- March 3, 2011
- 351
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United Kingdom
Hi there,
As a long time user of firstly Mirsolav's Sky grabber and then DJBlu's Custom grabber, I decided to give web-based EPG grabbing ago on the basis of DJBlu's not been able to carry on with support (I know that this is has since changed and DJBlu is going to carry on with his grabber - definite potential candidate for a knighthood for this).
Anyway, despite noting that a number of people on here appear to have lots of problems, I had both XMLTV and WebEPG working flawlessly. I had to use both as although XMLTV provides much better information, it only provides data for the main channels.
I got used to this but decided a few days back (when I heard that the Custom Grabber was coming back) to revert to DVB grabbing in preparation for my just upgrading TV Server with the Custom Grabber version.
Having used both DVB and Web-based grabbing has made me appreciate that there are some fairly signficant benefits/drawbacks of each and I cannot decide which, overall, is the best option.
Benefits of Web-based grabbing over DVB-Grabbing
* Much, much better EPG information, including full details of Season and Episode and upto 14 days. I still cannot understand why, even if Sky don't add as much information as the Radio Times, why they cannot just add a little code to each programme, staing the Season and Episode.
* Does not tie up a tuner card (though not really a problem in practice).
Benefits of DVB-Grabbing
* Does not require the internet (not really an issue as I leave my router on all the time).
* Grabbing whilst recording/time-shifting option allows the EPG to be updated with unexpected changes. I have first hand experience with this. I recorded a sports program that went over and the EPG was automatically updated to record the whole thing. This would not happen with Web-grabbing.
* You can get EPG for some channels that appear not to be available from the internet (e.g. channel 301).
Areas where I cannot decide
The main difference between the two is the way you record anything that is not a one-off showing. Series link is definitely the easiest to use with your just setting it up and leaving it to do its business. With Web-grabbing, you have to use the record everytime shown option and make sure that TV Server is set up to make sure that duplicates are not recorded.
The advantage of the second option is that if a recording fails to record at any point, it will just record it again at another showing, which does not appear to happen with series record. It also allows you to record all available programs for a program, especially when random series get shown accross the EPG - The Big Bang Theory, being a good example.
The downsides of this second option are that you always have to keep at least one recording otherwise it will keep recording duplicates if you erase it immediately after watching or if you remove it to another folder. One improvement to his might be the facility for the TV Server to remember all recordings made in its database for say a month before deleting.
The other downside, as my other half noted the other day, is that some programs have different titles for each showing and this can really mess it up. "Big brother" and "Big brother live eviction" being an example.
What to do
I would grateful for anyone's advice on which system you use and why.
My ideal system would be to use the Custom Grabber but top it up with information from XMLTV - is this even possible? If it were, would this stop series link working?
For programs like The Big Bang theory, I suppose I could just use the record every time on every channel option rather than series link.
Sorry about the long post - am just interested in discussing these things.
As a long time user of firstly Mirsolav's Sky grabber and then DJBlu's Custom grabber, I decided to give web-based EPG grabbing ago on the basis of DJBlu's not been able to carry on with support (I know that this is has since changed and DJBlu is going to carry on with his grabber - definite potential candidate for a knighthood for this).
Anyway, despite noting that a number of people on here appear to have lots of problems, I had both XMLTV and WebEPG working flawlessly. I had to use both as although XMLTV provides much better information, it only provides data for the main channels.
I got used to this but decided a few days back (when I heard that the Custom Grabber was coming back) to revert to DVB grabbing in preparation for my just upgrading TV Server with the Custom Grabber version.
Having used both DVB and Web-based grabbing has made me appreciate that there are some fairly signficant benefits/drawbacks of each and I cannot decide which, overall, is the best option.
Benefits of Web-based grabbing over DVB-Grabbing
* Much, much better EPG information, including full details of Season and Episode and upto 14 days. I still cannot understand why, even if Sky don't add as much information as the Radio Times, why they cannot just add a little code to each programme, staing the Season and Episode.
* Does not tie up a tuner card (though not really a problem in practice).
Benefits of DVB-Grabbing
* Does not require the internet (not really an issue as I leave my router on all the time).
* Grabbing whilst recording/time-shifting option allows the EPG to be updated with unexpected changes. I have first hand experience with this. I recorded a sports program that went over and the EPG was automatically updated to record the whole thing. This would not happen with Web-grabbing.
* You can get EPG for some channels that appear not to be available from the internet (e.g. channel 301).
Areas where I cannot decide
The main difference between the two is the way you record anything that is not a one-off showing. Series link is definitely the easiest to use with your just setting it up and leaving it to do its business. With Web-grabbing, you have to use the record everytime shown option and make sure that TV Server is set up to make sure that duplicates are not recorded.
The advantage of the second option is that if a recording fails to record at any point, it will just record it again at another showing, which does not appear to happen with series record. It also allows you to record all available programs for a program, especially when random series get shown accross the EPG - The Big Bang Theory, being a good example.
The downsides of this second option are that you always have to keep at least one recording otherwise it will keep recording duplicates if you erase it immediately after watching or if you remove it to another folder. One improvement to his might be the facility for the TV Server to remember all recordings made in its database for say a month before deleting.
The other downside, as my other half noted the other day, is that some programs have different titles for each showing and this can really mess it up. "Big brother" and "Big brother live eviction" being an example.
What to do
I would grateful for anyone's advice on which system you use and why.
My ideal system would be to use the Custom Grabber but top it up with information from XMLTV - is this even possible? If it were, would this stop series link working?
For programs like The Big Bang theory, I suppose I could just use the record every time on every channel option rather than series link.
Sorry about the long post - am just interested in discussing these things.