical to the Geniatech HDTV Thriller X8000A. Drivers for these cards are in development now. Experimental drivers can be had by fetching revision 7448 or later of the main v4l-dvb repository.

As of 27 Mar 2008, this card can be used in both analog and digital ATSC modes, although this must be done separately as a reboot between mode switches is presently required, due to the architecture of the card. Plans to work around this issue are ongoing.

It has a PCI subsytem ID of 17de:08c1. The complete details of this are, as reported by lspci -vvnn are:

00:05.0 Multimedia video controller [0400]: Conexant CX23880/1/2/3 PCI Video and Audio Decoder [14f1:8800] (rev 05)
        Subsystem: KWorld Computer Co. Ltd. Unknown device [17de:08c1]
        Control: I/O- Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV+ VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR+ FastB2B-
        Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
        Latency: 64 (5000ns min, 13750ns max), Cache Line Size: 64 bytes
        Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 21
        Region 0: Memory at fa000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
        Capabilities: [44] Vital Product Data
        Capabilities: [4c] Power Management version 2
                Flags: PMEClk- DSI+ D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-)
                Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

00:05.1 Multimedia controller [0480]: Conexant CX23880/1/2/3 PCI Video and Audio Decoder [Audio Port] [14f1:8801] (rev 05)
        Subsystem: KWorld Computer Co. Ltd. Unknown device [17de:08c1]
        Control: I/O- Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV+ VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR+ FastB2B-
        Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
        Latency: 64 (1000ns min, 63750ns max), Cache Line Size: 64 bytes
        Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 21
        Region 0: Memory at fb000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
        Capabilities: [4c] Power Management version 2
                Flags: PMEClk- DSI+ D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-)
                Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

00:05.2 Multimedia controller [0480]: Conexant CX23880/1/2/3 PCI Video and Audio Decoder [MPEG Port] [14f1:8802] (rev 05)
        Subsystem: KWorld Computer Co. Ltd. Unknown device [17de:08c1]
        Control: I/O- Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV+ VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR+ FastB2B-
        Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
        Latency: 64 (1500ns min, 22000ns max), Cache Line Size: 64 bytes
        Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 21
        Region 0: Memory at fc000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
        Capabilities: [4c] Power Management version 2
                Flags: PMEClk- DSI+ D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-)
                Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

Components used

• Xceive XC3028 (tuner & analog IF demodulator)
• Samsung S5H1409 / Conexant CX24227 (digital demodulator)
• Conexant cx2388x (A/V Decoder & PCI bridge)

Making it Work

Overview

Currently there is a resource conflict such that this card can only be configured to receive NTSC or ATSC signals. Selecting the desired mode comes down to loading the proper driver.

Step by Step

Thanks to Vanessa for much of this info!

• Ensure that there are no conflicting drivers being built with your kernel, either as modules or built-in. Basically, disable the whole video4linux subsystem from your kernel config. Rebuild, re-install, and reboot if necessary.

• Acquire the xc3028 firmware file as directed by the wiki, and place it in:

 /lib/modules

You will need mercurial support here (i.e. the "hg" command)

• Acquire the v4l-dvb repository, build and install it:

 # hg clone http://linuxtv.org/hg/v4l-dvb
 # cd v4l-dvb
 # make
 # make install

• Create a new file to blacklist the new modules from being auto-loaded:

 # nano /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-misc

Add these four lines to it:

 blacklist cx8800
 blacklist cx8802
 blacklist cx88-alsa
 blacklist cx88-dvb

Note: When I did this on Debian unstable I could not get cx88-dvb or cx88-alsa to load. I had to remove it from the black list before they loaded.

• Save the file and reboot.

• Once your machine comes back up, do an lsmod and verify that the modules did not load.

• To make Digital/ATSC the default, set up the new modules to be loaded explicitly (note the "exit 0" is probably already in the file):

 # nano /etc/rc.local

 modprobe cx88-dvb
 modprobe cx88-alsa
 exit 0

Note: I actually preserved the way the back end installed it's self and added a script with a lower sequence number then the myth back end script to the rc2.d directory. I'm thinking in this way you can re-install the back end w/o breaking your 120 support. I'll type more about this later if it works out.

If you want to default to Analog/NTSC mode instead, replace "cx88-dvb" above with "cx8800".

• Use vigr to add yourself and the dummy "MythTV" user to the "video" and "audio" groups, and put yourself into the "MythTV" group as well.

• Reboot your computer now to make all of these changes take effect. When the modules are loaded, the KWorld 120 will be auto-detected.

External Links

• KWorld product page