Okay, so I took all this fine advice and began the journey.... It started with KMplayer, which can run the TV. Problems: Needs something to interface the remote and there are plenty of motion artifacts. However, switching channels via the keyboard was lightning fast.
I had only two requirements: Watch Live TV fullscreen and be able to use the Hauppauge remote. Little was I to understand that even those two requirements are shooting too high... I had previously encountered GBPVR. Did some research and thought that maybe I could get the remote to work with it using HIP. HIP has plenty of interfaces but none for the hauppauge. Addtionally, there is a steep learning curve for GBPVR because they seldom explain their acronyms or their settings: "Set XQFD: The place where you set your XQFD to DFE or PZQ". Makes lots of sense. Next stop: SageTV. I tried them because they supported my TV card (Hauppauge HVR-1600) and the remote. Setup was almost easy. Problem #1: For the Electronic Program Guide, which is required, entering my zip code did not give me anything close to CT. They thought I was in Wileyville, PA. Tried it twice. I just scanned for all the channels on the TV card and began to sort through them. I got exactly 11 channel changes before it would lock up. Tried twice, then gave up sorting and went directly to finishing the setup. In operation, channel changing is glacially slow. Then again, a certain number of channel changes and it locks up. Followed all the advice about updating drivers with no improvement. It is now almost two weeks since I left a message on the forum with no response. Uninstalled Sage TV. Media Portal: Simple easy install. Too easy. Left it to install on its own, came back and it was finished. Tried to follow startup advice. TV services settings were not accessible. Double-clicking the icon resulted in a box asking if I wanted to start TV services. Yes or no resulted in going back to desktop with nothing else happening. Starting Media Portal gave me a live TV blank screen and no channels. Uninstalling and reinstalling TV services resulted in something different: I would getting endless warnings that TV services was not installed. Every OK gave me another of the same box. After searching the forums, found that SageTV uses certain services that I may have eliminated from my lean install of XP. What services? We can't tell you since different plug-ins require different services. Uninstalled Media Portal. Beyond TV: Installed easily. Virtually no setup. Uses Hauppauge Remote. Image quality is fine. Uh, huh? But where's the problems???? Working for about a day now with no issues. I think you can guess my recommendation.....;-) Steve
