Who needs HDTV?

[flavius]

I do.

Really? Not really. But it would be nice, wouldn't it. So, get a cable box, get a dual tuner STB with PVR and enjoy.

And you, you with the green hair, running BTV or Sage and no life and too much time on you hands, waiting for your VBOX or A180 or whatnot, upgrade your cat5 network, buy new computers, buy a software encoding tuner - yes, back to square one.

That's what the economy thrives on, but not you. On the other hand, you may actually be having fun. Good for you. And for me, since I'm one of you. At least, I used to be.

Now, I have two HDTV tuners in my STB and two more tuners in my PVR available.

This is such a waste of money, and resources. Don't you think? That's for sure.

[TV Scheduler]

Me too, but a dual tuner STB isn't enough for me. I often use three recorders at a time.

I use the TV for a computer monitor so the STB won't cut it there either.

Today I've been wondering just how little computer it would take to build a system with two FireWire recorders. I think I could do it for about $600.00.

Bob

[btvfreak]

I need HDTV, and I'm in the same boat. I'm resorting to using the Motorola 6412 DVR to record and timeshift HD programs. I use my HTPC to record most SD shows since I can leave it there longer since my HTPC has more storage space. I use my HTPC to record some OTA HD programs too.

[MJC]

I'm in the same boat as the responder with the 6412 DVR. After two years of fighting the cable company's destruction of inside and outside my house, I was gratified when they left the 6412 by mistake, rather than a standard cable box. This augments my 2 channel BTV. I can now record 2 HDTV channels and 2 analog. Not the greatest WAF, with two separate systems, but the result is more than satisfactory.

MJC

[Rich A]

Heh heh ... Yeah I need HDTV too. Or I should say I didn't really need or care about it until I saw it. Now I can't live without it.

I went the "freebie" route myself. I'm fortunate to have a Ham Radio tower in my back yard where I could hang all kinds of antennas.

I get all the major networks including PBS, or a total of about 12. The quality is far superior to anything that the local Cox digital cable can provide .. and it's free.

Yes, life is good no?

[crush157]

I really don't need HDTV. BUT, I do need a clean digital signal.... Now that SciFi is moving from standard cable that I could tune with my PVR-250 to the digital channels that only the STB can get, I am relegated to record through my STB only. My STB is a 6412 and now that I have it setup, I can actually record the HD channels and digital channels thru the Svid connectin on the PVR-250. I hope I get cleaner recordings now.

It is an unfortunate waste of resources to have to do this, but it's the only way to get Digital TV and HD TV into my snapstream BTV/MediaMVP/GoVid D3270/PC distribution network.

[btvfreak]

Any reason you got the 6412 (DVR) instead of just the (6200) if you're not using the DVR funtions?

[crush157]

I got them to actually record the HD in native format so I could get that level of quality and I wanted to play with them. I actually have 2 of them. One is connected to an HDTV in another part of the house and the other is with my BTV system and SD RP TV. Comcast was having a deal and as soon as the montly cost goes up, I will be asking to switch things around and get the 6200 for the BTV system. I still can setup recordings on the 6412 to it's own hard drive due to the fact that it is a dual tuner system. I just wanted to play around with them for a bit to see what i could do.

[flavius]

Speaking of HDTV and the DCT6412 - what are you settings?

[segadc]

I need HDTV. I am waiting on an external HDTV tuner (firewire base) for my computer. I will use the OTA antenna

I want my favorite shows to be HDTV. Anything else I don't mind...well actually I would like to see the Skins game in HDTV as well

Cannot afford an HDTV so my monitor will have to do...

[flavius]

Here is my comment to blogs from today:
"I don’t want to buy some big antenna, and put it on top of my house. I also don’t want to buy new equipment. I live in southern central New Hampshire.

I have been testing PVR softwware for two years now - spending roughly five grand on new hardware over those two years. I’m actually still using PC based software to record all the TV we watch as a family (as of today not BTV) to record at least 100 gig worth of shows and movies every day.

But not for HDTV content. I got myself a dual tuner HD STB. Couldn’t be happier. "

[optikhog]

I'm glad you're happy, but how would you get HD from that DVR to the other TVs in your house? I don't have a cablejerk-branded DVR for exactly this reason - it's a closed box and as such I do not want to pay $10/month for every TV to be able to view recorded HD content.

[jgourd]

I have a nice big 65" HDTV from Mitsubishi. I do not subscribe to ant HDTV service from the cable company becuase BTV does not yet support it. To keep things simple for my family I have only one TV system in the house and that is BTV.

I do love HDTV though so I download the .TS files that people post on usenet. From there I Xvid Compress them to 1080i Xivds so that an entire Hi Def TV show or movie fits onto a single DVD-R.

I am waiting for a BTV solution that would let me use the firewire interface for HDTV and I don't mind waiting if it means that once it is set up, it just works and keeps working without much fussing about with it.

[Rich A]

Originally Posted by jgourd

I have a nice big 65" HDTV from Mitsubishi. I do not subscribe to ant HDTV service from the cable company becuase BTV does not yet support it. To keep things simple for my family I have only one TV system in the house and that is BTV.

I do love HDTV though so I download the .TS files that people post on usenet. From there I Xvid Compress them to 1080i Xivds so that an entire Hi Def TV show or movie fits onto a single DVD-R.

I am waiting for a BTV solution that would let me use the firewire interface for HDTV and I don't mind waiting if it means that once it is set up, it just works and keeps working without much fussing about with it.

Egad .. I'm curious .. how long does it take you to download a one hour 1080i TS file? Typically they are around 8 GB. At least that's what my HD 1080i captured (OTA) one hour shows are .. I would think that even with a fast broadband connection it would take you quite a bit of time ??

[jgourd]

Yes, I have a 6Mbit cable connection but it doesn take a long time, about 3 hours to grab a TV show. I don't do it all that often.