[mythtv-users] DVICo Fusion Gold - v4l?

[Kirby Bakken]

Bill Suit wrote:
> Rather than hijack another recent thread, I've cut 'n' pasted the following:
> From: 
> Michael Freeman <mlfreeman at gmail.com>
>   To: 
> Discussion about mythtv <mythtv-users at mythtv.org>
>   Date: 
> Saturday 11:51:46 pm
>    
> 1. i swore i read a spec pdf or something on the dvico site that claimed
> hardware mpeg encoding, as well as something on the linuxtv website but i
> dunno anymore
> (and i don't care, since i just use it for ota hd, since none of the tuner
> makers have the desire to pur a qpsk demod on their cards...so we can't lock
> onto the digital cable information stream [if you hdhomerun guys are
> listening, i don't need 4 qam tuners at home, but i'd sure as hell buy one
> if it could provide the qpsk forward data channel to my linux box for me to
> parse...so if it's not too late consider cramming a qpsk demod in there])
>
> 2. if it's a certified windows mce tuner, then it's supposed to do hw mpeg
> encoding.  if it's not certified, then all bets are off. they claim support,
> but they don't mention certification, so i dunno what to say about that.
>
> On 2/11/06, Jason Gabriele <jason.gabriele at gmail.com> wrote:
>   
>> Where do you see that it has an onboard mpeg encoder? Looking at the specs
>> and from my experience setting mine up, this board has no onboard mpeg
>> encoder. You need to set it up using V4L. It mentions on the web site that
>> it comes with an mpeg encoder but to my knowledge it is included with the
>> windows driver. I am still not using the card because I could never get
>> the
>> analog video quality up to where my old wintv is.
>>     
>
> I'm a day away from building my first HTPC. MythTV is part 'n' parcel. I 
> thought I'd made a wise decision by choosing the Fusion 5 gold + card as my 
> sole card. With the above exchange, I'm now wondering if I need, say, a 
> pvr250/350 also?
>
> Should I even mess with the Fusion 5 card? I'm only going to be using OTA HD.
>
> TIA,
> Bill
>   

By 'OTA HD', do you mean OTA ATSC?  If so, read on, if not, please 
ignore....

I recently bought a Fusion5 Gold card...  I sort of wanted to play with 
the remote control/ir receiver, just to get something working, AND I 
wanted to be able to receive NTSC signals, just in case....  I was 
unable to even get the NTSC tuner working....  but I wasn't too 
motivated either.  I also have an HD-5000 card, so i then had two HD 
tuners....  I was able to (finally) get the remote working (turns out 
there is an 'older' Fusion5 remoter that has nothing to do with the new 
one they're shipping).  I've since gotten a (new) Harmony remote, and 
that works fine to 'directly' drive my IR keyboard receiver...

My recommendations (if all you want is OTA ATSC, AND you don't need/want 
an IR receiver/remote combo) would be to just get the Fusion 5 Lite 
card...  Its got the same tuner as the Gold card, and is $50 
cheaper....  As I said, I have the Gold card, but if I had it to do over 
right now, I'd get the Lite card.