I don't see what's the point of building a dedicated distro for MythTV. Why reinvent the wheel? Why not use a well-known, established distribution, and just create a software repository with MythTV?
Even the best efforts of package maintainers (like cardoe for the Gentoo ebuilds) cannot make the process of setting up a Myth system as simple as a dedicated distro.
The reason for this is that there is so much more to setting up a Myth system then just installing and configuring Myth. Even compiling from source is very simple.
The hours of toil come from:
- getting your TV tuner(s) working correctly (ivtv, firmware)
- setting up your storage (LVM?)
- defining and automating maintenance tasks (backup, channel data updates)
- getting Lirc working
- Working out the quirks of your particular setup (unavoidable)
- etc. etc.
There are many small tasks which cumulatively take a lot of time to complete which have been taken care of for you in, for example, MythDora. Many people will just follow Jarod Wilson's guide http://wilsonet.com/mythtv/fcmyth.php anyway; why not take advantage of all that hard work in an automated installer?
The flip side is that building it yourself from scratch will allow you to diagnose and fix many more problems while also providing an interesting project which will not only record TV but give you a taste of what it takes to keep a heavily-loaded system running for weeks or (hopefully) months at a time.
A word of warning, might save someone a day or two:
The RaLink-based wireless devices are becoming increasingly popular due to the parent's assertions (which I agree with).
I bought an Edimax EW-7128g from http://www.openforeveryone.co.uk/ as I was assured Linux compatibility. I followed the excellent Gentoo wiki rtx00 HOWTO the instructions of which are geared towards that specific Edimax card.
It is common knowledge that this card has the rt2500 chipset, however the two cards I received have the RT61 chip (from RaLink also). You can get this driver from Ralink.
Minutes after downloading that driver I had the card setup and connected to another machine. I have not used it for long enough to give an idea on its stability however.
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I don't see what's the point of building a dedicated distro for MythTV. Why reinvent the wheel? Why not use a well-known, established distribution, and just create a software repository with MythTV?
Even the best efforts of package maintainers (like cardoe for the Gentoo ebuilds) cannot make the process of setting up a Myth system as simple as a dedicated distro.
The reason for this is that there is so much more to setting up a Myth system then just installing and configuring Myth. Even compiling from source is very simple.
The hours of toil come from:
- getting your TV tuner(s) working correctly (ivtv, firmware)
- setting up your storage (LVM?)
- defining and automating maintenance tasks (backup, channel data updates)
- getting Lirc working
- Working out the quirks of your particular setup (unavoidable)
- etc. etc.
There are many small tasks which cumulatively take a lot of time to complete which have been taken care of for you in, for example, MythDora. Many people will just follow Jarod Wilson's guide http://wilsonet.com/mythtv/fcmyth.php anyway; why not take advantage of all that hard work in an automated installer?
The flip side is that building it yourself from scratch will allow you to diagnose and fix many more problems while also providing an interesting project which will not only record TV but give you a taste of what it takes to keep a heavily-loaded system running for weeks or (hopefully) months at a time.
A word of warning, might save someone a day or two:
The RaLink-based wireless devices are becoming increasingly popular due to the parent's assertions (which I agree with).
I bought an Edimax EW-7128g from http://www.openforeveryone.co.uk/ as I was assured Linux compatibility. I followed the excellent Gentoo wiki rtx00 HOWTO the instructions of which are geared towards that specific Edimax card.
It is common knowledge that this card has the rt2500 chipset, however the two cards I received have the RT61 chip (from RaLink also). You can get this driver from Ralink.
Minutes after downloading that driver I had the card setup and connected to another machine. I have not used it for long enough to give an idea on its stability however.