HTPCs

[kittyhas1000legs]

I wasn't sure exactly which section to post this in, so I figured this was most appropriate.

I was just curious who here has some sort of HTPC and exactly what it's used for (OTA, FTA, streaming, etc).

My self-built computer's been slowly getting filled with drives and cards, and has become a complicated beast. It's used for general computing as well as media. The monitor is our 32" TV. Over the years I've added a USB OTA tuner, an internal OTA tuner, an internal DVB-S2 tuner (still waiting for a southern sky), and now an HDHomerun Prime. All the general TV watching is done through Windows Media Center (Win7 pro). Hulu (free), Netflix, and HBO GO are all done through Chrome. Torrented anime and DVDs are watched in VLC. I have music on D:, Anime and movies on E:, F: died, G: is some backup stuff, and H: is DVR, captured video (VHS), and my anime backup.

I'd like to simplify all of this, but so far everything still works fine, and the wife can operate it all without issue. The only concern right now is lack of storage space (out of nearly 4TB), which means I'll be converting a couple hundred episodes of shows over the next few weekends.

What's everyone's experience with HTPC's? Simple? Crazy? Not worth the effort? Totally awesome?

 

[Wayn23]

I use the no longer available( Thanks Google )SageTV with hardware extenders and my server is in an equipment rack in a closet, I used an HTPC in the past but prefer the client server model of SageTV instead. I have used Media Portal and TVedia in the past and have played around with WMC. I want to try setting up a Myth TV setup with XBMC clients some day when I have the spare time. I use SageTV with HDHomerun Tuners for OTA and an HD-PVR for recording HD over component with other sources, I used to have a couple of FTA tuners in my server but I upgraded my server when the old motherboard died and the new one did not have PCI slots.

 

[. Raine]

Maybe setup a dedicated PC for just the WMC? That's how my setup is and it makes it a lot more simple, plus you don't need a real great computer if it's just for the WMC and nothing else. I'm running it on a Dell 8300 [not the XPS, this one is the 10 or 11 year old 8300] with a 3.2 Hyper threading P4 processor with 4 GB ram. It's been setup running just WMC for about ten years now, have two internal OTA ATSC cards and HD Homerun for my antenna and modulating a few channels from my dishes into it, X Box 360s as extenders. I've tried using Myth and others here and there but those I had to constantly fiddle with things, WMC I just set it up and no fiddling except for the occasional blown power supply or bad fan, changed the OTA cards when the digital switchover went through, stuff like that.

I'd like to add a DVB-S2 card to it like you have, but can't really figure out what's good.

 

[kittyhas1000legs]

The DVB-S2 card I pretty much bought in a whim. It was a $20ish Hauppauge WinTV Nova-S2, made for the European market. The LO options are for pretty much everywhere in the world except the US (though it looks like you can type in a custom LO). I went for it because of the silly low price and because I already have Hauppauge everything.

 

[. Raine]

The DVB-S2 card I pretty much bought in a whim. It was a $20ish Hauppauge WinTV Nova-S2, made for the European market. The LO options are for pretty much everywhere in the world except the US (though it looks like you can type in a custom LO). I went for it because of the silly low price and because I already have Hauppauge everything.

Hauppauge software isn't so hot, but their cards are great!

Where did you get the WinTV Nova-S2 from? I actually wanted to get one of them for quite a while now and try it, but Hauppauge hasn't had them available for some time now in the US, but they do still sell them through Amazon UK for about $100 USD. It seems like they're moving away from making sat cards completely.

My ATSC cards are Hauppauge HVR-1600s and they've been great. I wasn't at all sure with the WinTV Nova-S2 being European if it'd work here States-side, but I'd figured it'd probably work seeing as how it does DVB and DVB-S2. If a custom Lo can be entered, seems like it should work.

The only other thing I could see possibly wrong with it was with XP Media center the WinTV Nova-S2 had to use software for encoding and could only do DVB, but the XP WMC couldn't handle the digital ATSC correctly either and couldn't send it to extenders at all, I'm thinking Win 7 WMC wouldn't have a problem. When you get a clear Southern sky, let me know if it works!

 

[jevans64]

I stopped having a dedicated HTPC around 2008 when I got a net-connected AVR. Now I just use a Dish DVR for basic programming and OTA, Oppo 103 to access disk arrays, and Roku 3 for streaming. Storage is pretty cheap these days and can be accessed with something as cheap as the Roku running Plex. Recording accurately just wasn't that easy back then. It is probably more reliable these days, but just using the Dish DVR is simpler.

 

[avg1joe]

I've tried a bunch of stuff over the years. Roku with Netflix and Plex provides me with plenty of content and you don't need to dedicate a computer to it. Plex runs unobtrusively in the background on my laptop feeding content to the Roku while I use the laptop to check facebook or play simple games. Plex gives me a lot of the current shows available on some of the major networks, basically replacing what I would watch on Hulu.

 

[lparsons21]

I use Playon running on an always on desktop. While it is limited to 'channels', I get the ones I want so I seldom have to leave the Hopper environment these days.

Same machine is running iTunes so I can use the AppleTV for watching things in my library and the rare video rental/purchase.

I gave up on more broad HTPC things long ago as it was just too damned fiddly!!


Sent from my 23-n010 using Tapatalk

 

[kittyhas1000legs]

Hauppauge software isn't so hot, but their cards are great!

Where did you get the WinTV Nova-S2 from? I actually wanted to get one of them for quite a while now and try it, but Hauppauge hasn't had them available for some time now in the US, but they do still sell them through Amazon UK for about $100 USD. It seems like they're moving away from making sat cards completely.

It was on fleabay, pulled from another computer. It came with no documentation, software, anything. The programs I've tried all seem to recognize it (even WMC in Windows 7), I just need a signal now. I was hoping to check during the solar outage this morning, but it's too cloudy.

 

[Wayn23]

The only other thing I could see possibly wrong with it was with XP Media center the WinTV Nova-S2 had to use software for encoding and could only do DVB, but the XP WMC couldn't handle the digital ATSC correctly either and couldn't send it to extenders at all, I'm thinking Win 7 WMC wouldn't have a problem. When you get a clear Southern sky, let me know if it works!

That what was great about SageTV, I have a bunch of Sigma Design SOC based hardware extenders that SageTV used to sell and they can play about anything you can throw at them, all with the same user interface as the main server. I also had full recording and playback control of my R5000HD modded 4DTV C-band system with a far better epg than the 4DTV receiver had.

 

[kittyhas1000legs]

Where did you get the WinTV Nova-S2 from? I actually wanted to get one of them for quite a while now and try it, but Hauppauge hasn't had them available for some time now in the US, but they do still sell them through Amazon UK for about $100 USD. It seems like they're moving away from making sat cards completely.

Just found one on the 'bay for a decent price (one left) if you're still interested.

Note: you'd need a copy of the WinTV CD to install any more than the basic drivers. It's available at Hauppauge's website for $10ish, or I might have an extra one around somewhere in exchange for gas money or some cheap sat equipment you don't want.

Notenote: at least in WinTV, it wants info for a universal LNB.

 

[. Raine]

Just found one on the 'bay for a decent price (one left) if you're still interested.

Note: you'd need a copy of the WinTV CD to install any more than the basic drivers. It's available at Hauppauge's website for $10ish, or I might have an extra one around somewhere in exchange for gas money or some cheap sat equipment you don't want.

Notenote: at least in WinTV, it wants info for a universal LNB.

Kitty, you've helped me out once again, thanks a lot! I just bought it, can't wait to get it and try it out!

I have two WinTV CDs that came with my HVR1600s and a few others kicking around here, so I think I'll be all set with that, if not, I'll take you up on your offer. Thanks again!

 

[. Raine]

Just found one on the 'bay for a decent price (one left) if you're still interested.

Note: you'd need a copy of the WinTV CD to install any more than the basic drivers. It's available at Hauppauge's website for $10ish, or I might have an extra one around somewhere in exchange for gas money or some cheap sat equipment you don't want.

Notenote: at least in WinTV, it wants info for a universal LNB.

I got the card and it's working in Win 7 Media Center, WinTV and a demo version of DVB Viewer that I downloaded. I haven't tried it on more than my one fixed dish on 97w yet, but it looks like Media Center will support up to four LNBs, so four fixed dishes. Gonna dig out a DISEqC switch and see how it works with more than one dish in WMC right now. The only thing I noticed with WMC was that it couldn't auto-detect the card and it made me set it up manually, but it wasn't hard to do at all. For $31, this was a good deal!

 

[. Raine]

Update, in WMC the card isn't completely working right, even though it works in WinTV fine. DVB-S2 won't work in WMC, even though it should, and some other channels are wonky. Scanning 95w, it picks up all the CCTV channels but will not play the CCTV Doc one and list the others wrong, but those will play. Some channels from 97w would scan in but not play on the computer or extenders until I did a update for WMC called X Box Optional Media Update, which was a PITA, it's not received within normal updates and I had to do it through X Box Live on one of the X Box extenders. Still a good deal for $31 and I haven't given up on trying to get it all working correctly yet!

One nice thing I found was a program called Guide Tool which allowed me to add EPG within WMC for sat channels like Ebru, etc and also for some ATSC channels that I receive which are out of my zip area and that WMC never had EPG info for, really nice, that. It also makes it real easy to remove channels from the WMC channel line-up, which is very helpful because when you rescan a sat transponder in WMC it will just breeze over any previously detected channels and only looks for new ones. Without the Guide Tool, in order to do a rescan and have it detect anything, the only option is to completely go through setup again, really stupid, that.

Hauppauge has a patch tool for WMC to fix missing sats, channels, DVB-S2, [MCEDVBS2PatchTool.exe], but I haven't been able to get it to work quite right yet.

 

[kittyhas1000legs]

Without the Guide Tool, in order to do a rescan and have it detect anything, the only option is to completely go through setup again, really stupid, that.

I've had that issue with adding/rescanning OTA channels. It will also go through the setup for the HDHomerun Prime again, which adds every possible cable channel to the listings (about 500 more than I actually get) and reverts their names back to all caps abbreviations. Good to know.