Hi,

I thought I better kick this topic off for all those lucky owners of this delightful STB.

Here are some basic reources:

iplayer.teac.com.au

The following links relate to the UK version of the STB (very similar, but there are differences):

www.netgem.com

forum.netgem.com/

Please feel free to add more.

I'm also inteterested in hearing from anyone who has hooked their TEAC up to their home network and/or broadband internet (I've got Apache web server running on my PC serving up MPEG movies and MP3 music to the TEAC, also connected to ADSL). Has anyone created any interesting HTML pages that they use on their TEAC, which they might want to share? I was interested in example 2 on the TEAC iplayer site, but unfortunately the link is broken.

Cheers!
morkli

I'm looking forward to the software update due about September and downloading it from the net. I'm fed up with the rigmarole of changing the aspect ratio...supposedly much simplified in the next version.

just curious as to how you can conect adsl to it. Through usb?
How many usb ports are there? If it's connected to a local workgroup, can you save digital tv broadcasts to hard drive on a connected pc?

And finally, what's the price and where do I get one? I'm in Brisbane...

thanks for letting us all know about this.

Cheers,

Kurt

Previous posts that discussed the abilities of the ITV-D500 are buried in a huge 10+ page thread in the archived posts.
However, a bunch of possibilities were promised in the next firmware upgrade. When the upgrade is available, I'm sure that the old advice will be refreshed and a thorough networking guide will be posted.
There is one USB 1.1 port, into which you can plug an ethernet adaptor and then network to an ADSL PC or straight to the ADSL adapter (See morkli below). The STB has its own 56kbps modem, for those of us in remote areas or Canberra. Consensus was the USB port can't provide the throughput to allow digital recording. However, there is a PCMCIA slot that has apparently been receiving Top Secret attention at TEAC central. (TEACSTB posted a teaser on the previous forum.) Speculation has run wild and everyone is dreaming of some digital recording device.
Look here http://www.teac.com.au/retailers.php for retailers. There's heaps in Brisbane. Even though my nearest dealer didn't stock it, they were happen to order it in especially in April. It was the first STB to be discounted on release with most selling for $650 instead of RRP699. YMMV I bought mine for $550, but I had bought lots of white goods for the new house and the same shop is selling them for $689, less for cash.

That might be a problem with the broadcaster. In Canberra, only WIN seemed to have a signal that was "ratio-aware". Other channels could be stretched one way or the other and if one was stretched it would affect the next channel I switched to. I found that I had to change to WIN and then flick back to the channel I wanted to watch to reset the ratio. Recently, I haven't had that problem. The STB hasn't been upgraded so I'm guessing that it was not an STB problem.
ABC shows its News and 7:30 Report promos in 14:9 but the programs are 4:3!?! 14:9 is a reasonable compromise.
Keep an eye on iplayer.teac.com.au hopefully it will have a lot of resources and answers soon.
(Edited out the boo-boos)

Hi,

Thanks Braddles for saving me a lot of typing. It's just one USB on the TEAC and I think it is USB 1.1. To connect to the ethernet port ofn an ADSL modem or router you need a USB adaptor. The compatible models are listed on the TEAC iplayer site, which also has a lots of useful info on the capabilities of the STB. You don't need a PC to serve up the ADSL, you can connect the STB straight to the ADSL modem or router. I'm typing this on the STB at the moment, while listening to the news on Sunrise on channel seven, and my PC isn't on right now.

The next version of the software release (due September) should also support wireless networking adapators.

Cheers,
morkli.

thanks guys.

What have people been paying for the i players? I see they are selling them in the UK for 139 quid.
Do you recommend the wireless keyboard as a package or will any wireless work?

I bought mine a couple of months ago at HN for $599. They wanted $699 but I said I'd only pay $599 and they said OK!

I don't know about capital cities but in regional areas the ABC news and current affairs is in 4.3 so I have to keep changing the D500 from letter-box to normal 4.3 and it is a fiddly process currently. But with the update I gather you will press "info" and then change the aspect ratio with one press.

The first STB I had was Ikusi and that had 1 button to press on the remote....surely the ideal arrangement.

By the way, is ABC news and current affairs on widescreen in the capital cities?

Hi,

I bought mine over 3 months ago from my local Retravision store for $579. Just over a month ago I got ADSL connected and then I went out and bought the wireless keyboard. Unfortunately, I ended up paying RRP for that and it was too much at $149. However, the keyboard is good if you intend to send e-mails using the STB. If you only ever browse the odd web site, then you might get away with the supplied remote only.

Some people in the UK have reported getting USB keyboards to work, but not 100%. You would also need a USB hub if you intended to do this and connect the STB to an ADSL modem/router. The keyboard is actually infrared - like the remote - so other wireless keyboards won't work.

The UK version of the STB is cheaper probably due to greater volume of sales. However, it won't work here as it is not designed to cope with VHF like the local STB. Local version has different hardware and software.

You could order the keyboard from the UK (about 40 quid I think). However, they have two versions there, an old one and a new one. The software in the local STB probably does not support the new keyboard (different function key layout I think). Probably won't be much cheaper after shipping anyway.

Cheers,
morkli.

Nope, not yet as AFAIK, but they are slowly upgrading there systems to broadcast the news in 16:9. They haven't started broadcasting 16:9 in Melbourne yet... Not sure of a start date.

How did you figure that we have different hardware?



Whist Aspect Ratio flag is within Mpeg2 spec, I suspect this isn't used in TS - all Australian digital TV transmissions are widescreen. When a 4:3 program is on, it's simply letterboxed (ie. vertical bars) within the 16:9 rectangle by the broadcaster.

Is the Mpeg2 spec relevant to DVD etc. or does DTB also need to follow the spec as well? There could be a difference between what the spec expects and how it gets implemented in DTB in Australia. Anyway, it's fixed at my end and I'm out of my depth discussing this anyway.
BTW, if I view analog TV many WS programs don't fit neatly within the screen but are stretched a little bit over all four edges. Obviously using a different method to broadcast analog picture ratio that relies on luck.

A chap from TEAC used to post to the old DBA forum. I can't find the old post anymore, but I believe he basically said that the local box had slightly different hardware to cope with the VHF transmissions. They only use UHF for terrestrial digital television in the UK. This was in refence to the UK box being cheaper then Australian one. Some might say that it could just be TEAC trying to stop people from grey importing the UK box. However, TEAC have been very good with support and releasing information on this STB in the past, so I have no reason to doubt them. Personally, I probably wouldn't risk it for the price difference.

Anyway, from the Netgem forums I see there is a new hardware revision available in the UK which ups processor power from 150 MIPS to 350 MIPS. I wonder whether we'll see that box here and what the extra processing power could be put to use for?

Cheers!
morkli

Hi,
I'm posting this in the UK on a NETGEM i-Player. There's another UK-based forum you guys might be interested in URL: http://forum.digitalspy.co.uk/
Just follow Digital Platform Forums>Digital Terrestrial>Technical>NETGEM i-Player and you will find a 48 page thread.

Linleia,

Thanks for the link to the digital spy forum...quite interesting stuff there, especially about the 'old' iplayer vs the 'new' one.

Cheers!
morkli

Well, it's spring!...Which means it's September...which means TEAC is due to delivery the software upgrade for the TEAC ITV-D500 this month. Has anyone heard any news on this?

Cheers,
morkli.

I just emailed stb@teac.com.au regarding the software upgrade and got the following (automated) reply from Fabian:



I guess we'll have to wait until then.

BTW, where are all the other TEAC ITV-D500 owners? I'm sure there used to me many more on the old DBA forum. Haven't they found the new forum yet or have they gone elsewhere?

Cheers,
morkli

Well, I'm an owner of this box.

I'm very suspicious about any claims of support, upgrades, etc made by any company in Australia. So, let's just say, I will be very pleasantly surprised if Teac releases this upgrade.

Hi,

I bought my unit about a month ago and are waiting for the next software upgrade so that I can use a Wireless LAN connection. At the moment I have it hooked up to my amplifer via the SCART - SVideo cable supplied with the unit. Here's where I want to go with the unit.

I want to connect it directly to my projector using component connections, but would also like to be able to record programs via SVideo using my SVHS video recorder. A couple of questions:

1) Do I need to purchase the SCART - Component adapter from TEAC or can I use any adapter (if they are available)?

2) There are two SCART outputs. The manual indicates that the second SCART conneciton outputs composite video all the time and can be used as a pass through connection. From this info I gather that if I use SCART1 output for component then I am limited to using composite rather than SVideo input to my video recorder from the SCART2 output. Is this a correct analysis or is there another way that I could achieve my desired results?

Regards,
Richard

I use scart/component which gives a superior picture to s-video. I bought a Neotech scart/component 2m lead.....Teac didn't have these available though they may now (email Fabian at Teac, he is extremely helpful)

The 2nd scart is only composite as you say. So your point no2 is correct.

I understand where you are coming from Alex. However, TEAC have been excellent with their support on for STBs. Despite the fact that Fabian is out of the office, I just recieved this reply from him:



Let's hope this is a pleasant surprise for you Alex.

Cheers,
morkli

The TEAC site also lists (in addition to their own adapter of course) the following:

AVICO NC2433 SCART-3RCA
AVICO NC2613 SCART-3+AUDIO

I would assume that other SCART to component adapters would also work as long as they follow the standards.

Cheers,
morkli

Any scart configured for RGB connection. As per

http://www.teddstudios.u-net.com/sct.htm

Component (YPrPb) is using same configuration as standart scart RGB.

Can you play MP3s without any problems at all? One of the problems with the UK software releases is that the MP3 player suffers from aand I was wondering whether the Australian software release (4.0.6 I believe) suffers from this also.

When the first software that allowed UK iPlayers to use ISPs other than Netgem's partner ISP (metered Tiscali) was released, I started on a project to document the iPlayer's HTML and JavaScript capabilities, specifically those HTML tags and JavaScript routines specific to the iPlayer. As of late, due in the main to lack of information from Netgem, this project has somewhat stalled. I did however create a page demonstrating how to use JavaScript to capture the pressing of remote control buttons. You can see that page and more at http://www25.brinkster.com/alien2k. I have also set it to be my homepage, so if you look at my profile there will always be a link to it there. This forum may also be set up to have a link at the bottom of all my posts, but I don't know.

Sam

Sam,

Thanks for your web site. I actually found it the other day. I might have to get you to send me some of your HTML (if you are willing to do so that is), as I'd like to try out a few things on this STB myself.

Regarding MP3 playback it generally works fine on my box. I'm not sure what the 'buffer management bug' on the UK spec'd box sounds like.

I generally create MP3s with 256kbps CBR and most play fine (LAME encoder). Others I've downloaded (mostly 128kbps CBR) also seem to work fine. I've found that while they play, VBR MP3s don't seem to play as well on the box.

Cheers,
morkli

The bug causes stuttering and small pauses in playback, which makes it at least annoying to listen to music through the iPlayer. I can't listen to most of my music anyway, as it's encoded in Ogg Vorbis, but streaming DAB from my WaveFinder, or recorded MP2 files would be nice. Although saying that I think it (or the power adaptor, I hope) has died!

Feel free to look through the source of my pages. I had to dissect some of Netgem's pages myself to find alot of the JavaScript. Try looking through this (http://ukepgv41.netgemplatform.co.uk/epg.htm) trying to figure out how pieces of code work, and which will work on an untrusted site. Then there was demo.netgem.com, which i think the only useful piece was the "tv:" url, which isn't even in the version of the page that gets served to PCs. Thankfully it was rather obvious how to get to the version designed for the tv.

Be warned that some of it is a mess. I tried to change the CeeTV demo from being link based to using key capture only, but my code was in such a mess I gave up.

I'd be interested to see what you do on the iPlayer. Something tells me TEAC are more willing to release useful information on this that Netgem. Just about the only useful things I've been able to get out of them are the sizes the iPlayer is capable of resizing video to, that the "tv:" tag is all we are supposed to be using right now, and that the Netgem browser will probably never support CSS psuedo selectors such as "a:hover", which means we have to assign JavaScript to every single link that we want an effect assigned to, which of course takes an age. Grrrrr!

Sam

I've been browsing the old forum archives, and I've seen a reference to gettting a page to come up when turning the iPlayer on? How does this work?

Thanks,
Sam

Sam,

Not sure about this one. I know that the STB will come back on to the last TV channel that it was on before it was turned off. Maybe this also works if the last display was a web page. I will try it tonight to see what happens.

In the current Australian software, putting the STB into standby disconnects the STB from the router. When turned on from standby, the connection is not reestablished. The unit actually has to be switched off and on again to reconnect to the router. This will be fixed in the next release of the software, which is due soon.

Cheers,
morkli.

Sam,

Unfortunately, after switching on the STB, it went back onto the last TV channel, not the web page last displayed. Pity. If there is another way to achieve this, I don't know it. Sorry.

Cheers,
morkli.

I have recently bought one of these nice little boxes direct from TEAC and was wondering whether any of you gurus/propeller heads out there know how I can go about connecting it to a NEC PG6900 3 Beam CRT projector using the RGBV/H BNC input connectors. At the moment I have the ITDV connected by the Scart out to my Marantz 4300 using S-video then a 8M S-video cable to the projector. While this gives a great picture, I believe it gets better with true colour seperation (RGB). Will a Scart to RGB adaptor do the job or do I have to use Scart to RGBs (combined horizontal and vertical sync) and if so does the ITDV support RGBs at the Scart output. I would be prepared to bypass the receiver as it has no RGB or component switching or flow through.

Thanks in advance Step.

Step,

I'm certain that the SCART's RGB output from the TEAC ITV-D500 is not RGBHV. While I'm not 100% sure if the SCART's RGB output is RGsB (sync on green) or RGBs (sync on composite), I'm fairly certain its RGBs. You see, I have my STB connected to a european TV and they generally only support RGBs. This leads me to conclude that the STB outputs RGBs. If your CRT projector supports RGBs input, then it should work if you get a SCART to RGBs adaptor cable.

Cheers,
morkli.

Whats the absolute answer on hard drive recording??
Surely a pcmcia card with a usb 2.0 adapter in it is no where enough throughput for PVR capabilities. It might be able to record a channel but what about playback and record at the same time, there was a great post here about the 5290 and using other harddrives in it, basically no hard drive available had the ability to really keep up with the 80 gig seagate supplied with the box, some talk of special firmware required to make a drive capable.
The d500 looks awesome but Im sure there must be another model around the corner with PVR capabilites as to me, a SD tuner is just a nicer picture, Ive got solutions to all there other gimmicks that they include, but if this box ends up with 2 tuners and a hard drive Im sold and all those "gimmicks" become "cool stuff" on my new PVR
Oh and I want to pay no more than $800!!

chargin8,



I don't think there is one. There may never be one. I enjoy the ITV-D500 for what it provides me, which is simply great SD reception and PQ. The internet/email functions are a bonus that work well with my ADSL connection. Handy for the odd surf and email while I watch TV (especially during the ad breaks) , but for more serious stuff I'll stick with my PC.

For a PVR, I would also want HD and more options. That is why I will probably end up building a dedicated HTPC for the lounge room.

I did read on another forum that Netgem (the developer of the ITV-D500) are developing a new STB, but there were no details on features, price, dates, etc.

Cheers,
morkli.

On the proposed Netgem i-Player here is a link featuring 'lucien' a French guy. Not sure what his status is, but he crops up on various forums in the UK, and seems well informed. Perhaps he is employed by Netgem. Anyway, here is the URL:
http://www.radioandtelly.co.uk/cgi-bin/for...78518;start=3#3

What lucien says is consistent with the i-Player handbook which states: "iPlayer is the first of a family of smart television devices."

So if we get a new model in the UK, my guess is that ypu guys will get something similar. At least let's hope so.

On the proposed Netgem i-Player here is a link featuring 'lucien' a French guy. Not sure what his status is, but he crops up on various forums in the UK, and seems well informed. Perhaps he is employed by Netgem. Anyway, here is the URL:
http://www.radioandtelly.co.uk/cgi-bin/for...78518;start=3#3

What lucien says is consistent with the i-Player handbook which states: "iPlayer is the first of a family of smart television devices."

So if we get a new model in the UK, my guess is that ypu guys will get something similar. At least let's hope so.

Thanks for the info Linleia. Let's hope 'Lucien' (whoever he is and works for) is right. Let's also hope that you are right and we get this 'down under' sooner rather than later.

To quote Lucien:



This would of course make a great STB. Now if we could only persuade Netgem to also make this unit able to receive and output our standard of HD...or maybe TEAC will do this for us?

Cheers,
morkli.

Thanks for the info Morkli.

Another thing that is painful is C9 Darwin which won't lock in to the STB memory meaning I have to retune it every night. When C9 is tuned the STB allocates it the number of 350. Some other brands I believe allocate it to 201. The PQ is excellent when retuned with strong reception and high quality readings. Is the lack of logical ch ID numbering causing my STB not to memorise C9 when coming on from standby everynight?. If I go to standby for ten minutes then switch back on it comes back, any longer and i have to do a complete auto tune. By the way, Brett from S/cross (Ch7)and Gregor/Tony from 9 in Darwin said that 5.1 DD is at least 6 months away on their channels while ABC has it now.

Thanks in advance.

Step,

When a TV station doesn't send a logical channel ID number, the TEAC ITV-D500 STB automatically allocates one starting with 350. This is apparantly according to Australian DVB-T rules.

However, I don't believe that the STB should 'lose' that channel data if you switch it to standby or off. You may have a faulty STB.

Another thing to try would be to do a manual tune of the channels. While a little more painful than automatic tuning, it is easy enough to do on this STB. You can find the data you need on the DBA site's reception locator. Hopefully the channels will stay after a manual tune.

If this doesn't work, I suggest that you contact TEAC (stb@teac.com.au or info@teac.com.au) or your retailer regarding possible replacement or repair under warranty.

Cheers,
morkli.

A question for TEAC. On the old forum, back in Late July there was mention of a software upgrade planned for 'around end of August to start of September.' We are now at the end of September, any update?

Also you made mention of 'There are many improvements which will be disclosed around that time' Any more hints on these?

Cheers

Scotta,


I e-mailed Fabian from TEAC in early September and replied with the following:



Fabian's e-mail also contained the following:


I'll e-mail Fabian on Monday to see if there is any news on the update, but I would expect it sometime in October.

Cheers,
morkli.

Hi,
I'm in Berlin , Germany. I bought the German version of the Netgem/Teac, and with the help of this and other Forums, i found this:

If you start in the safe mode (for reset) and then push the blue button you can enter the Internet provider phone number. This seems to stem from the times when there was no menu for this and/or you were forced to use a specific provider.

If you're in nth browser, you can visit these "pages":

about:cache

about:plugins

about:
this gives lots of info,

dvb:
here you get lots of info on each TV program, and mess around with some settings. If you manage to mess things up here, you might have to reset your box.

dvb:XYZ
you can do a direct switch to TC Channel XYZ

If I change my region from Germany to Britian, the netgem starts scanning from CH 21, when it's set to Germany, it starts with channel 6. Maybe someone could set his Region to Germany and start a scan. If it starts with CH 5, the netgem might also work over here.

I also tried to 'upgrade' to the newest netgem software, but that didn't work, due to the webpages reaction.

Rudolf.

(this wast also posted on related Forums).

Does the ITV-D500 support MP3 streaming ala ShoutCast? My ISP (Internode) has recently started relaying MP3 radio streams and I'd love to get a STB that does DTV and can stream MP3s to the stereo too!

I ask because the TEAC website says it's possible but not sure if it really can do it.

MMC

Does anyone have or know what the discrete off and discrete on IR codes for the ITV-D500?

I've asked Teac before for them, and they have never got back to me. Currently I leave my box on 24/7. It has been operating like that for over six months, and I fear that I'm doing the box no favours by doing so. The toggle standby IR code is no good for programmable remotes.

Thanks in advance.

I tried www.shoutcast.com tonight. The web page displays correctly, but when you press an internet radio station button, a message appears that this requires 'Winamp'. So, sorry doesn't seem to work. Maybe in a future software release?

Playing MP3 files from one's own web server over a network (router) does work fine though.

Cheers,
morkli.

WAIX, in Perth (http://waix.bur.st) offers a limited number of audio streams in mp3 and wma formats. I have tried these with the teac and only one of the mp3 streams works. (http://trance.iinet.net.au:8001/). The sound breaks up when scrolling around the page.

Digitally Imported (http://di.fm/) also streams mp3 music. When attempting to play tracks from this page the teac opens an internal(?) web page that lists your mp3 favorites with the selected track added to the list. Opting to play the track on this page does nothing at all! Has anybody else seen this page?

Oh well, I had hopes that the ITV-D500 might solve 2 problems at once. Back to the drawing board ...

Anyone got any suggestions on any other product that might suffice?

[Thanks for the help]

MMC

Hi All
Does anybody have a problem with a very faint slow wavering of diagonal lines(NOISE) extending from bottom left to top right of screen when you plug the telephone cable into the Teac ITV-D500??. I have tried a few monitors and it happens on all of them. It's not affecting my picture greatly but it is annoying.

Thanks Morkli for that RGBs info. I am gonna arc the soldering iron up this weekend now that the real footy has come to an end and I will let you know how I go.

What is the latest with this STB? I've been thinking about one for a while (and nearly bought one when they first came out for the back room TV; ended up with a Teac DVB-200 on there instead), but have lost track of a couple of things with it:

• Can the 16:9/4:3P&S/4:3Letterbox mode be toggled simply from the remote, or is this only via menus?
• How is the new firmware (with direct support for USB wireless LAN connectivity) coming along? Discussion of this seems to have gone a bit quiet recently, but it should be close to available shouldn't it?
• Where (other than the DBA forums) do users of this product interact?

ted.h.

The Remotec HD-2000 can be programmed to toggle standby Off/On for the ITV-d500.

1. No toggle from the remote at the moment. It was suggested as an option for the firmware upgrade.
If you are having trouble with aspect switching, it could also be the signal that is transmitted is not "ratio-aware" (until recently, an issue in Canberra) or you should check the settings on your TV.
2. See the message above from morkli Posted on Sep 27 2003, 06:19 PM as it is the latest.
BTW, in the previous version of this forum "TEACSTB" was a regular contributor and gave us a lot of feedback and answers to questions. I think it fair to say that TEAC's approach to customer satisfaction on this forum was and will be very healthy.
3. I suggested a separate DBA forum section just for TEAC boxes a while ago. while one long thread keeps information together, it also makes it difficult to access.
http://iplayer.teac.com.au/ isn't interactive, but it does contain promise of lots of information. E.G. there is now a networking guide http://iplayer.teac.com.au/networking.htm TEAC had kept the networking off the menu since it was thought to be too complicated for users (notice that the BLUE key function is not listed when you press MENU?) Gentle pressure from this forum probably encouraged TEAC to make the option more widely known.
It might be worthwhile to have a TEAC site serve as a forum for TEAC users, though other STB users wouldn't get the chance to be envious.
(There's probably a bunch of sites for Netgem users.)

I understand a programmable remote can use the toggle IR code, but in the example where you have a macro for "All On" and "All Off", if the IR code isn't received correctly, the sequence gets out of wack. For instance, you issue "All Off", but IR code for toggle isn't received (leaving the box on). You then issue "All On", and IR code is received, but box now toggles itself off. You then have to issue "All On" command a second time. This is confusing, when you can use discrete On and Off IR codes. The rest of my equipment has such codes, and I'm sure the ITV-D500 has one as well, but I don't know it, nor I am going to decode binary to work it out.

So again, please, if anyone has the discrete on and off IR codes, or knows of a euro Netgem site where I could get them, that would be great.

Thanks again,
Anthony