Get me started- please!

[Peregrine]

Hi all, I am keen to explore the possibilities of Linux based receivers, particularly Vu+Solo2.
However I am not particularly knowledgable when it comes to the technical side of configurations, etc.

My setup supports two satellite dishes. One for receiving TV and one for receiving the Internet ( separate cables for each) . As my Internet comes via satelite I have the normal restrictions on usage which for my package is 16MB per month.

Reading the comments on the forum site, it looks to me like using the Vu+ or similar Linux receivers takes heavy download usage.
Perhaps I haven't understood this correctly so I politely ask the question as to whether this is correct? Obviously if I need a lot of bandwidth I would have to use a more standard receiver, such as my current Sky box.
Also, my Internet satellite has only one lnb connected directly to my modem. So would I need to connect a router cable to the Vu box? Sorry for such basic questions but retail outlets for these boxes don't seem to answer my emails! Thanks.

[Larry-G]

Enigma 2 receivers use hardly any bandwidth at all especially if using a official subscription card, other methods we cant get into on the forum but even then the bandwidth is exceptionally small.

[stick50jr]

G'day Peregrine,

Until recently I resided on a remote cattle station in Australia (closest town > 100km away)... needless to say there was no communications infrastructure that reached us apart from satellite and microwave radio. So I had the same setup as yourself, a vSat dish (two way - transmit & receive) provided our internet connection, a receive only dish provided our access to television broadcasts and digital microwave radio provided our telephone connection. This style of telephone line max's out at about 7200bps for fax and is useless for internet usage in this day and age.

Initially I used a DM7025 satellite TV receiver but then a couple of years ago, i upgraded to the Vu+Duo. I envy you if you have a Solo2... a very good choice if it is anything like as well built as the Duo. I used the internet connection to provide access to EPG information for the sat TV receivers, but the TV streams themselves came via the satellite broadcast and did not use up any of our internet data allocation.

I did have problems with some of the enigma2 applications (including EPG downloads) that accessed the internet. Because vSat Internet has a much higher latency that internet via ADSL (typically > 700ms pings just to the satellite ground station gateway), most of these services use a page accelerator system where the ground station gateway prefetches most of the pages and their components and sends them to your satellite transceiver even before your connected PCs (or enigma2 receivers) even asks for them. This accelerator system makes the browsing experience a little more tolerable though it will still be a lot less responsive regardless of bandwidth available. In my case the page accelerator was implemented as a proxy server... so I needed to modify applications to support proxy servers in order to avoid the latency issues (timeouts due to the delays). I could only modify those applications that provided source code and also it required some knowledge of programming (mostly Python programming language). I know that some other page accelerator systems for vSat are implemented transparently and thus don't require explicit proxy server suppport. If you have one of these, then you will avoid some of the problems with enigma2 appications over satellite internet... but it'll still be a bit sluggish compared to what people on normal (copper and FO) internet services

In my system, I connected a router to the satellite transceiver (modem) within the homestead which provided me with four wired internet connections and also 802.11 b/g wifi internet access. I had two enigma2 satellite TV receivers connected via wired interfaces, a workstation PC (our book-keeping and business system) via wired interface and the fourth wired connection supported a 150m cat5 cable to a separate cottage for staff internet access (another wifi router on the end). I also operated a couple of laptops in the main homestead building via wifi from the first router.

You state that you have a 16MB per month data allocation... this is ridiculously small, I hope you mean 16GB per month, which would be usable (a bit limited but typical of vSat Internet subsriptions). Your EPG downloads and other updates and packages might consume about 500MB of this... less if you restrict the EPG download to twice a week and don't upgrade software too often.

Interested to see others having a similar setup... good luck

PS. Have moved into town more recently and now have access to ADSL internet and DVB-T broadcasts. So now I'm using the Duo with 2 x DVB-S2 + usb Dual DVB-T. Works well, but the Solo2 would provide more processing grunt and internet application features. The Solo2 might not be fully utilised if you remain stuck with satellite internet!

[Peregrine]

Thanks to you both for the quick response, and particularly to Stick50jr For the essay.

So as I understand it, the Vu+ is used to download programme information and to get updates from the Internet. Using little bandwidth. I can then watch satelitte TV via the Vu+ without streaming through the Internet.

Just one issue. That of latency and the mention of problems in getting just what I would think of as basic programme info. I would not know where to start if I had to modify proxy servers using Python! I don't even know what that means.

Put very simply, can I get this Vu+ Solo 2 up and running within an hour of following some download instructions and watch satelitte TV coming from three lnbs via disq switches. Perhaps then I can enter the somewhat dark world of Linux based receivers and start to get some more use out of the Vu without giving myself a heart attack through stress and worry. Not techy, but I could build you a house. Each to his own eh!

[twol]

Thanks to you both for the quick response, and particularly to Stick50jr For the essay.

So as I understand it, the Vu+ is used to download programme information and to get updates from the Internet. Using little bandwidth. I can then watch satelitte TV via the Vu+ without streaming through the Internet.

Just one issue. That of latency and the mention of problems in getting just what I would think of as basic programme info. I would not know where to start if I had to modify proxy servers using Python! I don't even know what that means.

Put very simply, can I get this Vu+ Solo 2 up and running within an hour of following some download instructions and watch satelitte TV coming from three lnbs via disq switches. Perhaps then I can enter the somewhat dark world of Linux based receivers and start to get some more use out of the Vu without giving myself a heart attack through stress and worry. Not techy, but I could build you a house. Each to his own eh!

Using these boxes is surprisingly simple, especially once you forget that it is a linux box and just look upon it as hardware and software.:)
Providing that you read up on what is available, especially some of the stickies on this and other sites, then it is certainly possible to be running within an hour.
Also read up/install some of the other basic software (like filezilla and DBE (Dreambox Editor for Bouquets) and learn how to install Bouquets (basically organised lists of the program channels you want to watch)
Decide on your image (VIX is good and straight forward), read up on how to flash the image.
Use the VIX Image wizard to set up the satellites and first channel scan
Install Bouquets
Set up your EPG for your satellite(s)
Watch:)

[josh_g]

i posted a sticky in the VIX section on how to set up a Vu+ Duo from scratch and applies to most Enigma2 boxes running VIX

[Peregrine]

OK, thanks to everyone for their support. With the help of this forum and Internet info I recon I could muddle my way through, so as to the original question."get me started, please!" Here we go. It's a Vu+ Solo2 loaded with VIX image. I'm sure this won't be my last post for help, but I'm more comfortable in the knowledge that there is support if I need it from the community. Thanks.

[Larry-G]

Using these boxes is surprisingly simple, especially once you forget that it is a linux box and just look upon it as hardware and software.:)
Providing that you read up on what is available, especially some of the stickies on this and other sites, then it is certainly possible to be running within an hour.
Also read up/install some of the other basic software (like filezilla and DBE (Dreambox Editor for Bouquets) and learn how to install Bouquets (basically organised lists of the program channels you want to watch)
Decide on your image (VIX is good and straight forward), read up on how to flash the image.
Use the VIX Image wizard to set up the satellites and first channel scan
Install Bouquets
Set up your EPG for your satellite(s)
Watch:)

Just to point out that if your using a premade bouquet you dont need to first do a scan just setup your tuners.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

[mickyblueys]

As my Internet comes via satelite I have the normal restrictions on usage which for my package is 16MB per month.

Don't mean to be picky, but guessing this is a typo......error. if you are only allowed 16mb per month. You wouldn't be able to download epg or updates......in fact anything.....did you not mean....16gb per month, which sounds more feasible! :)

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

[Peregrine]

Hi, I should have pointed out my error earlier. It is indeed 16GB, not Mb. I'm starting an acronym book to help me get to sleep, it goes something like - mb , gb , epg , jpg , usb , dvb , dvd , jcb, ZZzzzzzzzzz.