Kevin,<br><br>We generally don't top post on this list, but I am interleaving my response with <br>your questions and the responses that Dan already made. You may already <br>have figured out the additional details I'm adding, but others scanning the list
<br>might not. ;-)<br><br>You either have to go to the list archive, which has some delay before e-mails<br>show up or join the list and either wait for the digest (up to a few hours later) or<br>select to get all the e-mails separately. Sounds like you didn't already set up
<br>to get the e-mails individually so you didn't see Dan's reply. I am cc'ing you<br>this in case that is correct.<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Nov 4, 2007 3:14 AM, Dan Ritter <<a href="mailto:dsr-myth@tao.merseine.nu">
dsr-myth@tao.merseine.nu</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">On Sat, Nov 03, 2007 at 06:17:51PM -0700, Kevin Duffey wrote:
<br><br>I reformatted your post into paragraphs. 72 columns: it's not<br>just a good idea, it's... a very good idea.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> What I want to know from you experts is, if I were to build my own
<br>> with an existing AMD XP1600+ box, 1GB ram, and about 160GB HD (willing<br>> to buy larger if this is the path to go), will I get the same/similar<br>> features that I can with Tivo.<br><br></div>Mostly. Also, some features that TiVo doesn't have, or only
<br>makes available on certain models.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> That is, without being able to run a<br>> server, is there a way I can over the web, set up my home-built DVR to<br>> record something while on vacation.
<br><br></div>No, running a web site requires running a web server. Apache is<br>a good choice. If Comcast is blocking inbound port 80, you can<br>set it on port 81 or 8080 or 16300...</blockquote><div><br>There is more than one way to skin this cat, but you always have to have
<br>a system running to "catch" the commands, whatever the means. This <br>*could* include making a system responsive to wake-on-lan commands <br>sent over the internet. Not sure I'd do that, though. I'm not a big security
<br>guru.<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> Can I record two programs at once > while watching a 3rd recorded one.
<br><br></div>Yes; you'll need two tuners for that.</blockquote><div><br>The number of programs that can be recorded simultaneously is the same as<br>the number of capture channels you have installed. The Hauppauge -150 and
<br>-250 cards are single channel analog (SD) capture cards that can directly <br>encode the stream to Mpeg-2. The HD HomeRun is an ethernet attached <br>device which can capture two HD streams and feed them over the local LAN
<br>to the MythTV backend for storage to the hard drive.<br><br>The number of shows that can be played concurrently is limited by the I/O <br>capacity of the MythTV system, which includes Disk I/O throughput, LAN<br>bandwidth, backend compute performance and more. An XP 1600 may not
<br>support much more than the load you asked about. HD requires more <br>compute power because it takes more to translate the higher pixels per<br>second rate HD involves.<br><br>This is probable a good time to explain a little more about the MythTV
<br>architecture. The minimum configuration includes a database, a backend and a<br>frontend on a single box, although they can easily be on separate systems.<br>Slave backends can also be configured to expand the recording capabilities.
<br><br>Backends handle scheduling, recording, and managing the recordings storage.<br>The database keeps the data about upcoming shows, recording rules, and <br>options. Frontends mainly are for converting the encoded file (in one of several
<br>formats including mpeg-2 and mpeg-4) into display data to present over the <br>standard video card installed or built-in to the frontend system. This is *not*<br>a specialized TV card.<br><br>Up to this point, Nvidia interfaces have been more successfully used, but
<br>other vendors have promised to improve their Linux driver support recently.<br>The results have not yet been seen.<br><br>Both backend and frontend systems can be built with an ear towards silent<br>or at least quieter operation, but not with just any old retail store parts. You
<br>may have to replace the power supply and cpu cooling fans and/or replace the<br>cpu with a newer, cooler running part to satisfy your ears, or live with what you<br>have for the time being. Even disk drives can be part of the problem/solution.
<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> Can I share the video to more than<br>> one TV in the house without requiring computers next to each... is
<br>> there some wi-fi (or networked) cheap audio/video converter that can<br>> have a video streamed to it and just play to a tv.<br><br></div>Yes, but it's a computer. I think the best supported of these is<br>
the MVPMC, but I don't use one.</blockquote><div><br>The MVPMC is another Hauppauge product that is effectively a TV over<br>IP device. It has an O/S image that enterprising souls in this community<br>have figured out how to replace with a Linux/MythTV image that serves as
<br>a frontend. IIRC, this has a reduced command set vs. a full-up frontend, <br>that can always change.<br><br>Almost anything is possible with a computer, but just as importantly, is the<br>result worth the effort. Many video cards support multiple displays and you
<br>could always install multiple video cards in a system, too. Running A/V<br>cables to TVs in different rooms would be a challenge and getting different<br>shows displayed on them is another one that I have not seen addressed here.
<br>You would also have the challenge of how to remotely control the display of<br>TVs not in the same room as the MythTV system. It could be done with RF<br>remotes or additional IR receivers on long cables bundled with the A/V ones,
<br>but I wouldn't do it, personally.<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> I see that the cost is basically that of the tuner cards (about $150
<br>> each for the PVR-250 I think it was), + $20 a year for the guide<br>> info.<br><br></div>The PVR-250 doesn't get you anything over the PVR-150, which is<br>cheaper. A PVR-500 is a pair of 150s on a single card. I use a
<br>PVR-500 and an HD HomeRun, which is a pair of HDTV tuners in an<br>ethernet-attached box.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> The interface looks nice, and you get the added benefit of<br>> streaming audio, web interface, etc. However, I don't plan on using
<br>> any of that at my TV as we use the TV speakers.<br><br></div>I'm not sure why these two sentences are connected.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> The Pros I see to building my own is.. custom configuring the box,
<br>> with easily expanding the amount of shows I can record (including I<br>> assume having recorded DVDs on the hds to watch at any time, such as<br>> my kids PowerRangers and such).<br><br></div>Yes.<br><div class="Ih2E3d">
<br>> Also, if it's possible the big pro is the ability to have a<br>> centralized large HD storage, maybe even a home NAS of 1TB or more,<br>> and access it from any TV<br><br></div>Yes.<br><div class="Ih2E3d">
<br>> ... although I am guessing the bad news is, it would require a<br>> computer with capture/playback card at each TV.<br><br></div>No, just playback at each TV.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> This isn't an option for me as I only have the one box extra, and
<br>> leaving it running all the time with the noise it makes is not really<br>> and option as well (that is to say, running 2 or 3 computers, one at<br>> each TV, just for playing back videos from a central NAS is not a big
<br>> option for me).<br><br></div>Well, there's the MVPMC. There's the X-Box Media Center, and<br>older X-Boxes running Myth's frontend on Linux. And dedicated<br>MythTV machines can be set to power themselves down when not in
<br>use.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> An alternative > to this I *think*, is to use my laptop with pcmcia<br>> card that can decode/playback movies from the NAS with wifi. Then,<br>> I can just bring my laptop (with card) to any TV I want, and select
<br>> anything I want. If this last one IS an option, any recomendations<br>> on pcmcia (or USB) card that decoded mpeg-2, mp4, etc with excellent<br>> quality?<br><br></div>I don't think anyone is currently shipping such a decoder card.
<br>However, pretty much any modern laptop, or one with an NVidia<br>5200 or later video chipset, will do a decent job decoding by<br>itself.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> The cons I see is #1, the time involved in getting the hardware
<br>> in there, set it up, install the OS, install the mythtv software,<br>> configure everything and get it all working.<br><br></div>Yes.</blockquote><div><br>Installation packages like MythDora, which I started using, based on
<br>Fedora, Mythbuntu, and KnoppMyth can get you pretty close to done<br>in a couple of hours, or maybe less, once you have all the HW in place.<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> The 2nd is the cost. Two tuner cards and a couple HD's will cost 3x as<br>> much as the initial two-tuner 80hour tivo box. On the other hand, the<br>> service, if I pay 3 year up front, is $8 a month, so within two years,
<br>> the home built solution would break even with the Tivo solution.<br><br></div>Yes.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> The biggest con I see is having a big computer box with fan noise<br>> and hd noise next to my TV.
<br><br></div>1. Doesn't have to be loud.<br>2. Doesn't have to be right next to the TV -- cables come in a<br> variety of lengths.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> Confusion for me is things like how I split my cable output into two
<br>> tuners (or more...if thats possible).<br><br></div>With a splitter, of course. They are cheap. My house currently<br>has eight cable devices of various sorts, and I'm in no way<br>unusual.</blockquote><div><br>
These have a Cable-TV input and two or more Cable-TV outputs. If your<br>cable signal is strong enough, that can be all it takes. If you later find the<br>picture quality is worse than it was before it got split, you'll need to get a
<br>distribution amplifier. Here in the U.S., these are readily obtained from <br>Radio Shack, and retail stores such as Target, WalMart, etc.<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> Also, HD cable.. do I need expensive tuner cards to record HD<br>> content.<br><br></div>No, but you do need separate tuners for HD service. There is a<br>thread about cheap ones right now.
<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> The HD Tivo with 300 hour record (80 hours of HD I think) is like<br>> $800. That's insane!<br><br></div>Well, the 160GB TiVo is only $300, and you can add external<br>storage to that now.
<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> I imagine the tuner cards probably support HD already<br><br></div>Only the cards that do HD by themselves.<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> Also, remote control.. I think you can get a simple IR remote, but
<br>> will it "take over" the cable box so that I don't need to use two<br>> remotes.. I can use it like I do my current Dish one.. simply find a<br>> channel, pause it, record, continue, skip, etc? Or is this not really
<br>> an option.. or at least as full featured for the home PC DVR unit?<br><br></div>You can get as complex a remote as you want. Personally, I use a<br>$20 Sony remote<br> <a href="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16880118001" target="_blank">
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16880118001</a><br>and some people use $200 Logitech Harmony remotes, and some<br>people use magic wands.<br><br>Read the MythTV HowTo section on keys. Anything that you can do,
<br>you can do from a sufficiently complex remote.</blockquote><div><br>Perhaps it would be good to clarify that there are two different issues involved.<br>Remotely controlling the MythTV system involves attaching a device that can
<br>receive the remote commands from the handheld remote control. The handheld<br>is typically transmitting IR signals, but there exist units that transmit RF signals.<br>There are a number of IR devices on the market that can be used with MythTV.
<br>The device attached to the MythTV system *may* or *may not* also support <br>transmitting IR signals using IR LEDs at the end of a cable. These IR transmitter<br>units can be placed where their output is visible to other devices, such as the TV,
<br>the cable box, etc. and with appropriate configuration, pressing keys on the hand-<br>held can cause commands to be sent via the IR transmitter(s) to the other devices.<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<br><div class="Ih2E3d"><br>> I probably have some more questions.. but I think this covers most<br>> things. Any info on good quality SD/HD tuner cards, and other stuff<br>> (laptop tuner card, etc) would be great!
<br><br></div>Read the wiki.<br></blockquote></div><br>HTH.<br><br>Craig.<br>