LinHES Forums :: View topic - Replacing Tivo with MyThTV

LinHES Forums http://forums.linhes.org/

Replacing Tivo with MyThTV http://forums.linhes.org/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=21970	Page 1 of 1

Author:	gman00 [ Mon Jan 10, 2011 10:59 am ]
Post subject:	Replacing Tivo with MyThTV
I need some ideas/recommendations... Some needed background I have cable, with Tivo, which has Digital plug-in decoder cards... 1 card, supports two tuners. Channels 2-124 come in analog, above channels 124 are digital only. So some TVs in the house - without the digital cards - only get analog. I currently have Tivo, which I love, but it seems to be going out on me (dying). My house has a hub and spoke wiring, meaning the cable wire comes into a central location, and then fans out to all the TVs... I have taken my Tivo OUTPUT and ran it into a video modulator, to change the "normal channel 3" output to be channel 124 (which is empty), and then used a splitter backwards to merge the signal, back onto the cable line. This means that any TV in my house gets Tivo simply by going to channel 124. I would like to change out my Tivo for MythTV. Will this work? Specifically: 1). It appears that the OUTPUT of MythTV is meant to be a computer monitor. I want a cable signal so I can pipe it to the whole house. Can I do this? Does it need special hardware (i.e. tuner card? 2). How do I handle the Digital issue? i.e. what would do the digital decoding/unencrypting? (Note that I do NOT have any special channels, such as HBO, etc). 3). Does MythTV support having multiple tuner cards at the same time? 4). What tuner card would be recommended? 5). I am contemplating KnoppMyth, but would a different distribution make more sense for my needs? Thanks so much... A newbie needing help. GS

Author:	Big boy stan [ Mon Jan 10, 2011 11:28 am ]
Post subject:
Mythtv is broken into two parts. The first part is a backend that downloads TV schedules, finds requested programs and records them and stores them on its hard drive. The second part is the frontend that shows what recordings are available and plays the recordings out to your TV. In its simplest form, both the backend and frontend coexist in a single PC. The best functionality is to have a seperate frontend for each TV although this requires some form of hardware such as a PC at each TV. Using this system each frontend would communicate back to the backend through ethernet. If you want to duplicate what you have now, you could do it with a single PC running both the backend and frontend. I think you would be best served to use a standard video card with a S-video or composite output and then an external box to modulate it on to the coax. If your existing modulator doesn't allow for composite or Svideo input youc could use something like: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16882719004&cm_re=video_modulator-_-82-719-004-_-Product Recording analog is very easy and can be done with any analog card (look for PVR150). Digital gets a bit more tricky. you will still need the PVR150 but also you will need a convertor box from the cable company instead of the cable card that you have now. Changing channels on the box is done with an IR blaster that sends remote control signals to the box. Some of the PVR150 packages come with one included so look for that. Finally get a good RF remote so that you can control the mythtv from anywhere in the house.

Author:	mlbuser [ Mon Jan 10, 2011 1:35 pm ]
Post subject:
Kind of a separate discussion from Tivo vs Mythtv, but... If you don't have ethernet co-located with all of your TVs, but do have video, then I might suggest using MOCA (multimedia over cable) adapters to bring video and ethernet to each TV. Then you can have a cable feed to each TV as well as stream video from a myth back end etc. through the same cable. My home has cable outlets in many useful places, but no ethernet anywhere. It does add to box and cable clutter big time, but I'm happy with the result. Mark

Author:	mattbatt [ Mon Jan 10, 2011 3:42 pm ]
Post subject:
MoCA seems like overkill

Page 1 of 1	All times are UTC - 6 hours
Powered by phpBB® Forum Software © phpBB Group http://www.phpbb.com/