On Tue, 2005-03-29 at 10:00, Jeff Simpson wrote: > > The PVR-350 comes with a remote control and provides Svideo and > > composite outputs. The caveat is that the output is good for things you > > record (the PVR-350 has a hardware decoder for mpeg2) but apparently > > getting a DVD to play using the PVR-350 output is not possible. > > correction - it's possible, but not particularly good. It requires a > bit of a hack in mplayer. IMHO the software dvd playing programs > available in linux aren't as good as the hardware ones, so just use a > standalone DVD player whenever possible. >
Thanks for the correction. :) Does the hack for mplayer make use of the PVR-350s decoder? Or does it use the X overlay to display the picture for the DVD? I agree with using a standalone DVD player. However, it would be nice to have it all in one box. > > If you want the mythtv box to be able to play DVDs apparently you are > > better off using a standard video card output to the TV. This means you > > will need more CPU. And if you go that route the PVR-350 does not make > > as much sense. > > agreed. > Does the picture quality suffer much compared to the PVR-350 output? I know that during my initial testing I used the video card output and the quality was sometimes poor, but I think my cable provider was supplying the poor quality signal, they do that every 4 or 5 months for some reason. > > I believe the 250 and the 150 are the same in terms of features, the > only difference I know of is the price point and which tuner / other > chipset are used. The 250 is better supported than the 150 from what > I've heard. The 500 is recognized by the system as two 150s but it has > a single coax input, does all the splitting and tuning internally. > Very snazzy, but might be a pain with digital cable / satellite. > I was very interested in the PVR-500 but opted for the PVR-250 for the second tuner card, mainly because it appeared to be very well supported. I expect in the next few months the PVR-500 should become more stable and widely used. Possibly in time for my next Mythtv box. > > The TV output from the PVR-350 replicates the input signal so well that > > I doubt that I could tell the difference between a live broadcast from > > the cable company and what is being played back from the mythtv box. > > PVR-350 output is pretty beautiful (once set up correctly) Agreed! > > In the next few months I plan on building a cheaper cooler quieter > > frontend box and may opt for using a video card output so I can get the > > DVD playback working. I also like the live tv listings better over the > > video card. With the PVR-350 the tv listings overlay the entire > > picture. When I was testing it seems that the output to the monitor put > > the current channel in a small box in the upper right corner and > > provided the listings below that. Much easier to view. So if you are > > not going to use the PVR-350 output you may be better off getting a > > PVR-250 and some other remote control setup. > > I am pretty sure the difference in where the channel number and > listings are is a theme configuration, having nothing to do with how > you get your output. You may have used different software versions or > different themes in the testing. iirc, myth has two modes for channel > listings, one is the EPG where it takes the whole screen for listings, > the other is in browse mode, where you can scroll through the channels > one at a time, taking half the screen or less. If you use the PVR-350 > you'll want the video to always be full-screen sized, otherwise it > will use the X driver and play much slower. > It has been several weeks since I started using the PVR-350 output so maybe my memory is playing tricks on me. I just don't remember the program listings being translucent and covering the full size image being played on the monitor. For live TV it does not look the best but I understand why it is done that way. -- Scot L. Harris [EMAIL PROTECTED] You will lose an important disk file.
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