[mythtv-users] Building a system from scratch

[D Banerjee]

> > Processor?
>
> 2.0 Ghz Celeron.  This is probably overkill if you use a hardware encoder,
> but they are so cheep....
> > Tuner Card?
>
> PVR-250/350/Freestyle.  I also think that hardware encoding is the way to
> go.

> > What about harddrive space?
>
> I have a 200GB drive, and find myself running thin on space.  However, I
> just recently switched my encoding settings to decrease my file size.
This
> should increase my capacity from around 45 hours to about 80
> > Remote?
>

That should be enough cpu for software encoding, if space is an issue, I
record on a athlon 1300 high-quality 640x480 mpeg4 at 1.3GB/hour, 480x480 at
1GB/hour, (even with 800MB/hour 480x480 it's hard to find blocking unless
you're inches away from the screen) compared to 4.5GB/hour for hardware
encoder as above. Also mpeg-4 is good for low-bit rates, so for the simpsons
low-quality 200MB/episode is just fine. So that's 500 hours of the simpsons
in the same space :)

With faster and faster cpu's hardware encoder starts looking like a
drawback, unless you want to put many tuners in one system. Substantially
more when you can just find throwaway bttv cards, or really cheap,.

-Debabrata