A new beginning …..

Today i need to download some of the picture from my digital camera-Canon A75. I’ve done this before using gphoto but at that time its quite troublesome for gphoto to detect my camera. I havent install gphoto yet so I run the following command

pkg_add -r gphoto2

Before this usually I install all the package from ports but because of the slower internet line here I just install the binary package. After 3 minutes the gphoto2 is installed.

Then I plug the camera to the usb port. When I run tail -f /var/log/messages it detect the camera.


Dec 23 15:45:23 gasing2 kernel: ugen0: Canon Inc. Canon Digital Camera, rev 1.10/0.01, addr 2


To see wether the gphoto2 can detect your camera run the following command

[dean@gasing2 /home/dean]# gphoto2 -l
Detected a 'Canon:PowerShot A75'.
There are 2 folders in folder '/':
- DCIM
- MISC
There are 4 folders in folder '/DCIM':
- 125CANON
- 126CANON
- 127CANON
- CANONMSC
There are no folders in folder '/DCIM/125CANON'.
There are no folders in folder '/DCIM/126CANON'.
There are no folders in folder '/DCIM/127CANON'.
There are no folders in folder '/DCIM/CANONMSC'.
There are no folders in folder '/MISC'.
[dean@gasing2 /home/dean]#

From the output it can detect my camera. What I like about gphoto2 is you can actually open a shell mode. Just run this command


[dean@gasing2 /home/dean]# gphoto2 --shell
gphoto2: {/usr/home/dean} />

The command that can be use in shell mode is just like ftp command. You can cd,ls,lcd,get and few other command. For the unpatient you can issue this command to download all the file to your computer

[dean@gasing2 /home/dean]# gphoto2 -P

The gphoto2 package has improve so much compare to couple years ago. Hope thats help.

This is my first howto that I write during my early stage using FreeBSD. That time I’m using FreeBSD 4.3 if I remember correctly. Someone suggest me to publish this in FreeBSD Handbook but I’ve no time to do it yet. Maybe I’ll do it in the future.

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This howto will guide you on howto install and configure your tv card on your freebsd system. I’m using FreeBSD 4.9 and Kworld Xpert TV-PVR using Conexant 878A chipset.

Let start with compiling your kernel to support your tv card. Add this line in your kernel config.

device bktr0


Or you can just put in this line in your /boot/loader.conf file

bktr_load="YES"

You can add a few option for the bktr driver. Read the LINT and bktr manual. I just enable the options that set the default video format for the driver.

options BROOKTREE_SYSTEM_DEFAULT=BROOKTREE_PAL

Ok next compile your kernel, reboot and see wether the system recognise the card. If you see the output below then congratulation.

bktr0: mem 0xe0000000-0xe0000fff irq 5 at device 2.0 on pci2
bktr0: buffer size 3555328, addr 0x5000000
bktr0: GPIO is 0x003fffff
bktr0: Card has no configuration EEPROM. Cannot determine card make.bktr0: card signature: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00
bktr0: Pinnacle/Miro TV, Temic NTSC tuner.
bktr0: GPIO is 0x003fffff
bktr0: GPIO is 0x003fffff

As you can see from the output the kernel did not know what type of my tv card was. It only assign the default card (Pinnacle/Miro TV) and the default tuner (Temic NTSC). Dont worry about that. I’ll explain later.

After that install fxtv program from ports.

cd /usr/ports/multimedia/fxtv
make install clean

After finish go to the fxtv config folder

cd /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults
vi Fxtv

Edit the config file to suit your preference.

I just change Fxtv*antennaFreqSet: nabcst to weurope (actually this setting is for West Europe but can be use for Malaysia resident) and disable the !Fxtv*cableFreqSet: cableirc.

Next start the fxtv program and click the Format tab, change it to PAL/BDGHI. Then go to Options tab and select the AFC (auto tune) to make the fxtv start searching the channel.

Click the the up arrow until you get the channel. For me I got the channel on no 6(ntv7) and no 12(tv3).

If you only get picture and no sound then dont worry.We have the same problem.It is because the kernel did not recognise the type of your tv card as I mention earlier. You must try and error change the tv card setting using sysctl.

While the fxtv is running go to shell and type this command

sysctl hw.bt848.card=##

Change the ## to number from 1 to 13 until you get the sound. I manage to get the sound when I change the number to number 2.

Ok thats all. Right now I’m still trying to configure the remote controller and the radio.

Before that if you want use another player for the tv you can use xawtv (/usr/ports/multimedia/xawtv) and for the radio you can use xmradio (/usr/ports/audio/xmradio).

If you have any question please send an email to this address cyam95 at hotmail dot com.
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At last I’ve my own blog. Hello world ^^.