The hard part is uh... ripping your original laser discs to mpeg, or ripping them from the re-release DVD video, or uh other *wink* aquisition methods.
Although after firing it back up, it was both cool and slightly dissapointing, but it didn't cost me a dollar to die 3 times in rapid succession... stupid rope swingin sequence! At least I can change the dip switch/settings and have more lives
well, just to be contentious: you *can* get unencrypted HD (and presumably SD) channels via QAM256 with an HDTV card (the HD-3000 does do this).
You can also use mythtv to pull HD (and SD) channels into mythtv from your cable box via firewire, but it's a little hit or miss as to what channels have the 5c copy flag enabled or not (or if your cable box will have the appropriate firmware/active firewire ports... you can ask for a box with firewire port per FCC rulings from what I understand)
You're right though... there's no good, clear way to reliably get digital content into any external PVR (especially PC based) that isn't made/sanctioned by your cable/satellite company, and it sucks... especially when it comes to HD.
Allegedly windows vista MCE flavor will get sanctioned to be able to have enough drm to meet cablecard specifications and then we'll get it, but it'll be with M$, DRM, and blah!
"Wait, how can we get Linux-specific video capture cards (a moderately specialty device), and no designed-for-Linux video cards? What the crap is this?"
that's not exactly fair. Someone took the initiative to take a reference ATSC tuner design from conexant and write linux drivers for it and market it/sell it to linux/mythtv enthusiasts.
You can feel free to do the same (or organize a cooperative to do so) for video cards...
e.
That's my understanding of PCHDTV, my assumptions and recollection could be wrong/off.
"And this is supposed to be so much better than taping? The time shifting abilities of PRV's are great when watching live shows, but really the only people for whom the PVR experience is "revolutionary" are folks too stupid to program their VCR's to begin with."
*sigh* I hope this is a troll. You don't understand the power of a fully armed and operational PVR station!
How much fun was it to label tapes and mark down counter settings and forget the pain of shuttling back and forth to find a show in the middle of a tape! Sorting through and storing stacks of tapes sounds like fun too!
A PVR doesn't need to be programmed for time/channel/duration... you just tell it find all the seinfeld episodes... or tape any movies with bruce campbell in it... or only the NEW episodes of CSI LV. It's so much more powerful than a vcr.
the "revolution" is in building up a small queue of programming that was intelligently chosen and watching what you want when you want.
A VCR is to PVR for recording what old school search engines is to google for finding stuff on the web.
"What makes TiVo a great product isn't its PVR functionality, it's the thoughtfully designed interface. This is something I don't think people who havn't used TiVo really understand. From the way it rewinds a little after you stop fast forwarding to the schedule tables, TiVo constantly does things that make me happy"
I have both a series 2 Tivo and have a DIY PVR and regularly evaluate/try 3rd party PVR/HTPC software.
Tivo is certainly the gold standard for ease of use UI and design (including the remote!), but I think they've long since lost their first mover advantage in the UI department. SageTV and BeyondTV (3rd party commercial windows PVR solutions) both come really close to Tivo usability/attractiveness AND offer DRM-less files and other functionality TiVo doesn't have.
With that said, if you're TiVo stops listening to you and won't "keep until I delete" certain shows down the line because of a flag/glitch by content providers it's not gonna matter how pretty or easy to use the interface is if it's no longer "TV your way" Will Tivo be your friend still after that?
And affordability varies on what you want to do... but if you have an existing reasonably spec'd spare PC... a 90 dollar hauppauge wintv pvr 150 hardawre encoding card with remote/ir blaster is pretty reasonable. Especially if you don't have to deal with recurring subscription costs.
although the real reason to build a DIY PVR is NOT to save $$$, it's for freedom/control over your box and content and the flexibility to add functionality without waiting for Tivo to ask permission from content providers/FCC first (e.g. tivo2go). Commercial flagging/deletion, DVD ripping, cool parsing of closed captioning, etc...
you need to look closer at how Vista is "sandboxing" media, and then you'll understand how it could potentially lock out 3rd party media applications. Mix in a little trusted computing, phasing out analog... oh I'm afraid the DRM will be quite sizable and not up just my wazoo. =P
I find windows MCE a curious choice... with plenty of good extentadble or open source 3rd party PVR software solutions out there. *Shrug*
Someone has pointed out movielink... beyond media has it integrated into it's frontend... I believe Meedio does or would have a plugin for it. Meedio has a ton of HTPC/home automation stuff that might be worth investigating fruther.
"Wouldn't changing to another CMS possibly cause you to lose readership? Seems like just upgrading the server is the way to go."
I ASSume he'd import/export over the old entries/articles to the new CMS, and probably create some apache url rewrites to make sure links to the old content/link style redirect to the "new" version.
"I completely second that. Adsense makes a painfully small amount of money unless you get a ridiculous amount of hits. I get hit by The pirate bay [thepiratebay.org] every time I post a torrent (I post info/screenshots pages) and the thousands of hits add up to 40 cents here and there when someone buys something expensive through an ad."
The irony here is killing me. It's not just the number of hits, it depends on the popularity/desirability (from the adwords advertiser auction point of view) of the keyword(s) identified by the google adsense bot.
Surprisingly the cost per clickthrough bids on the "x86 OSX dev kit torrent" key word is low. Not sure why that is...
To the o.p. there's a 3rd option:
Have a semi-desirable topical site with modest traffic and people click on a few ads that have text that *shock* appeals to/interests them?! If you're lucky you can make a reasonably amount of scratch to cover hosting and maybe a little more. Who knew it could work legitimately?!!?
In my experience having high traffic isn't enough for adsense, you need to have a topic/key words that advertisers are interested in (anyone remember the asbestos lung cancer methsolopmisaiaiaaia blog adsense experiment?) good, but not obnoxious placement of the ads/color scheme, and of course gobs of traffic never hurt.
To be more on topic, it's interseting the dilemna they are facing... and it'll be interested in seeing how they make out with the contribution drive... It seemed to work on a smaller scale for kottke
I think they're obnoxious use of multiple adsense units inside articles hurts their clickthroughs... and they could probably do better with a full tower on the main page (from my experience, YMMV)
They could consider getting traditional advertisers or sponsors... but all this means thinking about business and developing business relationships instead of working on the site and doing the journalist/editor stuff... dem da breaks though if you want to make the big time =)
e.
didn't cringely do something like this...
on
Wi-Fi Times Sixteen
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
ah here's the link he "mesh'd" 3 or 4 open AP's to be one fat connection.
wasn't there some awful fold up "tv" tray that was advertised on TV that might work for something like this?
I know i ridiculed the slobs in the commercial when I saw it originally... but having my "lap" toasted by my laptop makes me think it's not such a bad idea after all
*shrug* Anyone remember the name to that as seen on TV doohickey
" Microsoft and Yahoo's new formula for success on the web seems to be: Do whatever Google does!"
As much fun as it is to piss on yahoo as the "old and busted" and google as the "new hotness"... Yahoo has made some interesting forward thinking purchases lately... like flickr and Konfabulator
*shrug* YMMV, and I'm no yahoo apologist/fan boy... just saying not all that glitters is google.
Slashdot Mirror
uh oh does it sorta vaguely resemble a modern/ipod looking phillips CD-i controller?
e.
You should check out Daphne Dragon's Lair / laser disc emulator
The hard part is uh... ripping your original laser discs to mpeg, or ripping them from the re-release DVD video, or uh other *wink* aquisition methods.
Although after firing it back up, it was both cool and slightly dissapointing, but it didn't cost me a dollar to die 3 times in rapid succession... stupid rope swingin sequence! At least I can change the dip switch/settings and have more lives
e.
well, just to be contentious: you *can* get unencrypted HD (and presumably SD) channels via QAM256 with an HDTV card (the HD-3000 does do this).
You can also use mythtv to pull HD (and SD) channels into mythtv from your cable box via firewire, but it's a little hit or miss as to what channels have the 5c copy flag enabled or not (or if your cable box will have the appropriate firmware/active firewire ports... you can ask for a box with firewire port per FCC rulings from what I understand)
You're right though... there's no good, clear way to reliably get digital content into any external PVR (especially PC based) that isn't made/sanctioned by your cable/satellite company, and it sucks... especially when it comes to HD.
Allegedly windows vista MCE flavor will get sanctioned to be able to have enough drm to meet cablecard specifications and then we'll get it, but it'll be with M$, DRM, and blah!
e.
"Wait, how can we get Linux-specific video capture cards (a moderately specialty device), and no designed-for-Linux video cards? What the crap is this?"
that's not exactly fair. Someone took the initiative to take a reference ATSC tuner design from conexant and write linux drivers for it and market it/sell it to linux/mythtv enthusiasts.
You can feel free to do the same (or organize a cooperative to do so) for video cards...
e.
That's my understanding of PCHDTV, my assumptions and recollection could be wrong/off.
"And this is supposed to be so much better than taping? The time shifting abilities of PRV's are great when watching live shows, but really the only people for whom the PVR experience is "revolutionary" are folks too stupid to program their VCR's to begin with."
*sigh* I hope this is a troll. You don't understand the power of a fully armed and operational PVR station!
How much fun was it to label tapes and mark down counter settings and forget the pain of shuttling back and forth to find a show in the middle of a tape! Sorting through and storing stacks of tapes sounds like fun too!
A PVR doesn't need to be programmed for time/channel/duration... you just tell it find all the seinfeld episodes... or tape any movies with bruce campbell in it... or only the NEW episodes of CSI LV. It's so much more powerful than a vcr.
the "revolution" is in building up a small queue of programming that was intelligently chosen and watching what you want when you want.
A VCR is to PVR for recording what old school search engines is to google for finding stuff on the web.
e.
"Try reading more closely. This is a bug in the Tivo software, caused by a noisy signal, not actual content protection being used."
I'm going to have to wrap my Tivo in tinfoil, me thinks =P
"What makes TiVo a great product isn't its PVR functionality, it's the thoughtfully designed interface. This is something I don't think people who havn't used TiVo really understand. From the way it rewinds a little after you stop fast forwarding to the schedule tables, TiVo constantly does things that make me happy"
I have both a series 2 Tivo and have a DIY PVR and regularly evaluate/try 3rd party PVR/HTPC software.
Tivo is certainly the gold standard for ease of use UI and design (including the remote!), but I think they've long since lost their first mover advantage in the UI department. SageTV and BeyondTV (3rd party commercial windows PVR solutions) both come really close to Tivo usability/attractiveness AND offer DRM-less files and other functionality TiVo doesn't have.
With that said, if you're TiVo stops listening to you and won't "keep until I delete" certain shows down the line because of a flag/glitch by content providers it's not gonna matter how pretty or easy to use the interface is if it's no longer "TV your way" Will Tivo be your friend still after that?
*shrug* YMMV =P
e.
in addition to the excellent knoppmyth mentioned previously... MythDora FC3 MythTV tailored distro.
"Re:MythTV Doesn't Do HDTV"
uh yes it does... HD-3000 PCHDTV
And affordability varies on what you want to do... but if you have an existing reasonably spec'd spare PC... a 90 dollar hauppauge wintv pvr 150 hardawre encoding card with remote/ir blaster is pretty reasonable. Especially if you don't have to deal with recurring subscription costs.
although the real reason to build a DIY PVR is NOT to save $$$, it's for freedom/control over your box and content and the flexibility to add functionality without waiting for Tivo to ask permission from content providers/FCC first (e.g. tivo2go). Commercial flagging/deletion, DVD ripping, cool parsing of closed captioning, etc...
e.
mini-itx case mod DVR =P
Or doorstep...
Or you can find a way to upload your own listings from your own mothership instead of tivo's...
*shrug*
e.
Thanks for the kind words, pardner!
you need to look closer at how Vista is "sandboxing" media, and then you'll understand how it could potentially lock out 3rd party media applications. Mix in a little trusted computing, phasing out analog... oh I'm afraid the DRM will be quite sizable and not up just my wazoo. =P
e.
no need for you to have all that DRM-less media laying around anymore
e.
I find windows MCE a curious choice... with plenty of good extentadble or open source 3rd party PVR software solutions out there. *Shrug*
Someone has pointed out movielink... beyond media has it integrated into it's frontend... I believe Meedio does or would have a plugin for it. Meedio has a ton of HTPC/home automation stuff that might be worth investigating fruther.
it's not hollywood, but creative common's licensed material of interest is Downhill Battle's Particpatory Culture DTV thingie
e.
intel's trusted computing meets MCE 2005's DRM'd media files.
the definition of "scalable" in 3...2....1...
"Wouldn't changing to another CMS possibly cause you to lose readership? Seems like just upgrading the server is the way to go."
I ASSume he'd import/export over the old entries/articles to the new CMS, and probably create some apache url rewrites to make sure links to the old content/link style redirect to the "new" version.
*shrug*
I had thought that Mambo was supposed to perform pretty well and "scale" reasonably well compared to some other comprable CMS/portals out there.
What version of Mysql... are you using any php caching/accelleration? Any regular caching?
FWIW I feel for you.
e
"I completely second that. Adsense makes a painfully small amount of money unless you get a ridiculous amount of hits. I get hit by The pirate bay [thepiratebay.org] every time I post a torrent (I post info/screenshots pages) and the thousands of hits add up to 40 cents here and there when someone buys something expensive through an ad."
The irony here is killing me. It's not just the number of hits, it depends on the popularity/desirability (from the adwords advertiser auction point of view) of the keyword(s) identified by the google adsense bot.
Surprisingly the cost per clickthrough bids on the "x86 OSX dev kit torrent" key word is low. Not sure why that is...
To the o.p. there's a 3rd option:
Have a semi-desirable topical site with modest traffic and people click on a few ads that have text that *shock* appeals to/interests them?! If you're lucky you can make a reasonably amount of scratch to cover hosting and maybe a little more. Who knew it could work legitimately?!!?
In my experience having high traffic isn't enough for adsense, you need to have a topic/key words that advertisers are interested in (anyone remember the asbestos lung cancer methsolopmisaiaiaaia blog adsense experiment?) good, but not obnoxious placement of the ads/color scheme, and of course gobs of traffic never hurt.
To be more on topic, it's interseting the dilemna they are facing... and it'll be interested in seeing how they make out with the contribution drive... It seemed to work on a smaller scale for kottke
I think they're obnoxious use of multiple adsense units inside articles hurts their clickthroughs... and they could probably do better with a full tower on the main page (from my experience, YMMV)
They could consider getting traditional advertisers or sponsors... but all this means thinking about business and developing business relationships instead of working on the site and doing the journalist/editor stuff... dem da breaks though if you want to make the big time =)
e.
ah here's the link he "mesh'd" 3 or 4 open AP's to be one fat connection.
*shrug*
do you know the "brand" name of the TV table off hand?
thanks!
e.
wasn't there some awful fold up "tv" tray that was advertised on TV that might work for something like this?
I know i ridiculed the slobs in the commercial when I saw it originally... but having my "lap" toasted by my laptop makes me think it's not such a bad idea after all
*shrug* Anyone remember the name to that as seen on TV doohickey
is this the first time I'll be rooting FOR Real?
(not to spite apple, but to support reverse engineering of course!)
is this like a once a year occurance?
patch the TiVo and PC PVR...
My microwave can be an hour off for eternity, but if I miss that INXS/hulk hogan/tommy lee reality show, heads are gonna roll!
e.
" Microsoft and Yahoo's new formula for success on the web seems to be: Do whatever Google does!"
As much fun as it is to piss on yahoo as the "old and busted" and google as the "new hotness"... Yahoo has made some interesting forward thinking purchases lately... like flickr and Konfabulator
*shrug* YMMV, and I'm no yahoo apologist/fan boy... just saying not all that glitters is google.
e