On Tue, Feb 15, 2005 at 07:34:37AM -0800, Bob Miller wrote:
> > One of the factors is time required to get it all working how I want it.
> > That's only one of the factors though.
>
> You will probably spend some time banging your head against the TV
> tuner card. That goes for any x86 Linux-based solution.
I've never had any trouble with frame grabber cards, but then again I have
never used MPEG capture cards. I understand that ivtv depends a bit on
where your kernel comes from, what you did to it, and the phase of the
moon.
> Aside from that, on Gentoo, MythTV was a simple emerge, followed by
> running through the configuration screens looking for things to tweak.
>
> The KnoppMYTH distro is supposed to make it even easier to set up a
> standalone MythTV box or a network of same.
>
> I do not have a working box I can demonstrate, though, because there
> is no over-the-air TV reception at our house.
The options, as I see them:
1. New TiVo
+ $100ish for about the same capacity I have now (a little less)
+ It Just Works
+ Easy to add a new drive and connect to network
- Probably can't transfer lifetime service to a new box anymore
- Hacking docs are scattered/inconsistent/stale/now-404
- The Peanut (The Sony series 2 seems to have died off)
- Single tuner =(
- Video extraction requires Windows and is DRM'd to hell
- HDTiVo? hahaha
- Cablecard TiVo? hahaha
2. EyeTV firewire PVR
+ Elgato works around some of the firewire video problems I have now
+ Want a second tuner? Buy a second firewire PVR thingy
+ No DRM crap, at all, extract whatever video I want and do what I want
with it afterward.
+ No DRM crap for HDTV if I act now(TM)
- The 200 does NTSC/cable/etc, the 500 does ATSC and digital, and all
of Comcast's digital channels are encrypted. So basically, the 500
would get me HDTV ONLY and the 200 has no HDTV support.
- These things sell for about $300 each, so I'd only be getting one
200.
- Keeps my mac a central machine that must remain online
- Remote control sold seperately
- CableCard EyeTV? hahahaha
3. MythTV
Option 1, frame grabber card
+ The frame grabbers are cheap
+ Can encode to MPEG4 to save diskspace
+ Once you get all of the bits installed, it's easy to set up
+ Second tuner? Dirt cheap!
- Requires a pretty significant dedicated CPU for encoding
- Requires a noisy workstation priced around $600
Option 2, PVR card
+ A Celeron 400 would do the job given the hardware encoder
+ Upgradable to two-tuner setup pretty easily
- PVR cards are 2-3x the cost of frame grabbers
- Only MPEG2 supported, so more diskspace needed
- ivtv doesn't have the support behind it that v4l grabbers do
+ Using MythTV frontends (or some variant based on them, I can set up a
video server in the corner that I just connect to from other machines
+ No need to pay for guide data (although a subscription to Tribune's
service will get you the same guide data TiVo gets)
+ If I go the PVR card route, I have everything else I'd need already
+ No DRM at all
+ Decentralises my mac by creating a video server
+ Could probably run mt-daapd and write something to fill up an iPod
too, especially an iPod Shuffle
+ If you can get a CableCard-using NTSC tuner and a way to control it,
you can use it. Might even be able to do it with an ATSC tuner soon
(which is more likely to be found..)
- If your time is sparse and valuable, it could be very "expensive" to
set up MythTV. No idea about upkeep and maintenance.
- No grouplens-like suggestions
- While you can get free listings, you really want the not free
listings
- The combination of client and server and ... yeah, I'd lose the nice
TiVo remote control for sure.
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