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Zgemma H7s Guide

basemann

After taking the decision to get rid of cable I took the plunge and bought a Sat box. I was going to buy a Tiviar Alpha Plus due to its support on here but they were sold out at world of satellite and they suggested the Zgemma as it had similar specs.

Here is my guide to anyone new to the Sat world after getting this box . I hope it will help get through the initial frustration and hurdles you have to overcome. The H7S is relatively new so it's not discussed as much as the alpha plus but with the same software installed most guides can be used for both. I think the alpha would be equally challenging to set up. It takes time and patience and reading so be prepared for a bit of work but it's very satisfying in the end.
Some of this will be obvious to Sat heads but it's meant as a guide for beginners like I was who have some knowledge of the basics. This is from memory so excuse any vagueness of detail.

Here are the main things I learned..

1. To get Saoirview and Uk channels on the same epg listing you need to scan Saoirview 1st then do a second scan of the UK channels ensuring that the option to delete any previous scans is switched off. By doing that you mesh the two together so they can be gathered in the auto bouquets. (This took me ages to figure out!)

2. To install a skin easily you can put the downloaded skin found on the net on a usb and put it in the usb slot while live TV is playing (without any menu open). That will get a prompt to install the skin. If that does not work a plugin like Dreambox found in the plugin section will show all the folders in the sat box and the USB drive can be found and opened to try the install. If that does not work you need to connet a PC and use software like Filezilla to access files on the box from a PC. It's quite easily done if you follow the online guides.

3. A lot of people want the SkyNEW skin for the sky feel (without the sky channels of course!) and it does work but be warned it will prob make your epg crash every time you try and use it. To fix that you need to download a patch file to repair it. Dont install that skin unless you are prepared for that. You will need prob to connect a PC to do that and put it in the correct folder as per the instructions from where it easily found in a google search in places such as techkings etc. You might have to register an email to download these but there's no fee. It looks good when fixed but to be honest other skins are better that the sky menu which is comforting at first but you might feel it unnecessary and lacking functionality after a bit, but that's a personal preference.

Once you get it set up to your requirements its a great machine and very fast with a super picture so it's highly recommended. I hope this helps someone!:)

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henke

Cancelled my Sky yesterday so may invest in one of these boxes.
I am thinking of getting it with OpenATV. Does that give the best experience overall once it is configured correctly?

Anyone recommend a good skin for this box that is not the Sky ripoff? I am looking for something that doesn't look fake with fake badges on display (slyk) and a more native feel to it, as if it was a finished product a consumer could buy. Thanks.

Cyrus

henke wrote: »

Cancelled my Sky yesterday so may invest in one of these boxes.
I am thinking of getting it with OpenATV. Does that give the best experience overall once it is configured correctly?

Anyone recommend a good skin for this box that is not the Sky ripoff? I am looking for something that doesn't look fake with fake badges on display (slyk) and a more native feel to it, as if it was a finished product a consumer could buy. Thanks.

its easy to change the sly logos to sky ones, they are included just not enabled for copyright reasons.

i couldnt find a better looking skin personally and i have looked.

re the images, they are much of a muchness.

Cyrus

Hedgecutter wrote: »

Cheers, the yellow button on mine gives the option: left, right, stereo. which did u choose?

i get different options related to audio tracks, i just messed around with that until it stopped :pac:

dulpit

Cyrus wrote: »

i get different options related to audio tracks, i just messed around with that until it stopped :pac:

I think the issue is to do with the default audio options. I had same on my box where the default audio output was the audio description version. Think it was in language settings (using PurE2).

henke

Cyrus wrote: »

its easy to change the sly logos to sky ones, they are included just not enabled for copyright reasons.

i couldnt find a better looking skin personally and i have looked.

re the images, they are much of a muchness.

Ok disappointed there isn't a nicer skin. Can we remove completely Sky/Sly logos from the UI. My personal preference wouldn't be to have branding on it.

FlexMcMurphy

henke wrote: »

Ok disappointed there isn't a nicer skin...

Some say the Vali HD Flex skin looks nice on OpenATV. If you want to try the OpenVix image I think the Simple Ten Eighty skin is a clean and functional choice. Some like the look and feel of the PurE2 image because it's default skin makes it look like Kodi with it's estuary skin.

Flex

Cyrus

henke wrote: »

Ok disappointed there isn't a nicer skin. Can we remove completely Sky/Sly logos from the UI. My personal preference wouldn't be to have branding on it.

Just my opinion other posters like other skins

Try them out !

Gerry Wicklow

I'm also a fan of Vali HD Flex on openATV but at the end of the day you are getting into the realms of personal taste. There's plenty to choose from so look around. As always do a backup first before messing about too much, just in case.....

hs5424

Shefwedfan wrote: »

What is the difference between this box and the Tiviar Alpha Plus?

All I want is something easy to use when I replace Sky Q......

I cannot see the difference between the two boxes. I purchased some Tiviar's from WOS in the past and when their stock ran out they offered me the zgemma H 7 as a replacement, which I flashed with the same Vix image also. I have about 20 customers with the Tiviar Alpha and no problems so far ( 2 years old). Only 4 of the Zgemma's in the fiels for the past 8 months. Compared with my older Vu+ duo these boxes are less than half the price and far more reliable.
Remember to install cross epg and setup for OpenTV providers. Never fails to update epg nightly.

Comer1

After a long and at times, frustrating day and a half, I have this box working on Openvix with YouViX-Blue.

Just three questions:

My Virgin Media 2 channel keeps disappearing. I have to go into signal finder to bring it back. Is there any obvious reason why this would be happening?

Is there a way to get the epg to default at the top of the list instead of the channel you are on?

Is there a quick way to exit live TV rewind or pause?

Thanks

hs5424

I presume you are talking about Virgin media 2 on terrestrial. If so what do you mean its disappearing. Is the picture breaking up or is it disappearing from the epg guide.

Comer1

hs5424 wrote: »

I presume you are talking about Virgin media 2 on terrestrial. If so what do you mean its disappearing. Is the picture breaking up or is it disappearing from the epg guide.

Yes, Virgin media 2 on tuner C. It's still on the epg with info etc still there, but no sound and black screen. After a few seconds, the message "tune failed" appears.

swoofer

That is a slightly weird issue. Do you know the 2 channels/MUXES you on from the xmitter? I am on maghera so use CH 46 and CH48. Virgin uses both so for me v one and two is on ch48 and v 3 is on 46. So if you check with rte and v 2 you should lose one of the rte's as well.

Can you try a manual scan of both muxes and press green each time to save. I have vix like you and same skin but different box. I am waiting for footie.

If you lose v2 be sure to check rte. When you press ok twice on blu skin you get ch frequency showing at left. One other thing is the tuner defenitely set at t2 and you have country and region set.

hs5424

Sounds very strange as there are only 2 channels broadcast which carry all the TV and radio program's. Do a manual scan which is always my preferred method when tuning any terrestrial channels. As the other contributor suggested , tune one mux at a time and save each time after it finds the program's. Another thing to try if you are still in trouble is to connect to the box with dreambox edit. You will see all the channels on the left hand side of the pc screen. Make sure that v2 is under the category ''TV'' and not data. You can change it and re-send to the box. Make sure to power cycle the box for the changes to get activated.
Good luck.

Tango One

Is it possible to install a netflix amazon prime plugin on the zgemma?

If not is there a box that can do that. I seem some android combo boxes no idea if they are any good though.

_Kaiser_

I'm gonna pull the trigger on one of these tomorrow I think. Should have it in a few days from WoS it looks like so be prepared for a lot of stupid/noob questions after that

Morrisseeee

Morrisseeee wrote: »

Just got this box and tweaking\messing about with it atm with advise here. I've a couple of questions:
1] can I use the sky wireless USB dongle? ie. I can get it going on an old PC with modprobe ath6kl_usb command, not working on this box tho!
2] ultra HD channels show up in web viewer but not the SD or HD ones? missing a codec I presume?!
Cheers

Just to update my own Q1 above: I got it working.
It was catch22 for me, no wireless, no internet, no update. I had to use my neighbors

For anyone that's interested, I ssh'd into the box, ran this command > opkg list | grep ath6k, it came back with the appropriate ath6kl_usb(& core) kernel versions. Copy/paste in these versions into > opkg install. After that you have do run 2 commands(modprobe ath6kl_usb and an 'echo > new_id), or put them in a shell script to run at boot.

Latest issue is with SSD, I have MSDOS partition table & ext4 partition but the box isnt recognising it in : Information>Devices

_Kaiser_

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

I'm gonna pull the trigger on one of these tomorrow I think. Should have it in a few days from WoS it looks like so be prepared for a lot of stupid/noob questions after that

So ordered earlier on. Should be here Wednesday/Thursday I'd say (went via Parcel Motel as shipping direct adds 20 quid to the cost

)

Selected OpenATV as the preload and ordered some homeplugs seperately from Amazon for the connectivity. Have a couple of 250GB 2.5" SSDs so hoping to install one of those handily enough.

So, is it worth trying to set up as it is when it arrives, or should I be immediately reflashing it - bearing in mind I want it to look/feel as similar to Sky HD as possible

FlexMcMurphy

Morrisseeee wrote: »

Latest issue is with SSD, I have MSDOS partition table & ext4 partition but the box isnt recognising it in : Information>Devices

Can you see the drive when you do a # df -h from the terminal? I have a 4TB USB drive and created a GPT partition table using Parted then formatted an Ext4 fs. The Zgemma H7S does recognise it.

Flex

bfa1509

Morrisseeee wrote: »

Latest issue is with SSD, I have MSDOS partition table & ext4 partition but the box isnt recognising it in : Information>Devices

I formatted my SSD to NTFS and it works perfectly.

FlexMcMurphy

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

.. is it worth trying to set up as it is when it arrives, or should I be immediately reflashing it - bearing in mind I want it to look/feel as similar to Sky HD as possible

What were you planning on reflashing it with?

When it's delivered and you turn it on you will be presented with the OpenATV setup wizard and you'll need to scan in channels and configure the box on your network. Then you just change the default skin to a Sky skin.

Unless someone has an image set up with a Sky skin and is happy to share a backup with you..

Flex

Morrisseeee

Note: I'm talking about the internal drive, ie. using the internal cables.

Update: I've tried an old PS3 40GB spin-drive & a 3.5inch 2TB sata spin-drive, the box (intermittently) recognizes both. As an example, I just connected up the 40GB drive again & the dmesg error is : ata1.00: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x100).
I'm beginning to think I've a sata connector issue ! Cautiously thinking about taking out MB & re-soldering connector (if possible!).

But.....it wont recognize any SSD I throw at it ! (maybe just unlucky, in terms of it's intermittent nature!)

The command : cat /var/log/messages | grep error = ata1.00: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4); ata1: SError: { 10B8B Dispar }; ata1.00: irq_stat 0x0c000000, interface fatal error; ata1: SError: { 10B8B Dispar BadCRC TrStaTrns }.
I've tried 2 different cables as well.

Comer1

swoofer wrote: »

That is a slightly weird issue. Do you know the 2 channels/MUXES you on from the xmitter? I am on maghera so use CH 46 and CH48. Virgin uses both so for me v one and two is on ch48 and v 3 is on 46. So if you check with rte and v 2 you should lose one of the rte's as well.

Can you try a manual scan of both muxes and press green each time to save. I have vix like you and same skin but different box. I am waiting for footie.

If you lose v2 be sure to check rte. When you press ok twice on blu skin you get ch frequency showing at left. One other thing is the tuner defenitely set at t2 and you have country and region set.

Hi, thanks for the response. Firstly, as a complete noob, I must be honest and say I don't understand a lot of your message. I don't know how to scan both muxes, so a little more help would be great:o

For the past two mornings, some of the terrestrial channels are gone, so am I correct in saying that it's ABM doing it's automatic scan during the night that's losing the channels?

The channels that I'm losing are RTE1, Virgin Media 1 and 2, TG4, and RTE News. The other terrestrial channels are still there.

When I press the OK button on any lost channel the following is displayed. It's the same for all the lost channels

This is how I originally setup Tuner C

This is how I setup Tuner C yesterday

This is how I setup the scan

After I scanned this morning to get the channels back, this is what is displayed when I press OK twice

Hope I've posted enough so someone can help.

Thanks

swoofer

I dont have the zgemma but I might get one for interest. I have same image and skin so thats a start. Someone who has the zgemma will no dount be along with the answer but you took a bit of time to post so I'll have a go.

1. 554 is CH31 so thats easy but I cant find 544!! No worries.

2. You dont need cable enabled so turn that off.

3. You should be able to find your transmitter by going here and put in eircode, that will give you the 2 channels.

https://www.saorview.ie/en/changes

4. Where you have tuner configured if you go to region and arrow right your transmitter should appear, green to save.

5. Now how to get channel scanned, go to menu,setup, tuners/scanning. signal finder, then arrow to the t2 tuner, down to tune and right arrow changes it to user defined, down to channel type in 31 it over writes, press green to scan, green to save, do same for other channel.

6. now go to autobouuets, select providers, check saorview and make region your region, press green.

7. exit out and you can now do a scan and all should be fine. If I was you I would turn off schedule scan.

Hope this helps, if confused post back.

paulhardman

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

So ordered earlier on. Should be here Wednesday/Thursday I'd say (went via Parcel Motel as shipping direct adds 20 quid to the cost )

Selected OpenATV as the preload and ordered some homeplugs seperately from Amazon for the connectivity. Have a couple of 250GB 2.5" SSDs so hoping to install one of those handily enough.

So, is it worth trying to set up as it is when it arrives, or should I be immediately reflashing it - bearing in mind I want it to look/feel as similar to Sky HD as possible

For what it's worth, and your mileage may vary, but we got rid of Sky+HD and SWMBO is quite comfortable using the box with the Magic FHD skin, so you might be OK with just using that! There is a skin preinstalled which looks very similar to Sky HD, but I wasn't a huge fan of it.

Charles Slane

These may seem like stupid questions to those who are well-used to this, but does changing the skin on the Zgemma change the functioning of the box at all?

For example, if I have all the channels tuned in and in the order that I like them to be, would changing the skin affect that?

Does it change the menu for accessing Kodi etc? (I assume the look of Kodi itself would stay the same unless changed separately).

Does it change how you record programmes and play them back? Would it neccesitate re-mounting the hard drive or re-setting the internet connection?

Would OpenWebif channel editor on the laptop still work in the same way?

Thanks for any advice on this. I have the box, it works fine, so I'm hesitant to mess it up for the sake of experimentation.

Gerry Wicklow

Changing a skin is purely cosmetic. It will not alter your channel lists, timers or recordings. The only thing that might change is the order of items in menus and sub menus.
If you are still nervous make a backup first before making changes. It only takes a moment to make and restore if needed.

Charles Slane

Thanks Gerry, I'll give it a go in the next few days.

Cyrus

Has anyone got Kodi working playing video from a network location ?

Johnboy1951

Cyrus wrote: »

Has anyone got Kodi working playing video from a network location ?

More details of what you mean would be helpful.

I use Kodi for all media devices in the home, including LiveTV and video files distributed on the LAN.