Recording HD from Freeview/Freesat - Xpost

I have been nudged back into thinking about recording TV using a PC by the
dire performance of my Bush satellite decoder.

All the "Smart" stuff gave up a while back when they changed the iPlayer
specs. The EPG keeps flipping from showing what is on to "No information
available" and mostly you can't see what is on now or next.

So, to replace it with something more recent (which will probably also
have a recording facility either internal or external) is likely to cost
£hundreds for Freesat with no guarantee that any "Smart" functionality
will last long.

Coupled with this, I plan to fettle a couple of Raspberry Pis to provide
TV smarts and hopefully video playing from a central store.

So this could be pointing to a PC with a decoder card for Freesat (and
possibly for Freeview for the few non-duplicated channels) so the rest of
the house (lounge has a Virgin Tivo) can enjoy video (stored DVDs)
distribution, recorded shows, and Internet smarts.

What is the state of the art for building a home media hub?

My HTPC build is currently running Windows 7 and due to move to the
lounge, it has a BluRay drive and a sound card which can output 5:1 to my
old (pre-HDMI) Sony AV amp. Also intended for HD video editing come the
revolution. I could move some of the stuff off to another PC and run Linux
on there, of course.

I guess what I need is a view of the hardware - as far as I know Windows
Media Centre (which comes with W7) is O.K. for PVR work.

Big subject, any advice welcome.

Cheers


Dave R

--
Windows 8.1 on PCSpecialist box

On 15/03/2016 13:48, David wrote:
I have been nudged back into thinking about recording TV using a PC by the
dire performance of my Bush satellite decoder.

All the "Smart" stuff gave up a while back when they changed the iPlayer
specs. The EPG keeps flipping from showing what is on to "No information
available" and mostly you can't see what is on now or next.


Good DVB-s2 card - Two channels.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Definition-Digital-Satellite-Receiver/dp/B0038LU03K


DVBViewer is an excellent remote viewer/recorder for windows.

http://www.dvbviewer.com/en/index.php

It has its own Program guide which is mediocre and needs returning
occasionally to pick up new or changed channels.

"David" wrote in message
...
I have been nudged back into thinking about recording TV using a PC by the
dire performance of my Bush satellite decoder.

I use the following:

- Windows Media Centre on Win 7 PC
- PCTV 292e DVB-T2 decoder (1 tuner)
- VideoRedo (to edit out continuity announcements and adverts, and to save
as a different format such as TS instead of WMC's WTV)
- Videolan VLC (to watch programmes on my PC, including at greater than
normal speed)
- Plex Media Server (to make programmes available on other devices)
- Roku box with Plex client (talks to Plex server)

I could buy Plex client for Android and watch programmes on my mobile
phone - never got round to it.

I tend to keep standard def programmes in WTV format, but I've found that I
need to convert HD programmes to TS format because VLC can't find the sound
on HD WTV files. This applies to any DVB-T2 channel, even if it's an SD (or
sub-SD 544x576) channel sent over DVB-T2 - eg TalkingPicturesTV.


Mostly I record and watch on the Windows 7 PC so I'm just using WMC and VLC,
but Plex is there for if we want to watch on the big TV downstairs.

Communication between PC and Roku box is by Homeplug (Ethernet over mains)
because I've found that wireless is not fast/reliable enough and I get lots
of buffering and pauses. I'd use Ethernet cable rather than Homeplug but it
would require drilling a hole through the study wall (where the recording PC
is), running an Ethernet cable down the outside of the house and then
drilling another hole to bring the cable into the living room to get it to
the Roku and TV - too much like hard work and SWMBO would not like it.

It's a shame that the PCTV 292e DVB-T2 decoder only has one tuner. It would
be nice to be able to decode and record two muxes/channels at once. Sadly
WMC can't record two different channels even if they are on the same mux. I
have occasionally used VLC to record a whole mux and then play whichever
channel I want from that recording - you need to know the UHF frequency (in
MHz) of the relevant mux to do this.

On Tue, 15 Mar 2016 17:34:20 +0000, NY wrote:

"David" wrote in message
...
I have been nudged back into thinking about recording TV using a PC by
the dire performance of my Bush satellite decoder.

I use the following:

- Windows Media Centre on Win 7 PC - PCTV 292e DVB-T2 decoder (1 tuner)
- VideoRedo (to edit out continuity announcements and adverts, and to
save as a different format such as TS instead of WMC's WTV)
- Videolan VLC (to watch programmes on my PC, including at greater than
normal speed)
- Plex Media Server (to make programmes available on other devices)
- Roku box with Plex client (talks to Plex server)

I could buy Plex client for Android and watch programmes on my mobile
phone - never got round to it.

I tend to keep standard def programmes in WTV format, but I've found
that I need to convert HD programmes to TS format because VLC can't find
the sound on HD WTV files. This applies to any DVB-T2 channel, even if
it's an SD (or sub-SD 544x576) channel sent over DVB-T2 - eg
TalkingPicturesTV.


Mostly I record and watch on the Windows 7 PC so I'm just using WMC and
VLC,
but Plex is there for if we want to watch on the big TV downstairs.

Communication between PC and Roku box is by Homeplug (Ethernet over
mains) because I've found that wireless is not fast/reliable enough and
I get lots of buffering and pauses. I'd use Ethernet cable rather than
Homeplug but it would require drilling a hole through the study wall
(where the recording PC is), running an Ethernet cable down the outside
of the house and then drilling another hole to bring the cable into the
living room to get it to the Roku and TV - too much like hard work and
SWMBO would not like it.

It's a shame that the PCTV 292e DVB-T2 decoder only has one tuner. It
would be nice to be able to decode and record two muxes/channels at
once. Sadly WMC can't record two different channels even if they are on
the same mux. I have occasionally used VLC to record a whole mux and
then play whichever channel I want from that recording - you need to
know the UHF frequency (in MHz) of the relevant mux to do this.

Thanks!

Given me something to get my teeth into!

Cheers

Dave R



--
Windows 8.1 on PCSpecialist box

"David" wrote in message
...
Thanks!

Given me something to get my teeth into!

Cheers

Dave R

PS: I tried NextPVR to see how it compares with WMC. Its UI has some strange
quirks: I don't find it intuitive to use because I always get confused
between programmes that you have already recorded and those which are
scheduled to record in the future. It is very slow to update the EPG (list
of forthcoming programmes). Also it has a major usuability error in that it
allows you (accidentally) to delete recorded programmes or scheduled
programmes without any "are you sure" confirmation - and when I reported
this to the forum moderator (who is also the software designer) he didn't
want to know - he scorned my suggestion and said that because *he* loathed
"are you sure" confirmations on operations that you might regret in software
packages in general, he would never implement them in anything he wrote. His
response was patronising and dripping with control-freakery :-(

One good thing about NextPVR, though, is that you can record several
programmes simultaneously as long as they are on the same mux, whereas WMC
can't even when programmes are on the same mux.

A big advantage of WMC is that it records in a format (WTV) that can have
embedded metadata - eg episode name, plot summary - whereas most other
packages record to formats like MPG, MP4 or TS which don't seem to support
embedded metadata, or if they do, I've not come across a recording package
that implements it. On the other hand, MPG, MP4 or TS are less proprietary
than WTV and are playable on a wider range of software (VLC can play WTV but
can't display the subtitles or, for H264 DVB-T2 files, play the soundtrack).

En el artículo , Nick
escribió:

Good DVB-s2 card - Two channels.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Definition-Digital-Satellite-Receiver/dp/B0038LU03K

I've got the single channel version. Yes, a good card.

DVBViewer is an excellent remote viewer/recorder for windows.

+1.

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Bunny says: Windows 10? Nein danke!
(")_(")

On 16/03/2016 07:22, Mike Tomlinson wrote:
En el artículo , Nick
escribió:

Good DVB-s2 card - Two channels.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Definition-Digital-Satellite-Receiver/dp/B0038LU03K

I've got the single channel version. Yes, a good card.

DVBViewer is an excellent remote viewer/recorder for windows.

+1.


An alternative would be Linux receiver. See the forum:

http://www.world-of-satellite.com/

and the related shop:

www.world-of-satellite.co.uk


You can record any Freesat programme in HD and the file is not
encrypted. Using a Sky card is generally possible.


--
Michael Chare

---
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
https://www.avast.com/antivirus

On Wed, 16 Mar 2016 10:30:11 +0100
Martin wrote:



On the other hand, Humax has refurbished fully guaranteed PVRs for
sale for under £100. http://www.humaxdirect.co.uk/refurbished.html

I have a refurbished HDR Fox T2, and it is just fine.

--
Davey.

"Martin" wrote in message
...
On the other hand, Humax has refurbished fully guaranteed PVRs for sale
for
under £100. http://www.humaxdirect.co.uk/refurbished.html

Do dedicated recorders such as Humaxes allow you to get at the recordings
and transfer them to media for long-term storage or to edit out commercials
etc? Or is it like a Sky box where the only way to access recordings to
keep them long-term is to play them and record them in SD in real time via a
video capture card?

On 16/03/2016 16:48, Davey wrote:
On Wed, 16 Mar 2016 10:30:11 +0100
Martin wrote:



On the other hand, Humax has refurbished fully guaranteed PVRs for
sale for under £100. http://www.humaxdirect.co.uk/refurbished.html

I have a refurbished HDR Fox T2, and it is just fine.

We sold 120 approx refurbished Humax boxes and had three that were or
became faulty.

Bill