Holy Crap, Windows Media Center is AMAZING!

[randomlinh]

of course the gbpvr page is down.. doh.. sagetv looks cool, especially w/ not too expensive media extenders. but damn, $100 for the software.

 

[Fritzo]

Trust me...it ain't like Tivo

Tivo's interface and functionality are so smooth and well laid out, my 6 year old can choose shows to records by himself (no to mention it'll automatically find programs he likes, and has a Kids Zone so he can only watch shows that are appropriate for him).

MCE is nice, but it's a bit clunky. SageTV and BeyondTV are generally more prefered by people "in the know" about making your own DVR.

 

[Fritzo]

Originally posted by: Shawn

Originally posted by: Sphexi
SageTV FTW.

What's so special about SageTV? Looks expensive to me. Vista is free until July 07.

Note it may be free, but it'll be useless after that and won't have security updates available after the product is released. So, in a year, you'll basically have to uninstall it.

 

[Bootprint]

Originally posted by: dman
Anyone have any good utils or tips to remove commercials from mpeg files without loosing audio synch and spending hours transcoding? I understand there's some limitations with editing MPEG files directly, just curious if there's any tried and proven utils since I last looked into this about 6mo's ago.

I find editing the Mpeg-2 files directly the quickest, you can make the cuts I believe at certain frame types. It may mean you can't make the cut directly where you want but maybe a frame or 2 over. I've never noticed these extra frames when watching them on playback.

I use BeyondTV with 3 different Hauppauge cards, with 2 cards on cable and the third on a satellite system(ExpressVu for Condos). The only problem I had was that I had to buy a usbuirt to control the satellite receiver, since the PVR-150's IR control works only if you only have one Hauppauge card in your system.

I use BeyondTV and Orb.com so that I can remotely watch videos and live TV.

 

[postmortemIA]

So how did you get the drivers?

 

[TheoPetro]

for those of you who use sageTV is your video lagging behind the audio? because there is like a 2 second delay for me.

 

[pulse8]

Originally posted by: Fritzo
Trust me...it ain't like Tivo

Tivo's interface and functionality are so smooth and well laid out, my 6 year old can choose shows to records by himself (no to mention it'll automatically find programs he likes, and has a Kids Zone so he can only watch shows that are appropriate for him).

MCE is nice, but it's a bit clunky. SageTV and BeyondTV are generally more prefered by people "in the know" about making your own DVR.

I found the opposite. I spent around 4 months using different DVR software and MCE was the easiest to setup and use. I've been using it for almost a year now and it's been great. The computer has froze up a couple of times, but that's about it.

SageTV and BeyondTV are more preferred by people who want to tweak their setup to death. MCE is probably more preferred by people who just want to set it up and have it work.

 

[hellokeith]

There are long-time tried-and-true plugins for SageTV called ComSkip and ShowAnalyzer. Along with DirMon, these can automatically analyze a recorded show (sd or hd), mark the commercials, cut them out if you like, and even transcode to a different video type (portable divx for example).

 

[Fritzo]

Originally posted by: pulse8

Originally posted by: Fritzo
Trust me...it ain't like Tivo

Tivo's interface and functionality are so smooth and well laid out, my 6 year old can choose shows to records by himself (no to mention it'll automatically find programs he likes, and has a Kids Zone so he can only watch shows that are appropriate for him).

MCE is nice, but it's a bit clunky. SageTV and BeyondTV are generally more prefered by people "in the know" about making your own DVR.

I found the opposite. I spent around 4 months using different DVR software and MCE was the easiest to setup and use. I've been using it for almost a year now and it's been great. The computer has froze up a couple of times, but that's about it.

SageTV and BeyondTV are more preferred by people who want to tweak their setup to death. MCE is probably more preferred by people who just want to set it up and have it work.

The fact that our MCE PC goes largely unused and my dad and mother-in-law have asked for Tivo's for Christmas kind of proves my point.

 

[pulse8]

Originally posted by: Fritzo

Originally posted by: pulse8

Originally posted by: Fritzo
Trust me...it ain't like Tivo

Tivo's interface and functionality are so smooth and well laid out, my 6 year old can choose shows to records by himself (no to mention it'll automatically find programs he likes, and has a Kids Zone so he can only watch shows that are appropriate for him).

MCE is nice, but it's a bit clunky. SageTV and BeyondTV are generally more prefered by people "in the know" about making your own DVR.

I found the opposite. I spent around 4 months using different DVR software and MCE was the easiest to setup and use. I've been using it for almost a year now and it's been great. The computer has froze up a couple of times, but that's about it.

SageTV and BeyondTV are more preferred by people who want to tweak their setup to death. MCE is probably more preferred by people who just want to set it up and have it work.

The fact that our MCE PC goes largely unused and my dad and mother-in-law have asked for Tivo's for Christmas kind of proves my point.

How?

I was responding to your comment about SageTV and BeyondTV vs. MCE. Not MCE vs. Tivo. Read it again.

 

[Heifetz]

I have time warner digital cable and HDTV. WIll any of these support that?

 

[Fritzo]

Originally posted by: pulse8

Originally posted by: Fritzo

Originally posted by: pulse8

Originally posted by: Fritzo
Trust me...it ain't like Tivo

Tivo's interface and functionality are so smooth and well laid out, my 6 year old can choose shows to records by himself (no to mention it'll automatically find programs he likes, and has a Kids Zone so he can only watch shows that are appropriate for him).

MCE is nice, but it's a bit clunky. SageTV and BeyondTV are generally more prefered by people "in the know" about making your own DVR.

I found the opposite. I spent around 4 months using different DVR software and MCE was the easiest to setup and use. I've been using it for almost a year now and it's been great. The computer has froze up a couple of times, but that's about it.

SageTV and BeyondTV are more preferred by people who want to tweak their setup to death. MCE is probably more preferred by people who just want to set it up and have it work.

The fact that our MCE PC goes largely unused and my dad and mother-in-law have asked for Tivo's for Christmas kind of proves my point.

How?

I was responding to your comment about SageTV and BeyondTV vs. MCE. Not MCE vs. Tivo. Read it again.

The way you worded it made it look like MCE was an easier choice over Tivo. Sorry.

 

[hellokeith]

Originally posted by: Heifetz
I have time warner digital cable and HDTV. WIll any of these support that?

SageTV will. You just need to make sure and get an IR Blaster or UIRT so it can control the cable box channel changes. Check and see what is the highest quality input your TV will accept, and then choose an appropriate video card.
HDMI>DVI>BNC>Component>S-Video>Composite RCA
And you can throw in a 2nd, 3rd, etc tuner to use multiple cable boxes or get Over-the-air HDTV broadcasts.