[mythtv-users] (UK) Front end hardware recommendations

James Fidell james at cloud9.co.uk
Sat Aug 27 17:36:54 UTC 2005


Summarising my thoughts so far...

The Pundit-R looks good and has an optical SPDIF output, which is a
bonus for me because my AV amp has a spare optical input.  The downside
is that it is on the front, and as well as not looking great, this may
be an issue as I have a 28 month-old and a 4-month old to contend with.

The Silverstone LC02 with an EPIA10000 option looks good, but I'd need
to add the remote. I guess I could re-use the remote from my VCR and
then build an IR sensor from scratch. Having a diskless front end seems
like a great idea, particularly as the front-end box is difficult to
get on a UPS and power cuts are frequent here. It's probable I'll also
install a front end for my wife's parents (who are about to move into an
adjoining "annexe"), so the simplicity of a diskless client there looks
good, too.  Of course, if I want to build more than one, I need to
find an alternative remote unit, but I'm guessing that shouldn't be
too hard.

The Silverstone LC11M has the remote and VFD, which could be a good toy
to play with, but then I need to get all the additional components.
I happen to have some memory and a 2.4GHz P4 hanging around, so it's
tempting to get a motherboard/video card/sound card combination that
does decent TV-out has an optical SPDIF connector. There don't seem to
be that many uATX motherboards (particularly from manufacturers I'd
trust) that support the older P4 processors though, nor motherboards/
soundcards with optical SPDIF.

Many of the other cases just look too much like PCs until you get into
paying stupid money.

The Xbox does look ugly and is apparently a bit on the noisy side.  On the
plus side I'm told that the TV-out is very good, and they're cheap.  I
don't think I'd want one sitting in plain view next to my amp etc., but
I'd be quite tempted to look at using one for the kids playroom.

At the moment I can't decide between the LC02 and LC11M solutions, but
if I can find a suitable remote and the necessary bits for the receiver
I think I might lean towards the LC02.

James


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