?replace vcr w/pc?

lorentzson wrote:

 > I would like to 'setup' a situation like this,,,, have my computer
 > record the programs I like from "over the air" TV. I would
 > appreciate input from those 'outther' who have gone before me, and
 > can help me with the 'mistakes' I would like to avoid. thanks in
 > advance. cl.

The main thing is to get a board that has good third-party support--while
some come with useful software, the bundled software is not as good as some
of the third-party products that are available. Just about anything based
on the old Brooktree 8x8 family is going to be usable--those are the most
widely supported chips. The newer Phillips SSA7133 and Conexant 23881 and
23883 chips are better performers and also developing good third party
support.

If you want a separate tuner the Dvico Fusion works if you've got a good
signal, gives you both high definition and analog, has good third-party
support for analog, is starting to develop third-party support for digital,
and for a high-definition tuner isn't terribly expensive--it's basically a
BT8x8 with an HD tuner--analog quality isn't quite as good as with one of
the newer chips but that's kind of a secondary issue when it can handle
high definition. If you don't want HD then the Compro Videomate TV Gold
Plus (Phillips chip) is well regarded, the bundled software is decent, it
has a good deal of third-party support, and is not terribly expensive. All
of these use the computer's CPU for compressing, decompressing, and/or
decoding the signal. If you want that done in hardware the MyHD is
currently the best-regarded setup for high definition, the Hauppauge
PVR-250 and -350 have hardware compression and in the -350 decompression as
well but their downside is that they are not capable of raw capture (the
chip they use does not have an uncompressed output--this is not a driver
issue), and they're also not cheap.

If you want a single-board solution the ATI All-In-Wonder boards work nicely
and the bundled software is not terrible but they don't have as much
third-party support as many others simply because they use a proprietary
chip. The bundled software has some nice features not available as far as
I know in anything third-party--for example you can run video in a
transparent window or on a transparent desktop, with controllable
transparency--I don't know of anything else that provides that capability.
If you decide to go with the Dvico board I mentioned above an ATI board is
a good match for it--the Dvico drivers can make good use of the ATI
hardware to reduce the processing load--they can do this with an nvidia
board as well but the reduction in load last time I saw anybody post
numbers did not seem to be as high--that may have changed with the current
generation of nvidia boards.

There is an equivalent nvidia solution, "Personal Cinema", however I've not
played with it yet and don't know the capabilities. In principle it's
possible to get Personal Cinema boards with high definition capture
capability, but in practice I haven't been able to identify anybody who is
actually making them.

I _strongly_ recommend an nforce2 motherboard with Soundstorm technology if
you're building a new machine for this purpose--the others sound solutions
I've tried I seem to end up fighting, the nvidia works like it was made to
support TV. The AMD processors aren't quite as fast as the Intels for
video editing but the difference is not huge and the convenience makes up
for it--unfortunately nvidia for some stupid reason chose not to implement
Soundstorm on their 64-bit chipsets.

Get plenty of disk space--video can fill up a 100 gig drive far faster than
you would expect. 160 gig drives are currently the "sweet spot" with
regard to cost vs capacity.

If you've got a spare machine with enough processor power you might want to
consider setting up a video server instead of using your main machine for
capture.

If you don't need high definition capture, give very serious thought to a
Tivo--in many regards it's a more satisfactory solution than a PC-based
system and if you choose the right model and hack it appropriately you
don't really give up very much.

Sources of information:

General information on home theater PCs and many other topics related to
home theater--<http://www.avsforum.com>--anything you're considering, look
up here and make sure it works--if nobody else has tried it then consider
carefully the wisdom of pioneering.

Tivo-specific information: <http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/>,
<http://www.dealdatabase.com/forum/>.

Applications to look at:

myHTPC <http://www.myhtpc.net> (free, has some good information in the
forums)
Snapstream <http://www.snapstream.com>
Sage TV <http://www.freytechnologies.com/>
Showshifter <http://www.showshifter.com>
Cineplayer <http://www.cineplayer.com>
WinDVR <http://www.intervideo.com>
iuVCR <http://www.iulabs.com/>
PowerVCR <http://www.cyberlink.com>
virtualvcr <http://virtualvcr.sourceforge.net/>
Dscaler <http://deinterlace.sourceforge.net/> (free, very highly regarded)

On Linux
MythTV <http://www.mythtv.org>
Note--on Linux there is only one High Definition board supported:
<http://www.pchdtv.com>



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--John
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