Joshua Zeidner wrote:
> Hi Leslie,
>
> Thanks for the reply. I am currently working with a local
> entrepreneur to prototype a linux based 'PVR'( Personal Video Recorder
> ). I see a great value in Linux due to its open nature and the ability
> for 3rd parties to contribute to whatever basic functionality we deem
> necessary for our market. Naturally, MythTV came up( also Freevo is
> being investigated ). It would be really great to hear your experiences
> with MythTV. Do you consider it to be a toy? A useful platform? What
> hardware did you use( Hauppauge card )? any info would be great!
>
> Thanks, Josh Zeidner
>
I had the Cox DVR, but got tired of paying the $15 a month and whatever
premium I was paying for Digital Cable, plus when I heard they were
going to expire "Six Feet Under" episodes after 2 weeks, I assumed that
they'd eventually start limiting everything, so I decided to try MythTV
and have never looked back. Also, with Cox, I had it stop recording
everything several times, one crash where I lost all my recordings, and
a few spontaneous resets during a recording.
I have a dedicated myth box running Gentoo and serving as both backend
and frontend. It's an Athlon 1700 with a Hauppauge PVR-250 and a
PVR-150, nVidia 5200 video card, plus 3 250GB disks using LVM to make 2
partitions - one for tv recordings and one for video. The 3 disks are
overkill, but obviously provide much more space than the Cox DVR. I only
have standard definition tv and analog cable, so it's a pretty simple
setup. HDTV and/or digital cable complicate the situation. It is also
in a plain beige case and is noisy but I haven't bothered to spend the
time or money necessary to make it cool, quiet, and pretty. I also have
frontends running on another Linux box and my Mac Mini - these just play
on monitors.
My first install was trivially easy, as I simply added the PVR-250 card
and emerged the necessary packages on an existing Gentoo system with a
120GB drive, connected to a monitor. It just worked. However, I had to
start fiddling with it, of course. At one point I had a separate Master
Backend and a Slave Backend/Frontend, each with a capture card, but
discovered (the hard way) that the Hauppauge PVRs don't play nice with
motherboards with Via 266 chipsets. I also had a bad PVR-150 and spent
a long time trying to make it work, convinced that I was doing something
wrong. I got a replacement and popped it in the system, and it worked
immediately.
I've had some other problems, too and have spent a lot of time
troubleshooting, but for me, that's fun. I wouldn't recommend MythTV
yet to anyone who doesn't enjoy geeking around with computers, so in
that sense, it is not as useful as a Tivo or something similar. Also, if
you want something that looks like a Tivo, it won't be cheaper, and
could be a lot more expensive, even without the monthly fee.
But what you do get is control and features. Featurewise, it blows the
commercial PVRs out of the water. I pretty much use it just to record
tv, then watch, then delete, so I've barely scratched the surface. But
two features I love are commercial skipping and time stretch. Time
stretch allow you to speed up (or slow down) playback of the recording,
but adjusts the pitch so the voices don't sound like chipmunks. Using
both of these, I can watch a 30 minute "Jeopardy" in about 13 minutes!
I'm learning Spanish, so I watch the Spanish channels and slow down the
playback. I also like being able to schedule recordings from any web
browser.
I think there would be a market for a prebuilt myth-based PVR if it was
in a sleek, quiet case - even if it was just a frontend only. However
it gets problematic because the number of people who are satisfied
with SDTV is shrinking daily, and making an HDTV product could be risky
since it's likely Congress will pass some sort of Broadcast Flag and/or
"Analog Hole" legislation, in which case you'd probably be somewhat screwed.
I think MythTV, despite being at version .18 (.19 should be released
very soon - like in a few days or weeks) is robust enough for it as-is.
Most of the problems I have alluded to have been when I've changed
or added hardware, upgraded my kernel or other software. Most of the
time it has been fine and just worked.
You might want to take a look at
http://www.plutohome.com - they have
put together a commercial system incorporating MythTV (as well as
Misterhouse and Asterisk I think), and they have the source available
for download.
I hope this is useful. Let me know if I've been unclear or if you have
any other questions.
-Leslie
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