<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><div>On Feb 10, 2008, at 6:30 PM, Doug Meredith wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0; "><div lang="EN-US" link="blue" vlink="purple"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="country-region"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="City"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="place"><div class="Section1"><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">I’ve been a MythTV user for over a year now, and the WAF has been very high. About six weeks ago I made the mistake of buying our first HDTV. My wife is quite disappointed that everything looks “the same”. To be honest, I’m pretty disappointed too. Even DVDs look amazing compared to my captures. I’ve been investigating my options for capturing HDTV, and have come up with the following:</span></font></div></div></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></div></span></blockquote><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div>I'm surprised. My standard definition captures look worse on my HDTV than on my old standard definition CRT.</div><div><br><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0; "><div lang="EN-US" link="blue" vlink="purple"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="country-region"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="City"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="place"><div class="Section1"><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; "><o:p></o:p></span></font></div><ol start="1" type="1" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in; "><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">Over the air. Not an option. There are no HD broadcasts in<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">New Brunswick</st1:city>,<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><st1:country-region w:st="on">Canada</st1:country-region></st1:place>.</span></font></li></ol></div></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></div></span></blockquote><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div>That's a shame.</div><div><br><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0; "><div lang="EN-US" link="blue" vlink="purple"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="country-region"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="City"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="place"><div class="Section1"><ol start="1" type="1" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in; "><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; "><o:p></o:p></span></font></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">QAM capture. I get four unencrypted HD stations and a number of digital SD broadcasts. I have an HD Home Run but I’m nervous about deploying this at all due to reports of cable companies changing what is available unencrypted or changing frequency assignments without warning. In any case, it isn’t going to get me HD.</span></font></li></ol></div></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></div></span></blockquote><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div>So you're not going to use it because some day it *might* stop working? Everything *might* stop working some day. Why do anything at all?</div><div><br><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0; "><div lang="EN-US" link="blue" vlink="purple"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="country-region"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="City"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="place"><div class="Section1"><ol start="2" type="1" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-bottom: 0in; "><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; "><o:p></o:p></span></font></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">Get a cable box and hope that I get what I want through fire wire. Some people have difficulty making this work, it seems. No guarantee there will be *<b><span style="font-weight: bold; ">any</span></b>* unencrypted stations on fire wire, and if there are, no guarantee they will stay unencrypted. I don’t think I would risk this even if it would work now. Better to never have HD than to have it and have to tell my wife we are going back to SD.<o:p></o:p></span></font></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">Get a moded cable or satellite box. The two options I have seen are Windows-only. It isn’t clear how easy or convenient it would be to tie Myth into there recording scheme.<o:p></o:p></span></font></li></ol><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; "><o:p> </o:p></span></font></div><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">Unless I’m missing something, there are *<b><span style="font-weight: bold; ">no</span></b>* good options. Option four, while expensive, looks the most hopeful. I’m just not sure I’m willing to put in the time required to be on the bleeding edge with this.<o:p></o:p></span></font></div><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; "><o:p> </o:p></span></font></div><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">We can dream about the encryption situation changing, but I don’t think that anything is going to happen that will let me record HD in the next couple of years. If anything, cable companies are likely to clamp down more and more on options two and three. It really looks like option four may be my only hope.<o:p></o:p></span></font></div><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; "><o:p> </o:p></span></font></div><div style="margin-top: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-left: 0in; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; "><font size="2" face="Arial"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial; ">Have I missed anything that should give me reason to be optimistic about being able to record HD in the (very) short term? Personally I wouldn’t give up Myth just to get HD. But I worry greatly about the WAF.</span></font></div></div></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></o:smarttagtype></div></span></blockquote><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div></div><div>The only thing that looks like another option hasn't been released yet. the Hauppauge HD PVR promises HD capture via component cables. Reasonably priced and someone posted a response from Hauppauge that said they hope to have linux drivers when they release. Should be out in March. Not sure if there other things to consider being a US product and you want to use it in Canada. Google should come up with a bunch of info about this new device.</div><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><div>-Brad</div><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div></body></html>