I think the update was relevant enough to start a new topic. This is the WebCam Panel which now has the ability to show TV.
Please, I need your feedback to improve this panel. It is based on VfW, but I want to jump to WDM as soon as possible.
You can change Input source by getting into Panel Properties. If you select a TV input source, the properties dialog should let you tune.
Enjoy yourselves.

Rethor.




** UPDATED 05/27/2005 Attached TVCamPanel v. 1.0.1971. Download below.
Please, submit your feedback after installing and using for the first time. Thank you.

So far it just looks great!!!. I'd like the ability to take shots via your plugin and store them somewhere defined in your properties dialog (videos also). But so far i'm very very impressed!!! Thanks again for your great work!!!

I'd be very interested to talk with you later about your WDM tales. I ran into all sorts of problem when I tried to intregrate Dscaler into it and just wanted to see what you did or your method.

wow this is the plagin Ι need it! It's so cool. I use WDM 2.20 (ΝV) but it doesn't display the signal. (I have turned it to Composite, where it works with AMCAP). Anyway I hope to support wdm soon

I hope not to spend more than two days in a WDM update

I downloaded the plugin. How do I install the plugin. Can u give me directions

Save the file with the file extension DSPACKAGE not zip. Once it finishes downloading just run the file and it should install itself to your sidebar.

~acommonjo

I'm impressed. Within a short period of time you signed up for the forum and presented us with a functioning TV Panel. Congrats!

There are a couple of things keeping me from using it full time thoughI don't know if this is the fault of my particular TV Card or your panel, but I can't seem to change the channel displayed nor the volume level for the TV feed. Also, I couldn't figure out a way to stop the TV display besides removing the panel, but I expect that you will fix some of these problems and have other improvements in the future.

Just in case it matters:
WinXP Pro
2.6Ghz
512MB
WinFast TV2000XP Expert

Overall though, great job. I am looking forward to your future projects here.

~acommonjo

Hi,
When TV input source is selected, ther should appear a tuner button in panel's properties dialog. There you can change the current channel.
I'm improving the video display but I'm getting some troubles with WDM. I hope it to be ready in a couple of days. Then I'd add some functions to get shots and complete avi captures.
Thank you all, I like to read your feedback.

It makes me want to buy a TV card just to use it with this panel. So sad I don't have one. It's not that easy buying a TV card. Any suggestion a good, stable and cheap TV card? Help is appeciated

I like AverMedia. A nice TV card is about 60 € here at Spain. Where are you from?

I got it to work. I now have both a webcam panel & a tv panel at the same time. Works great. thks

Thanks for the advices.

Well, I'm ready to show you an unstable WDM version. I need tons of feedback, so please, try it and write me something (all right, a lot of crashes, bad video or sound...). I put it here because I don't want to remove the VfW stable version that seems to work (because nobody has report any bug).
And please, enjoy as much as possible

MIN REQ:
- Win XP
- .NET Framework 1.1
- DirectX 8.1


Download Here the last version.

WOW it works!! Now I have the signal.
Bug. If I adjust the values that I want and apply it or press ok not implemented message appears and it doesn't show the signal. If I restart Sidebar changes has been applied and signal appears and everything is OK, thank you

Have you got a TV Card? If yes, does it sound? Plz, tell me your TV Card & Sound Card models...

No I don't have a tv card. I just have 5600FX VIVO and sound from the onboard IC.
I have to report another bug. When TV cam starts also starts to record on TEMP folder on avi until fill up all the drive space. This can cause BSOD. Cheers.

Okay works for me, the vfw one that is, have not tried wdm yet, my card is an external usb 2.0 unit by Vgear and it comes up okay with sound and picture, can change channels.

When the panel is undocked I loose the pic and sound and have to reset the channel etc. also if I resize the undocked window I loose the signal and must reset.

When docked the image is somewhat distorted because the tv image does not resize to fit the pannel size, also when undocking the system freezes for a short tim but this could be due to it being external and not an internal card.

Overall think you have done a great job and see the benefit as an undocked panel floating on the desktop.

One other small issue when closed I still get the tv sound and must start another app like powervcr to completely switch off the tv.

Well, Thanks for so much info. Actually VfW version won't be improved. The target is WDM now. I'd like you to test it and tell me as much as you can. You'll see that resize issues are now solves although there are other kind of problems.

When the author of software tells me his program is buggy I listen, and I try to avoid buggy software on my machine but I will try the wdm version just to please you should the fvw be removed first or will they cohabitate ?

You must remove it. VfW version may be buggy too. It was made in less than 24h. That's the reason because it isn't in the gallery.

Alright. I did get an initial signal when first installed but no audio on startup. The vfw method did start that for me to my PCI card rather than the onboard sound.
However, when going to change channels under properties...I ran into a roadblock. The settings went to none and I went to set them and the audio codec part as well. Then I got a dialog box saying 'not implemented' with ok.

So I removed the panel from DS. Then added it back. And repeated.

BUT, the video frame rate is MUCH better with WDM.

You are certainly close, I think my issue may revolve that I have a PCI Soundblaster Live and onboard sound. I certainly everything to this point since I could never get the WDM to work when I tried.

Let me know when if you want some quick beta tests (though have to be after I get home)....you know my email addy.

I use radeon AIW-9000pro, my sound card is a plain old audigy. In your first release I could change the channel and hear only sound, no picture.
With the exception of the winamp tv plugin, this is probably the farthest an alternate plug-in/program has gotten for me for watching TV other than using the ati player. I can't get dscaler or any other to work for me. So thats a good thing

In the second and third releases you posted, I could get into the options but nothing else worked, got some errors.

Anyways, this is gonna be a great plug-in.

Well, I thank you both (and all) very much your comments. These comments and the fact that there has been more than 100 downloads in two days make me to go on.
I have realized that the frame rate es much better now as Indian_Mayhem says, and I must say that sound doesn't work to me either, and this problem is resulting very difficult to me by now.
The VfW version seems to work quite well so the bloody's video problem
may be a hardware incompatibility. In any case, VfW as I mentioned before has been desestimated. The Windows' video management relays now on DirectX (DirectShow filters). So VfW is the "past" and WDM is the "present" & "future?". You shouldn't worry because almost video drivers (webcams, tv cards...) support WDM nowadays.
I'd like to know too if you are experiencing DesktopSidebar crashes when tv card device is selected, after a few minutes.
kr.

Using WDM, it has been running (without sound) for about 30 minutes now. No crashes yet.

Oh...I have a Pinnacle PCTV Pro card.

The wdm is a step backward for me, installs okay and actually get a picture straight away but NO sound.

Panel properties are a little strange like why are they 2 Audio Devices drop downs? and it's not in english, the action buttons that is.

For me there was no way to select audio in path as it didn't show up nor did my sound system which is Nvidia soundstorm.

Also after all the above the pic is fine even without sound but try to call the panel properties a second time results in nothing happening, I have to remove the panel and add it again to change channels!!!

Still keep working on it.

Well, you know, it is a step backward because it is unstable and unfinish. I'm sure that it will be a great step forward at last.

Hi, I've upload a WDM version able to stream video and audio. I'd like to know your impression before improving the GUI or adding snapshots/avi capture functions.
Thx

LOL. I at first was very confused as to why I heard a low mono tone with the Line In audio...because USANetworks had the sound on their feed for the tennis match. That was about 15 minutes of confusion.

After that, I think this is a great advancement. I think if you can add a pane for channel buttons and stuff, I really think your close. No issues so far. I'll watch the football game on it from this point to see if it is stable.

New note, I got alot of JIT errors/exception while tweaking the settings in various places.

New note, I'm totally lost back in the properties, probably for having two sound cards, but that hum is back so I'm wondering what's going on. But I still have video

I too have gotten the latest release to work for the most part. I can't seem to figure out how to get my sound going or change channels. The sound thing is probably my fault.. I have always had trouble configuring sound through my Audigy card. It gives great sound, but has way to many options. You seem to be making some good progress though. Awesome job.

~acommonjo

EDIT: You can add all of the notes that Indian Mayhem has said to my post as well as I have experienced the same problems he is reporting.

the 1.0.1714.1932 version works even better for me. It doesn't record the avi and I can set it up w/o having to restart the Dsidebar. Also doesn't seem the overlay to lost focus. No crashes for me at least for now...

but you know how to change the channel in the properties dialog, don't you?

Golly it's a bit complex to get working but I managed firstly video is fine and once installed I get a picture but no sound.

Panel properties defaults to a "Modem #12 handset record" so if I CHANGE IT TO MY SOUND CARD, nVIDIA AUDIO, AND HIT APPLY i CAN THEN GET MY VARIOUS INPUT DEVICES, SELECTING LINE IN STILL GIVES ME NO SOUND. oops sorry about caps.

Going to the video crossbar as you suggested and changing that to Audio in and fiddling with the settings gives me sound, hooray BUT if I hit accept or Apply I loose sound so must hit cancel to get a working system.

I then can change channels etc but on reboot everything reverts back to before and have to go through the whole process again

My system is a Nvidia soundstorm chip and external USB2.0 capture device,

Yeah, I know all your notes. It doesn't still store settings and you have to get tv sound manually (and then choose cancel). But once I have confirmed you all are getting sound this way, the next step is to get it automatically.

How should this be installed?

I've just added the files to the plugins directory under the DeskTopSideBar directory.

I've run regasm.exe on the dll

But when I start up I get the Message

Cannot load plugin TVCamPanel.
Cannot create IPlugin instance: File or assemply name TVCamPanel, or one of its dependencies, was not found.

http://www.desktopsidebar.com/forums/index...?showtopic=1853

It works fine with me so far.

I have 3 requests for it:

1) It should store the settings automatically.
2) A panel toolbar to change channels, etc.
3) A details window (that way you can change from a small thumbnail size screen in the panel, to a bigger size you choose yourself, by just hovering over the panel).

I'm still having problems

I've got the panel installed and added to my side bar - I want to set it up to show my web cam but when i try to select panel properties - nothing happens, no dialog box appears.

This is a fantastic start. I hope you keep working on it!

I've been running other TV progams and then using Application Capture to grab them, but this has a number of advantages to that. My comments are the same as the others you've seen here. I've been able to get the audio to work using the method you outlined above.

I had one crash when I moved it from its default installation and into a stack of panels, but then re-started and it's OK.

Running a 3.5 GHz Pentium box with hyperthreading... ATI TV Wonder Pro card.

unfortunately, I don't know when rethor is coming back.

Nice Very!

AverTV USB seems to work ok.

How can I have two separate tvcam panels running at the same time on my sidebar, one showing tv and the other showing the webcam?

Add the panel twice - right click Desktop Sidebar and choose Add Panel. Choose the TVCam panel and add it. Repeat this once again. Now, set each panel's properties in Panel Properties (right click the panel).

Thanks GoMa,
I added two tvcam panels like you said, but one of the panels automatically shows my webcam and when I right-click > panel properties the other panel to configure it for tv, no properties window comes up. Please help.