Working on a Media Center PVR build
I ordered a Hauppage 1600 Tuner card and an extra mobo/cpu for a home build PVR project. I had one in the early days but now I’m back to start again. This time a veteran.
I’m going with a fairly cheap AMD X2 dual core 64bit 6000 proc and a nice little Abit motherboard, 2GB DDR2 and a 320GBSATA I had from another project. I have a 160GB SATA which I will use for the System and leave the 320 for data and better performance.
One thing that will be different than most builds discussed on-line is that I dual boot all my machines and I use virtual machines more than most. This machine will boot as follows:
- Ubuntu - MythTV
- MS Media Center 2005
- MediaPortal on WinXP Pro
I’ll probably end up back at Media Center or MythTV, after working with Vista and researching all the terrible things Vista does to video streams…that is dead for me. It would be ok as a dual boot option or virtual option on another workstation but not this one. No media PVR function should be attempted with Vista. The video degradation alone is reason enough not to touch it. The DRM borders on Facism.
I’ll report back on how the different video quality and ease of use works out.