HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

Now when I look at it like that, Tivo's are a lot
more expensive to run poer wise.

Try not to take this as a flame, but now you're just being silly! Most
people do not have a server running 24/7, so it's hardly a fair
comparison so say thay power is being burned anyways. You can turn a
tivo off also and make its power zero when its not bing used (with an
X10 lamp module). If there were a mythtv that supported foxton, this
would be ideal, keep the thing low power until you see on the clock you
need to record, then come on. Until then you will likely need to have
that power eating CPU running all the time and you will never approach
the low power of dedicated designed hardware.

You will also never approach the base manufacturing cost of a Tivo by
purchasing PC parts. Tivo no doubt loses money selling a box for $50,
but I do not think its ver much ($10-$20). If you really want an
interesting project to share with the open source community, hack the
tivo hardware to use a free subscription service, heck I'll sign up
right now as your first customer!

To Jeff, Have you actually measured the input power to this machine?
If its calculated, can you share the breakdown? I still have an 8 year
old Matrox for video in my desktop at home, but I recollect putting in
some power eaters in my kids PCs. How much power do you need to burn
in the video card to get 1080i? The CPU is probably the biggest thing
to watch out for, maybe the way to go is to put a laptop CPU on the
MB(?). Even a lazy celeron will cost you 50+ watts on the input power
(more then the whole Tivo S2). I can't imaging the tuner cards are
more then a few watts, disks are ~10-12W on your input cord. If mythtv
could master the power problem, I would spend $ on hardware to build
one, until then it would only be a recreational project on a box headed
for the junk heap.

Had a buddy who set up a POWER2 based server at him home stuffed will
small SCSI drives he got from ebay. He no longer runs it 24/7 since we
calculated it burns $40/month in power!

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

On Fri, 10 Feb 2006 07:16:23 -0500, Randy S. wrote:

Well, Wes, you must admit that the comparison exercise that you and I
went through is largely speculative based only on 3rd hand reports of a
prototype of a yet to be released product. I have no problem admitting
that the comparison is early, speculative, and quite possibly incorrect
in minor and/or significant details.


You don't really believe that. If the product they displayed at CES wasn't
very close to the final product, they wouldn't have shown it. And if there
are major changes, I wouldn't look for a release this year. besides,
comparisons between products like this is done all the time. That's one
reason it was displayed. To show people what they had. You and I both know
the real reason behind the flames.


Wes, in another thread I had someone flame me for citing the cableCARD
standard because it wasn't a standard (because supposedly standards that
aren't ratified yet aren't "standards"). Now you are trying to say that
there's nothing wrong with making a complete review of a product way
before it's ever released.

I didn't review how well it worked, only that it's going to support cable
card. If you think it's not going to I can say no in the review. Then
others can come back and bitch. Get over it.

There *are* middle grounds here. It is possible to speculate and draw
conclusions on things that are not yet complete. But it is also
important to acknowledge that those things *aren't* complete and could
change. I don't have a problem admitting that while still speculating
for the academic exercise of it. Why is that so hard for you to do?


And why must you type so much. My review states that it's based on info as
of Feb 2006. How long of a disclaimer do you want me to type? IMO, there
won't be any changes to the HDT tivo between now and production. You're
welcome to your opinion. Only time will tell.

--
Want the ultimate in free OTA SD/HDTV Recorder? http://mythtv.org
http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html Usenet alt.video.ptv.mythtv
My server http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

On Fri, 10 Feb 2006 07:31:02 -0500, Randy S. wrote:

Wes Newell wrote:
On Fri, 10 Feb 2006 00:11:17 +0000, Chris Adams wrote:


Once upon a time, Wes Newell said:

http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/mythtivo.htm

I don't see the part where you tell that MythTV can only record
broadcast network over-the-air HD, while the CableCard TiVo will be able
to record many more HD channels from digital cable


Then you can't read.

Cable card support ? Yes

Wes, I've already pointed out your bias in that statement.

There's nothing but facts there. There's only 2 answers. I don't know if
there will ever be PC support of cable card (although some here seem to
think so), and that Tivo will support Cable card. Now where is the ****ing
bias?

(HDNet/HDNet Movies,
ESPN/ESPN2 HD, HBO HD, Showtime HD, Discover HD Theater, Universal HD,
TNT HD, to name a few). OTA HD may be enough for you but the majority


I also didn't mention that many of these premium channels are available
OTA, which would have been in the MythTV's favor.

No, Wes the HD channels he stated above are *not* broadcast channels.

And I didn't say they were. I'm tired of this...

I.e. they aren't sent OTA. Your beloved USDTV which you've never used,
is only available in *4* western cities in the US, and only supplies the
broadcast networks in HD anyway (notice all of the above list is HD?).
Plus USDTV raises my suspicions, what type of service provides so little
information on their website, they don't even list a channel lineup !?
On top of that, it's not like you can integrate it into mythTV, you'd
have to some sort of lash up with IR blasters which would negate many of
Mythtv's advantages.

Why is everyone bringing up crap that doesn't even pertain to the review?

of TV viewers want more than the broadcast networks (well over half the
US TV owning households have cable and/or satellite).


And from a survey I did, the only reason the majority do have cable or
sat is because they don't know how to get a good clear picture with an
antenna. 3 out of 4 I asked said the only reason for havingt pay tv was
because they couldn't get good recption otherwise.

Please show us the source of this survey, along with proof of it's
statistical accuracy.


That's preprietary info.

Asking 4 acquaintances does not count as a
survey.

Why not? 4 or 4,000, 000. It still a survey. The margin fo error is
greater though.

How geographically diverse was this survey, since location is
so critical to reception?

Strictly Dallas area.

Due to CableCard DRM, an open source system like MythTV will never be
able to record those channels digitally.

Not that it matters to me, but you are mistaken. Maybe you haven't seen
the USDTV ads running, offering many premium channels OTA.

but none in HD. We've already been down this road.

So what? They are still premium channels OTA.

The only possible way would be
with an expensive real-time HD encoder per stream (and then you'll get
decode/reencode artifacting, not the orginal digital signal like a
TiVo).


WTF are you talking about. Digital signals are broadcast alreay encoded
in mpeg2. There's no encoding required. The digital stream is simply
saved to disk. And for your info, OTA HD gives a much better signal
than the compressed crap you get from cable or sat. If you don't know
what you're talking about it's best to keep quiet and not look the
fool. If you hook up an antenna to an HD tivo and compare the signals,
you'll see the OTA picture is a better quality. That's been documented
for some time now.


He's not talking about OTA, he's talking about reencoding a signal from
a source like your oft-quoted USDTV. Since you can't pull a native
digital signal from USDTV's required settop box, you'll have to reencode
the analog signal.

Accoring to USDTV, you can. I told them exactly what I had and they
confirmed I could record them. I don't know and don't care. I think I've
made that obvious many times. Again, way away from the comparison where
USDTV isn't even mentioned.

--
Want the ultimate in free OTA SD/HDTV Recorder? http://mythtv.org
http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html Usenet alt.video.ptv.mythtv
My server http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

"Wes Newell" wrote in message
news:[email protected]
On Thu, 09 Feb 2006 16:20:53 +0000, Scooby wrote:

Uh, Wes,

How's about adding some more fields to that chart, like...

"Appliance"
Tivo - Yes
MythTV - No

Interesting. You find a Tivo computer to be an aplliance, and a MythTV
computer not to be an appliance. Sorry, I just don't agree with that. Did
you happen to miss the very first line? System Type.

Apparently you don't understand what the computer industry considers an
appliance. That is an all in one turn-key device that doesn't need a custom
build, such as a Tivo. A build it yourself box, such as MythTV does not
qualify.


"Time to install/setup"
Tivo - 10 Minutes
MythTv - infinite based on knowledge. No less than a few hours (what is
your time worth). Actually, it is probably never "complete".

You can't setup a tivo in 10 minutes. Perhaps you don't remember the first
one you had. Granted it's not rocket science, but It's a lot more time
consuming than that. And how long does the data download take over the
phone? Hours. There's configuration time with it just as there is with
MythTV. And fwiw, basic setup for mythtv is as simple as loading 1 cd onto
the drive using knoppmyth. Sure, it takes more time overall, but it also
will do a lot more.


Okay, 10 minutes may be a little low, but not much. I've setup a handful of
these things and it is a pretty quick setup. If the initial phone call
needs to do a big down load, you can just go away and come back.

The setup in MythTV I am referring to is research of products to use,
ordering those products, unpacking them and building your system,
downloading the O/S, downloading MythTV, burning CD's for installation,
running the installation procedures, configuring MythTV to work with your
devices, troubleshooting device driver issues.

Now, you've made it well known that you had some video card issues. I'd
really like to know the total time you've put into all of the above. I'll
say again - what is your time worth? Maybe your time isn't worth much, but
I'd rather pay a little more an appliance than to fight through that. I've
actually considered building a MythTV box myself, but more for a learning
experience and to evaluate it. I certainly wouldn't do that to save a few
bucks and neither would most people that are just trying to improve their
viewing experience.

"Cost with cards that HDMI output"
Tivo - included
MythTV - Variable based on Video card, but sure not included in those
el-cheapo cards

Right, I had to pay $30 for the video card, plus a $10 adapter for DVI
to HDMI. But wait. I don't need hdmi. I don't even use the DVI port
(which tivo doesn't have). I use the VGA port (that the Tivo doesn't have
either) to get HDTV on a $69 1600x1200 monitor. iwth the one backend cost
of about $600 and one frontend cost of about $250, including monitors,
I've got 2 HDTV's with a combined capabilty of recording 4 shows at once.
What would this ewtup cost you using Tivos, and the cheapest HDTV monitor.
I'd estimate that the HDTV monitors alone would cost you $800. Now add 2
HD tivos to that and you're up to about $2400. No thanks.:-)


Well, Wes. I just think you are really cheapening the experience. Most
people that would pay for a device such as a Tivo or a MythTV box are trying
to increase their viewing pleasure. Using 19" VGA monitors does not do
that. It is not all about cost - for most people. Also, I would say that
most people that would pay for one of these devices would also pay for TV
service as well. It seems to me that you are spending a whole lot of
trouble for a setup that gets a limited amount of service.

Also, consider that your PC monitor is not a 16x9 format. If you are
viewing HD programming on there, you are either seeing it squished to fit
the screen, or in widescreen, which would have a much smaller viewing area
than 19". HDTV should be viewed on a widescreen tv for best viewing
experience.


"Automatic Updates"
Tivo - Yes
MythTv - No, and updates needed from different sources

Control of updates?:-)


There is a trade off, but rarely has there been an update that people don't
want with the Tivo software. I'll take the all in one provided updates
rather than having to worry about O/S, MythTV, driver updates. Having to
download them and install. Again, what is your time worth?

"Remote Control"
Tivo - Well known and well designed peanut remote MythTv - no standard,
needs a universal remote (did you factor in the cost of your remote, and
the time to set it up?) BTW - how well does your remote work for
turning off those PC monitors?

While I do have a remote for it, I chose to spend $10 for a remote KB and
mouse that can control every aspect of the system. Do you really want me
to get into what else you can do with a Linux PC that you can't do with
the Tivo?


Again, cheapening the experience. MOST people do not want to have to
control their TV with a KB/Mouse. The Tivo Peanut remote is a very creative
design that makes navigation an easy experience. I'm not disputing that a
Linux PC can do more than a Tivo. Remember, though, that most home users
have never touched linux. I personally have a pc hooked up to a couple of
my HDTV's with wireless KB/Mouse, and I like using it when using PC
applications. But, I still prefer the remote for TV viewing.

There's more... As I've said before, Wes. You arguments are
disingenuous at best. I've got nothing against MythTv, just your
presentation that it is a simple, slap it in, better and cheaper than
Tivo attitude.

And in my opinion, it is. You're more than welcome to yours. That's why
they are opinions. And I didn't have any arguements in my review. I only
presented facts . I don't see you claiming there are any mistakes in it.
It's a free world, if you don't like my comparison you are more than
welcome to create your own website and... Sorry, you can't do that with
the tivo can you. Yes, the website is running on this machine, as is
MythTV 's backend server, and a FTP server, and I'm using a news reader to
reply to you now on it too, with a game I've got paused in the background
along with frontend that I paused until I finish this. Oh, and I can pause
live TV for hours too.:-) You like Tivo. That's your choice. Probably good
for you.


I've got nothing against your opinions - you are welcome to them. I've got
a problem with you coming around as a Troll to the Tivo group giving a
lopsided sales pitch to the MythTV setup. You'd think you were getting some
kind of commisions from it. I think most home users would have a very hard
time trying to implement the box that you've defined at $400.

I've got no desire to put together a public comparision of the two and
publish it. But, if I did, I would try to be objective. Your presentation
and arguments are far from objective.

Your arguments are disingenuous at best.

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

Once upon a time, Wes Newell said:
Then you can't read.

Cable card support ? Yes

Read what I said (that you cut out); since CableCard has heavy DRM
restrictions, MythTV (or any other open source software) cannot support
CableCard. Putting a "?" in there is wrong; it should be a "No".

Also, under tuner comparison, you listed MythTV as "Any", which is
wrong. MythTV can support NTSC, ATSC, and some types of unencrypted
digital cable (the only unencrypted channels on the cable here are the
copies of the OTA channels).

(HDNet/HDNet Movies,
ESPN/ESPN2 HD, HBO HD, Showtime HD, Discover HD Theater, Universal HD,
TNT HD, to name a few). OTA HD may be enough for you but the majority

I also didn't mention that many of these premium channels are available
OTA, which would have been in the MythTV's favor.

Yawn, we've been down this path before. A few cable networks are
offered in a handful of markets OTA in standard definition. None are
available in HD OTA. Since several of the channels I named are HD only
(HDNet/HDNet Movies, Discover HD Theater, Universal HD), their content
is not available OTA.

And from a survey I did, the only reason the majority do have cable or
sat is because they don't know how to get a good clear picture with an
antenna. 3 out of 4 I asked said the only reason for havingt pay tv was
because they couldn't get good recption otherwise.

Highly scientific survey there. Sorry it isn't very convincing,
especially when the nationwide ratings show the broadcast networks
losing viewers rapidly to the cable networks (the cable networks have a
majority of the viewers during some time slots and are close to half
much of the time).

Due to CableCard DRM, an open source system like MythTV will never be
able to record those channels digitally.

Not that it matters to me, but you are mistaken. Maybe you haven't seen
the USDTV ads running, offering many premium channels OTA.

Again, as we've been through before, USDTV is non-HD (which is what this
thread is about - try to keep up with discussions you started). And no,
I haven't seen USDTV ads, since I don't live in one of their 4 markets.

And no matter what USDTV does, MythTV still can't record from CableCard
cable digitally.

The only possible way would be
with an expensive real-time HD encoder per stream (and then you'll get
decode/reencode artifacting, not the orginal digital signal like a TiVo).

WTF are you talking about. Digital signals are broadcast alreay encoded in
mpeg2. There's no encoding required. The digital stream is simply saved
to disk.

Only if you have access to a digital bitstream. With CableCard digital
cable, MythTV does not have access to the digital bitstream. The only
way for MythTV to record HD from digital cable would be to capture the
analog bitstream (if available) through a real-time HD encoder (I don't
know if MythTV supports that).

And for your info, OTA HD gives a much better signal than
the compressed crap you get from cable or sat.

That highly depends on your local broadcaster. Some do better than
others, while some compress multiple channels into a single OTA slot.
I've got one local that has 3 channels, compressing the HD down a good
bit to fit the other 2 channels in (at least the compress the other 2
heavily). Another carries two different networks, one in HD and one in
SD; since that is the local source for the second network, they can't
compress it down significantly, so it takes bandwidth from the primary
HD channel.

If you don't know what
you're talking about it's best to keep quiet and not look the fool.

You should print that out and tape it to your monitor. You are
repeating the same crap you spouted before that was proven wrong.
--
Chris Adams
Systems and Network Administrator - HiWAAY Internet Services
I don't speak for anybody but myself - that's enough trouble.

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

On Fri, 10 Feb 2006 07:11:00 -0500, Randy S. wrote:


The HD Tivo isn't a series 1. And it's going to draw a lot more current
than the S1. In the end, the difference in power consumption one way or
the other isn't going to matter much. While Tivos will be left on 24/7,
MythTV boxes can be turned off most of the time. my frontend machine only
runs about 4 hours a day, so even if it used 5 times as much power as the
HD Tivo, it would consume less overall. I actually save more money
running MythTV since my server ran 24/7 anyway and has for close to 15
years (excluding upgrades). Now I don't have the Tivo running 24/7. I also
don't have my other DVR running 24/7, and I also don't have the 2 vcr's
running 24/7 either. Now when I look at it like that, Tivo's are a lot
more expensive to run poer wise. And I'd have to run 2 HD tivos for the
same recording capability I have now. Current electric cost for MythTV is
0. Cost of 2 HD tivos running 24/7=?


Wes, now you're biasing again.

There's nothing biased about it. It's the damn truth. And I didn't bring
up the power issue.

Can your Mythtv setup run without your backend server?

No, but the backend server can also be the the frontend. I chose to use a
seperate machine so I could have HDTV in both rooms. Had I not, the only
extra power used would be that of the tuners inside the box, since my
server runs 24/7 anyway and did and still will regardless of mythtv.

We both know it can't. So discounting the backend
power is disingenuous.

No it's not. It going to running all the time anyway.

Just because it's running anyway doesn't allow
you to discount it.

So I have to pay the electric company twice.:-)

If you want to be fair, figure out the percentage
of use that goes to Mythtv (and I mean percentage of *use* not of
capability, total percentage should add up to 100%). Then include that
percentage of total power used in the consideration.

What? Why don't you do it for me. I don't care how much extra power the
tuner cards draw. But here's a rough estimate. Before installing the
tuners, my UPS load was 26%. It's now 32%.

Power's probably not a big consideration anyway, particularly if both
devices can be setup with low power modes.

Exactly. But I still use less than the HD Tivos would.

--
Want the ultimate in free OTA SD/HDTV Recorder? http://mythtv.org
http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html Usenet alt.video.ptv.mythtv
My server http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

On Fri, 10 Feb 2006 05:12:45 -0800, zafdor wrote:

Now when I look at it like that, Tivo's are a lot
more expensive to run poer wise.

Try not to take this as a flame, but now you're just being silly! Most
people do not have a server running 24/7, so it's hardly a fair
comparison so say thay power is being burned anyways.

Well, I wasn't talking about other people. I was talking about me.

You can turn a tivo off also and make its power zero when its not bing
used (with an X10 lamp module).

Yeah, if you want to force call ins for guide data. I've never heard of
anyone doing this though.

If there were a mythtv that supported foxton, this
would be ideal, keep the thing low power until you see on the clock you
need to record, then come on. Until then you will likely need to have
that power eating CPU running all the time and you will never approach
the low power of dedicated designed hardware.

Never heard of foxton. In any case, a MythTV box isn't going to use much
more than the new HD tivo. And some people might actually turn their
MythTV boxes off during all but the evening hours. Not many people with
Tivos are going to do that. Toatal consumption of power shouldn't even be
an issue here.

You will also never approach the base manufacturing cost
of a Tivo by
purchasing PC parts. Tivo no doubt loses money selling a box for $50,

Since when did the $50 Tivo box record HD, which is what the comparison is
about, the series 3 HD tivo.

but I do not think its ver much ($10-$20). If you really want an
interesting project to share with the open source community, hack the
tivo hardware to use a free subscription service, heck I'll sign up
right now as your first customer!

That's already been done. Why reinvent the wheel. And it's still
illegal.:-)

To Jeff, Have you actually measured the input power to this machine? If
its calculated, can you share the breakdown? I still have an 8 year old
Matrox for video in my desktop at home, but I recollect putting in some
power eaters in my kids PCs. How much power do you need to burn in the
video card to get 1080i? The CPU is probably the biggest thing to watch
out for, maybe the way to go is to put a laptop CPU on the MB(?). Even
a lazy celeron will cost you 50+ watts on the input power (more then the
whole Tivo S2). I can't imaging the tuner cards are more then a few
watts, disks are ~10-12W on your input cord. If mythtv could master the
power problem, I would spend $ on hardware to build one, until then it
would only be a recreational project on a box headed for the junk heap.

Recording 4 HD shows at once, my cpu uses 35W. Newer models only use 22W.
So the only difference between an HD tivo and a pc is going to be very
minimal power wise.

Had a buddy who set up a POWER2 based server at him home stuffed will
small SCSI drives he got from ebay. He no longer runs it 24/7 since we
calculated it burns $40/month in power!

Just run it during the winter.:-)

--
Want the ultimate in free OTA SD/HDTV Recorder? http://mythtv.org
http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html Usenet alt.video.ptv.mythtv
My server http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

Wes Newell ) wrote in alt.video.ptv.tivo:
On Thu, 09 Feb 2006 18:41:11 -0500, Jeff Rife wrote:

Well, you could get a very nice 20" 1600x1200 Dell LCD (that can actually
display all 1600x1200 pixels, unlike your monitor) for less than $500 the
next time they go on sale. Or, you could get a 19" 1280x1024 (which
*still* has more real resolution than your monitor) for $300.

Are you drunk? I said my $69 19" CRT monitor runs at 1600x1200
non-interlaced.

Yes, it can accept that scan rate. No, it cannot display 1600x1200
unique pixels. You can believe it does all you want, but that doesn't
make it so.

Why in the hell would I want to spend $300 for one with
less capability.

Because the actual resolution on that "1600x1200" 19" monitor is about
1000x800, if you bother to measure it (or cared).

And i don't want an LCD monitor or TV of any kind, even if the
price were the same as the crt.

Some of us want actual quality from our video...not just the cheapest
thing available.

--
Jeff Rife | Sam: What d'ya say to a beer, Normie?
|
| Norm: Hi, sailor...new in town?

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

Chris Adams ) wrote in alt.video.ptv.tivo:
Yawn, we've been down this path before. A few cable networks are
offered in a handful of markets OTA in standard definition. None are
available in HD OTA. Since several of the channels I named are HD only
(HDNet/HDNet Movies, Discover HD Theater, Universal HD), their content
is not available OTA.

Actually, there is exactly *one* exception and it does happen to be in
the DMA where he lives. A lot (but not all) of HDNet content is available
OTA in HD from a local station there because Marc Cuban has some sort of
interest in that station.

--
Jeff Rife | "Tragedy struck today in Sector Nine as rebel
| terrorists blew up the Death Star, killing
| thousands. The Rebel Alliance, a fringe group
| of anti-Empire fanatics, has claimed
| responsibility for the terrorist act.
| Fortunately, Lord Vader escaped without harm.
| Our hearts go out to the families of the
| victims."
| -- "NewsRadio"

HDTV MythTV and HD Tivo series 3 compared.
 

I didn't review how well it worked, only that it's going to support cable
card. If you think it's not going to I can say no in the review. Then
others can come back and bitch. Get over it.

WTF? Of course it's going to support cableCARD, that's the whole point,
there's very little speculation in that. The *severe* speculation is
yours when you mark "?" for Mythtv cableCARD support. We know the
answer for that even without speculating, and the answer is *no*.

There *are* middle grounds here. It is possible to speculate and draw
conclusions on things that are not yet complete. But it is also
important to acknowledge that those things *aren't* complete and could
change. I don't have a problem admitting that while still speculating
for the academic exercise of it. Why is that so hard for you to do?



And why must you type so much. My review states that it's based on info as
of Feb 2006. How long of a disclaimer do you want me to type? IMO, there
won't be any changes to the HDT tivo between now and production. You're
welcome to your opinion. Only time will tell.


Your "opinion" as to whether there will be changes is worth *0*. You
can't guarantee that, so you can't assume it. In fact I can virtually
guarantee you that there *will* be changes, at least minor ones, and
possibly only in software, but there will be changes.

Randy S.