TVHeadEnd, HDHomeRun, Emby, Roku

[mlapoint 10]

I have Emby, a HDHomeRun device, the TVHeadEnd (TVH) plug-in for Emby, and a WD My Cloud 4TB NAS.  I am trying to set up TVH to be a DVR on my Ubuntu 16.04.2 Linux box.  

 

I have Emby set up to have TVH working and I believe I can watch live TV through Kodi, but not through Roku.  I am not sure if TVH is giving me that ability to record through Kodi, but because I can't even watch TV in Roku, I am sure I can't record there.

 

I went through the steps to set up HDHomeRun View and Config GUI on the Ubuntu box, but have run into several errors.  I have contacted SiliconDust and hopefully will hear back from them in a couple days.  My big question is this.  Do I need to be able to view Live TV through my Ubuntu 16.04.2 box before the Emby Plug-in will work?

 

Thank You,

 

Mike LaPointe

[Luke 39614]

hi @@mlapoint, since you have HD Homerun it is strongly recommended to use the built-in native Emby support for HD Homerun. If you do this then you will not need the TV Head End plugin.

 

The reason why we recommend this is because this is what the core team is actively testing on a daily basis.

[frabe8378910 3]

Hi, an acceptable and good working solution if you would like to use your tvheadend is using this tvheadend proxy "https://github.com/jkaberg/tvhProxy".It was first developed for simulating a HD Homerun to Plex when using tvheadend, but works like a charm for emby too. You get the build-in native Emby LiveTV support - as Luke suggested - when using only tvheadend. So you have the full integration of tvheadend in Emby and all on one Server (PC). That's a true media server!

I'm running Emby premiere for some month on two servers (one Prod, one for test  ) and have about 80 TV movies/shows recorded. I'm using a dual tuner Sat PC card and recorded once 3 HD Sat programs in parallel.
As you're on Ubuntu Linux (I'm running debian), it is easy to configure to run Emby media server and tvheadend on the same server.

 

Just my 2 cent ...

Edited March 27, 2017 by frabe8378910

[Luke 39614]

Great stuff, thanks for the info ! @@fc7 you may want to take a look !

[frabe8378910 3]

Great stuff, thanks for the info ! @@fc7 you may want to take a look !

 

BTW: The tvhProxy setup was much simpler when Emby, tvhProxy and tvheadend should run on the same server untill some weeks ago. During the latest Live TV changes (4-5 weeks ago) the Emby HD Homerun config did not honor a port on all communication to that device. Until then I hat just filled the IP + port  i.e. 192.168.100.1:5004 in the HD homerun device and all communication was done to that port. So I just had to have the tvhProxy sitting on 192.168.100.1 (the IP where Emby and tvheadend runs) and it was listening on port 5004. After these changes part of the communication is not using the port, but to 192.168.100.1 (port 80 I guess) and so i.e. the request for the channel listing was not receive by the tvhProxy anymore.

 

To fix this, you have to configure Emby HD Homerun on virtual address without a port and proxy the communication like listed below:

 

If Emby and tvheadend should run on the the same Server, you have to bind a second IP address on your interface. Then create one (or a second if you already have one) Apache Virtualhost for that IP, listen on port 80 and proxy to port 5004. Have the tvhProxy run on that IP and port 5004. It will then proxy all communication to tvheadend and vice versa.

In Emby you just configure TV Live as a standard HD Homerun on your virtual IP and configure your program guide (i.e. Schedules Direct). 

 

Here is some example config:

 

As my server is firewall too, it has to network interfaces. The primary goes to my FritzBox (just ignore that), the secondary is the internal network. On this one the second IP is configured. The network has 255.255.252.0 netmask and is from 192.168.100.1 <-> 192.168.103.254 and 192.168.100.1 and 192.168.101.1 are in the same network 192.168.100.0!

 

 

 

---- /etc/network/interfaces ------------

 

# The secondary network interface

#allow-hotplug eth1

iface eth1 inet static

        address 192.168.100.1

        netmask 255.255.252.0

        network 192.168.100.0

        broadcast 192.168.103.255

        up ip addr add 192.168.101.1/22 dev eth1

        down ip addr del 192.168.101.1/22 dev eth1

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

 

--------- /etc/apache2/site-enabled/your-config -------------

 

<VirtualHost 192.168.101.1:80>

        ServerName tvhProxy-fs

 

        ProxyPass / http://192.168.101.1:5004/

        ProxyPassReverse / http://192.168.101.1:5004/

</VirtualHost>

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

 

------------ tvhProxy.py (lines to modify) -------------------------

 

config = {

    'tvhURL': os.environ.get('TVH_URL') or 'http://emby:yourPassword@192.168.100.1:9981',    [This is the tvheadend user, PW, IP + port => but remember tvheadend runs on the primary IP of the interface as Emby do!]

    'tvhProxyURL': os.environ.get('TVH_PROXY_URL') or 'http://192.168.101.1',                          [This is your second IP on the interface]

    'tunerCount': os.environ.get('TVH_TUNER_COUNT') or 6,  # number of tuners in tvh

    'tvhWeight': os.environ.get('TVH_WEIGHT') or 300,  # subscription priority

    'chunkSize': os.environ.get('TVH_CHUNK_SIZE') or 1024*1024  # usually you don't need to edit this

}

 

if __name__ == '__main__':

    http = WSGIServer(('192.168.101.1', 5004), app.wsgi_app)                                                     [ Again, tvhProxy runs on the second IP of the interface on port 5004, so it has to put in here too!]

    http.serve_forever()

-----------------------------------

 

It is relativ easy to setup up in  2-3 hours.

 

Hope it helps.

Edited March 27, 2017 by frabe8378910

[Astate 0]

Hi,

 

I dont understand the advantage of tvheadend.  Now i use hdhomerun with emby ... but i cant record because i am not premium member. (the price with rates exchange are high..).

I never use tvheadend because its not on my linux distribution. Before add  the package on the linux i use (like i add emby-server) can you tell me what are the possibly advantage of tvheadend.

Sorry for  my bad english

[Luke 39614]

If you have HD homerun then you are better off with the native emby functions.

[Astate 0]

With emby  and HD homerun i cant listen Live TV directly on emby-server. i think its because i need more CPU on my computer

[haraldov 10]

@@frabe8378910. 

To fix this, you have to configure Emby HD Homerun on virtual address without a port and proxy the communication like listed below:

I use the Crystal port of tvhProxy with success. With this tvhport port I can have Emby, tvheadend and Crystal port of tvhProxy on the same server without using two network card in the same server.  Look here if you are interested https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/49407-hdhomerun-emulate-using-antennas/?p=523115

Edited December 23, 2017 by haraldov

[frabe8378910 3]

@@frabe8378910. 

I use the Crystal port of tvhProxy with success. With this tvhport port I can have Emby, tvheadend and Crystal port of tvhProxy on the same server without using two network card in the same server.  Look here if you are interested https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/49407-hdhomerun-emulate-using-antennas/?p=523115

I just want to point out, that my above setup does NOT require a two network cards! You just need to bind a second IP on your interface to get Emby, tvheadend and tvhProxy run on the same PCs.

(That my server has two network cards is a different story for firewalling, but not required by the Emby-tvheadend-tvhProxy in any way. ;-) )

 

BTW: On my Emby test PC I'm just experimenting with the tvheadend plugin, but I can't get any channels to assign inside the "tv guide source" window. 

tvheadend has channel numbers assigned, LiveTV shows me the 32 channels, it pulls the guide data from my xmltv file and I can watch and record tv.

On my Emby prod server (using tvhProxy  for tvheadend) I'm get all channels inside the "tv guide source" window and can manually assign a TV channel to a guide channel. I already deleted guide source, tvheadend plugin several times, but no change so far. Anybody with an idea?

 

 

@Luke:

If you have HD homerun then you are better off with the native emby functions.

Is there a real functional difference when using "fake HD homerun" or the tvheadend plugin?

Edited December 23, 2017 by frabe8378910

[Luke 39614]

The difference is that the built in features are what the emby team is actively testing.