Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Best PC DVR Software, For Any Platform?

Posted by timothy on from the open-minded-open-ended dept.

jshamacher writes "I've used MythTV for several years (first on Slackware, now via Mythbuntu) and it's good. But not great — I have a list of annoyances as long as my arm. For example, even 0.22 still has problems playing many DVDs and I frequently have to fall back on Xine. Since upgrading to new hardware, I've had issues with sound dropping out; these problems only occur for Myth, not for anything else. So now I'm trying out alternatives. Freevo seemed promising when I tried it a few months ago but it had its own issues. I'm also increasingly getting pressure from my family to get things like NetFlix streaming working on this machine. This seems to imply migrating to a Windows-based solution. I threw XP on it and tried MediaPortal but could never get that to control my Motorola cable box via the IR blaster. So my questions to you: What DVR software do you use? Are you happy with it? What don't you like? Are there any packages out there that 'just work' as media hubs and for time-shifting cable TV?"

1 of 536 comments (clear)

  1. try MediaBrowser w/ VMC/W7MC by ahbi · · Score: 0, Redundant

    WMC is "good enough" but you really want something like MediaBrowser is you have a lot of ripped DVDs or saved videos.

    It is currently free and open sourced.
    Although the authors want to move to a pay but open source model, mostly due to the popularity of it and how that eats into their time. They seem a bit slow to move onto that model however.

    MB will automatically pull metadata info from the TVDB and Movie DB (open APIs) for your movies and videos (assuming they are named in a way MB understands).
    Based upon that metadata it'll do genre/studio/release date sorting, and keeps track of your watch & partly-watched videos.
    Has about 3-4 themes (supported by the respective authors) and within those themes a series of views (poster, banner, coverflow, thumbnail, etc.).

    Also MB had a Music plug-in in the works (haven't tried it).
    And it can handle VMC and W7MC recorded videos. (also haven't tried personally)
    You can also look towards MyMovies but that is really DVD-centric. Although it is a great source for movie metadata.