Thanks for your updated findings Swasam. I sent an email to Hauppauge asking when they have plans to release a driver which supports QAM on Fiji. I can't blame them for microsofts release changing code, but I do hope they have all hands on deck to keep up with this change and future changes.

swasam:

May be I am getting only 2 clear Qam or signal is low from comcast.  

Very likely. I was having problems getting QAM channele on my Samsung 50" when I first set it up. The scan would find many of them, but when I tried to watch I would often get the "Signal not Found" error. I put a 16db signal amplifier on the line going into the digital tuner on my TV and it cleared it right up. When I was setting up VMC for QAM after TV Pack I initially could not find any QAM channels even though VMC recognized my QAM tuner card. I put another signal booster on that line and found over 40 QAM channels no problem.

Hauppauge replied with the following:

Hello,
                As of right now we don’t have a driver for QAM in Fiji. We are currently working on a set of drivers and will have them posted on our site ASAP. Check there periodically or I’ll alert when we have something available.
 
Regards,

Technical Support
Hauppauge ComputerWorks NewYork

 

Driver page:

http://www.hauppauge.com/site/support/support_hvr2250.html 

I have had this card since it came out, and have had problems with it ever since.  I actually had it mostly working in VMC with the clear QAM plugin, and recording shows but a few of the channels were jittery.....not terrible but noticeable.  Now since then I have wiped my machine clean and can no longer tune HD Clear QAM Channels.  I know they exist since I get them just fine on the TV upstairs.  I am wondering if I have a half-failed card or not since the analog is rock solid and works well.  Does anyone have any thoughts?  Tech Support has been little help stating that it must be a driver issue, but I have all of the exact same drivers installed as I did before.  Oh, and BTW they say the card will NOT work at all with the Vista Media Center TV Pack floating around.  They do not support it and it won't work...period.

Also, Microsoft does not yet support clear QAM in Vista, so we are out of luck there as well. 

All I want is to record HD channels like I can analog, and actually have a guide that works for both analog and digital. 

Is there any program out there that can do this for the Windows platform without me wasting another 50+ hours trying to get this darn thing working properly?  I thought I would have had enough time to get the kinks worked out before the shows premiered, but I guess not!

ErikKur

Microsoft does support clear qam in Vista with the TV Pack 2008 update, codenamed "Fiji."  Officially, it only being distributed to OEMs for deployment.

Using the drivers from  ftp://hauppauge.com/Support/HVR2250/081014_22xx_7.3.28.26288.prerelease.zip I succesfully have Clear QAM working in Vista Media Center (VMC) Ultimate with the TV Pack 2008 installed.

VMC does not automatically detect the card. I manually setup the TV Signal, and set one tuner to Clear QAM, and the other to Analog Cable.

No special routine or sequence of installation.

I did manually add the registry entry from below. Not sure if it is required though. Copy and paste between the dashes and save as a file with a .reg extension. Then right click and merge the registry key.

---

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcwPrx89\Parameters]
"AllowQAM_PowerToy"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcw89\Parameters]
"AllowQAM_PowerToy"=dword:00000001

---

ScooperJay,
How did you go about the following:
I manually setup the TV Signal, and set one tuner to Clear QAM

I have the TV Pack installed, the drivers listed installed, the QAM Plugin installed, and the registry entries installed. I still get a hardware error with the QAM Plugin, which I wouldn't need if Media Center would recognize more than just the 2 Analogs.

I am also using the 2250

Thanks
Ed

You do not use the QAM plugin from Hauppauge. It is not necessary with the TV pack installed.

I think the QAM plugin adds all sorts of registry entries that screws things up.

Dig around your registry in the area of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcw* where * is a wildcard.

There are only 2 registry keys that start with hcw in my registry.

hcw89 looks like this:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcw89]
"Type"=dword:00000001
"Start"=dword:00000003
"ErrorControl"=dword:00000000
"ImagePath"=hex(2):73,00,79,00,73,00,74,00,65,00,6d,00,33,00,32,00,5c,00,44,00,\
  52,00,49,00,56,00,45,00,52,00,53,00,5c,00,68,00,63,00,77,00,38,00,39,00,2e,\
  00,73,00,79,00,73,00,00,00
"DisplayName"="hcw89 service"
"Description"="hcw89 PCIe capture driver"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcw89\Parameters]
"AllowQAM_PowerToy"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcw89\Enum]
"0"="PCI\\VEN_1131&DEV_7164&SUBSYS_88800070&REV_81\\4&295d2893&0&00E1"
"Count"=dword:00000001
"NextInstance"=dword:00000001

and hcwPrx89 looks like this:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcwPrx89]

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\hcwPrx89\Parameters]
"AllowQAM_PowerToy"=dword:00000001

BUT - in VMC WITH the TVPack, you can only set up each "tuner" as analog OR digital, which means you either have 2 analog tuners, 1 analog and 1 digital, or 2 digital. (This is TUNER setup, not what you can record)

Win7 has full support for this hybrid card, so you set up both tuners as analog AND digital, and can record 1 analog and 1 digital, 2 analog, or 2 digital at the same time!

OK, How are you guys getting this to work?  I have the VMC x64 Ultimate installed.  I have the TV Pack installed.  I have put the above registry hacks in place.  It still only finds 2 analog tuners.  How do you set one tuner to clear QAM?  That doesn't seem to be an option in Media Center? 

 

Thanks Ahead,

 

Erikkur

I finally got my HVR-2250 working with both analog and clear-QAM cable signal about a week ago.  The secret is to keep an eye on Hauppauge's FTP site where they post pre-release drivers.  Take a look here:

ftp://ftp.hauppauge.com/Support/HVR2250/

I don't remember which one I installed but it works nicely and allows me to configure one or both of the tuners for QAM.  The downside is that VMC-Fiji does not recognize hybrid tuners (coming in windows 7) so you have to set each of the two tuners to be either analog or digital.  Yes, you can set them separately.

Personally, I dug up an older analog tuner and stuck it into my media center so I could configure both the tuners in the 2250 as QAM.  Comcast provides us with about 5 or 6 channels that broadcast HD content so we are extremely happy with the results.

Good luck getting yours to work!

How How How???  I have Installed Vista 64 Bit, I have fully patched it.  I have installed Fiji update, i have then installed the following:

 

1.2 PlayReady PC Runtime

2. KB951685

3. KB950754

4. KB957209

When I go to set up the tuners, it just sees 2 analog tuners still.  I select manual, and try to do atsc, picking digital, but once that is done, the signal strength is nil., zip, zero on all channels.  I never get the option to select Clear QAM like others are seeing.  What am I doing wrong???

I have also put in the power toy registry keys as outlined in a few previous posts.  I have been messing with this card for monts, bought it direct from the manufacturer, and have been disappointed ever since.  I actually had it all working once with their clear-QAM plug-in for Vista manymonths ago, bit it was iffy jittery, at best.  When I re-did my machine and Fiji came out it seemed like it was the way to go.   That doesn't seem to be the case and I am at my wits end with the card.  Is there anyone at all out there who can help me with this truly annoying problem???

BTW - When using Windows 7 - 7000 Build, all of my tuner cards were recognized including the 2250.  Hybrid mode and all.  I let Windows configure them automatically after seeing them all recognized.  Prior to this attempt I was trying to use VMC and rebuild my new machine about 10 times trying to make it work. I followed all of these instruction and read everything possible regarding VMC and getting the 2250 working with QAM in my area. Update NY - Timewarner.

First try with 7...everything worked.

Additionally, Windows 7 Media Center is an upgrade over VMC.  New Mini guide rocks.

The deal is...The Easiest Solution for all of you struggling with this issue is the 7000 build.

Has anyone figured out how to sucessfully backup then restore their scheduled recordings in VMC with TVPACK... I'd love to move to Windows 7, even if it is for the beta period, but the wife would kill me if I don't move all the scheduled recordings too... (and doing 70 some odd series by hand doesn't thrill me either! )

So I am also using W7 - 7000 x64 with 2250.

Following the threads, I also updated 2250 drivers to 7.3.28.26259.

I'm in Scottsdale, AZ with Cox. I have tried configuring Tuners with both Cox Cable and connected with Terk HDTV Antenna.

With antenna, W7 shows 2 x Analog AND 2 x ATSC tuners and x.y ATSC channels from Guide show up fine and picture is excellent.

With Cable, W7 shows only 2 Analog tuners.

Manually setting the tuners to 1 x Analog and 1 x ATSC/QAM, I see the channels in the guide, but when tuning, any QAM channel - get error that the channel is unavailable.

I have tried manually tuning to QAM channels listed on various forums, AVS, Silicon Dust, others without any luck.

Is anyone out there getting PHX Cox Clear QAM with the build/config listed above ?

thanks..