[mythtv-users] PVR-350 clarification

[Nick]

On 6/17/05, John Hanauer <j-hanauer at northwestern.edu> wrote:
> I'm in the intial stages of my planning for my summer05 project, building a
> MythTV box.
> 
> Question, though ...
> 
> PVR-350:  Is the TV-OUT used only for playback of MPEG-2 video?  Or can I
> send all video output (linux console, mythtv menus, mythtv video (mpeg 1,2,
> or even 4), etc) through this port?  Would this mean I don't need a video
> card?

John,

You can run the whole X shebang over the TV-Out of the PVR-350 if you
want (instructions on Jarod's guide) Currently best video performance
is with MPEG2 video, but John Harvey is working on getting accelerated
video playback working smoothly on the 350 for all manner of video
types (like an xv video card) so for standard definition video (inc
DVD) this should be fine. You can also run MythTV on a regular video
card's TV-Out, but use the excellent decoder on the PVR-350 to
playback live TV and recordings (best of both worlds approach)

You may likely need a video card to boot successfully and to setup the
system first, but depending on motherboard it may boot without it once
the system is setup. It is less likely that you'll need one with
TV-Out though.

If you are wanting to use the system for HDTV playback though, you
will need a powerful system with a decent video card with TV-Out
though.

HTH,
Nick