[mythtv-users] Current wisdom on PVR-150/250/350/500

Brian Wood beww at beww.org
Sat Apr 15 20:21:21 UTC 2006


On Apr 15, 2006, at 1:51 PM, Sam Varshavchik wrote:

> Scott Karlin writes:
>
>> In this post: <http://mythtv.org/pipermail/mythtv-users/2006-April/ 
>> 132083.html>
>> Jeff Simpson states "Don't buy a PVR-350 for any purpose."
>> Jeff, if you are reading this, can you elaborate?
>
> That's wrong.  My PVR-350 works splendidly here, with Myth TV 0.19,  
> and I see no reason why the PVR-350 would stop working in the  
> future, since the only difference between this model, and the  
> others, is the TV-Out plug.
>
> There's been some misinformation floating around the PVR-350,  
> lately.  There are two ways of sending the TV-Out signal out of the  
> PVR-350.  One, is using the native MPEG decoder in the PVR-350, the  
> other is through the PVR-350's framebuffer.
>
> The only thing that's happening is that the support for the MPEG  
> decoder is getting dropped.  Which nobody really cares about,  
> because it's always been clunky.  The PVR-350's framebuffer will  
> continue to work, and it's actually the better option of the two.

Nothing wrong with the 350, especially if you are building a small  
machine without on-board graphics or an AGP/PCI-e slot. There is no  
cost advantage if you have a graphics slot, because the extra cost of  
the 350 is about the same, if not more, than an nVidia 5200.

Seems a pitty to buy an mpeg decoder and not use it though, and the  
cost of a 150 plus a MediaMVP is about the same, just thought I'd  
point that out.

>
> I also like the IR receiver that's bundled with the PVR-350.  It  
> makes things much, much easier.  Saves you whole bit of trouble  
> trying to hack together an IR receiver of your own.
>

The 150s that come with remote use the same receiver and an IR  
Blaster. I don't know if current 350s come with a blaster, mine  
didn't but neither did a 150 at that time. I don't  think you can get  
a remote and RCA jacks, but I don't think there's much difference  
between available audio connectors, both options are crap.

A 250 is more or less moot, since you can't buy them new anymore  
AFAIK, but you might find one used someplace, whether it's worth  
buying would depend o the price.

I'd go with a PVR-150 for the first card, and get the remote and the  
blaster. No sense buying multiple remotes though, so go with  
PVR-150MCEs for additional cards. Use a 5200 for video, so you have  
the possibility of HD in the future. Use a MediaMVP for a remote  
frontend.

Unless you positively need two tuners per card, for whatever reason.  
Then and only then would it be worth fighting the "500 fight".

Just my $0.02US/


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