- April 5, 2009
- 245
- 16
- Home Country
-
United States of America
I have used MP for 5 months, three of which involved a fairly high level of experimentation and learning. The HTPC is now very stable and easily usable by the wife. Most quirks have been ironed out and I now feel knowledgeable enough to give constructive feedback to the team about suggested improvements.
Don’t get me wrong, the great job the authors did with the polished install package, great default settings, and fantastic user interface make this the PVR/DVR software package of choice. It also was nearly immediately usable, just that getting it perfect took time. There are so many potential features and plugins, and of course the big variable of hardware platforms that can make perfecting it a challenge.
My DVR HTPC must have features:
I have accomplished all of the above with plugins, native MP features, or hacks that I have configured.
Which lead to my list of --- Feature Requests:
1) EPG
one of the most time consuming tasks setting up MP was getting the EPG configured and properly working, for US TV guide. I now have a windows task run mc2xml and then pull in the xmltv data. Please add a fully integrated option to pull TV guide data from a free source. Three options to accomplish this:
2) Hulu desktop launcher
I would like to see a launcher, again, look at what was done for comskip, to launch HULU desktop and direct remote control commands to hulu desktop.
3) Easy record to DVD
A simple menu item that allows you to select a program, optionally apply comskip data to it, and burn it to dvd for sharing with friends. At this point I do this on a remote machine where I copy the recordings to and author them to dvd
4) Integration of features like SAF
I have seen the argument for and against integrating SAF with MP but It took SAF with PowerDVD MPEG2 ''CLVsd.ax'' decoder to get DVD playback smooth and enable the use of video hardware acceleration for HD TV playback to minimize CPU load. I would like to see an option to pull the features of SAF into MP natively to make the “out of box” experience more polished.
5) Reference platform
Not so much a feature request as a web site add, I would like to see a sticky with a simple reference platform. This would simplify the hardware selection choice and make the bring-up and debug process much simpler. Minimize the hardware software unique problems that are difficult to track down.
Thanks to everyone contributing to this great open-source software!
Don’t get me wrong, the great job the authors did with the polished install package, great default settings, and fantastic user interface make this the PVR/DVR software package of choice. It also was nearly immediately usable, just that getting it perfect took time. There are so many potential features and plugins, and of course the big variable of hardware platforms that can make perfecting it a challenge.
My DVR HTPC must have features:
- · Record, pause, play, and time shift ATSC TV
- · Electronic Program Guide
- · Commercial skipping
- · Play DVD’s
- · Play HULU content
- · Play Netflix “watch now” content
- · Simple, intuitive User Interface
- · Web radio
- · Photo/slide show viewer
- · MP3 player
- · Automatic power up / power down / power save
I have accomplished all of the above with plugins, native MP features, or hacks that I have configured.
Which lead to my list of --- Feature Requests:
1) EPG
one of the most time consuming tasks setting up MP was getting the EPG configured and properly working, for US TV guide. I now have a windows task run mc2xml and then pull in the xmltv data. Please add a fully integrated option to pull TV guide data from a free source. Three options to accomplish this:
a. Launch Mc2xml, just like is done for comskip in MP, pull in the output file
b. Pull in data from a free source, Titan TV , MS media center server, etc.
c. Use ATSC broadcast data sent from CBS for listings
b. Pull in data from a free source, Titan TV , MS media center server, etc.
c. Use ATSC broadcast data sent from CBS for listings
2) Hulu desktop launcher
I would like to see a launcher, again, look at what was done for comskip, to launch HULU desktop and direct remote control commands to hulu desktop.
3) Easy record to DVD
A simple menu item that allows you to select a program, optionally apply comskip data to it, and burn it to dvd for sharing with friends. At this point I do this on a remote machine where I copy the recordings to and author them to dvd
4) Integration of features like SAF
I have seen the argument for and against integrating SAF with MP but It took SAF with PowerDVD MPEG2 ''CLVsd.ax'' decoder to get DVD playback smooth and enable the use of video hardware acceleration for HD TV playback to minimize CPU load. I would like to see an option to pull the features of SAF into MP natively to make the “out of box” experience more polished.
5) Reference platform
Not so much a feature request as a web site add, I would like to see a sticky with a simple reference platform. This would simplify the hardware selection choice and make the bring-up and debug process much simpler. Minimize the hardware software unique problems that are difficult to track down.
Thanks to everyone contributing to this great open-source software!