250 and streaming

[subq]

Can you stream livetv with BT3 and the pvr 250 yet?

I was holding off on upgrading my hauppage card to a pvr 250 until I could watch streaming content, though I am not sure how it would accomplish it since it is encoding to mpeg2, it would have to get it to wmv to stream.

[mickwall]

No with the hardware encoding cards streaming is not supported.

Mick

[subq]

I wonder if they plan on supporting it somehow. I don't use streaming a lot but I do use it sometimes.

[V_D_O]

As far as I know, there are no plans to enable streaming WMV from the PVRs, as the CPU requirements to decode the MPEG2 stream, then reencode it to WMV on-the-fly would be enormous.

I do believe, however, that SS are working on MPEG2 streaming in the next couple of versions (I'd tend to think this would be bundled with a client), but 3.5 is going to be a very busy release, so this feature might not make it. However, with dual-tuner support confirmed for 3.5, you should be able to keep your SW encoder for live streaming, and use an HW encoder for recording/watching live locally.

I'm also holding off on a 250 until they support live streaming, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed...

[Rich A]

I'm sure many of the requests for "streaming" have their needs. But I ask why limit yourself to "streaming". For such to work you need a PC at the receiving end no?

I use the PVR-350 in my HTPC. The video out of that HTPC feeds a whole house A/V distribution system. So at any TV in the house I just select channel 84 (which is where the HTPC modulated signal is) and can watch real time, scan the program guide, or watch the playback of anything saved by the BTV program. I use the ATI remote (which is RF) to control the HTPC from any TV in the house.

No PC needed. I'd rather watch my shows on a TV anyway.

If you already have a cable system available and cables running to each TV in the house this is certainly better than "streaming" a transcoded video.

Of course if you "have" to send the video to another PC then I guess it's "streaming" for you.

The advantages of playing back the unmodified mpegs are obvious. No transcoding. Stuff is ready to view at all times. Quality is not changed by transcoding. (I record all my important viewing shows to DVD proper mpeg at high res) Playback to any TV in the house looks perfect.

Just thought that with all the talk about "streaming" some newbies may not realize there are other ways to "distribute" and view your HTPC's output.

By the way .. since my HTPC is hooked up to my home LAN as well, it's very easy to move the mpegs from the HTPC to my big fast NLE machine for editing and DVD authoring.

[V_D_O]

Much as I'd love to have a TV in every room, I'm restricted to a couple of laptops connected to the network wirelessly. Live streaming is the ideal solution so I can watch TV (live or recorded) anywhere in the house or garden; this was the USP of, and why I bought, PVS2.0. Now with 3.x, the benefits of the FSUI and timeshifting have been offset by the problems of having no MPEG streaming, so I have to transcode and am stuck with an SW encoder. Until MPEG2 streaming and client software is implemented.

[Rich A]

Originally posted by V_D_O
Much as I'd love to have a TV in every room, I'm restricted to a couple of laptops connected to the network wirelessly. Live streaming is the ideal solution so I can watch TV (live or recorded) anywhere in the house or garden; this was the USP of, and why I bought, PVS2.0. Now with 3.x, the benefits of the FSUI and timeshifting have been offset by the problems of having no MPEG streaming, so I have to transcode and am stuck with an SW encoder. Until MPEG2 streaming and client software is implemented.

Well I think you guys are kinda "hung up" on this "streaming" thing. When my son was living with me, he used to watch the mpegs that were on my HTPC with his laptop in his bedroom all the time.

He had a copy of PowerDVD on his laptop in his bedroom. No TV. He also had a LAN connection there. He would just use his laptop to browse via his network connections to the HTPC. Then would select any of the recorded mpegs in that window and drag them to the PowerDVD GUI. The mpeg would then play back perfectly ... "across the LAN" ... and full DVD resolution. No misses or glitches.

If your LAN is halfway decent, you certainly don't need to jump through hoops and use the lessor quality of a re-recorded Mpeg-4 to watch it on a " PC " somewhere else.

Just to make sure I'm correct, I just dragged my laptop upstairs to the living room and plugged it into the CAT5 cable behind the TV. I watched last night's recording of "7-Days" in full D1 mpeg quality as it played back from my HTPC.

Why do you need streaming? Or why would you want to putz with transcoding or streaming a "re-manufactered" video when you CAN enjoy it by "streaming" the mpeg itself. Works great.

Of course if you are limited in LAN thru-put by going wireless, then you may have no other choice. In that case .. with the high quality of the PVR-250 (as the original poster was using) you can record 1/2 D1 Mpeg-2 at 3 to 4 Mbps video bit rate and it will be very high quality and might even be able to transfer fast enough across your wireless lan to watch with a DVD player. Don't know for sure about the transfer rates .. dealing with a wireless. But you should try it. If it works, you CAN watch your movies from the garden. Without having to get involved with transcoding or video "streaming". Even if your HTPC is using software encoding, it should still work as the mpeg is already encoded before you start watching it. The only issue with this is real time viewing. But if you want to just watch pre-recorded shows, you should look into using a PC-based DVD player to access the mpegs across the LAN.


Keep in mind the original poster was asking about "streaming" with a PVR-250 based system. And was talking about "Live" viewing. Not sure that can be accomplished, but playback of pre-recorded shows is not a problem.

[mmckenzie]

Originally posted by Rich A
I use the PVR-350 in my HTPC. The video out of that HTPC feeds a whole house A/V distribution system. So at any TV in the house I just select channel 84 (which is where the HTPC modulated signal is) and can watch real time, scan the program guide, or watch the playback of anything saved by the BTV program. I use the ATI remote (which is RF) to control the HTPC from any TV in the house.
[/B]

Rich A,

Your setup sounds ideal for my purposes as well. Would you ming sharing more info on the A/V distribution system? What equipment, etc.

Thanks in advance.

Michael

[TomZ]

There are needs for streaming that your technique does not address.

For example, I would like to tune to the 'classic rock' channel on DirecTV and stream it into my office all day without storing a days worth of recording on my disk.

[Rich A]

Originally posted by TomZ
There are needs for streaming that your technique does not address.

For example, I would like to tune to the 'classic rock' channel on DirecTV and stream it into my office all day without storing a days worth of recording on my disk.

True .. very true. I'm talking about "streaming" for the purpose of viewing the stuff the BTV had recorded.

If that's what you want to do (stream pre-recorded stuff), you don't need to use windows media files etc. Mpeg should work fine with a DVD player across your LAN.

Now as for "your" needs .. let me think on it a bit.

I think you could use a set up like mine to do what you want. Something like one of those devices that allows you to move A/V in it's A/V format (not data) across a LAN. I'd take my TV-out of the HTPC and split it, sending one line to the modulator and another to the A/V device to transmit it across the LAN. The point here is the content in this case would be the raw video/audio or what-ever and not an RF-signal.

You would then be able to watch BTV live (with the PVR-x50) at any LAN point via a computer / laptop that had the ability to decode the A/V coming down the LAN. It wouldn't make any difference whether it was hard wired or via wireless. You'd just need some kind of software at the laptop in the garden to convert the A/V signal to display on your screen. Uh .. maybe .. ?? Hmmm, this sounds interesting.

I may be mistaken, but I believe there is a device that will move A/V content across a LAN and then use software at the receving end to decode it. If SO, that would allow you to view / listen to anything "live" from anywhere. Don't know about across the "Internet" (www) but certainly anywhere your personal LAN connects to.

[cmasters]

Streaming is intended to save bandwidth. Unless you are in a situation where that is needed then it is not a big deal. However, here is my example.

Media server with multiple tuners in the back room. Content to be streamed includes MPEG2, MPEG4, and MP3. Client PC in the living room that needs full functionality to watch pre-recorded shows and to watch live TV off of one of the tuners. Three other client PC's - one in each bedroom. Each client may want to watch pre-recorded shows or stream live TV if a tuner is available. On average 2 clients are active. At times all are active. While all this is going on I don't want the network completely bogged down either as I or someone may be using it for something other than TV. Without managing the bandwidth and the server HD's via streaming this could not be done.

Forgot to mention that one of the clients also has a tuner that streams recordings and live TV back to the server (ran out of PCI slots in server).

Seems more complicated than it is .

[Rich A]

Originally posted by cmasters
Streaming is intended to save bandwidth.

<snip>

Seems more complicated than it is .

Heh heh .. And I thought my setup was complicated.

By the way. ATI (the video card people) have a new deal going called "Easy Share". It allows an ATI Radeon based All In Wonder to stream live content across a CAT 5 Lan to any computer on that LAN that is also using a Radeon video card (regular non-AIW cards as well, just has to be an ATI Radeon)

This would also work across wireless and allow you to pause live TV, re-wind, or play back any media content across the LAN.

I think all you would need is a "powered by ATI Radeon" laptop with a 100 mps ethernet connection to enjoy remote live viewing on the laptop.

Of course it only works with the ATI Multimedia software .. and not the BTV client. But it is an example of technolgy that allows live PC based TV viewing across the LAN.

[TomZ]

My PVR now records with a PVR-250 and displays via an AIW 9000. Could I preserve my BTV functionality and add easy share to stream input from the AIW to another computer (with an ATI video card) ??

[Rich A]

Originally posted by TomZ
My PVR now records with a PVR-250 and displays via an AIW 9000. Could I preserve my BTV functionality and add easy share to stream input from the AIW to another computer (with an ATI video card) ??

hmmm, don't know Tom. I have an ATI AIW 9000 here myself in my editing machine. I'll have to play with it. But I think the deal is that it only works with the ATI MMC 8.x software. In other words it's own multimedia / TV program. I also have noticed (as is normal for long time suffering ATI guys) there is a lot of issues and seems to have the usual ATI quirks. (if you know what I mean)

FWIW, I first started without the PVR-350 and was using solely the ATI 9000 AIW. It worked just fine, BUT the cpu use was just too high during live time shifting and such. Even with the 3K Athlon I was using at the time.

[Rich A]

Originally posted by mmckenzie


Rich A,

Your setup sounds ideal for my purposes as well. Would you ming sharing more info on the A/V distribution system? What equipment, etc.

Thanks in advance.

Michael

Hi Michael. Here is a graphic of my "current" setup. I say current as it's in the middle of reconstruction as I'm building a home theater with projection screen where most of this stuff will be integrated. As of now it's on the first level of the house in a "media room" that is shared with my ham radio shack.

http://www.pcphotovideo.com/Downloads/avdist3.jpg

There's a lot of stuff you should know before embarking on that kind of job. You need to have an rf-tight cable distribution (like good quality quad shield coax and proper grounding. Also the amplifier should be of the type that is "bi-directional". These usually are one way only (incoming above 50 mhz) and two way below 50 mhz. Most cable systems have their uplink and downlink separated above and below 50 mhz. So if you are modulating the injected signal after the amp and above 50 mhz (like higher than channel 2) then it won't get back out to the street and feed your neighbors' TV. <grin> You need at least one or two empty channels above and below your "custom" channel or they may "bleed" and/or interfere with it. My channels 80 to 90 are empty so I chose 84. In some cases you may have to put a notch filter before the amp to provide a notch at (in my case) channel 84. This also reduces the adjacent channel garbage. (I don't need it) I use the Channel Vision E-1200 single channel modulater. You want one that has a variable RF output so you can match it to the other cable channels and also programmable so you can change the output channel if needed. Already my cable company has changed their line up twice and I've had to move it twice.

Or you can spend more bucks and get a multiple channel modulator which can have remote switching inputs and/or outputs. I chose to have the input to the modulater fed by a remove A/V switch.

I also have an RF IR repeater to pick up the various remote control IR signals and output them in the media room. All the computers, ReplayTV and HTPC are in a downstairs media room.

Not shown in the diagram are various grounding blocks, and filters and such.

Net result is that at any TV in the house, I can control and view any of the playback devices. Ie. Tune the TV to channel 84, select the AV source (ReplayTV HTPC etc) and control and watch it. Hope this helps with some ideas.

Opps, I apologize guys for getting off topic.