[mythtv-users] Assorted questions from a new user

[Patrick Reynolds]

On Mon, 22 Mar 2004, Matt R. wrote:

> 2. Is it customary for each set-top box to be both a frontend and a
> backend? (i.e., the ReplayTV 4000 approach)

If you have a TV and a cable drop (or satellite box or whatever) in the
same place, then the computer you put there can be both frontend and
backend.

> 2.b. Is it wise... ?

Well, it lets you pack everything into one box, which saves you the cost
of a second system.  The downside is that your disk, encoder, and CPU
(which are all doing some pretty heavy lifting) are in a box next to your
TV.  That box may get warm and/or noisy.  It may need a big, ugly case if
you plan to have multiple disks or tuners.

That said, there are people here with Shuttle and Pundit cases (among
others) who have frontend/backend combos sitting next to their TV.  Myself
included.

> 4. Where does the other content (games, videos, mp3s) live?
> 4.b. Which cpu actually runs a game process?  Does the game executable
> copy to the frontend box before executing locally?

Games, videos, DVDs, and MP3s are all stored and played on individual
frontends.  You can set up nfs or smbfs to share them among multiple
machines.  They're not streamed off a backend the way TV video is.

> 5. Is this combination of hardware really adequite for playback of DVDs?
> 5.b. What about MPEG-4?

It doesn't take much to play MPEG2 or MPEG4 as long as your video card
supports XV extensions.  I wouldn't bother with special playback hardware
unless you're doing it to improve TV picture quality (e.g., using a
PVR-350 instead of a video card with TV out).

> 9. Where do all of MythTV's configuration files/scripts live?

Most of the configuration lives in the MySQL 'mythconverg' database.
/etc/mythtv/mysql.txt tells Myth where to find the database.

> 10. How do I view the 'console output' while in Myth?  I mean, when I

Kill the frontend and restart it in an xterm.  That will get you frontend
output, which (I think) includes output from MythDVD.  The backend has its
own logfile, which (at least in Debian) is in /var/log/mythtv.

--Patrick