My MythTV PVR Project

Project started: March 7, 2005
Participants: Tim Colby

It started innocently while researching a Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition PC for a user at the office... I came across a link in an article regarding homebrew PVR projects, and just had to check it out. Since I'm definitely the tinkering and TV-watching type, this sparked some joyful enthusiasm to start my own project.

And so some research I started doing. Where to start? Well the MythTV site at www.mythtv.org was a good point! It has lots of great resources to get any knowledgable computer geek going. Next? Figure out a budget. Most computer geeks have some spare parts (or complete systems) lying around, so what will I need? I had an old ATI All-In-Wonder TV tuner card from way back that I thought I could use. Turns out that there are no compatible Linux drivers for this old card. What now? Shop around! In March 2005, I stumbled into Bureau-En-Gros (Staples) one morning before work and saw the Hauppauge WinTV PVR 250 on liquidation! Liquidation? I dunno, but $120 sure wasn't expensive, considering every other local store had it for at least $200! Now that I had the essential component, it was time to get cracking!

What is it?

MythTV is a homebrew PVR (Personal Video Recorder) project started by Isaac Richards (see the MythTV website). It is essentially a complicated piece of software that runs on Linux (and UNIX) that turns a PC into a cable decoder box, personal video recorder and audio/video center for your home. With it, you can: watch live TV, including pause, rewind, replay live sequenses; display images from any computer (slideshow); play music from the Net or your MP3 archive; check the weather; read the news; etc... Just a plethora of exciting features, all by remote control!

What is my project?

I am building a homebrew PVR... This MythTV Project page is my home for keeping track of what we're doing to get it running. I feel it's important for me to keep better track of how I progress in projects like this one. Having a place to share my experience is also a big part of it. One issue is that I'm not a Linux guru. I do understand how Linux/UNIX systems works (this server runs on FreeBSD), I felt it very important to enlist the help of a knowledgable associate! Besides, he was interested in building his own box as well!

Here's what we started the project with:

A Hauppauge WinTV PVR 250 TV Tuner and capture card

A Dell Optiplex GX1p, Pentium III 550 MHz with 256 MB RAM (Our bare minumum)

A 10GB Maxtor drive for the OS

A 200GB Maxtor drive exclusively for the /recordings/ folder

RedHat Fedora Core 3 operating system, using Linux Kernel 2.6.10

Links to many, many resources on the web!

How is it going?

Well, it's been running for quite a while now, and I haven't had any major problems. The software was updated a couple of times, and I fixed a couple of bugs myself with MythWeb. The server occaisionally needs some troubleshooting, mostly just a restart of the mythbackend service. Overall, I'm quite pleased with the performance...

In November, 2005, we subscribed to local basic cable service to improve the quality of the channels we already had. Of course, we also now have a lot of channels that we didn't previously get, and so are watching more TV than we should!

As of the summer of 2006, my biggest problem is finding time to watch everything that I record! One of the best features of this type of system is the option to schedule a program to "Record at any time on any channel." Good for catching Discovery Channel shows that are always on, but never when you're home! Gotta love Myth Busters!

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