[mythtv-users] Help in Design of Mythtv Setup

Doug Young goofdad at gmail.com
Sun Sep 23 16:55:34 UTC 2007


On 9/23/07, Christopher Riordan <cpr at hal-9000.net> wrote:
> I currently run Mythtv with 1 Backend (closet) , and 3 Frontends(living
> Room, Bed Rooms), with NO Tv capture. I am rebuilding a new Backend
> (Ubuntu 2TB storage)) to support more drive space.
>
> I am looking to purchase Hauppauge WINTV-PVR-MCE Kit (includes remote
> and USB IR Blaster))
>
> Question I have is this:
> I want to expand the TV to 2-3 Tuners, Do they all go in the Backend? or
> do I have to put them in each of the Front Ends? To use the Remote? I
> currently have Directv. If I can would love to move the STBs to the
> Closet and out of the way of everything else. I tried reading the Wiki,
> but get lost kinda easily. Is there a way to assign potential Tuners to
> certain Frontends? So 2 Bedrooms share a tuner, Livingroom get's it own?
>
>
> FrontEnd: Intel P3 1ghz 384 RAM, DVD Drive,, Nvidia Fx5200
> Backend: Inel P4 1.8ghz 1gb RAM, 2+TB drivespace.
>

To take your questions one at a time:

> Do they all go in the Backend? or do I have to put them in each of the
> Front Ends?

They each have to go on -a- backend, but they can go on separate machines
if that works better for you.  You could, for instance, make one of your
current frontends into a frontend/slave-backend combo and put it in that
machine.

> To use the Remote?

The remote is attached to the card, so wherever the card goes, it goes.
However, it is a relatively inexpensive thing ($30-$50 or so) to pick up
a usb/serial IR reciever and remote control for your front ends.

> I currently have Directv. If I can would love to move the STBs to the
> Closet and out of the way of everything else.

Absolutely.  There are various issues surrounding this, mainly surrounding
how to control the different STB's.  You could have one IR blaster, and
send two different sets of codes (assuming you can set your boxes to
recieve different codes), you could have multiple IR blasters, and
separate the boxes so the blasters don't interfere with each other (ie,
tape the blasters to the eye on the box, and put a piece of cardboard or
somesuch between them so the ir signal going to box A doesn't interfere
with box B).  Best yet would be to control via serial if you can.

Remember, however, that in this setup you lose the remote functionality
built into the 150 cards.  I still think this is the best choice, but YMMV.

> Is there a way to assign potential Tuners to certain Frontends? So 2
> Bedrooms share a tuner, Livingroom get's it own?

Not as such.  Tuners are picked up round robin style, and AFAIK, can't be
-assigned- to a front end.  In my experience, if a FE is running on a
combined machine, it will give preference to the local backend (tuner), but
if that backend is unavailable, it will simply use one over the network.

Hope this helped.
-- 
Doug


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