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Build Your Own Linux PVR
linuxwrangler writes "A few weeks ago Russell Pavlicek, Infoworld's 'Open Source' columnist mentioned a personal linux video time-shifter (PVR) he built. In response to reader requests he has now posted a page describing the project." Escaping the monthly fees of TiVo is a good motivation -- and the total cost here isn't bad either.
Any suggestions for a good remote that doesn't support the company with the worst pop-up/under ads ever?
After all, if one person posts the times of the programs that they want to record, then everyone can have automated recording like Tivo.
Any volunteers for this open source database?
The baby's fine -- please stop sending business cards.
Market this! I have the ability to make a machine for this purpose, and I know people that have done it several times over.
Why isn't there a company bold enough to at least make the hardware?
I'm sure there are legal issues but it seems like some company would have tried it by now.
If I build it myself, it won't start to think me gay (not that that's a bad thing...necessarily)
/. is getting more and more bizarre by the day.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
It's curious that there's no reference to Freevo.
So, for $100 more than the cost of a TiVo, which are now at $199 with a $50 rebate, he built a box that has 5 hours less recording time, a worse encoder,a fraction of the features, and how do you even begin to discribe the UI? Non-existant? I will stick to my TiVos.
I always wonder that all that gets talked about is the Tivo. Im in Europe and there are many different PVRs avaialable here form small and big companies like Toshiba, Nokia, Panasonic and the like. Building one yourself is cool i bet but there are also many different harddrive based video recorders with timeshifting available. And no annoying subscription or anything like that.
Step 1: Sell your TV
Step 2: Cancel your cable/satellite/TiVo account
Step 3: Profit!
Oh...crap. I actually have a step 2.
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Open Source Shirts
For something /. worthy, check out New series 2 Tivo for $199
MythTV works quite a bit better than this one does. Check it out here.
Yeah, I'm tired of paying monthly fees to a company that treats its customers with respect. Screw these companies supporting Linux too. Man, when TiVo released the 3.0 version of their software with broadband support built-in I nearly puked.
If I hear another person complain about a monthly fee to TiVo, I'm gonna punch them square in the pie hole.
I think this is totally awesome, and I'd like to build one of my own, but theres just something nice about being able to pull a piece of hardware out of the box and have it work, no questions asked.
But, maybe this will lead to more hardware manufacturers building machines like this that don't have monthly fees. I mean, what's it cost to build and store a database of television schedules? Can that cost be countered by simple ads? Slashdot seems to be making a great thing happen with its small amount of ads. I would be glad to trade a monthly subscription for some possibly helpful advertising inorder to have a PVR.
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
The recording rate of the TV capture card appears to max out at 15 frames per second. If I were intending to archive these programs forever, I'd probably invest in a better card. But for timeshifting shows like the evening news from France (for my wife) and The Red Green Show (for me), 15 fps is adequate.
15 FPS, I'd hardly call that adequate for 30 FPS NTSC television, but to each his own I suppose.
doesn't TiVo already run linux?
If i'm not mistaken, TiVo is pretty much a linux box running on PPC hardware.
With the current Christmas sales around the country, I'm sure you can get the real thing cheap.
In his first article:
"I remember how the process used to go when I'd scope out solutions in the closed-source world. There would be brochures to peruse. There would be data sheets read. Maybe there would be crippleware demos to run. And then there would be a solution to buy.
Unfortunately, this takes time. Significant time. And in the Internet age, time is critical.
But in the world of open source, I had several options right on my Linux CD. I didn't have to waste time with endless marketing materials."
But you DID have to waste time compiling, testing, setting up, configuring, tweaking, this that and the other thing. I mean c'mon. I've seen (and used) several proprietary solutions that work great with *uncrippled* time-trial demos.
And then you had to waste the time searching for compatible hardware, testing that, taking it back to the store, arguing for a refund, paying 15% restocking, trying something else, etc, etc.
And then you get to the box itself. I'm sorry but a Celeron 400? Sure it might 'work', but not all that well. My p3 600 had trouble capturing tv quality streams without siginificant losses. And it at least had the benefit of UDMA/100 and a 133mhz FSB.
Meh, so some guy made a shitty (functionally and aesthetically) PC that runs linux and plugged it into his TV. Kudo's to you, sir.
I'd really like to do something like this, and use linux to do it. But this guy is full of it. I hate when zealots pretend to be informative.
Gimme a useful article, not a thinly veiled 'MS is TeH SUCK Liniz is tEH GODE!' troll.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Ive seen some good mods of VCR's, but they all seem to make some pretty nasty compromises.
Any ideas?
I call it my "tuxvo"
If you combine cron with vcr you can achieve good quality recordings using divx4/5 pretty much off the shelf.
Add an nVidia GeForce 2 MX w/TV-out and nVidia's kernel module you can save yourself the money for the scan converter.
That is, if you don't mind black bars at the edge of the screen. Otherwise go with the scan converter.
But IMHO nothing beats MPlayer for playback. YMMV
Oh and In Soviet Russia tuxvo records you.
I just got Tivo, and while I'm not a huge fan of the fee (I went box lifetime subscription), you have to remember that with the fee you get software updates and fixes and a really good, highly detailed program guide.
Tivos feature set goes well beyond just recording Sopranos on Sunday nights at 8PM.
I'm not saying an HDD-based VCR wouldn't be a good thing, I wouldn't mind having one, but don't compare it to Tivo -- it's not the same.
Basically, a video capture card, a minimal OS, and two dedicated storage drives capable of holding 24 hours of good quality B&W video each.
If something interesting happened yesterday, I can swap out the quiescient "yesterday" drive for a fresh disk (hotswap) and save/copy/analyse the old data, without having to mess with the running system or the currently active drive that is being used to save today's footage.
Seems simple enough, shouldn't even really need to have an OS, just enough smarts to capture frames and write them to disk. I've heard of people converting old TiVo units to this purpose, but no dedicated hardware that fits my description.
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
DirecTivo is the best... it has a satellite decoder built right in... now show me how to build one of those, and I'll be impressed... but until then, I can't easily change channels on my sat reciever with my pc, and I don't feel like forking out huge amounts of money for two tv tuner cards and two sat receivers just so I can watch one channel and record another...
Tivo still has a place in the market... shrinking yes, but it's not cost effective to try and replace it's functionality... at least not yet...
---
Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
Bullshit! Apparently he doesn't have a wife that feels the need to carry on a conversation right in the middle of a critical part of the show. ;-)
and likewise, the rewind feature comes in handy so you can reply what you just missed when the "conversation" started, before you could pause
Use vcr
/dev/video
Here are my settings: (works very well)
[defaults]
quality = 100
keyframes = 15
audiobitrate = 128
framerate = 29.97
audiomode = stereo
resolution = 384x288
codec = DivX 4.0
norm = NTSC
source = Television
grabdevice =
freqtab = us-cable
It may be nice to have a box and software that *potentially* can work like a Tivo... for the Linux gods. But I have to ask in the name of all the rest of the mortals, where's the GUI? Can we just set this up ONCE and then avoid any kind of hacking? Or is this flawed with the problem of many OSS packages, lack of usability for those who doesn't want/are not able to bother?
IMHO this is the main reason why OSS has not skyrocketed yet, because many people would prefer to pay an extra $100 than having to write batches every time you want to record a TV show or any other kind of menial task.
I know instances of OSS with good interfaces exist. But GUI usually seems to have a very low priority, unfortunately.
The ENIAC Demo Competition
With all these homegrown tivo like PVR's is that if you have digital cable or a satellite you are going to miss out on recording a ton of stuff. With satellite at least you can get a box with the decoders built in. For cable I just recently got the new Scientific Atlanta 8000 box for time warner and it works pretty well, but it is Tivo-lite and has some problems sometimes. But its still WAY better than using a VCR. All it needs is a network jack so I can get 2 boxes and share their recordings. Oh it doesn't do hdtv either.
So what % of TiVo sales goes to GNU/Linux? Or is Tivo just riding on Linux's back?
Anyone out there know?
Karma: The shiznight, mostly because I am the Drizzle.
While the main appeal to most people to purchase a TiVo is its timeshifting ability, there is far more to its featureset than just the way it pauses live TV. Anyone who thinks that TiVo is just a digital VCR hasn't really looked at one closely enough to understand the flexibility that it grants you.
"And I don't like the concept of having my destiny linked with the fortunes of the supplying company. I don't need a US$300 doorstop if the TiVo company should someday fail. Hey, if Enron and Worldcom can end up in the toilet, you have to allow for the fact that no one company will be around forever."
I think TiVo has stated that should they go under, they'd supply the current users with some facility to allow the units to continue to function.
"It should also be capable of creating images that can be burned on Video CDs (VCD)."
This is an ability I know someone has hacked into their TiVo. In addition, the new version of WinDVD allows you to view a stream at 1.2x the speed of broadcast, letting you shave down a 60 minute program to 30 minutes or so (after eliminating commercials).
"My God...It's full of ads!" -Fry, about the Internet, Futurama
Plus it's progressive scan, so actually losing 75% of the original 60 frame interlaced NTSC source. This system was definitely designed by a computer guy, not a video guy (as honorable and deep a form of geekhood as any).
:).
He really wants something that can do interlaced capture, like MPEG-2 or some of the higher profile versions of MPEG-4. I believe this is supported in the current CVS of Xvid, at least experimentally. MPEG-4 would give a LOT smaller file sizes than MPEG-2 at the same quality.
Or, since VCD is his goal, he could capture straight to ffmpeg in a VCD compatible profile. Or use SVCD MPEG-2, which would be higher quality, and could still fit a half-hour show on a 800 MB CD-ROM.
Windows Media 9 has great, free, integrated capture that can do interlaced, but that'd be hardly Linux friendly
My video compression blog
Both companies have seen the market for this data shrink as more people move to Dish Network and DirecTV, systems which have their own in-house listings service, bundled with the decoder boxes.
While there is (limited) competition in the TV listings market, and the profit margins are thin -- it takes a lot of time and effort to not only collect and validate the information from various sources and put it into a single standard format, but also (attempt to) clean up errors, typos, and general inconsistency across all the different data sources.
I have heard hints that TMS is considering offering "hobbyist" licensing for their local lineup and listings, perhaps eventually giving a free/cheap service to get "legal" access to the same online listings database as is currently offered for some smart remote controls.
This guy watches Red Green. I was shocked to see that none of the pics on his site had a stitch of duct tape.
I don't have any problems getting 30fps, but I am using 1Ghz Athlon for my home made PVR. I have experimented with this a bit, for me, 15fps doesn't cut it, 24-25 is exceptable, but for truly smooth video that isn't hard to watch, I need to hit 30fps.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
Man builds house by pushing large stones into a big pile.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Sure you say you can do a Tivo cheaper. Maybe. But to me, the advantages of doing this outweigh the advantages of Tivo. I personally don't care for the thumbs uping and thumbs downing. I know what I want to watch and I don't want it recording anything else. Couple other folks mentioned the Freevo project and that interests me alot. But a lot of folks forget what you could do. You could hack the program a bit and add a button that lets you Zap a show to a standard DVD-R. You could use NFS and make a similar pc with a WiFi card in it, but minimal hard drive and a TV out card and have the view your recorded shows on any tv. Or start watching it in the living room, pause and go to the bedroom to finish. You could run samba and then mount a disc and setup a doze machine for your kids and they can watch Seasame Street in their room (no TV needed). I could go on, but I would have a rather long post. The advantages far outweigh they nice package Tivo provides.
Gorkman
So what % of TiVo sales goes to GNU/Linux? Or is Tivo just riding on Linux's back?
Why should any of it? Isn't the point that they should be putting the source back out for people to benefit from? And if they are doing this, aren't they fulfilling the gpl and any requirements and/or obligations they have to the OS community?
The principle is simple, because the TV is just a fixed frequency monitor that takes RGB and timing signals. The circuit only converts the timings. This means a little extra work on the software side, as you have to configure X for the TV's resolution and frequency. Unfortunately some video boards (such as mine) have a lower limit on the frequency and the circuit won't work well. Otherwise it might be worth the hack :-)
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
Seems the missing piece in all this is supported MPEG-2 encoding hardware. Then one could use a really low-power (read: quiet) CPU to run it all.
Are there any cards out there worth looking at?
Ah, but in fact 29.97 is an approximation itself. The actual value is 30000/1001.
:).
As long as we're being geeky
My video compression blog
Which brings me to the question: are there any (cheap... goes without saying) TV tuner cards out there that can output MPEG2 or MJPEG in realtime? I'm thinking of building such a PVR box with multiple tuners ("just 'cause"), and I think the bandwidth requirements might be too much for multiple cards, especially if you want to do good quality capture (30fps?).
He goes through all the trouble and expense to make a basic TV "Time Shift" device with Linux, and then sumbits a picture of it sitting on top of a VCR!!! Granted, that's old tech "time shifting", but he obviously knows how to set the clock on the damn thing, so it probably could "work just fine for his needs" as well.
Let's see, what else could we make with Linux to do the same job as a tool we already have?
Wine, music and cinema are the three great creations of humanity. -T'Ian Han
It seems like the real voodoo cool trick that is unavailable on any of these systems and is available on Tivo and ReplayTV is the ability to pause live TV. Personally I think that's one of the best features of the system. Actually, pausing live TV isn't the cool part, it's letting a show queue up all the commercial time at the beginning, while you do something else, then go in and skip all the commercials. I'd love to flip a recorder on for the first 90 minutes of monday night football, then go do something else, and come back to a commercial free game.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
The NetTopBox project claims to be working on this, but I haven't seen any results yet.
The thing is that it is much easier to sit down and do a CLI quickly and get the kinks worked out than it is to develop a usable GUI. I've tried to do a similar project to this, and doing it all command line makes life much simpler in the beginning. Eventually, yes, having a nice GUI would be good, but if a hacker can throw together the box with a CLI and be happy with what he's got, isn't that okay?
If somebody wants a nice GUI, they'll write one. As somebody else pointed out, there's the freevo project which has what appears to be a very nice GUI.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
From my figuring, the author spent $300 building this super-widget. So, he saved $250 over a new TiVo with a lifetime suibscription.
:)
For that, he sacrificed a whole lot!
* 15fps
* poor video quality (vertical lines) on top of the 15fps
* No 'live pause'
* No watching one program while saving another
* No guide, etc.
For me, the tradeoff isn't worth it. Even if TiVo fails as a company, I suspect that the community will come up with a network-hack for getting scheduling information.
And even if you lose that, you still have a better-quality recorder with an easy interface, more features, that's running linux.
It only compares if you wanted to play around building a PVR for personal humor. It doesn't make sense as a solution, though
Steve
So, going to build us a VCR, then? Sure, this thing isn't as convenient or functional as a Tivo, but to that I have three comments:
1) there is something to be said for the experience and enjoyment of building something like this yourself even if you could go out and buy something equivalent
2) this is clearly a first effort on low grade hardware. Given a little better performing hardware, or maybe just a hardware mpeg encoder, this machine would surpass a basic VCR.
3) unlike a VCR, this is all digital so he can send the recordings to friends without quality degradation. He can archive the shows conveniently in a database on his computer and search for old shows he wants to see. It gives somebody a lot of power to manage the shows that can't be had from a VCR.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
So do they not use gcc? I thought anything that was developed with gcc or included it's libraries also had to be OS (just a question, I have no idea)?
As for "leeching" off of Linux, how many people who actually use Linux (or any GPL code for that matter) have actually contibuted, regardless of whether or not they make any money from it (note that I would consider those who use it for their job someone who is making money from it).
If they utilize the tools available, don't break the rules governing it, and produce a good usable product, why not support them?
"a personal linux video time-shifter"
Wow, I wish my linux box could shift time. Then I could waste my time on slashdot and still get these final Compiler projects graded on time!
Actually it wasn't gcc the compiler, but rather the libraries that I was curious about. With M$, you are granted a license to use the libraries for whatever purposes, I wasen't sure if the libraries that came with gcc also stated the same (since some third party libraries are clearly GPL).
The one benefit of a home-made PVR is that you can program the start time and end time very specifically.
I don't know if TIVO has time offset features, since they're not available in Canada, but I do know that no two stations synchronize their clocks nor start and end on time as per electronic schedules. For that matter, it's quite possible that the clock on my PVR could be off by as much as minute.
I've always found that I've had to give my VCR 2 extra minutes on the start time and end time just so I don't miss anything important at the beginning or end of the show (especially the clip for "next week's episode"). This can especially be a pain the behind if you are trying to tape two shows one after the other on two different channels.
Maybe someone with a TIVO can let us know if you can override the electronic tv programming schedule?
Everyone who thinks this is a good idea seem to be people who have never actually used a Tivo and don't really "get" all it does.
Or prove me wrong. Is there anyone reading who uses a Tivo and is interested in switching to this?
the company with the worst pop-up/under ads ever
Just as MP3.com is only one vendor of MPEG audio files, X10.com is only one vendor of devices that follow the X-10 power-line data communication protocol.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Go get one of these cards, ins/outs galore, coaxial in, monitor, all on one card. It comes with software for time shifting and all the usual pause rewind etc live tv features too. Probably the coolest thing is the RF remote, its gotta mouse on it, sort of. The 7500 is going for a little over $100 these days.
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
Why 384x288 for NTSC? That's quarter PAL screen. Since NTSC only has 480 lines, quarter screen is normally 320x240.
DivX 5 handles interlaced video, I believe. 640x480 DivX 5 could give you better quality, and the file size wouldn't be too much worse if you turn on all those Advanced Simple features (you'll need a fast box though).
My video compression blog
For smooth motion, capture frame rate should be an integer division of the source frame rate. So, for NTSC, 60, 30, and 15 are good options, but 24 isn't.
Of course, if you do an inverse telecine with film source originally shot at 24p, restoring it to 24, 24 is a fine option.
My video compression blog
There are extra features hidden behind a password. I guess it's hacker-friendly in a twisted way -- there's now a distributed project to brute-force the password.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
I've been working on a PC-based Tivo-like system for a couple of months now and have published some (hopefully) useful information here.
One critical factor is the choice of a "smart" or a "dumb" capture card and deciding whether you want to be able to export your recordings to DVDR/CDR disks in DVD/SVCD/VCD format.
If you just want plain Tivo-like functionality then you can use DivX as your compression method and get reasonable results with a software-based realtime encoder.
I've compared the two options and reviewed the Pinnacle PCTV card (dumb BT8x8 capture) and the Hauppauge PVR-250 (smart -- it has onbard hardware MPEG encoding).
Is this stuff any good? Here's a clue -- hardware companies should stick to making hardware and leave the software writing to software professionals. This clearly hasn't happened in the tuner/capture-card industry.
Most of the work to date has been done under Windows but I'm currently working on using this hardware config under Linux and will update the project site accordingly.
However, if you want to then export your DivX files to DVD/SVCD/VCD you're going to get sub-optimal quality because you're transcoding between two lossy formats. Since the stuff I like to keep for posterity on CDR/DVDR is more than likely going to be material like good movies or music concerts, I have opted to use an MPEG1/MPEG2 encoder and avoid re-encoding.
There are also a couple of video samples demonstrating the differences between the three most popular options:
1. Realtime MPEG capture using a dumb card
2. Non-realtime encoding using TMPGenc
3. Realtime MPEG capture using a hardware encoder.
There's a heap more to do on this project but it's coming along quite nicely.
This TV-Now thing looks to be a better bet. It's not free but that (to me) is not a bad thing--you'll have somebody to complain to if it doesn't work or the listings are incorrect.
I tried Tivo - it sucked. The Tivo couldn't change the channel on my DirectTv receivers (RCA). I still like the PVR concept and was thinking of trying to get it working using freevo and DirecTv. Has anyone else tried this combonaition (I haven't seen any posts on the web concerning this combonation.) Thanks - Tony
the networks will probably want to kill me for this, but....
As long as we're making our own PVRs, do any of them have the ability to use XML edit scripts to cut out commercials? Fast forward and 30-second skip and all are nice, but they always miss and you have to back up. It wouldn't be to hard to just distribute exact timing. In theory, everyone records The Simpsons on their computer, some kind soul goes through and marks the start and end time for each commercial break, and makes this file available on the net. The edit file includes the station it was captured from (different stations could theoritically use differnt length breaks), and some signature derived from the content which can be used to synch up the times. There's a slashcode site where they're posted, and you get modded based on how accurately you annotate the commercial breaks (meaning the networks don't distribute commercial-only edits (although... superbowl)). Then the rest of us get home a few hours later, grab an edit script off the web, and watch the show hassle free.
I've wanted this for most of my life. And now that it's becomming technically possible it's probably illegal (or will be). sigh
To create (S)VCD cue/bins from MPEG files , you can use vcdimager. Keep in mind that (S)VCD only accept certain resolutions and bitrates, not just any MPEG file can be used to create a video CD.
Don't build it, buy it!
The folks at TiVo worked hard to develop and manufacture their product, and this pirate just goes and makes his own, basically taking food from the mouths of TiVo engineers.
Making your own stuff goes against the ideals of Corporatism!
1) Earn!
2) Consume!
3) Discard!
TV Guide has online listings... for free... I'm sure someone could figure out how to make use of it.
you'll have somebody to complain to if it doesn't work or the listings are incorrect
Isn't this one of Microsoft's reasons for avoiding free source projects? How is this any more relevant here than with source code? Do you really think they are going to pay much attention?
Infuriate left and right
He watches the Red-Green Show!
No wonder he practically pieced this thing together with Duct Tape!
What next? A Linux based Lawn-mower made out of an ol washing machine?
And I thought I was the only one that gets too tired to stay up late enough to watch Red Green.
I just put together something like this for myself under Windows.
;).
Works like this:
Athlon 1200 with a cheap 1394 interface card sitting beside the TV with a Canopus ADVC-100 Analog/DV transcoder sitting on top. The output of my satellite receiver goes into the canopus box, then out of the canopus box into the VCR/TR.
I've written a simple winbatch script to remote control the "Scenalyzer Live" software to run the firewire interface and capture the video incoming from the ADVC-100. Hopefully the Scenalyzer author will add some command line switches to the software as well so the winbatch script can go away (not particularly elegant, but it works).
Remote controlling the whole thing with a Logitech wireless keyboard / mouse works very well.
When the script is finished capturing, winbatch exits. Once a day (early in the morning), virtualdub fires up at low task priority and automatically recompresses the captured file down to a much smaller DIVX5 file and deletes the original DV media (if that option is set). Since it's at such a low priority, it's not a big deal if another DV cap starts as virtualdub gets virtually no CPU time (ya, pun, ha, I know
If I choose not to delete the DV file, I can watch it back through the ADVC box into the TV. Most times I'll just go with the virtualdub file which looks very nice at 3/4 resolution and 30fps (deinterlaced). Can also be easily archived to CDR/DVD-R as well.
The interface isn't particularly elegant at the moment, but it works, can run mostly in automatic mode, and has the advantage of also being able to listen to MP3s, watch DiVX media, and of course, network to all of my other machines.
"Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence." - Charles de Gaulle
The problem with this guy's effort is that he's doing things the hard way.
My own Tivo-like PC project has so far taken a more pragmatic approach and evaluated a number of hardware and software options.
It would seem that Windows, given the proliferation of PVR hardware and software available for it, is the better option for such a task. (Yeah, I hate to say it).
As part of my project development I've reviewed two capture/tuner card options: a dumb BT8x8 card which relies on the host PC's CPU to do all the hard work, and an affordable tuner/capture card that has an onboard MPEG1/MPEG2 encoder in hardware.
The differences can be quite dramatic when you're looking to build Tivo-like functionality on a PC platform -- but there's no clear winner because both have pro's and con's.
However, using the card with the hardware encoder I can capture at 720x576 or so with no dropped frames while the host CPU sits comfortably at about 12%-18% utilization.
I can even carry on using the PC for other tasks without any real perceptable effect on either the recording or the interactivity of the desktop.
Man, there are inpatient treatment centers for people like you.
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
All you MandrakeClub members who are interested in Freevo and MythTV need to head over to the RPM-voting section of the Club and vote for Freevo and MythTV.
o ad &name=RPM
http://www.mandrakeclub.com/modules.php?op=modl
Freevo is on the first page, and Myth TV is on the 3rd.
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Instant TiVO.... Oh wait, for Linux .....
Try, http://gatos.sourceforge.net/ or ftp://ftp.xig.com/pub/3Ddemos/extras/README.xvamp
... Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed...
It's a limitation of the hauppage bttv card and/or v4l interface it complains about certian values. Make no mistake, This is not a setup for videophiles, I usually play them back on a analog tv or in a small window on my workstation. The small size is a bonus too it averages 400MB/hour Which lets me get 2 hours on a cd (having cropped out commercials courtesy of mencoder)
Great now *they* know I skip commercials. I've just made a list somewhere. *ugh*
I completely agree. There's a lot of criticism from people that have never used a Tivo. I used to be one of those on-the-fence people that never thought it was an ok idea, but I would never need one. Pausing live TV just didn't seem like it was that good a feature. I saw the displays at the store, but didn't really think much of it. It wasn't until I actually sat down and used one that I understood its true power. I could sit here all day and explain to you how good a Tivo is but it's nearly impossible for you to gain the understanding you would if you spent one day with one, recording shows and playing with the UI. So before many readers go out and try to build their own Tivos with Mountain Dew and duct tape, I encourage them to find a friend who has one and use it to understand what they should be shooting for. It'd be great to permanently archive shows to CD/DVD and do all kinds of crazy stuff, but sometimes it's just nice to be able to buy a component that works. You can use that old PC with a radio card and spend a few nights writing code to turn it into an awesome clock/radio that will play mp3s or grab streaming radio for the morning news, but it might just be better to buy that $19 Sony clock radio.
Aw, damn ... I knew that Preview button was there for a reason!
Time Warner has started to offer their own PVR for $5 a month. It includes two tuners (for recording two shows at once), it can hold 50 hours, it works directly with an on-screen guide, and I highly doubt TW is going out of business anytime soon. Hopefully more cable providers will pick up on this venture.
Escaping the monthly fees of TiVo is a good motivation -- and the total cost here isn't bad either.
You don't have to pay the monthly fees with a tivo, you only have to if you expect the built in tv guide functions to work. The total cost of a tivo is bought on sale when they are clearancing the old units is around $100 or so.. the total cost of using an extra computer to do pvr stuff is significantly more.
If anyone's interested, there's also an article on this is the November 2002 Popular Science.
The networks just don't "get it" yet.
The big thing that PVRs change is the whole "must see" lineup. You're no longer tied to your couch because favorite show is one right now. This puts a big crimp in the way Networks are used to thinking in, since using a PVR means you may not watch their Thursday night line up until Sunday morning.
PVRs also threaten the whole "lead-in" concept where they'll put a not-so popular show between two popular programs in hopes that you won't switch away. Since PVRs only record what you tell them to, you won't be recording those extra programs anyways.
Worse still, since many cable programs re-run at later times/dates, using a PVR means you'll actually be able to watch *more* TV that you're actually interested in.
It's too bad the Nielsens don't take PVRs into account otherwise the Networks would learn that is actually a good thing... They no longer have to just fight for your eyeballs between 8-10pm when all they have to do is rerun their programs at 2am, and folks will record them. (IE - there's no reason to go off-air...)
Must... escape... $4.95... monthly... fee!!!!
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is kinky.
I went with the VIA EPIA 800, which features an 800 MHz VIA C3 CPU with on-board TV-out (and much more) for a mere US$120. And it's tiny for a full-featured computer, just 170mm x 170mm.
Plus, it has built-in audio, on-board Ethernet (though I've plugged in a wireless PCI card), USB, etc. -- great for a project like this. And it runs GNU/Linux like a champ.
I put it in a US$90 black mini-ITX case so it doesn't look like a computer -- it looks like an A/V component, fitting right in with the VCR and the cable box.
Finally, it runs very cool and very quiet (or it will once I remove the noisy hard disk and make it boot off the network instead) -- just one small CPU fan required. The CPU isn't that powerful -- mostly around the speed of a 600MHz Celeron, and the FPU is a little weaker than that -- but it's plenty of power for me.
There's a lot more info about this and similar hardware at mini-itx.com. I think a big market is developing around these little boxes.
``Life results from the non-random survival of randomly varying replicators.'' -- Richard Dawkins
What's wrong with you people? For years, everyone whined that Linux was being ignored in the server market, in the embedded market, etc.
Suddenly, a few years ago, TiVo produced a Linux-based PVR. They even (*GASP!*) encouraged hacking it!
Now, you want to "avoid the service cost?"
Brilliant. Take one of the few companies that stands to actually make a successful business based on Linux, and attempt to put them out of business because you're too cheap to pay $12 a month for the service, to support a company that has supported the Linux community over the years.
What, exactly, is the reason for not wanting to support TiVo? Besides being complete skinflints, that is...if you can't afford $12/mo., you shouldn't be spending $300-500 for a luxury item like a PVR in the first place.
.@.
Dude, if my girl's thong is as big as her t-shirt, I don't think I want to see her in it :)
It all goes downhill from first post
Although for a while Borland was trying to pull precisely this trick with their development tools.
Is this thing real?
Nah, can't be.
http://freevo.sourceforge.net
EXCELENT PVR software, i've used it. Actually, i haven't tried the recording part, but everything i have tried (playing movies, mp3s, photo gallery) was worked great. Has an awsome interface too. It would be GREAT for one of those anandtec boxes.... the sv24 or whatever it is.
I'm not drunk, I'm just in touch with pi.
No, this joke is definitely way past its 'best used before' date. Sorry about that, everyone. Please move on.
Money for nothing, pix for free
It would be very useful to be able to control all the stuff that currently has a remote, from a computer.
I would guess that anybody attempting to collate TV listing information and distribute it will rapidly find a DCMA warrent being served.
Got to love those legislators. The things they will do to protect us from our evil selves.
is one that I am currently experimenting with: Allwell Set-Top Boxes.
I bought one through my employer, and the cool things about these boxes are:
Can be seen here.
Only problem is the display driver, the video chip is a Tvia 5005 and so far I had no succes in finding drivers for Linux... VESA FB works well but it could be much faster/smoother/use real PAL resolutions if I had the correct drivers. If anyone knows where to get them, please tell me !
Sound works fine BTW, but I don't remember what chip that was... CX5530 ?
Now, you want to "avoid the service cost?"
Yes, it is called choice.
You know, that thing Free software is about?
Besides being complete skinflints, that is...if you can't afford $12/mo., you shouldn't be spending $300-500 for a luxury item...
When you demonize someone who has made a choice you disagree with, you come across as an obnoxious zealot.
Your comment, and the other comments in this thread which personally insult the guy who made this PVR and then took the trouble and the bandwidth costs to share it with everyone, make many people ask themselves:
"Hmmm, the Tivo seems kind of cool, but some of the most vocal users are such vicious, immature dicks.. maybe I don't want one."
If Linux itself ultimately fails to take over all computing, it will not be due to any technical fault or deficiency. It will be because immature, foul-mouthed shits who insult anyone who disagrees with them have driven undecided people away.
I wanted a dedicated gaming box, so I put together a system with a Celeron 400 and a Voodoo3. Sure, it only plays games at 5fps and it cost twice as much as a PS2, Xbox or Gamecube, but it runs Linux. I said it runs Linux!
Sigh. I get the essential coolness of hacking things together, but this is such a poor solution that I really can't see it as anything other than a big fat waste of time and money.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Unofficially, yes. My Tivo (Series2) has a USB port with a USB Ethernet adapter. On startup, it grabs a DHCP address, and does its thing.
Hmm,
I'm not impressed.
My own creation is a lot better:
full PAL resolution, full FPS, and
no fans whatsoever -> zero noise.
It's at:
http://www.stolk.info/server/
Bram Stolk http://stolk.org/tlctc/
C'monnnnnn I know you do it. Or what about all those Yoga shows! Admit it!
I see many posts here complaining about this guy's home made PVR. They are all complaining about the lack of features or this and that. It's a work in progress folks and it's just been started! Grow up!
I wonder if these same complainers were complaining in 1993 about Linux kernel 0.9x "Microsoft has more features!" "Microsoft has a better GUI!" "Why should we spend all the time configuring this Linux thing when we could just spend $300 and buy Windows".
The arguments are identical. Cut this fellow some slack for daring to build something that you won't even attempt.
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
What's needed is something that will announce all kinds of real-time content. Video streams, audio streams/ radio/TV satellite / time sensitive media files etc. etc...
How about a massive p2p announcement like...
Right now, a commercial just started/ended on channel 37.
The announcement should be in a well-specified short low-latency binary format, of course.
Those who would give up liberty in exchange for security and DRM should switch to Microsoft Palladium!
[ I'm posting this without +1, as it's already offtopic. ]
Paging NumberSyx. See here.