[mythtv-users] 2 capture cards: want 1 dedicated to live TV, other to recording

James Miller gajs-f0el at dea.spamcon.org
Wed Dec 17 05:25:48 UTC 2008


I've fiddled around with Mythtv for a few years now but only really got it 
to work once the Mythbuntu project came along. So I'm not really new to 
using Mythtv, but I also can't claim to have a lot of technical prowess 
either.

Among things I've tried to do since successfully setting up Mythbuntu 
(about 1.5 years ago) is to use 2 capture cards. I've succeeded in 
installing them and getting them set up and recognized by the system, but 
I'm still kind of fundamentally confused about using them. One of the 
cards is a better quality card than the other (the better card is a 
Internext Compression Inc iTVC16 [CX23416] MPEG-2 Encoder, the worse one a 
Brooktree Corporation Bt878 Video Capture). As I see it, the machine 
should be using the worse card for displaying live TV (of which I watch 
very little) and using the better card to do all recording. Problem is, no 
matter how many times I look through the settings, I can't seem to find 
any way to "dedicate" one or other of the cards to each of the two tasks.

So my initial question is whether what I want to do is actually possible? 
Can I assign the BT878 to live TV and the iTVC16 to recording functions, 
so that any time I watch live TV it will come through the BT878, while any 
time I schedule a recording the machine will record through the iTVC16? If 
so, I'd like to ask for some pointers on how to do this.

Thanks,
James

PS Other relevant system info.: this is a P4 2.0 Ghz with 1 GB of RAM, 2 
HD's (at  80 GB and 160 GB), and I watch recordings and TV on a 32 inch 
Gateway/Destination CRT monitor via a geforce2 MX400 AGP video card. 
Think that's about all that needs to be mentioned. Oh yeah: I get my TV 
signal through cable.


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