[mythtv-users] HDHomeRun - Comcast shut off clear QAM

[Gary Buhrmaster]

On Wed, Dec 11, 2013 at 1:41 PM, Mike's JdJ <stepsisters at comcast.net> wrote:
....
> Something to know is that I was unable to scan for channels in MythTV with
> mine.  I had to ask for the channels in Schedules Direct before I could
> receive in MythTV.

Correct, as documented in the wiki regarding CableCARD setup.
In theory, if someone contributes patches, one could perform a
channel scan for the virtual channels for OCUR tuners.  In practice,
since one "needs" the scheduling data that SchedulesDirect
provides for cable providers (EPG data is essentially non-existent
on cable systems), I do not believe anyone has gotten an itch to
write such patches.

> The HDHomeRun Prime can be shared between MythTV and Windows Media Center.

MythTV has always presumed that it has exclusive control of its
tuners and eventually "bad things happen" if you share, either
with WMC or using the DLNA streaming feature of the Prime,
although, as you say, you can sometimes get things to sort of
work.

Given how the scheduler works for recording current/future
shows, it becomes an interesting exercise to architect a solution
where sharing works well (since there is no way to know what
type and how many tuners will be available when).  As you say,
the best solution is to over provision your tuner farm, although
this is not always possible/affordable.

> ... The quality of the OTA recordings
> seems much better to me than the Comcast recordings

Every provider transcodes what it gets to fit within their idea of
acceptable bandwidth.  Since (simple) transcoding will never
result in better quality, use the original stream whenever possible.