Best HTPC setup (3 Viewers)

Previous Next
UncleTrvlingJim said:
One card? I take it, that it will only take an analog signal from directv, right? which card is this?
Click to expand...

It is this one:
http://hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_hvr1600.html

Speaking of, I was checking newegg to see if they have them, but they don't have them yet. However, there are a lot customer comments on the PVR-150 complaining that when they open the box, instead of the PVR-150, they are finding HVR-1600s. They complain not because they paid $90 and received a $120 card, but because apparently it doesn't work with the ivtv Linux drivers, which only work with PVR models. Just FYI.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16815116625
 
cool... thanks!

i've got my components list down to about $800. That's making it look pretty doable. I'll start off with linux i think, and then if i stick with directv and they offer a pci card for vista, i'll switch to vista -- unless someone can hack it for linux.
 
my problem is i'd love to be an early adopter but don't really have the funds for that.

Right now, I think it would be fun to buy a PS3 and install MythTV on it, and then compare that with a Media Center/Xbox combo.....

I also think I might do away with a HTPC case altogether and put the computer on a shelf with and just make a cover to hide the components from site (plenty of airflow behind the shelves.... I have delusions of making my own case out of wood eventually (that won't happen for a couple of years).
 
Hiding the case should have the added advantage of silencing things even more.
 
Yup... should get a pretty nice quiet rig when i'm all done... i might wait to see what people can do with the PS3 though... if I can get most of what i want and only pay $800 for a BluRay HTPC and gaming rig, that might not be a bad way to go...

still, that isn't as much fun as building one myself...
 
I know this thread is over a year old, but what did you end up doing UTJ?

I've been thinking about creating an HTPC for my theater/gameroom.. I'm not a hardware person, so I'd need some guidance on what parts I need..

Basically, I'd like to be able to get HD broadcasts (cable system's HiDef DVR is in another room), record them to a hard drive and then burn them to a DVD.. What all would I need to be able to do that? Streaming them around the house would just be icing on the cake..
 
the hd 1600, i dont' believe has directv input.. i have that card, and it has hd input that supports atsc and qam, and an analog input.

UTJ, what kind of memory is that running.. i have some old sticks laying around unused.

fwiw, the xbox360 teamed up with vista home premium, wireless in another room is a much easier proposition.
I played with making a linux one a while back and after fighting with drivers said heck with it.
the htpc case and using liquid cooling would be absolute quiet option as well.. if wanted a standalone instead of front end..
PS3 is def a viable option to with loading linux onto it.
 
Well, kid number two turned out to be a lot more expensive (in terms of time and $$) than I had planned so I put this on hold until after I finish grad school.

I was never very happy with where everything stood as far as interoperability, etc... and I hated the idea of being tied to anything.

Still, there are some interesting things rumored... the HDPC-20 from directv which will supposedly allow you to use your media pc to record and control content sounds pretty nice. If it is network capable (like the HDhomerun) I think i would get that, use a media server in my office and then an xbox 360 as an extender.

I'm also looking at some hacks to the AppleTV which might make it more attractive to me, but right now it looks like too much work for me.

As far as guidance... I got most of my research from avsforums.com ... this thread in particular is great:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=940972

Be prepared to have to mess around a lot. It's a lot more stable than it was 3 years ago, but it still isn't at appliance status yet.
 
Yeah, I definitely don't have a problem tinkering with stuff.. It's just knowing the basic hardware I need to do what I want..

Thanks for that link to AVSForum.. I've browsed some of the HTPC stuff over there but missed that thread somehow..
 
The HDHomeRun looks promising, but would I need an HD antenna plugged into it to get HDTV?

There are so many options, it's hard to decide what to do.. Do I build something from scratch? Or do I upgrade an old computer? Or do I buy a cheap desktop and modify it?
 
As far as HDHomerun, yes, you should have some type of antenna with coax running from the antenna to HDHomerun. IIRC, there is a HDHomerun that can capture QAM (the unencrypted HD signal on a cable companies coax).

As far as what direction you want to go in... obviously, that's ultimately up to you.. but for starters, what exactly do you want it to do? Do you want this to sit in a nice unit or are looks unimportant? What about noise? What kind of media sources do you plan to use?
 
UncleTrvlingJim said:
As far as HDHomerun, yes, you should have some type of antenna with coax running from the antenna to HDHomerun. IIRC, there is a HDHomerun that can capture QAM (the unencrypted HD signal on a cable companies coax).

As far as what direction you want to go in... obviously, that's ultimately up to you.. but for starters, what exactly do you want it to do? Do you want this to sit in a nice unit or are looks unimportant? What about noise? What kind of media sources do you plan to use?
Click to expand...

Basically, I just want it to act as a DVR with the ability to watch and record both SD and HD content and be able to burn DVDs off of the recordings.. I would like to have dual tuners though, so that I could watch something and record something at the same time..

As far as looks, I would like it to look nice, but it doesn't have to be the most stylish case.. It will be sitting on the middle shelf of a big screen, low-profile TV stand (wide and short)..

I'd like to reduce the noise as much as possible obviously, but I can deal with some noise as my previous plasma made lots of it..

Media source would be coax cable.. Output media, while I'd like to go BluRay eventually, I think regular DVD would be fine for now..
 
I've been dreaming up a set-up like the following:

In my theater/gameroom, I would have the HTPC, probably running some flavor of Linux with MythTV..

In my office area, I'd have the HDHomeRun connected to my cable line and directly connected to my router.. I'd also build a small UnRAID server for the office area to store recordings and act as a basic file server, and it would be directly connected to the router..

Here's where it gets a bit dicey and I'm not sure if it will work.. I'd like to extend my LAN to at least have a network drop in the theater/gameroom, so that I could directly connect the HTPC to the network and not have to deal with wirelessly streaming the data from the HDHomeRun and/or UnRAID server..

The main things I'm not sure on are:

a) Would I be able get live content from the HDHomeRun in this setup?
b) Would I still need some sort of tuner/capture card in the HTPC?
c) Will this work?
 
As far as your questions:

a) yes
b) no
c) probably....

Do you have cable, directv or over the air? You won't be able to record digital HD channels from your cable or directv coax. You can only get QAM and over the air signals right now. There is a cable card support out that will let you capture cable signals, but you have to buy the whole htpc from a certified dealer. Directv is supposedly coming out with a solution that will let you capture their stuff, but that is not out yet.

You could probably run your mythtv backend server in your office, and then build a nice small linux htpc for your media room as the front end.
 

Create an account or login to comment

You must be a member in order to leave a comment

Create account

Create an account on our community. It's easy!

Register

Log in

Already have an account? Log in here.

Previous Next

Users who are viewing this thread

    Total: 4 (members: 0, guests: 4)

    Share this page

     

    Twitter

    Back
    Top Bottom