Re: [OT}: how to make PVR any ideas welcome

[James Fidell <james@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Quoting Gary (questuk1@xxxxxxx):

> I would like to build a personal video recorder using my PC, I can
> find a lot of ways of getting video into my PC, WIN TV etc.
>
> but I cannot find any way of getting the video signal out to a normal
> television by a scart or coax socket.
>
> Has anyone achieved this on the group, as I know you're an inventive
> lot on here.

I have a machine with an nVidia 5200 TV-out card in.  The S-Video out
goes into an scart converter and into the television.

> I have had a brief look at software and MythTV maybe what i use as the
> front-end, again has had experience of this or anything similar
> preferably freeware.

I've been dabbling with mythtv since very early on, but only got around
to setting up a proper machine this April. It has the above-mentioned
nVidia 5200 and two Hauppauge PVR250 cards in and uses one of the
remotes that came with the cards. (I'm analogue TV only, atm.) The
box runs Fedora Core 3 and I build all the software/drivers/etc. from
source, but there are easier ways to do it -- I just happen to be a
freelance coder & sysadmin by profession, so it pleases me to do it
that way. Schedules are downloaded from the RT site. It "just
works".
WAF is high, not least because it means my son can watch multiple
Miffy/Thomas/Bob the Builder programmes in a row with the minimum of
fuss.

*I* think it's great because I can set it up to record a whole series
of something and then don't have to worry about remembering it's on.  When
I feel like being a cabbage for an evening, I can just sit there and flick
through what's been recorded recently.

I already have the hardware (less one IR receiver) to build two
reasonable-looking front end machines in Silverstone cases, so I can
move my main recording box into my rack and run everything over cat5. At
that point I'll get some DVB-T cards and switch over to Freeview.

It is worth noting that the nVidia cards do require a proprietary driver
to be installed, but it really isn't that much hassle and the card
"just
works".

James