Mailing List Archive

Search back through the archives a bit, the discussion is still valid. There really isn't much of a comparison to make.

-----Original Message-----
From: Jones, Keith [mailto:Keith.Jones@wonderware.com]
Sent: Thursday, May 01, 2003 12:36 PM
To: 'mythtv-users@snowman.net'
Subject: [mythtv-users] MythTV vs. freevo?



Anyone know of a comparison document to evaluate which of these to use? (I know this is the MythTV group, and maybe a little biased, but any discussion would help <g>!)

--

Keith

Jones, Keith wrote:

> Anyone know of a comparison document to evaluate which of these to
> use? (I know this is the MythTV group, and maybe a little biased, but
> any discussion would help <g>!)
>
Personally my decision to go with MythTV was purely down to the livetv
stuff - MythTV supports it, freevo doesn't (according to their website -
possibly they support it in latest CVS) although as freevo is written in
python I suspect it's a lot easier to develop for. Also I had more
trouble importing xmltv data into freevo than mythtv but that's probably
my fault :)

Tim

On Thursday 01 May 2003 02:35 pm, Jones, Keith wrote:
> Anyone know of a comparison document to evaluate which of these to use? (I
> know this is the MythTV group, and maybe a little biased, but any
> discussion would help <g>!)

My (totally unbiased, obviously) comparison

MythTV over Freevo:

- It's actually a PVR, and has been for a while =)
- More advanced music player -- can rip CDs, create playlists, etc from the
UI.
- Most configuation tasks are done through the UI.
- Distributed architecture, lets you have multiple machines automatically
sharing information (big loud recorder machine in the basement, tiny quiet
playback machine in the living room).
- _Very_ active user community.

Freevo over MythTV:

- Easier initial install.
- Doesn't require X to run.
- Written in python, so it's theoretically easier to develop.
- Better movie playback interface, built in support for DVDs, etc.

And a short counterpoint to the X requirement -- if you're going to be
recording video, you've got a good enough system to run X, too. It's not
_that_ much added overhead, especially if you choose a fast, lightweight
window manager.

Isaac

> On Thursday 01 May 2003 02:35 pm, Jones, Keith wrote:
> > Anyone know of a comparison document to evaluate which of these to use? (I
> > know this is the MythTV group, and maybe a little biased, but any
> > discussion would help <g>!)
>
> My (totally unbiased, obviously) comparison

Far more intriguing I would say is a MythTv vs VDR comparison. This gives you much of what you get with myth (DVD, mp3, TV, timeshifting, multi-card support, etc) - all this on a pentium 90....! (Although I suspect that you will need a P166 or perhaps slightly faster for timeshifting. Probably also faster disks than the avg P90 came with).

What is misses though is all the eye candy. And the biggest issue (for me at least) is the lack of constant ringbuffer so that you can hit reverse at any moment and start timeshifting. It basically works like the Sky Digibox where you have to press pause first to start timeshifting and then you can press play and watch the rest of the show timeshifted. For DVB-T users it has an EPG problem because there are currently no broadcasters sending the EPG info over the air (durr). Also, on screen display is text only, no graphical eye candy.

I would love to see Ben's DVB support in Myth and then I suspect we might be able to migrate a good number of the VDR people to myth... (There are a lot of requests on the VDR list for a software based frontend to DVB instead of using the output on the card)

So in conclusion I would have thought that there was no contest that Myth and VDR are currently at the top of their respective trees (analogue vs Digital)

Great work Isaac!

Ed