What should I do? (new setup)

Forums › Home Theatre (including HTPC and EPG Collector) › What should I do? (new setup)

loryda

29 posts

Geek

#150134 12-Jul-2014 00:52

Hi All,

So i finally convinced the wife we can ditch the mySky box & save some cash by using an old htpc I have & actually using my sub to netflix.

But. It doesn't have a digital tunercard, & I'll need a new wireless mouse & keyboard.

I can buy, but I'm wondering if that's still the right way to go..

Ideally want freeview on pvr, youtube, netflix, hulu+ plus others I've yet to discover, and would like something to manage some streaming music.

I used to torrent and horde a lot but beside a movie maybe every six months, not so much these days.

The old box is currently running an i3 3.1GHz cpu with 3gb of ram, a 60gb ssd & win7 in a silverstone case. I also have a harmony one remote. Last time around I was playing with xbmc which honestly was a bit of a pain.

I'm wondering, should I stick with the htpc, or should I go the dedicated box way?

Whatever I do it HAS to be wife friendly.

What would you do?

Benoire

2753 posts

Uber Geek

#1087614 12-Jul-2014 09:10

I would personally use MediaPortal with a DVB-T tuner card for freeview and then use the various plugins available to do other stuff, I even think there is a Netflix plugin for MP now.

www.team-mediaportal.com

:-)

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loryda

29 posts

Geek

#1087743 12-Jul-2014 14:49

Hrmmm, im already getting frustrated with XBMC again. Perhaps MediaPortal is a better way to go, although ive never played around with it.

I note there is a Netflix plugin for MP, but is there a Hulu+ plugin? I couldnt find one when i did a search..

Also, how does MP handle freeview EPG? Again, taking a quick look at it it looks like XBMC will be a pain to get the EPG running.

Cheers
Alex.

Benoire

2753 posts

Uber Geek

#1087744 12-Jul-2014 14:55

XBMC has often been the best for plugins but MediaPortal IS the best open source for TV in my opinion. Due to way that the freeview spec is handled, I don't believe there are any native tv engines that can read the EPG, but you can use EPGcollector developed here by some talented geekzoners to read the EPG from the stream, create an XML file for importing in to MP. This is however, only by terrerstrial TV. If you use DVB-S for satellite you'll have no problems with the EPG but your channels won't be in HD.

Hopefully this helps a little bit :-)

In summary, Freeview|HD via terrestrial means (DVB-T) is in HD but the EPG cannot be read natively and relies on 3rd party programs to supply the guide; FreeSat via Satellite (DVB-S) is NOT HD but the EPG and channel numbers are not encoded and can be read by MediaPortal.

loryda

29 posts

Geek

#1087825 12-Jul-2014 18:48

Thanks, i had played around with EPG collector in the past and gotten one to work a long time ago when MCE came out but haven't really had a need since. It will definitely need to be DBT-T so will give that ago with Media Portal (downloading now).

Whats the best dual card around now? Still the Hauppage 2200? I really need to check how many PCI-e slots i have on this mobo..

Do you stream a lot of things? Im wondering what content everyone is using now?

Cheers again
Alex.

edit. Still looks like HuluPLUS is the hard one to easily get. :/

floydie

474 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1087832 12-Jul-2014 19:15

i wish media portal looked as good as xbmc.
i'm not sure why you dont like XBMC...most stuff can be changed/modded to your preference.

i love my xbmc/Logitech setup once i did a few keymap changes.
best one is the audio sync adjust by simply using left or right arrows while the movie is playing.

Benoire

2753 posts

Uber Geek

#1087841 12-Jul-2014 19:30

Floydie,

The biggest problem with XBMC is the very poor TV setup. The EPG is shocking at the moment, there are no real timers/events for recording easily and the plugins can be a bit flakey. I do want XBMC to evolve the TV better then I might use it, but at the moment the EPG is the thing I need the most and it does not display it all in a WAF friendly way.

loryda

29 posts

Geek

#1090673 17-Jul-2014 13:36

UPDATE: So ive managed to get the Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Instant streams (plus a bunch of others) into XBMC's Library using PlayOn, My.Library plug-in & unblock-us. Bonus points that it streams to all our other devices too.

I did download and play around with Media Portal but in the end it was easier to integrate the streams i needed with XBMC and make it all Wife friendly. It just looks so pretty..!

Im just now to buy a dual DVB-T card, hope i can get the Freeview EPG working and set the Harmony One up properly and ill be able to finally cut the cord.

Few Questions:
- Anyone else been able to get Freeview EPG with timers and everything working properly?
- Recommendations for DVB-T cards?
- Just wondering what skins everyone is using for XBMC?

floydie

474 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1091803 18-Jul-2014 21:39

i bought an avermedia twinstar card.
the included remote/receiver is useless so i just bought a HP MCE one off ebay.
this was all setup for my mum so it has to be super simple so i am using windows MCE for her. not the best and pretty ugly but it works.

HiroProtagonist

47 posts

Geek

#1092478 20-Jul-2014 14:06

loryda:Anyone else been able to get Freeview EPG with timers and everything working properly?

Yes, I've done this - what backend are you using though? This will make a difference. I'm using TVHeadend.

loryda

29 posts

Geek

#1093153 21-Jul-2014 16:24

I havent gotten that far yet. Just got Yatse working and the streams porting properly into the Library first. Now I am still figuring out which DVB-T card i should get before i get into setting up the Freeview and EPG.

Did you follow a particular guide / Could you give me a run down of your set-up?

Cheers
Alex

EDIT: So after a quick search it appears TVHEADEND is for Linux distributions only so i wont be able to use this (running Windows 7). Anyone have a Freeview EPG / PVR solution for Windows 7 XBMC installs?

nickrout

219 posts

Master Geek

#1093630 22-Jul-2014 12:44

There seems to be some confusion here. XBMC does not enable you run a PVR without a backend. The EPG is handled by the backend, nothing to do with XBMC.

tv_grab_nz-py is a standard xmltv epg grabber for Freeview NZ. Your backend probably suppports XMLTV EPG data.

loryda

29 posts

Geek

#1093850 22-Jul-2014 18:53

Oh no I get that, what I was saying was TVheadend appears to be backend for Linux distros only.

I'm wondering what implementations people here have working, or would suggest.

I was thinking from very light reading EPGCollector and DVBViewer would be the way to go...?

Cheers
Alex