Mailing List Archive: Oh to Choose PVR-250 or PVR-350

I've been reading the Dev list for 6 months or so to get an idea of where
the project is at and how things are going... but figured if I posted this
question there I might miff a few people, although they seem to be pretty
calm compared to some other lists I've been on.

I've been through all the documentation on www.mythtv.org and still have a
few questions.

Some background first, I'm a decent C and C++ programmer, a pathetic Linux
guru. Probably enough said there to give you an idea of where I'm coming
from. Can you say Linux newbie? Almost a newbie anyway, last time I spent
any significant time working with Linux you still needed to compile the
kernel yourself.

I however would like to get into Linux, and what better way than the MythTV
project.

I'm not looking to bug anyone to learn the Linux ropes, but I would like to
get some hardware advice, since from what I can tell Linux drivers are
still a major problem when your trying to do something this intense.

Question 1:
From what I can tell PVR-250 works fine, I'm not sure but it seems like
some people on the list have gotten the PVR-350 to work? Yes/NO? I
understand that the drivers don't support the video out / hardware decoder
for the PVR-350. But it does seem like the IvyTV guys are going to add
support for the additional PVR-350 features. Will the additional features
of the PVR-350 every be useful for Myth? If so I'm not against putting a
few extra bucks in now instead of later for the newer cards.

Question 2:
I see where people have setup 2 capture cards and can do simultaneous
recording and liveTV on the same box. Can one do 3 capture cards, 2
simultaneous recordings and 1 liveTV in the same box or is that just to
much?

Question 3:
Video out to the TV, I know quite a few people are doing this on the list.
I'm having a difficult time telling which video cards are working and which
ones are only partially working. All I really need is a couple
recommendations saying "this works and in my opinion it works well".

Question 4:
Any suggesting on what type of Motherboard / Processor will be supported
the best by Linux?

I think the rest I can sit down and plug away at before I bother anyone
else.

I appreciate any suggestions. Sorry for the long post.

Jason Vannest

I looked at mythtv many months ago, and finally went the dedicated myth
route the other day. I can answer your questions as best as I can, but
my knowledge isn't all that great...

> Question 1:
> >From what I can tell PVR-250 works fine, I'm not sure but it seems like
> some people on the list have gotten the PVR-350 to work? Yes/NO? I
> understand that the drivers don't support the video out / hardware decoder
> for the PVR-350. But it does seem like the IvyTV guys are going to add
> support for the additional PVR-350 features. Will the additional features
> of the PVR-350 every be useful for Myth? If so I'm not against putting a
> few extra bucks in now instead of later for the newer cards.

From my understanding, PVR-350 works, but it also has a decoder which
isn't going to be used. Not sure if it'll be suported in the future,
but it isn't that hard to decode in software with most contemporary
CPUs.

A quick tangent however... It seems that most people use PVR-250s
due to the built-in encoder. I felt that having mpeg-4 would be more
useful than mpeg-2 (pvr-[23]50 output), and with my 2.8G P4, I'm using
about 20% cpu to accomplish this. I want to go the 2 capture card
route, and doing it all in software is still feasable with my CPU.

I'm using a LeadTek Tv2000XP deluxe card which has most all the bells
and whistles, and it's only $51 @ newegg. However, I'm having a hard
time getting the contrast/brightness settings working with mythtv, so
but I'm sure I'll get it working with some fiddling.

> Question 2:
> I see where people have setup 2 capture cards and can do simultaneous
> recording and liveTV on the same box. Can one do 3 capture cards, 2
> simultaneous recordings and 1 liveTV in the same box or is that just to
> much?

You can use any combination of cards, just as long as you have enough
CPU to handle the streams, and your HD doesn't become a bottleneck.

>
> Question 3:
> Video out to the TV, I know quite a few people are doing this on the list.
> I'm having a difficult time telling which video cards are working and which
> ones are only partially working. All I really need is a couple
> recommendations saying "this works and in my opinion it works well".

I use the video out of my pundit, and that works fine.

> Question 4:
> Any suggesting on what type of Motherboard / Processor will be supported
> the best by Linux?

Most anything will run linux. Seems like some chipsets aren't happy
with the high pci bus bandwidth of myth. I would pick out a
motherboard you like, make sure your CPU supports SSE (faq 18.1 i
think), and then do a search in the archives for the chipset on the
motherboard to see if anyone's complained about it.

hope that helps
-r

> I think the rest I can sit down and plug away at before I bother anyone
> else.
>
> I appreciate any suggestions. Sorry for the long post.
>
> Jason Vannest
>
>
>

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