So how do "they" do it? More on picture quality

[mattl]

My interest in BTV/BM got piqued when I learned that DirecTV was no longer offering the DirecTiVo boxes for their service; and if any of you have seen the new DirecPVRs, you understand just how far back DTV has gone.

So now I've been about 4 months set at building an "acceptable" PVR, based on BTV. While the software is slick, it's still plenty glitchy and needs its fair share of massaging to get working smoothly. I have yet to find the perfect Tuner/Capture/Codec/Recording Rate/Overlay options required to get a TiVo-quality picture, but I'm definitely getting closer.

Along those lines, two weeks ago I started a thread about tunerless capture cards because I, like many here, don't need a tuner. Given the array of premium channels and the 200+ channels that occupy the space above 100, I'll have my STBs around at least until CableCards (and PC adapters for them) get mainstream.

In this pursuit, I've found dozens of pure capture cards (primarily for the DV and security industries) that seem far better suited to this purpose, with prices ranging from $43 (I kid you not) to around $6000 (for 12 simultaneous streams and more whiz-bangs than you dare dream). Many even offer DV resolution captures at 120fps... and that's all in hardware.

The catch, of course, is that SnapStream "officially" supports, oh, about 2 pure capture cards. One being the VideOh!, which is a stalwart little PCI or USB option from Adaptec that at least captures at 720x480. Unfortunately, it's only got one input, and since I'm looking for a 4-tuner setup, I need more.

Then, tonight, I came to a realization while watching a lovely picture on a DirecDVR... what on Earth are they using? I mean, these STBs certainly can't be very expensive -- they give them away for free. Meanwhile, I'm going through $200-$600 cards trying to solve my problem.

Does anyone in here know? Can we reverse-engineer a TiVo enough to find the equivalent hardware in PCI/PCIe form?

-Matt

[not_Shorty]

they just pipe the digital stream directly to HD, there is no 'capture' taking place. It's already digital, so why do anything in the analog domain.

[mattl]

While it's possible they would do that for a DirecTiVo, the regular TiVo still has stutter-free recording from a standard coax tuner and full NTSC-D resolution -- plus they have an MPEG encoder, scaler, and analog audio processor onboard.

-Matt

[not_Shorty]

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying...are you unaware that there are several hardware encoder cards to choose from?

[not_Shorty]

you want four tuners, get a pair of Hauppauge's PVR-500 cards.

[Mr.X]

My 2cents - Hauppauge will give you the best bang for buck in terms of quality hardware encoding, regardless of whether you actually use the tuners or not. You can actually get 4 inputs (only 2 available simultaneously though) on the PVR500.

But if I were you, and are capturing from STB's, I'd hold out for firewire capture. No cards required in your computer at all. Capture cards will only be required for the 5C=1 stuff.