Tuesday, October 18, 2005
So, We Begin . . . . . Again
I think I mentioned that I bought an HD Capture card. Actually/technically, it's an HD tuner/capture card. The card is a Fusion HDTV5 Gold Plus card from DVICO.
There were actually several cards to choose from and my choices were narrowed down to two. It was either this card, or the MYHD card (with daughter board for HD). The MYHD card is strictly a hardware decoder where-as the Fusion card is a software decoder. That mainly means that the MYDH card would require less CPU, RAM, etc. The MYHD card was also more expensive and since I wasn't totally convinced that this would work at all, I wanted to minimize the cost. I also have plenty of CPU and RAM, so wasn't concerned about that with the software based Fusion card.
The Fusion card installed without a problem along with it's accompanying software. I had read, before purchasing, that the software supplied with this card was pretty weak ---- I can confirm now that that was significantly understated.
I wasn't too concerned with that as Meedio (my chosen front-end software) had released their Meedio TV module which has HD support, and supports the Fusion 5 card. I also wanted to try the Beta version of SageTV's software which does HD and supposedly also supports the Fusion
card.
I have been able to record and playback HD content using the Fusion software, but it's very cumbersome. It can, however, be made to work.
Just a point of interest --- one hour of HD content consumes about 8-9 GB of storage on the hard drive. I planned for that though -- using the mirrored 200GB Sata drives.
Future posts will document my progress with the Fusion card and Meedio TV and or SageTV.
There were actually several cards to choose from and my choices were narrowed down to two. It was either this card, or the MYHD card (with daughter board for HD). The MYHD card is strictly a hardware decoder where-as the Fusion card is a software decoder. That mainly means that the MYDH card would require less CPU, RAM, etc. The MYHD card was also more expensive and since I wasn't totally convinced that this would work at all, I wanted to minimize the cost. I also have plenty of CPU and RAM, so wasn't concerned about that with the software based Fusion card.
The Fusion card installed without a problem along with it's accompanying software. I had read, before purchasing, that the software supplied with this card was pretty weak ---- I can confirm now that that was significantly understated.
I wasn't too concerned with that as Meedio (my chosen front-end software) had released their Meedio TV module which has HD support, and supports the Fusion 5 card. I also wanted to try the Beta version of SageTV's software which does HD and supposedly also supports the Fusion
card.
I have been able to record and playback HD content using the Fusion software, but it's very cumbersome. It can, however, be made to work.
Just a point of interest --- one hour of HD content consumes about 8-9 GB of storage on the hard drive. I planned for that though -- using the mirrored 200GB Sata drives.
Future posts will document my progress with the Fusion card and Meedio TV and or SageTV.
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Ahhhh, And You Believed Me When I Said It Was Done
When I closed this project down about a year ago, I still hadn't accomplished one of my major objectives. That objective was to be able to record High Definition Content and turn the HTPC into a HD TIVO. At the time, there were virtually no HD capture cards for the PC, and no software to support them.
That is starting to change now; there are several HD capture cards and two or three software packages claim to support them.
So, I've purchased one of the new HD capture cards and am re-opening the project.
If you have interest in the progress, check in occasionally.
It will likely be pretty slow-going. Bring Wine and cheese, or beer & chips depending on what suits you.
That is starting to change now; there are several HD capture cards and two or three software packages claim to support them.
So, I've purchased one of the new HD capture cards and am re-opening the project.
If you have interest in the progress, check in occasionally.
It will likely be pretty slow-going. Bring Wine and cheese, or beer & chips depending on what suits you.
