On Sat, 23 Feb 2002 16:48:15 -0600
Dustin Puryear <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> I'm kind of interested in the Tivo after missing yet another good movie on 
> the Sci Fi channel because I was busy (oh, and I never remember to get VHS 
> tapes on the VCR that I have with the blinking '12:00'). Anyone have the 
> Tivo? Like it? Are there alternatives? Are they good? Also, has anyone 
> tried to reproduce the capabilities, at least the recording feature, of the 
> Tivo with Linux or put-your-OS-here? I mean, I guess with a TV card you 
> could just do this.. right? Anyone tried? Have any links?

Linux digitial video recording is being worked on.  I havent
investigated it too hard, but based on some searches I did a while
back, it's Not Quite There Yet(TM).    You can watch TV with any
Brooktree Bt848 card (i.e. using the bttv driver), and I think there's
tools to record from that source - but automating times and scheduling
in an integrated manner probably isnt all put-together yet.

The most popular cards under Linux are the Hauppauge WinTV's.  There's
also the GATOS project (http://gatos.sourceforge.net), working on
getting the TV parts of various ATi cards working.

Closest think you could probably put together is a ATi All-in-Wonder
card under (gasp) Windows.    Matrox (with their Marvel line of cards)
used to be the best cheap consumer video capture cards, but they've
since abandoned that segment of the market.

Of course, the user interface wont be as convenient as a Tivo, plus
you'll have to put up with the constant fan noise, and power consumption
of a full PC.   I believe the TiVo uses an embedded PowerPC CPU running
about 60MHz - dont think those CPUs even need heat sinks.   I'm no
fan of Apple, but high-end Mac G4's are just now reaching the point
where they're going to need fans on the CPU heatsink.

--
Mark Orr
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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