<br><div><span class="gmail_quote">On 12/5/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Steven Adeff</b> <<a href="mailto:adeffs.mythtv@gmail.com">adeffs.mythtv@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</span><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
a P4 2GHz will be too slow on its own so you'll need the help of XvMC.<br>The PCI card should work if you enable XvMC though. XvMC isn't a<br>perfect solution though as many people have difficulty getting it to<br>
work well, and the overlays won't be in color on that card IIRC.</blockquote><div><br>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.
<br></div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">If you do decide to use your 3500+ machine, XP should run fine on the<br>slower box though I would suggest adding at least another 512MB or
<br>RAM. The 3500+ is fast enough to be used as a combined FE/BE as well<br>without the need for XvMC (I had such a setup a while back on a 3200+<br>and it ran fine with an pcHDTV3000 and a PVR-150).</blockquote><div><br>
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.
<br></div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">As for HD tuners, I've got a pcHDTV 3000 and two Aver180's. But like<br>
what was suggested by matt I'd go with an HDHomerun now that it is<br>available. Slightly more expensive but I'm pretty sure the consensus<br>is if you can afford the difference and want two tuners (and really,<br>
who wouldn't) that its more than worth the money.</blockquote><div><br>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).
<br></div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">I'd also suggest a PVR-150 to connect to a cable box,etc. for<br>capturing regular TV. Or if your cablebox has firewire and your
<br>channels are not blocked via 5C you can go that route too.</blockquote><div><br>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.
<br></div><div><br><br>Thanks for the responses !! :) <br></div><br clear="all"></div><br>-- <br><a href="http://jacob.steenhagen.us">http://jacob.steenhagen.us</a>