[mythtv-users] Why use PVR 350 TV-out? (Was: X and PVR 350)

[Niklas Brunlid]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2005 16:06:50 +0000, Eggert Thorlacius  
<eggi at menandmice.com> wrote:

> Hello
>
> I have been following the thread "X and PVR 350" and other similar
> threads where people have been having problems with running MythTV on
> the PVR 350 TV-out, and I can certainly relate to their frustration
> because I went through all the same problems when I was trying to set
> up my machine.
> I finally gave up and instead used the TV-out of my nVidia card and I
> couldn't be happier.  Before, I could not play DivX files or transcoded
> recordings because my machine was too slow, but now I play them (at
> about 50% CPU).  Plus, the UI is noticably snappier, I don't have to
> use that funky audio out-> audio in -> oudio out loop and the image
> quality is IMHO better.
>
> So my question is, why should people setting up their Myth boxes even
> try to use the PVR 350?  Why not just buy a PVR 250 and a e-GeForce
> MX4000 for the same price?
>
> Note that this is not meant as a flame, I'm just curious.

In my case, it's because my box (a Pundit, old version) has sucky tv-out  
by itself and not much room for a PCI GFX card now that I have a 350 and  
250 in it. Also, I have never had any real problems with the 350 TV-out  
since I started using the ivtvdev X11 driver - TV works great, DVDs and  
MPEG4 play at <20% CPU (on a P4 2.4GHz) with no dropped frames or anything  
(with just a bit of tearing from not being synced with the TV refresh, and  
even that seems to go away after a while).

The fact that the 350 has PAL (or NTSC) resolution as its one and only  
native mode helps greatly with picture quality IMHO. Although my next box  
will not be a Pundit as it gets way too hot - I even moved the HD out to a  
server and run the root filesystem as well as the recordings over NFS.

/ Niklas