All In Wonder Pvr Software For Linux
Approaches to a Linux PVR. You could leave the video in the same format in which the PVR software originally saved it. The ATI TV Wonder VE. Best of all, GB-PVR can be yours for the low, low price of $0. Once only a viable option for veteran Linux users and hackers.
For fuck's sake. Anyway, back on PVR's. I use mythtv. I have a pinnacle pctv pro and a DVD player in my box.
I splurged and bought a $45 sb live! It took me a day of compiling and configuring on gentoo, and things were running fine. A few more days of tinkering and I have a n64/snes console/pvr/dvd player/mp3 player that shares my windows mp3 collection. Not hard, but then I'm not an idiot. Do.you.
have to be? I said 'I don't have the time'.
You say it took you days to compile, configure and tinker. You may not be an idiot, but you sure are an asshole.
Here's the problem with comparing Linux PVR projects with Windows PVR's or a dedicated machine like a Tivo: variety. With a dedicated machine, the manufacturer can pick the hardware they want to use, and then tell their developers to write code to fit the hardware. With windows, the hardware manufacturers make the drivers, etc. So the PVR coders don't have to. With linux, we lose on both fronts - not only do the PVR developers have to code their software to work for a variety of different platforms (hardware/software encoders, different remotes, distributions, etc), but they also have to rely on other sets of open source developers who work on the drivers for the sound cards (ALSA), video cards (ivtv, v4l), tv-out video cards, etc. It makes the programs a lot more complex, slows down development time, etc. On the other hand, they're free, and you can add your own features if you want.
I'm a happy mythtv user who didn't like its mythweb module. So I rewrote it and gave it back, and now the project is better than ever (imho, the web interface to mythtv makes it more useful than any other PVR solution - I don't have to walk into the other room to set up or manage recordings, or can schedule recordings I've forgotten about before leaving on vacation). So which choice do we make: 1).
Make linux easy to work on and use so that it can be an effective alternative to windows. This might entail things like standardized GUI interfaces, methods of adjusting preferences that neither involve the command line nor hacking an initialization script, and help files that guide users through how to easily solve their problems. Keep linux in it's current state of 'difficult for the newbie to work on and use.'
This would involve the least disruption to the current developmental process(es), would keep things 'just as they are today', and ensure the burden is on the user for tracking down an expert in case they need to install, modify, use, upgrade, or remove either the operating system or an application. While keeping the customization that is vital to the particular user available is it necessary to keep it difficult? Or are the two mutually exclusive? The only thing that causes a rift in distinction of difficulty between windows and linux is lack of familiarity on the part of the individual deciding the difficulty level. Or, to put it a simpler way, people think linux is hard because they don't know it. Put anyone unfamiliar with Windows on a Windows PC and it's not any easier to linux. It's only easy because you or the neighborhood geek is familiar with it.
Also don't overestimate the ease of use Windows purports to have. It's still hard in spots, som. The thing that concerns me is that for some reason there's a mode of thought throughout most slashdot articles as of late (2-3 years) that linux should be as easy to use as windows. Do you really want this to be the case? Yes, Linux absolutely should be available in a form that is as easy to use as Windows. What concerns me is that there is still such a holdout among elitists like yourself. The notion that allowing Linux to be newbie friendly will somehow make it worse for us hackers is downright asinine.
I briefly held this belief myself before realizing how stupid it was. Every example you gave of the 'horrors' of a newbie-friendly Linux is pure hyperbole and utter BS. (And frankly, they show that you have little clue what you're talking about.) The development of software and utilities that assist ordinary users will not in any way affect those of us who do most of our work in a bash shell and a vim session. To the contrary, it will help us immensely because more software will become available for our platform of choice and any kludgy configuration issues that exist today will be standardized by necessity as automation tools are developed. Also, may I ask you a question?
Do you ever plan to actually use the skills you infer to have to make a living? Well guess what? It's a no-go if ordinary people can't use the technology you are most adept at and if Linux doesn't drive a significant 'market-share'. So what is your solution? Let Microsoft and Apple have all the desktops and let Linux/BSD be niche players for the geeks only? If that happens, we will have a world filled with DRM garbage and security nightmares.
Get your head out of the sand. Do what TiVO does with cable boxes - get an IR blaster. Program the PVR with the codes to change channels on your Sky TV box, and let it change the channels on the STB for you. Any good PVR app will have support for this. As a side note, TiVO has recently (within the past 6 months or so) started supporting certain cable boxes via the serial port, and they do support many satellite boxes via the serial port as well (just in case you had a TiVO before you got on DirecTV, and didn't want to get the DirecTiVO). However, the IR blaster approach is still required for a lot of cable boxes, and it works. I don't know what version of MythTV you were running, but I've been using it for 4 or 5 months with almost no problems.
On ocassion, video won't be there or the channel won't change or there is no sound, but usually the problem isn't with Myth but with me (whoops; seperate module for the tuner.) But no lockups. Perhaps your problem was a system problem as well; immature driver for your capture card or video card? In any case, my experience with mythtv has been superb. Never miss an episode of Family G. I'll add another to the 'me too' count, MythTV works fine for me. I even own one of the supposedly troublesome combos of a VIA KT400 chipset and a PVR-250, and it's working fine. We'll see how that works when I put another PVR-250 in the mix, but for now it works.
As a bonus, there's a website that has step-by-step instructions, using apt-get for everything on Fedora Core 1. You could pretty much copy/paste the directions, and have a MythTV machine up and running in less than one hour. That website would be wilsonet.com.
I love my mythtv installation, it is what made me move over to Linux for good. The only 'issue' is that MPEG-4 really puts strain on my CPU, holding a Athlon 2600+ at 60% while encoding. I now do homework for the next day's courses instead of watching adult swim and the daily show at night. I also watched some football games with it, and having a frame-by-frame slow-mo is wonderful. What's even better is never watching commercials, cuts the time of shows way down. Even with a crappy four year old bt87.
That's what I was wondering.this guy was impressed with his friends Tivo. He then went out, bought Replay and decided he hated it. Then, went out and spent a bunch of cash on another computer? Why not just by a Tivo?
At his rate, it would have saved him time and money (assuming he couldn't return the Replay). My Series 1 absolutely rocks. 120GB drive in it, with Tivoweb.
Sure, there are things I wish it would do, but then again.what it DOES do, it does REALLY WELL. After a couple of month of the monthly $12 fee, I learned that my TV watching had changed forever, and I sprung for the lifetime subscription before they bumped it up from $250 to $300. I've got backups of the software.but I absolutely dread the day my hardware dies (I hope I outlive it). No: his wife asks the question several times, which rather leads one to believe that he never answers her.
Come to think of it, the entire article could be summed up thusly: 'A friend of mine had Tivo, which I decided I wanted, but I didn't want to shell out $600 for the whole nine yards. So first I went with a cheap option which didn't work. Then I went with a cheaper option which also didn't work.
Then I went with a more expensive option which worked, but badly. Finally, I tried something which worked, an. There have been many stories here about home-brew Tivo/Replay (both run Linux, BTW) systems and almost every one has been filled with horror storied about getting things working. The advantage that Tivo and Replay have over home-brew systems is that both systems are fixed hardware platforms and as such, drivers are a non-issue.
Much like game consoles. Tivo's software was written and tested on Tivo equipment. They don't have to worry about getting different brands of sound cards to work, or different ker. I used knoppmyth to set up two boxes, going to make a couple of changes and use one as a front end, the other as a three tuner server. Possibly this weekend. Latest Journal entry is my experience.
Web site with a forum (you may still want to search through e-mail list archives, I don't) is R4 worked for me after some tweeking that I agree would be more than the original article writer would like. I am comfortable with Linux, including Debian, so it was not a problem for me.
I am hopping R5 will be out soon, and will take care of the few issues I had. One item that the KnoppMyth forums have that you may find handy is a tier 1, tier 2, tier 3 listing for hardware configurations that worked out of the box, with minor changes, or not at all.
The DIY approach does cost more, unless you happen to have the hardware lying around. But, as many other people have stated, with the setup guide mentioned in the article (which I also mentioned in another post), you can install all of MythTV via apt-get.
This gives you much more functionality than a TiVo, as you get not only timeshifting of TV, but you also get the ability to do picture slideshows, watch/rip DVD's, playback videos (stored on the hard drive), view the weather forecast, and play games under. I've been pricing a box for MythTV, and something like an Asus A7NVX-VM with processor, ram, and case would run $200-300. I was thinking of booting from the onboard LAN, using NFS for storage, and using the onboard video for output (with the ASUS tv-out & SPDIF accessory cards). Then I'd just need the video capture device. I see the Linux HDTV card (www.pchdtv.com) is around $200, but that might require some serious storage capacity. Then again I'm back to your $500 or so, but that would be an HDTV.
His web site screams 'tech moron'. The bit killed me about never going to use the modem, and then proceeding to bend the case to make it fit anyway! He spends the first two thirds of the page meticulously documenting his incompetence in putting together hardware for all the world to see, then one paragraph on rebooting Linux and not everything working right away, and then off he goes into Windows bliss. And then the moral of the story is that Linux PVRs are not ready for prime time?! To quote Basil Fawlty, his wife clearly made a mistake. And then the moral of the story is that Linux PVRs are not ready for prime time?!
Regardless of his skill level, the point is that linux didnt work out of the box, but the windows stuff did. Windows is crap, but more often than not, it works right away. Your mileage may vary is the case with any linux project, in my opinion. Any OS for that matter. Ive been relatively pleased with XP, but i sure wish i didnt need it and could use my debian install at work more. I love linux, i can deal with wind. the point is that linux didnt work out of the box, but the windows stuff did Uh, not really.
Windows itself maybe did, but his first attempt at a Windows PVR didn't. Besides, only once have I failed to boot Linux successfully on the first try, and that was this week with a MandrakeMove CD on a Dell Latitude. Knoppix worked fine on that same machine. having said all that, i think im just gonna buy a pvr I've had TiVo for several years myself, despite being quite comfortable with Linux and Windows. When I read a review like this, I find it incredibly useful if I know the qualifications of the reviewer. In this case, by reading the article, you can tell that he has enough skill to build his own computer system, get it connected to his television, but not so much skill with getting video drivers to work in older linux distributions, or solving what some of us would call 'easy' floppy controller problems.
This is very valuable information to have, especially if you: 1. Don't use linux on a regular basis. I tried building my own 'Tivo'-like box too in Linux. It eventually cost a bit more than buying a Tivo, but I use it as my DVD burning and mp3 jukebox in addition to MythTV. Installed Debian on it with similar hardware as the author of the article had. I had no problems whatsoever, though I've been using Linux since '98.
If you want just a Tivo box for cheap, I don't suggest doing it unless you want shady quality. Get a damned good TV Card (like the PVR-250 which does encoding on the hardware - this is around $120 alone), and a huge hard drive, and a good amount of memory.
If you have the PVR-250, you don't need such a powerful CPU as the MPEG encoding is handled by the PVR. All in all, it was worth the time. I never have to look back and it's simply an amazing solution. I've been using Myth for about 8 months and it never stops to amaze me.
First of all, I get the idea this person is not a veteran of the linux industry. He does a good job of navigating through what are essentially basic problems. I don't think its worthy to mention he had his jumpers wrong. Everyone makes a jumper mistake and it is fairly easy to diagnose. His major fault. He purchased a Win-TV 250. This card is pretty good actually with onboard hardware mpeg2 encoding.
(I own a 250 as well as a vanilla hauppage win-tv) The drawback to the Win-TV 250 is it does not have tv out. He should have spent a couple extra bucks and got the 350.
The next big mistake was relying on some integrated tv out solution. It's been my experience that onboard has the tendency to be slightly different then their off board branded brotherin. Thus, I can easily see why he had some troubles. He said it himself, he suffers from some impulse buying habbits. I think a little more research on compatability would have turned up better linux results. Personally, I went into the linux pvr project with absolutely no starting knowledge other then getting my hauppage card working a long long time ago.
(out of the box support made it no chore). However, knowing nothing about the task prompted me to research, research and well. I wish he had tried a Knoppix MythTV Live CD as I would like to have seen the results. Used knoppix CD and it worked!
(probably not with the odd video out). His major fault. He purchased a Win-TV 250. This card is pretty good actually with onboard hardware mpeg2 encoding.
(I own a 250 as well as a vanilla hauppage win-tv) The drawback to the Win-TV 250 is it does not have tv out. He should have spent a couple extra bucks and got the 350. The WinTV-PVR-250 is well supported in MythTV which is currently the most mature linux based PVR package and from experience I would recommend a VGA to NTSC video converter WAY before I'd recommend using any cards video ou. Anyone who can't properly hook up an IDE disk (check the jumpers BEFORE you install it) shouldn't be attempting to both build a computer and install an OS they've never tried before under a deadline. He also did a horrible job on research and homework. He could have probably slapped a KnoppMyth CD in the drive and been done in record time. I'd say - this guy simply didn't have the basic computer and Linux skills to do anything but install pre-packaged software.
He ended up with the solution that fit that skillset the best. No offense, but he wasn't ready to try a do-it-yourself solution. A consumer solution.is. the best for someone with the limited time he had available (self-imposed deadlines) and knowledge level. So the writer spent dozens upon dozens of hours building, tearing down, rebuilding and troubleshooting something that's going to be less reliable and more expensive than a TiVo? DirecTV with TiVo is $100 plus $5 a month, not $600 I can just hear his wife now, 'Matt!
I JUST want to watch American Idol! Can I PLEASE watch American Idol? Why is there no sound? How come the picture looks bad? Why do I have to reboot the computer just to watch TV? What's a General Protection Fault?
Something just popped up on the TV that says 'NIMDA' what's NIMDA? The TV said 'C: drive full' while I was watching the Trading Spaces Marathon! Dude - just buy the TiVo and you're done. 'Though I still hope to improve my Linux competency someday, I seem not to have the patience.' One wonders, if you are going to venture into building something like this, with a confessed lack of competency and patience, would failure not be a certain outcome?
Best Pvr Software Htpc
When one feels the need to document at length the oh-so-advanced topic of repeatedly screwing up the jumper settings on your hard drive, this becomes more an article on basic computer construction skills than anything about PVRs. I won't get into 'the instructions said 'use a screwdriver.' ' He ditched the entire linux idea because he couldn't disable the floppy seek.
Conclusions This is only my second day as a PVR equipped husband and already my wife has forgotten about TiVo. She watches episodes of Charmed and the Gilmore Girls and grins as she fast forwards through commercials. As for me, I have been spending quality time with John Stewart - his show on the Iowa Caucases was not to be missed.
Yes, this little project ended up being a little more pricey than I had expected, about $800 total, but I am left with an expandable and powerful system capable of doing a lot more than any TiVo can do. Perhaps the whole thing was silly. After all, VCR's basically do the same thing right? Hey, kudos to him for getting it working. Most of the stories I've read in this genre end up with the author buying a ReplayTV or TiVO because his creation failed the spouse test.
Or just wouldn't work reliably. According to the conclusion, wifey is as happy as a clam. But: Soon the sound started falling behind the movement of his lips. That was no good. Plus his body blurred when he moved.
My hero, John Stewart was jittery and smeared. The wife grumbled. So, we have $800 for a TiVO with a relatively unreliable guide with less info, no auto-commercial skip (as in 50XX series ReplayTV's), lots of fans and noise, 3x the power use, and picture quality issues that will be fixed Real Soon Now: After all of this, the picture was better, but John Stewart still looked unintentionally silly.
Apparently, the next version (2) of Sage will be available in early February 2004, and these picture adjustment issues will be much easier to grapple with. In my experience, SageTV always has image quality and sync problems (and they always blame the OS, or the video card, or cosmic radiation, etc. I got a refund). I really do want to make my own PVR one day, but I'm afraid the time is not yet right. Almost, but not quite. By the sounds of it this the guy did't have much (or really any) experience with linux. He simply wanted to slap a bunch of stuff together, and hope that the designers of Fedora & whaterver else he used could make everything 'magically work.'
That belief lends its self to someone who should pay for an out of the box solution. I can slap a lot of hardware together and try and run any number of systems on it, but if I'm not willing to WORK through problems, they will all fail. Don't waste./ers time with whiners. Despite being a penguinista, my experiences with getting the ivtv driver to work with The Hauppage PVR 250 PCI cards were rather hopeless regardless of the distro I employed. I finally broke down and installed SageTV on a Win2K box and have been very happy ever since. I'm using two PVR 250 capture/compression cards, an NVIDIA GeForce 5200 and a Fortissimo 7.1 (just for the TOSlink output) on an Athalon 2000+ system using an IRman universal IR recivever which makes the system think It's a tivo to allow for my universal remote to support it.
One tuner is connected to the output of my cable box to allow access to the digital tier and HBO using an Actisys IR-200L. The overall result is spectacular, I never have recording conflicts, flawless sound and picture quality, and I can back off shows to DVD with the Ulead MovieFactory package which comes with the PVR-250. I can also view the Mpeg files from my other computers as well. The SageTV package also serves as an MP3 and DVD Player.
When the remote is not enough VNC works flawlessly. Quite indispensable given my schedule, and its addicted me to Inuyasha as well! Excellent software, 'tho I intend to revisit mythtv when a mini-distro is available. 2) Use MythTV ABSOLUTELY.
I was lucky enough to start with it, but it has been one of those rare bits of software the continues to surprise me with.both. its design and implementation.
3) Make sure you have enough horse power, I'm using an AMD 1800 and its enough to get the job done. I'm sure some have done it with less, but I've found a couple of occasions its been a little tight. 4) Use the Hauppauge WinTV-PVR 250. Its supported under MythTV (thanks to their hard work) and will give you Mpeg1/2 recording in hardware.
5) Buy 2 Hauppauge cards. MythTV supports PIP and I think the coolest thing is to be able to let the kids watch one program while the other records in the background.
6) Use a VGA to NTSC video converter. Preferably one that uses its own hardware to convert the signal (I'm using one that is more or less a pass-through and had to set up some pretty weird modelines). You will not regret this. 7) Don't get stingy with the hard drive space!
They are pretty cheap now and even having two 120 gig drives THINGS GET TIGHT. All day marathons of your favorite programs can unexpectedly create 100's of gigs of unwatched TV shows (add to that ripped DVD's and your entire Mp3 collection.). 8) Just a reminder: Use Mandrake. Its OSS, its friendly enough for your wife/kids/visiting friends and will install MythTV (or a MythTV update!) in a single shot.
Just make sure to configure Urpmi (which will apply to Rpmdrake simultaneously) with the urpmi.org and nyvalls.se resources (you'll find how to configure them in the links I provided). Aside from have the MythTV packages they have a lot of really good (and really useful) multimedia software and after all the funniest part of having a homebuilt PVR that does more then most commercial packages is that its really a complete computer, so you might as well use it. Like I said, I built mine over a year ago. I haven't stopped gloating since.
Commercial detection, DVD ripping, dual WinTV-PRV containing, upgradable, themable and totally configurable home video entertainment at its best. And for the times your bored with that you can try a little gaming on the big screen (right after checking Slashdot and reading your email of course!). Is MythTV network capable? Yes, the front (display) and back (recording / storage) can be separate.
Can I have a monster recording server and then playback clients on my LAN? Oh yes:-) Can I rip a DVD/CD at the client and store it on the server? Yes, I do this a lot. Personally I rip to mpeg4/xVid at 1000kbps and have no real hassles with quality.
This is built into the mythDVD section. What about DVD burning. Not too sure about this one, but it would be relatively easy for a hacker to code a. Digital video is still fairly new, tech-wise, and it's still rapidly changing (MPEG4, HDTV, new codecs). Plus, you're trying to perform a specialized task on top of a generalized platform - which is naturally going to be more complex then a dedicated solution would be. So between the rapidly changing codec terrain, the scads of possible devices, varying levels of operating system support, and the fact that pushing video around is an order of magnitude (or two) more demanding then audio - I'm not surprised. I built my own PVR last year, but even with myhtpc.net it failed the spouse test badly.
So when I saw those fatwallet.com for sale in Radio Shack I pounced on them. I bought two. At $150 they deliver amazingly good MPEG-2 capture so for the same price as a PVR-250 I get free guide and streaming. Contrary to the experiences described in this article, my ReplayTVs work flawlessly.
Plugged in to the home network, DHCP served them up IPs, they downloaded their info and updated their software. They use uPnP to auto-discover other ReplayTVs on the network and integrate them very well in their on-screen UI. In fact the UI is a big win - it passes the spouse test easily.
Browsing material on the base machine, from another ReplayTV, or from the PC file server is takes a single button push. The ReplayTVs handle program contention intelligently, offering to offload a conflicted recording slot to a 'spare' ReplayTV on the network. The clever Java program sourceforge.net uses uPnP to imitate a ReplayTV and enables you to upload, stream, or move recorded content from the auto-discovered ReplayTVs.
In effect, each ReplayTV acts like a big, external MPEG-2 capture card with lots of ports and functionality. All ReplayTVs on the network can, of course, stream from any DVArchive-equipped file server to any ReplayTV. You can even schedule DVArchive to automatically grab recorded material from the ReplayTVs on a batch basis, providing an easy way to create large archives. I have set up some watched folders where new material gets automatically batch encoded to MPEG-4 (xvid) for archiving.
There's a planetreplay.com. All in all I am very satisfied with my ReplayTV setup.
It is totally integrated into my home media setup (1 TB RAID-5 file server) and works effortlessly. The ReplayTVs automatically skip adverts (works pretty well) and there's an active planetreplay.com I avoided Tivo, partly because of cost, but mainly because of its incipient DRM. I was afraid I would have to expend significant effort to create a spouse-friendly PVR system but thankfully my networked ReplayTVs have obviated this requirement for a while. The guy makes building a PC sound like pulling teeth: 'When I booted up the unit, I found that neither my CD/DVD Drive, nor my Hard Disk were recognized.Two hours later God spoke to me.look at the back of the hard drive and compare the jumper positions.Jumpers are little brackets that must be moved to tell a piece of hardware what role it will play as part of your computer.' To make a long story short, brain surgeon guy had the hd set to slave so it wouldn't boot. Course it took him 2 hours to realize it and God had to tell him too.
No offense guy, but MythTV wasn't designed for you. You'll be happier.
Pretty buttons. I've had my Radeon All in Wonder working since mid 2002. It does a beautiful job of recording TV in both Mpeg2 and DivX format. I use a Pioneer DVD burner to create DVD's that I can play in any compatible console player. The only qualm I have with the it is that the included software to let you view TV listings doesn't work, or at least not without switching the input to the built-in tuner. I really don't know why the thing even has a tuner at this point.
Who in their right mind is going to use an RF input instead of the composite or s-video? Now some of you may be wondering how I'm doing this. Well I'm doing it under Windows 2000 is how. When there is a Linux solution that works as well I may switch, but I'm not going to go out of my way to avoid a good solution just because it runs on top of Windows. People who make choices based upon emotionally driven ideology instead of practical considerations usually don't get as far as people who do the opposite. So while I may prefer Linux to Windows in general, my preference is based upon the technical and social merits of Linux, not upon some quasi-religious hatred of Windows. I work with someone who is at least as good as I am with Unix, and is most likely far better.
Her superiors are wanting her to support Windows now as well and she is fit to be tied. Her hatred of M$ and Windows is such that she just can't do it.
Unfortunately Windows is not going anywhere. Refusing to deal with it doesn't make it go away, it just makes its presence that much more of a problem. It is better to keep your friends close and your enemies closer. If I can't make windows jump then that makes me that much less powerful a hacker (!=Cracker) and that much less valuable to whomever I work for. I think having a Linux PVR solution would be great, but going out of one's way to use alpha and beta quality stuff that is a pain to get configured and working just to avoid using Windows is pretty damned silly unless you're one of the developers. I've just finished building a mythtv-based system, and agree with several other posters that hardware choice is absolutely critial.
I'm normally hardware and distribution agnostic, but had very good results with the following combo:. Fedora FC1. Axel T's apt-rpm of mythtv-suite and ivtv drivers (nothing better than an apt-get install mythtv-suite, and watching it go.).
The following hardware from www.minipc.com.au:. Shuttle SN45G nForce2 Ultra. Athlon 2700+. 512 Mb 333 RAM. 120Gb HDD, 8MB, Seagate.
Mitsubishi DVD +/-R/RW. Hauppauge PVR-350. Follow the bouncing ball from a l and o wto The shuttle is VERY quiet, and works great with mythtv. Some key 'gotchas' I encountered on the way:.
Have the nvidia drivers handy on a CD after installation, or the network card won't work. Make sure you're date/time is set correctly on your system (several hours stuffing around with TV guide data and XMLTV before I caught the fact that I was 1 year off!). The Australian default channel positions are often replicated higher up in the spectrum - the 'higher' versions may be the defaults for your area. I was starting to worry that my tuner card was a dud. For anyone that wants a one-system mythtv box, I'd recommend grabbing the same specs (probably from the same location if you're in Oz - prices were pretty good for Australia). If you just wait until a special, you can get a PVR w/ dual tuners for free by switching your video provider (CAT/SAT).
There's always some special going on by one of the major companies. Yeah, you'll get a 12 month contract, but whoopee-do. $29/mo x 12mo = $348.00. That's for a year of basic satellite service (125 channels) with a 40 hour unit for 'free'. As the PVR prices continue to tumble, you'll find that PVR units will become standard-with-service in a couple of years. Sure, 'hacking' is fun, but only when it's improving something and learning in the process.
I know Linux/BSD as well as I ever care to, so there's nothing new to learn by typing 'rpm -i Myth' or 'make install' and edit a conf file, or two, after building a new box. I've seen too many people refer to this as hacking, thus my mention of it. Don't call it that unless you are writing your own code or have either utilized a soldering gun or dremmel in your project.
Don't get me wrong, I am not critizing people's efforts. I think it's great that folks are using this to learn something new. But, it hardly replaces a set-top PVR or saves any money. Here's the reasons, as I see them: Multiple tuners - lets you record one show while watching another, record two shows while watching another previously recorded one.
This issue has only ever been responded to with 'You watch too much TV' cracks, but I watch about 4 hours a week and have two series with over-lapping schedules. If I had one tuner, I would miss one of them. Realtime encoding/decoding - This goes with the multiple tuners issue. My unit can encode two shows at once while playing a third one back.
This is all done without any slowdowns on a dinky CPU. Remotes - A task specific remote. VCR style controls, never have to touch a keyboard. No dead buttons. No extra buttons.
Wife/child friendly - If it crashes, the most you ever do is pull the card and power cycle. Boots in 15 seconds and picks up where it left off (recording or playing back), no loss in material except for the off-time. I don't want them having to worry about ever having to see a console or have any bugs surface that can't be fixed by a power cycle or press of a button on the remote. No fuss in the event of a failure - If a lease or in warranty: Call your SAT/CAT provider and they will Fed Ex you a whole new unit in the even of a failure. If it's old and you own it, then simply take advantage of the market and switch providers for 12 months, get a free new one. I know some folks are very dependant or faithful to one provider. They all just want your money, just because one has a cooler name and you like blue icons better, that doesn't mean you need to not play the market.
There's plenty of money to be saved and the tactic of branding is just that, a marketing tactic. Shop around, get cool stuff for nothing, enjoy! But, it hardly replaces a set-top PVR or saves any money. My PC PVR does far far more than a Tivo would ever dream of, and it can do it for much less. For instance, I can edit out commercials, credits, intros, etc., or I can use some programs that will automatically edit out commercials. I can network my machines cheaply (NICs are practically free), and copy files any way I choose.
I can record videos to VCD, or SVCDs with my cheapo CD-recorder, or I can spend $100 for a DVD-Recorder and start ma. I went through all FOUR major offerings on this front, because, mostly, i didn't have to pay for extra OS licenses. I built a machine for Myth, for Sage, for Snapstream, and for MCE. In the end, I stuck with snapstream. MCE is a buggy piece of crap (surprise) SageTV is nice, but fails the pretty/Wife Factor test quite badly, and has plenty of bugs of its own. Snapstream has by far the most 'tivolike' interface, and just plain does the job well. Myth, if I NEVER, EVER had to have my wife and kids rely on it, would be nice, but I simply did not find the combo I got with my snapstream install.
If you are JUST going to do PVR, sure, its not THAT hard to get set up. But when you add playing DVD's, pushing a high def signal through a converter, playing MP3s, cutting DVDs from home movies, doing some light websurfing, actuing as the household firewall, the household fileserver, and being a KILLER gaming platform on a nice 50 inch HDTV, you're gonna end up with windows. Bitch all you want, but add 'killer gaming' and 'easy to use all the other little crap' to the equation, and windows RAPIDLY becomes worth the license fee.