[mythtv-users] Hardware Question

John F. DeLuca johnfdeluca at comcast.net
Tue Mar 2 09:17:06 EST 2004


On 1 Mar 2004 at 21:01, Dex West wrote:

> So I've read about people purchasing a 250 & 350.  I'm
> assuming the 250 is used for recording and 350 is used
> for playback??  That seems like a lot of money to
> spend if I have to buy both.
Buying one is sufficient to record and playback.  With one, you can 
+ watch a prerecorded show while recording another
or
+ watch live TV

Buying two gives you the added ability to:
+ record two shows at once
or
watch Live TV while recording another show
or
watch a pre-recorded show while recording two additional shows (at the same time)

get the idea?
> 
> Thanks for the help..
> --- Andrew Dodd <atd7 at cornell.edu> wrote:
> > Quoting Dex West <dexwest at yahoo.com>:
> > 
> > > Newbie alert!! Sorry, but I've been reading the
> > > mailing list for the last week and have read
> > through
> > > several hardware manufacture's websites, about
> > > hardware specs.  I'd like to build my first mythTv
> > > box, but first need to buy some hardware.  I'd
> > like to
> > > make sure whatever hardware I buy will A.  Give me
> > > good quality B.  Straight forward to install.
> > > 
> > > After reading through the user list and looking at
> > the
> > > hardware DB, I get the feeling Hauppauge 350 is
> > the
> > > best bet.  
> > > 
> > > My question is:  If I go with the Hauppauge 350
> > should
> > > I also buy a gfx card with TV out?  Looks like
> > > according to Hauppauge website the 350 can record
> > OR
> > > playback video but not both.  Is that True?  Or
> > should
> > > I get a 250/350 and a gfx card with TV out??
> > > 
> > > My goal is to get the system up and running soon
> > so I
> > > can add some applications/programming help.  I'm
> > very
> > > excited by this project.
> > 
> > The 350 can record and play back simultaneously,
> > BUT:
> > 
> > On some people's systems this causes problems and
> > will make the recording end
> > prematurely.  On many people's systems it works
> > fine.
> > 
> > On some people's systems bringing up the EPG during
> > playback with the PVR-350
> > will cause a hang.  (Like the other problem, on
> > other people's systems such as
> > Isaac's, no problems occur.)
> > 
> > The 350 will also not work with non-MPEG2 video
> > (MythVideo), and won't work well
> > with MythGame either.
> > 
> > On the other hand, when playing back MPEG2, its
> > quality is FAR better than the
> > TV-out of most video cards (although the TV-out of
> > NVidia cards is pretty good,
> > the PVR-350's is still better.)
> > 
> > Some people have reported good success with external
> > VGA-to-TV converters.  Even
> > the cheapest ones seem to do better than even the
> > NVidia TV-out.
> > 
> > The best non-PVR350 quality encountered so far has
> > been a specific type of
> > VGA-to-NTSC (or PAL) converter that only does signal
> > conversion but not timing
> > conversion, developed by Cory (Papenfuss?  That's
> > his email userid...).  Thiss
> > requires a video card that can output NTSC/PAL
> > timings - Problematic currently
> > with NVidia cards due to the fact that the drivers
> > don't support interlaced
> > modes at the moment.  "Coming Soon" according to NV
> > though.
> > 
> > _______________________________________________
> > mythtv-users mailing list
> > mythtv-users at mythtv.org
> >
> http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
> 
> 
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