[mythtv] Help please!

Brian Wente mythtv-dev@snowman.net
Tue Jan 14 16:52:17 EST 2003


Here is my story:

This is my first linux box.
This is my first intel based computer.

I am mac user.
I wasn't happy with the choices for pvr on the mac
(http://www.elgato.com/eyeTV/index.html)
I didn't want to upgrade to OSX.

Anyway, I wanted a PVR and found MythTV. It looked like it was going in the
right direction. I sign-up on the mailing list and search the archives and
decided to take the plunge.

My hardware:
 SS50 Shuttle (to pci slots for two wintv cards)
 80 GB HD seagate barracuda
 DVD-RW HP refurbish from tigerdirect
 2.4 gHz Pentium 4 (for ripping DVD's and hopefully converting recordings to
VCD)
 512 MB RAM
 PCI wintv 401 card (just one for now)

total price $800

I spent more than I needed to, but I plan to have do more too.

Build time 1 hour, it's a tight fit for my big hands, but it is a straight
forward approach.

The fan is noisy, I did buy a Zalman case fan. It did reduce the noise
somewhat. I going to leave the processor fan alone and get a RF remote and
keep the MythBox in a cabinet.

My Software:

I'm using RedHat 8.0 the instructions on the site are very good. I just
followed the instructions. There is some other software that I consider a
must have for a beginner. One is webmin it is a gui web based tool for all
sorts of stuff. Apache, MySQL,  NFS shares, user and groups, and even
appletalk setup for my other computers.

The other piece of software I found was APT (Advanced Package Tool
http://apt.freshrpms.net/ ) it is package manager. It's command line, but
someone created a gui frontend called synaptic. I just used it to upgrade
xmltv last night, just three clicks and it's done.

MythTv installation was exactly done by the available documentation. I had
problems with getting the sound configured, but playing around with the
mixer fixed it. Sound quality is still a problem, the list has suggestions
on changing the sampling rate.

I also found a RPM for MythTV 0.7 after I installed it. I don't know if it
works.

rpm http://apt.physik.fu-berlin.de redhat/8.0/en/i386 at
rpm-src http://apt.physik.fu-berlin.de redhat/8.0/en/i386 at


I hope this helps.

I am eagerly waiting for MythTV 0.8

-- Brian




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