AverMedia AverTV Cardbus Hybrid E506R

Introduction
The AverMedia AVerTV Cardbus Hybrid supports analog TV, DVB-T and FM radio. It has following inputs:


 * 75 Ohm (UHF/VHF) TV Antenna Input
 * Composite Video
 * S-Video
 * Stereo Audio L/R
 * FM (RF Radio Antenna Input)

Requirements

 * 2.6.26 or newer kernel (2.6.30+ recommended)
 * XC3028 firmware

What works

 * Analog TV
 * Digital TV
 * S-Video input
 * Composite input
 * FM Radio
 * Remote control

Linux Kernel
There are known problems with 2.6.26 (DVB-T initialization fails) and 2.6.28 (OOPS during initialization) kernels that causes the card initialization to fail. Kernel 2.6.27 works flawlessly, 2.6.29 is untested by the author.

Patching the kernel for the card
If you have 2.6.26 or 2.6.28, you need to apply corresponding patch first:

Choose the file you need, save it into to your kernel directory and apply the patch by running:

Patching the kernel for remote control
The patch has been submitted to linux-dvb mailing list already, you can try it yourself now. It was tested with 2.6.28 kernel and is part of the upcoming kernel 2.6.30.

Download the file [[Media:Avermedia-cardbus-remote-control.patch|Avermedia-cardbus-remote-control.patch]], store it into your kernel directory and apply the patch by running:

With this patch you should have corresponding created, you can use it for example with LIRC.

Kernel configuration
Enable the SAA7134 card including the DVB in the kernel.

If you want modules outside the kernel, choose SAA7134 as module. See if you want complete in-kernel support, you can select to compile SAA7134 inside the kernel afterwards.

Downloading the firmware
The kernel contains a script to download a firmware for XC3028 in. To download the firmware you need to do those steps (extracted from the script):


 * 1) Download the windows driver with something like:
 * 2) Extract the file hcw85bda.sys from the zip into the current dir:
 * 3) Run the script:
 * 4) Copy the generated file into :

Finishing the job
After the job is done (kernel is built, Lilo/Grub is updated, system reboot is done), you should be able to fully enjoy your DVB card, you should be able to see structure.

In-kernel firmware
There exists support for external firmware linked directly into kernel since version 2.6.27.

You have an option to specify the firmware root directory and the space-separated list of firmware files. The shown configuration above causes the kernel to contain firmware.

Now you can optionally select to compile SAA7134 inside the kernel:

Double-initialization problems
If you see the following message in, you have double-initialization problem.

The firmware loading path initializes the device while the device is already being initialized. There are two workarounds:


 * Use in-kernel firmware. This doesn't cause the device to initialize while loading the firmware.
 * Disable I2C device interface. This prevents early creation of i2c device.

DVB-T applications
To get the DVB up and running (with applications) is not trivial, you will probably find some tutorials using:


 * , provides frequency table list in and  tool.
 * if you don't have a frequency table for your location - the tool will create one table for you. If you are interrested in the channel to frequency mapping, you can find it at this page, but to fill the frequency table correctly you need more information than the frequency.
 * tool from to scan for TV programs, you can use it as soon as you have proper frequency table.

Some clever applications don't need frequency table and are able to scan the channels for you:


 * , multimedia player able to play DVB-T.

Controlling the remote control
You need to apply the patch from first, you can follow the article LIRC to get the remote control working afterwards.