[mythtv-users] New to HDTV; looking for advice

Steven Adeff adeffs.mythtv at gmail.com
Wed Dec 5 20:57:36 UTC 2007


On Dec 5, 2007 12:52 PM, Jacob Steenhagen <jacob at steenhagen.us> wrote:
> On 12/5/07, Steven Adeff <adeffs.mythtv at gmail.com> wrote:
> > a P4 2GHz will be too slow on its own so you'll need the help of XvMC.
> > The PCI card should work if you enable XvMC though. XvMC isn't a
> > perfect solution though as many people have difficulty getting it to
> > work well, and the overlays won't be in color on that card IIRC.
>
> For some strange reason, when I put the PCI card in the 2GHz machine Linux
> wouldn't boot anymore... As I recall, I was getting a kernel panic before
> init.d stuff started to initialize. I'm not sure if my card is bad (it
> worked when I took it out of the machine it used to run in a year or so ago)
> or if it was just some strange interaction with the Dell and the onboard
> Intel card.
>
> > If you do decide to use your 3500+ machine, XP should run fine on the
> > slower box though I would suggest adding at least another 512MB or
> > RAM. The 3500+ is fast enough to be used as a combined FE/BE as well
> > without the need for XvMC (I had such a setup a while back on a 3200+
> > and it ran fine with an pcHDTV3000 and a PVR-150).
>
>  I started installing the 64-bit version of CentOS on the 3500+ machine last
> night. My biggest downside of this box is that it only has 3 available PCI
> slots. If I put an HD card in, my PVR-350 card and my wireless NIC (I know
> it's not really recommended, but it's pretty much just to retrieve guide
> data), I'm full. Not the worst thing in the world I guess, but I generally
> like to space my cards a bit for slightly better airflow.

No reason to go with 64bit linux unless you *have* to. 32bit will work
fine and at the same speed, plus for some things (like win32codecs)
actually be easier to setup. I run 32bit on my dedicated backend and
my dedicated frontend.


> > As for HD tuners, I've got a pcHDTV 3000 and two Aver180's. But like
> > what was suggested by matt I'd go with an HDHomerun now that it is
> > available. Slightly more expensive but I'm pretty sure the consensus
> > is if you can afford the difference and want two tuners (and really,
> > who wouldn't) that its more than worth the money.
>
> I'm still holding out to see what my friend is sending... I'm not sure what
> brand it is, but he said that Linux does recognize it (he was gonna build a
> MythTV box, but gave up). I can't say I'd ever looked at the HDHomerun
> before, but that does look impressive. It would also help solve my PCI issue
> :). I'm just not sure if I can scrounge up the $$ for it (the TV took a
> decent chunk out of the bank account).

you can always get a USB wireless adapter if its just for guide data.
Of course if your getting a free card use it for now =D

> > I'd also suggest a PVR-150 to connect to a cable box,etc. for
> > capturing regular TV. Or if your cablebox has firewire and your
> > channels are not blocked via 5C you can go that route too.
>
> Even though I'm not using the TV out so it's kind of a waste, I still own
> the PVR-350 so I'll probably continue to use that... though I might at some
> point build a slave backend with the 350 for the bedroom TV.... though at
> that point I'd imagine it'll be a bit harder to continue to run over
> wireless.

yea, go ahead and use that, wasn't sure if you had a PVR card or not.
Wireless for non-HD is fine, but for HD, forget about it, just suck it
up and run some CAT5e =)

-- 
Steve
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