The VideoLAN Forums

Just to point this out up front I'd have posted this in the "Helping VNC" forum, but the software won't let me, so I cant. :\

Anyway, I'm not so much looking for help as I'm wanting to help out. The situation is that we now have a multi-room dvr system here in the house that uses UPNP to play across the LAN. There's Windows software that can't seem to make up it's mind on how to identify itself, but either calls itself Direct2PC or DIRECTTV2PC. The server software running on the host DVR (which is itself a Linux box) identifies itself as "DIRECTTV2PC Media Server".

Now, I don't honestly expect VLC to be able to play any of this back outright, but I've started to wonder what it would take. So far, I've been provided with a "key" to plug into the Windows playback software. I don't have a Windows box handy (on an intel mac), but I tried installing the software into CrossOver Office (wine), which only partially works. From reading forum posts, apparently the Windows software installs a codec for playback and also somehow authenticates, presumably using the key I've entered.

I'm getting some interesting debug output trying to play it back as-is.

VLC does not support the audio or video format "undf".

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that "undf" isn't a detected format, but a cute way of saying "undefined". Maybe I'm wrong though - thought it was worth mentioning.

faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Bitstream value not allowed by specification
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Unexpected channel configuration change
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Bitstream value not allowed by specification
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: PCE shall be the first element in a frame
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Channel coupling not yet implemented
faad warning: Invalid number of channels
faad warning: Bitstream value not allowed by specification

Seems almost as though it's trying to send a valid aac audio stream, but it's somehow incompatible with faad?

Anyway, my plan at the moment is to install VirtualBox and install Windows XP into that VM. I'll then install the playback software and I guess load tcpdump and try to capture the interaction between the vm and my dvr. What I'm hoping to see at least initially is the conversation that exchanges my key with the dvr. It all appears to be happening over http via port 9000 and 49152:

VLC is unable to open the MRL 'http://172.16.30.214:9000/playback?id=a ... 1208ffad06'

upnp_intel debug: upnp_intel.cpp:630: ERROR: UPNP_E_OUTOF_BOUNDS when trying the send() action with URL: http://172.16.30.214:49152/upnp/control ... Directory1
upnp_intel debug: upnp_intel.cpp:678: ERROR! No response from browse() action
upnp_intel debug: upnp_intel.cpp:630: ERROR: UPNP_E_OUTOF_BOUNDS when trying the send() action with URL: http://172.16.30.214:49152/upnp/control ... Directory1
upnp_intel debug: upnp_intel.cpp:678: ERROR! No response from browse() action
main debug: rebuilding array of current - root DIRECTV2PC Media Server
main debug: Creating an input for 'DIRECTV2PC Media Server'
main debug: rebuild done - 359 items, index 190
main debug: deleting item `DIRECTV2PC Media Server'
main debug: deleting item `HR20 Showcases'
main debug: deleting item `HR20 Showcases'
main debug: no fetch required for (null) (art currently (null))
main debug: Creating an input for 'DIRECTV2PC Media Server'
main debug: no fetch required for (null) (art currently (null))
main debug: no fetch required for (null) (art currently (null))
upnp_intel debug: upnp_intel.cpp:214: Could not download device description!

Just a quick update here - I have VirtualBox installed, just haven't had the chance to install Windows XP on it yet. Should have time to do that this weekend. I want to make sure that I have tcpdump loaded before I ever even run the DirecTV2PC installer and capture any communications either to the internet or to my local LAN in case the initial process there impacts any playback later.

I tried doing it through Parallels, with no luck. Keep us updated on your progress :]

So far, I've been provided with a "key" to plug into the Windows playback software. I don't have a Windows box handy (on an intel mac), but I tried installing the software into CrossOver Office (wine), which only partially works. From reading forum posts, apparently the Windows software installs a codec for playback and also somehow authenticates, presumably using the key I've entered.

What DirecTV key did you enter? Where'd you get the key?

I'm interesting in decrypting these "undf" video streams from a Directv dish on Linux.

undf means unknown codec. This is never going to work, at least without not without new development.