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Old 03-10-2014, 15:46
lalaland
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Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: UK
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I currently have Youview via a Humax box. It's not bad apart from the occasional slowdowns and crashes. In addition to this I have a WDTV Live connected to a NAS via a home network.

I've backed up all my DVDs to the NAS and most of my music collection along with my photographs. We can view / listen / watch all these on the TV the WDTV is connected to in the living room.

I now want to move on a little and upgrade.

I was thinking about buying or building a HTPC and here's where I'm flooded with options it seems.

I want to replace the Humax box and the WDTV with one HTPC option. So live TV will go to the HTPC for PVR features. I'd probably look to mix areal TV with satellite through this. I'd also look to do all the stuff we do with the WDTV through this HTPC and move the WDTV to the bedroom which in turn would then be fed from either the NAS or the HTPC increasing the options for watching stuff around the house.

So far I've looked over Mediaportal, XBMC and MythTV. I can go down Windows or Linux route, I'm happy to play about with either, although I'd prefer something that's going to work long time and not freeze or crash often as my wife and child will need to use these when I'm out without causing problems.

Anyone have any experience with this sort of stuff for any tips?

I'm looking at pros and cons of each piece of software as well as trying to get an idea on hardware to use.

Cheers
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Old 06-10-2014, 20:18
c4rv
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I've a DVB-S2 card (basically HD Sat card) with Windows 7 using Windows Media Centre. It works pretty well though WMC EPG can be flaky. This would give you access to Freesat roughly though there are options if you want to start hacking a bit.
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Old 07-10-2014, 19:19
mark_b
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When I built my HTPC I got my advice from AVForums. I know you said that you are flooded with options and this site will probably only compound the problem but it's my opinion that there is nowhere on the internet that knows this subject better. It's worth a look just to see the fantastic custom setups that people have.

As for my own system, I run XBMC over Ubuntu and I like that it is very customisable and the way it handles the LCD panel on my case. I also like the relatively small footprint that the OS has. It can be a little tricky to set up sometimes but there is a lot of help online and I study computing at uni so I don't care anyway. I control it remotely using an IR remote or my mobile running Yatse.

I have never set up a HTPC on Windows so I can't really comment or compare the two.
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Old 08-10-2014, 11:41
jcjeffe
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I have been using a PC based PVR for about 4 years using the NextPVR software on Windows. I looked at Media Portal but decided it was a bit heavyweight for my needs. I did look at MythTV first as I mainly used Linux at work but found it a struggle to get it to work. My son has just started using XBMC/TV Headend running on an RPi although there is a version which is supposed to run directly on his NAS. Its too early to comment in its reliability and ease of use.

I started with a PC next to the TV then added a Window client so I could also watch recordings in another room. Next I moved the server to a cupboard and used 2 small silent Windows PCs as clients. The most recent change was to run XBMC on the clients under Openelec. The server has a 2GB data disk and three DVB-T USB tuners so rarely miss any recordings. The only recording it missed in the last year was my fault having forgotten to return a tuner I had borrowed to try on TV Headend.

You don’t need a high spec PC to record and play back even HD. With the addition of a MCE remote control and sensor it works just like a ordinary PVR
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