OT: Alternatives to Tivo?

[Carl Parrish]

You could also wait a few months and go with googleTV.

On Wed, Aug 25, 2010 at 6:48 PM, Brian Cluff <brian at snaptek.com> wrote:

> Go for a MythTV system.  You can base it off of any old Pentium 4 class
> machine or better that you might have lying around already, and you can
> slave your main system to other system that you can put in other rooms, as
> well as watch shows on your other computers.
>
> The one major piece of advice that I can give is to go with the most
> compatible, easy to setup, capture devices that you can get.   If you do
> that, you can just pop in a Mythbuntu CD and have a working MythTV system
> withing 20 minutes with no special setup what-so-ever.
>
> You will need to purchase guide service, but it's only $20 a year, and
> worth every cent... They do give you a free week of service to get
> everything going and make sure that you will want to continue to use the
> service.  After that you just give them $20 once a year (they only allow 1
> year max)
>
> If you are only worried about capturing over the air high definition and/or
> basic cable service, I would recommend the Silicon Stardust HDhomerun
> device.  It's about the easiest device to setup in mythTV and will allow you
> to capture 2 channels at once in hi-def.  Otherwise most cards made by
> hauppage, that are compatible, are plug and play these days, but make sure
> it is one of the compatible ones first.
>
> If you want to capture high definition through a cable or satellite box so
> that you can still get to your premium channels, you will need the HDPVR by
> hauppage, it pretty much the only thing I have seem that can capture a
> hi-def signal that doesn't come over the air.  You might need an hdmi to
> componet converter depending on your cable/satellite box's output.  You
> might also want to go that direction anyway since the MPAA is trying to get
> them to turn on selective output, so the component outputs wouldn't work for
> you all the time.
>
> My system has 1-HDhomerun device for local, over the air, channels and
> 3-hauppage PVR-150s for satellite channels.  This allows me to grab up to 5
> channels at once.  I then have a small computer in every room that I want to
> watch TV.  It's been purring along like that since about 2005ish.  I just
> throw new hard drives in the system every couple of years to both increase
> space and make sure they don't get too old and tired so that they fail
> taking all my shows with them.
>
> Brian Cluff
>
>
> On 08/25/2010 02:54 PM, joe at actionline.com wrote:
>
>>
>> Our Tivo box seems to have an intermittent problem, so I'm thinking of
>> making a change (also to get rid of the annoying monthly fee).
>>
>> One promising option might be moxi (moxi.com) although it is expensive
>> ($599) but does the same HD recording (and more than Tivo) with no monthly
>> fee.
>>
>> Any other suggestions?  I don't think I have the saavy to set up (nor
>> woulc my wife use) a computer with an HD TV card.
>>
>> I'm surprised that there don't seem to be more competitors for this
>> business yet.
>>
>>
>>
>> ---------------------------------------------------
>> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss at lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
>> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings:
>> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss
>>
>>
> ---------------------------------------------------
> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss at lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings:
> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/pipermail/plug-discuss/attachments/20100826/39e1f83f/attachment.html>