Ideal MythTV Setup
Michael
MythTV setup for myself for both fun and practical use, and I wanted
to know what hardware real users would choose for themselves if they
could have whatever they wanted. Like if you were building something
for yourself and price were not a concern, what would you put together?
R. G. Newbury
I have just had an on-board network interface go bad, so I am a little
worried about my hardware. So I have been thinking about this and doing
some browsing. The present motherboard is an Asus P5L-MX with a Core 2
Duo E6600 cpu, and GT9500 based nvidia video card. It has a 60G Patriot
SSD for the OS and database and a WD 1TB hard drive for video storage.
The case is a Thermaltake Bach with a built-in iMon ir unit. On boot, it
touches 135 watts for a second, and then settles to 88 watts. Thereafter
it stays at 88 or so watts, no matter what it is doing. It has a PVR500
tuner and an USB based HVR-950 plugged into it plus an hdhomerun
externally.
Changing from this setup is not just a "money no object" exercise. A
mythbox does not have to be a monster machine if you avoid software
encoding/decoding of the signal. And in North America, the OTA signals
are just digital streams. And with cableco STB's there is no real choice
but to use a digitizer to be able to capture the stream.
So secondary considerations come into play: how much power does it use
(especially if it is to be a 24/7 operation), and how noisy will it be.
Power and noise go hand in hand so low(er) power is good. And where will
it live?
I am thinking along these lines:
The Intel i3 2120T and 2100T chips have a full draw load TDP of 35
watts, and can idle down around 7-10 according to bit-tech and phoronix.
This chip has lots of power for a mythbox at 2.5GHz or so. The present
chip is 2.5GHz. So my overall draw will probably drop by 40 watts.
I am looking at an ASUS P8H61-M EVO motherboard since it has a whack of
USB ports, 1 PCIEx16 slot, 2 PCIEx1 and 3 PCI slots. I probably won't
use them all, but I had to hunt around to find a PCIEx1 network card to
replace the dead one on my present setup, and my present Asus P5L-MX mb
now has all of its slots filled.
You probably want a PCI#x16 slot for an nvidia-based video card (fanless
of course). But Intel has made some great strides in the drivers and
VAAPI is starting to look good. In which case the onboard HD Graphics
2000 might be enough.
You might need a PCI slot for an analog tuner card (PVR500) for cable
reception. I'm being forced to go to a set top box and digital cable in
the near future, so I'm looking into using a Hauppauge Colossus card to
digitize component output from the STB. That requires a PCIEx1 slot. So
my present motherboard only fits this scenario if I swap the PCIE NIC
for a PCI NIC (to go where the PVR500 presently sits).
I could instead get the external HD-PVR 1212, which costs $50 more and
uses 10W which is likely way more power than the internal board. And
more clutter.
With at least 512MB or even 1GB in the video card, then you don't
actually need more than 2G main RAM. Get 2 sticks of 1.35V memory. It's
faster anyway, uses less power and therefor runs cooler.
Power supply: the smallest 80+Gold or Platinum certified unit you can
find. The gold or platinum cert is worth the extra dollars as the
efficiency is better and goes further into the envelope. Unfortunately
it will be around 500Watts output. Modular cables are nice. The only
fanless ones around are even more powerful and may be less efficient.
But there is one less thing to make noise.
CPU cooler. Something big with heat pipes and a 120mm fan. Or (for a
slight hit in power usage) an all-in-one water cooler. I have an Antec
Kuhler 920 on this desktop and it is quiet (not silent, but low noise)
and does a great job. The CPU runs at 40C.
Hard Drives: a good fast SSD for the OS and database. Look for a special
on a re-furb or return unit of 30GB or so. You do not need much storage
for this use. Buy a good brand however. (I recently installed Fedora 16
into a 10G virtual and only used about 4.5 Gig total.) I recently bought
an OCZ Vertex3 60GB SSD for $80 with rebate. The SSD is fast enough to
obviate all bottleneck worries on the OS side. Interestingly, an SSD
does not use a lot less power than its spinning counterpart. But the
size does make a difference, so find a small one if you can. Format to ext4.
For video storage, a terabyte is good. Format to xfs and use
'allocsize=512M'. I use from 500 to 650G on an ongoing basis on my box.
It does not need to be a 'fast' drive. For "money no object" Vertex (and
others) now offer terabyte range SSD drives. The cost is somewhere
around $2,800 for 960G on a 3.5" formfactor!
To summarize thus far, at present prices, and in round figures all of
this would be about $850- $900. I am budgeting $100 for the CPU cooler
but good units can be had for less. Check at silentpcreview.com.
And you need a case, and tuners.
Case: This depends on where you are going to put the box. If it will be
visible, then a case which looks like high level audio gear is
indicated. The Thermaltake Bach or the Silverstonetek Crown or Grandia
series boxes look really nice and can be obtained with builtin IR +/-
VFD/LCD. But any HTPC case is necessarily limited in some respects. For
example, the Bach case physically cannot take my Antec Kuhler
water-cooler setup unless I forego any PCI cards so I could mount the
120mm fan and radiator. But the case is tall enough to take a fairly
large CPU cooler.
If the box is going to be out of sight in a cupboard or in the next
room, then almost any good well-ventilated (quiet) case can be pressed
into use. I admit that I am looking at the Silverstonetek Fortress-3 for
my next general use/server case as its design is really neat, and is
designed to run quietly. The Antec P182 which this desktop machine
inhabits is big, very quiet and heavy. But it can take a large mb and
lots of other stuff.
And part of this decision process is the 'messy factor' (otherwise known
as "the WAF"). And how many cables and cross-connects there need to be.
Even a big case may be less objectionable if it contains ALL of the
necessary hardware, and all of the cables and wires to and from it can
fit within an unobtrusive cable cover. The Antec P180/280 series are
large enough that I could easily hide an antenna amplifier and 4-way
splitter inside the case, feeding coax out through the provided
water-cooler ports to the tuners and to the tv. It all depends.
You also need to have a remote control setup. These can be built into
the case (and generally come with a remote), or come with your tuner
choice or purchased separately.
The tuner mix depends on where you are, and whether you have to deal
with a cable STB. An HDHomeRun is about $150 for 2 OTA network attached
tuners, the HVR-950Q is about $80 for a USB attached tuner. The HVR-1250
for the same price uses a PCIE slot and comes with an IR remote while
the 2250 has a few more features and also comes with a remote and
ir-blaster for about the same price.
The Colossus component input card is $160 while the HD-PVR1212 is $200.
I am ignoring the costs of the STB as obviously an HD capable box will
cost you more and you may rent the box from your cableco.
At the moment I am thinking that my upcoming change will be to swap in a
Colossus board to replace one side of the PVR-500 and feed it from the
STB, while adding a HVR-950Q for a third OTA tuner for the US channels
(keeping the present 950 for the Toronto channels. Net loss is one
simultaneous cable recorder. And now I am running out of USB connections!.
AND I am a little worried about this motherboard.. if the network chip
failed, what else is reaching EOL? So maybe another $350 for a new mb
and chip and RAM.
And that is an hour and a half of billable time. Amazing what you can
accomplish when you can multi-task a rather boring conference call!
Geoff
--
Michael
Uh oh, I think I have some newbie questions...
[snip]
> touches 135 watts for a second, and then settles to 88 watts. Thereafter
> it stays at 88 or so watts, no matter what it is doing. It has a PVR500
> tuner and an USB based HVR-950 plugged into it plus an hdhomerun
> externally.
Hauppauge PVR500, a Hauppauge HVR-950, and an HDHomerun. What is the
purpose of the HDHomerun? What purpose do all of these serve? What
would be the advantage of this over say, one WinTV-HVR-2250?
[snip]
> You might need a PCI slot for an analog tuner card (PVR500) for cable
> reception. I'm being forced to go to a set top box and digital cable in
> the near future, so I'm looking into using a Hauppauge Colossus card to
> digitize component output from the STB. That requires a PCIEx1 slot. So
> my present motherboard only fits this scenario if I swap the PCIE NIC
> for a PCI NIC (to go where the PVR500 presently sits).
whole television thing as I had gone without it for many years.
However, my co-workers seem to be very into it and it sort of
interests me now. I can watch both HD and standard channels right
now, but I guess I just want to be able to record these shows and
recall them at my whim. So given this, what type of tuners would I
need? Would I need something like this PVR500 or is the HVR-2250
enough?
[snip]
I appreciate the input. If this is not the right place to ask, what
mailing list or site would be the proper place to get an explanation
of the basics? There are some complexities here that are lost on me
as I envisioned a box that would somehow take in an HD input, record
video files and could play them back. With all the tuners and the
HDHomerun, this looks to not be so simple. I don't mind getting all
of those devices, but I just want to understand what I'd be doing.
Michael
Chris Petersen
> Why are so many tuners necessary?
Because you asked for a "dream system" setup.
Honestly, an HDHomeRun or Ceton with a cable card would probably be your
best bet for digital cable.
> I appreciate the input. If this is not the right place to ask, what
> mailing list or site would be the proper place to get an explanation
> of the basics?
This list is actually intended for people looking to pay people to do
things related to MythTV (everything from building a custom system for
you, to doing custom code to support a MythTV-based business). The user
support mailing list or #mythtv-users on irc.freenode.net is probably a
better place for general user questions. Links here:
-Chris
R. G. Newbury
> On Feb 10, 10:57 am, "R. G. Newbury"<newb...@mandamus.org> wrote:
>
> Uh oh, I think I have some newbie questions...
>
> [snip]
>
>> touches 135 watts for a second, and then settles to 88 watts. Thereafter
>> it stays at 88 or so watts, no matter what it is doing. It has a PVR500
>> tuner and an USB based HVR-950 plugged into it plus an hdhomerun
>> externally.
>
> Why are so many tuners necessary? If I understand the above, I see a
> Hauppauge PVR500, a Hauppauge HVR-950, and an HDHomerun. What is the
> purpose of the HDHomerun? What purpose do all of these serve? What
> would be the advantage of this over say, one WinTV-HVR-2250?
I have that many tuners so I can record at least 2 shows on each
transmission medium. The 2250 has two tuners for one transmission medium
(OTA). There is a listing of mythtv capable tuners here on the wiki:
http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/Digital_Tuner_Cards
I ended with 5 tuners for physical reasons. I have effectively three
transmission media.
I started with a PVR500 on cable only. I picked up a pcHDTV 3000 to
check out my reception of unencrypted QAM on the cable. The pcHDTV was
picky and unreliable, but I was impressed with the clarity of the
signal, even on my then 20+ year old Sony Trinitron. On June 30, 2007,
Rogers changed all 35 QAM channels to encrypted and I was 'reduced' to
cable analog SD only.
I *liked* the digital picture and I had heard and seen good things about
OTA reception in my area. I promptly bought an antenna (ChannelMaster
4228) and an HDHomeRun. When I started using mythtv, it quickly became
apparent how *different* the use case is, from using a vhs tape deck.
You record more, and like tape, you watch it when you want to but it
becomes almost ridiculously easy to change to a program, to skip the
commercials and to watch and delete when done. The 30+ stack of vhs
tapes and the post-it notes are redundant.
Moreover, having multiple tuners means you can record simultaneous
programs. And with a 3-way splitter (you might need an amp ahead of it),
you can send one stream to the TV tuner directly for live viewing, and
still record two shows.
I found that I often wanted to record 2 shows at once. I had 2 vhs decks
in use already. Choosing the PVR500 originally over the pVR150 was a
no-brainer. Choosing the hdhomerun so I could get HD versions of the SD
analog streams I got on cable was also a no-brainer.
So that is 4 tuners. Then Canada started moving to digital broadcasts.
There is an 86 degree angular difference between the line from my house
to Buffalo and the line to Toronto. My big antenna gets almost no
reception from Toronto being side-on. So I have added a channelmaster
4224 in the attic and the HDPVR950 so I can record the Toronto channels
OTA. The PDPVR-950 itself was an impulse purchase: it was an 'open-box'
special for $40 at TigerDirect.
This gives me 5 tuners on 3 input lineups. There is a fair amount of
program overlap of course, so I can sometimes record 3 OTA HD programs
at once, choosing the Canadian simulcast of the US network show, for one
feed. I have only done that a couple of times. Recording 2 OTA and 2 SD
cable shows is rare, but works fine. The PVR500 tuner is the
'last-option' tuner for an SD version of an HD show, since the cable
gives me all of the OTA channels. And I have problems with some of the
Canadian OTA channels. The antenna is in the attic and needs to be up on
the mast with the other antenna.
I would love to drop the cable, but there are channels and programs
which are not available otherwise and which I and my wife like to watch.
So dropping cable is not an option. But Rogers is forcing me to go
digital, and the PVR500 will become surplus to requirements. It will
likely be replaced with an STB and Hauppauge Colussus card combo. I may
or may not add another OTA tuner to cover the "three OTA programs at
once" scenario" while reserving the Colossus for cable-only shows.
Moving the antenna may resolve some of the low-signal problems. Other
problems may go away when the Canadian broadcasters actually complete
their changeovers. A number of channel changes and transmitter upgrades
have still not taken place.
So *that* is why so many tuners. Happenstance and need.
>> You might need a PCI slot for an analog tuner card (PVR500) for cable
>> reception. I'm being forced to go to a set top box and digital cable in
>> the near future, so I'm looking into using a Hauppauge Colossus card to
>> digitize component output from the STB. That requires a PCIEx1 slot. So
>> my present motherboard only fits this scenario if I swap the PCIE NIC
>> for a PCI NIC (to go where the PVR500 presently sits).
>
> So, I have digital cable right now. I admit, I'm rather new to this
> whole television thing as I had gone without it for many years.
> However, my co-workers seem to be very into it and it sort of
> interests me now. I can watch both HD and standard channels right
> now, but I guess I just want to be able to record these shows and
> recall them at my whim. So given this, what type of tuners would I
> need? Would I need something like this PVR500 or is the HVR-2250
> enough?
This is where things get difficult. I presume your cableco provides an
encrypted stream. Your STB decrypts that stream and can send it to your
TV over HDMI because your HDMI input is HDCP compliant: that is, it
protects the encrypted status.
You can get around that by using the SD output and an SD analog-digital
card such as the PVR500, or use a Hauppauge HDPVR 1212 box or Hauppauge
Colossus card to digitize a component HD output. THis is the so-called
'analog hole' in the encrypted content world. The STB output is HD level
analog: that stream is then re-digitized. There are other professional
level cards which do this at far higher cost.
In this situation, your STB is your tuner: one STB, one tuner. In
Canada, to my knowledge all of the HD + recorder STB boxes keep the
recdording in an encrypted format on the disk, and you cannot copy it.
Some boxes allegedly delete the program if you have not watched it
within a certain period. Not nice!
The HDHomeRun Prime is a multi-tuner CableCard ready tuner, intended for
STB replacement. The Ceton tuner is another CableCard ready tuner for
this use. From reading the mythtv-list it appears that getting the
CableCard to 'pair' properly is the major difficulty. This is a cableco
problem area. Once done, these units appear to be stable and good.
> I appreciate the input. If this is not the right place to ask, what
> mailing list or site would be the proper place to get an explanation
> of the basics? There are some complexities here that are lost on me
> as I envisioned a box that would somehow take in an HD input, record
> video files and could play them back. With all the tuners and the
> HDHomerun, this looks to not be so simple. I don't mind getting all
> of those devices, but I just want to understand what I'd be doing.
As Chris noted: the mythtv list would be the proper place. Don't be
worried that it appears complex: lots of things in the tech world are
far more complex internally, then the user interface exposes. We become
blase (or are naive) about our lack of knowledge of how a widget
*actually* works (as distinct to our sometimes misplaced pride in our
ability to control the widget and make it do what we want).
HD input: -> needs an antenna for OTA or
-> needs an HD cable feed
-> tuner to tune to a channel (computer internal or external) or
-> STB to tune and decrypt or
-> CableCard tuner acting as STB
-> producing an output in form we can use
-> component if from STB -> digitizer card/box
-> direct digital stream if from HD tuner
-> direct digital stream from CableCard tuner
-> fed to a recording unit ( *Mythtv!!!*)
-> Mythtv must be set up to tune and control this unit
-> Mythtv must have channel and program information paired to
the tuner capabilities
== playback as desired
There! Easy-peasy! Unfortunately NOT. Some assembly required.
Batteries not included. Handholding and advice available here and on the
mythtv wiki
--
R. Geoffrey Newbury