moving from media center to media portal (1 Viewer)

[desmond]

Hi guys I am new to this forum and I have some questions to ask about media portal. I got into HTPC’s about 2 years ago when I started looking for a PVR solution that would also allow access to online stuff like BBC Iplayer and also ripped movies I have. I am based in Northern Ireland in the UK. So I bought a pre made computer in a small case with blueray player, amd E350 cpu/gpu, 4Gb ram and 2 TB hard disc. I fitted a TBS6281 card which gives me 2 DVBS2 receivers and I also fitted a twin receiver DVBT USB stick and also a twin receiver DVBt2 usb box made by TBS. So that gives me 6 receivers in total. I tried XMBC but no live tv?? so I setup windows media centre and for me it works well. I had lots of glitches and it took a long time to get the satellite and terrestrial channel into some sorta working order. To further confuse things I live near a boarder with another country (Southern Ireland) and I can also pick up their terrestrial TV so I have some interesting channel groupings and orders going on. The reason I went for the E350 is it was low power and as the machine was on all the time it would keep costs and heat down. I made some tweeks to the computers cooling and fitted low speed large fans to the cpu and case. The computer is ALMOST silent, with the most noise coming from the western digital green disk drive. I use the optical out SPDIF connection to connect to my AV amp which decodes the DTS etc stuff and I use the HDMI connection to feed my TV. The HTPC is in my living room beside my av amp and TV. After driver optimisation this setup runs anything I give it. Full blue rays on power DVD from within media centre to rips and internet content. BUT the CPU is slow, and sometimes menu changes can take a little while, but nothing that is bugging me or more importantly the wife. The issues I still have with media centre is that the EPG is poor over here and due to my odd channel availability with having 2 countries terrestrial content and freesat satellite content it gets a bit confusing. Some channels have no epg etc. I have tried aftermarket programs to fix this, but I got lost and it didn’t seem to work, or at least was overwritten by Microsoft soon after. So back on topic, I want to add another system to my bedroom that could have access to my content. The obvious thing to do is to use a media centre extender, such as a ceton echo, but as these have problems with UK tv h264 encoding and other ripped media that rules that out. Also the xbox can struggle with some content I am told. So I am now considering building another pc and installing media portal on both my HTPCs and going that route.

Questions are:
1 The E350 system I have can play anything I need with media centre. Will it still be able to do this under media Portal. Will media portal run at a similar speed to media centre with this low power CPU. I’m not expecting instantaneous menu changes, but I wont wait all day.

2 If I install media portal on my system for testing, will it screw up my media centre. I want to keep media centre working so I can swap back if things get ugly with media portal.

3 Assuming I can test media portal and its ok for what I want I would start with two new installs of windows 7. If am building another machine, I will put my current e350 system in my bedroom and build a new, faster machine in my living room and I would remove the tv cards from the E350 and put them in a new machine. I have windows 7 64 bit ultimate which was quite expensive. Can I transfer this to a new machine and keep Microsoft happy? I could then install another bought copy of MS windows on my existing e350. Can you do that or does Microsoft think you are using multiple machines under the same license? What’s the best way to get another license or cheep copy of windows? Legally…

4 I also have a purchased copy of power dvd with blueray capabilities. I wouldn’t want to loose this during the transition. How can that be delt with?

5. For the new pc what spec should I aim for. I am thinking of an i3 intel or equivalent AMD that is still quite power efficient but has a lot more CPU than my E350. I have heard the i3 3225 with hd4000 gpu built in is good or amd a6 5400 with 7540d gpu or amd a10 5700 with 7660d. I would use an ssd boot drive in the new system too for speed, any recommendations? What ram and motherboard? I need hdmi and the optical out for my av amp. I could build this into a larger case, eg av amp size/ full pc size even, to give space and extra cooling with low noise. Any recommendations without breaking the bank?

I have read the media portal setup guide on the av forum and it looks manageable. I also have read the FAQ here and many forum posts. Any other suggestions of things to read? Cheers des.

 

[Edalex]

Hi. I'm not an expert but I'll try since I'm using E350 myself with Mediaportal.
1. Mediaportal definetely can play all stuff you played with mediacenter since you could use every codec you want with mediaportal. Also you could use lav codecs shipped with it. Mediaportal has some heavyweight skins like Titan which could be not so responsive with E350. But on the other hand there are many light skins like DefaultWide, Frames which will be very fast for you.
2. Nope, Mediaportal and Media Center should be fine together.
4. PowerDVD is still on of the best blu-ra players and you can configure mp to use it for playing blu-ray but Mediaportal itself could play blu-rays without bd-java and in combination with anydvd

 

[desmond]

OK thanks for the help. I just need to get the wife out of the way for a while and then try a quick play. Still thinking of specs for the new htpc. AMD a10 6700 looks a good all rounder without being to expensive or power hungery.

 

[desmond]

So I went for it today and installed mediaportal. I followed the guide on the net and used version 1.4. It went OK with just a few glitches. I like the moving pictures plug in and the TV series show one. Its great!

But my current glitch is that I have no audio on hd TV channels. The rest are fine. All the ripped videos I have tried are OK too just HDTV. So I'm guessing I have a codec issue. I installed the sav 6 codec. I have an av amp connected over spdif and it worked fine on media centre. Any tips? Also when I type in a channel number over 100 it isn't selected but I can get it in the guide. This issue only started with the install of the skin with the moving pictures and TV series plug in.

Cheers des

 

[desmond]

The plug in is called StreamedMP that caused the TV channels over 100 not to be directly entered.

 

[porky996t]

Hi Des,

Sorry for the late post, work has taken over my life recently and I missed your post but did you get everything working OK?

Your audio issue on HD Channels would be down to the audio codec used. It is best to use the LAV audio codec - it is what I use and have had no issues with the HD channels.

I also use the TBS cards, and have found them flawless.

I note your issues with the EPG - I use a combination of Freesat and Freeview and have set up a channel group labelled "Favourites" to cover the main channels we watch - I find it easier to do this than scroll through 600+ channels. The EPG is populated by grabbing the Sky EPG via the DVB-S card, and this is done by using DJBlu's Sky Grabber plugin (see >>here<<) You can also use "Series Link" for your recordings. I would be lost without this plugin!

I have now been using MP for nearly four years for watching live TV - the GF has also got used to it, and is more than happy with all it can do. It is a bit of a steep learning curve, and is certainly not "plug & play", however, in my view, the level of customisation provided gives a better user experience when all settings have been tinkered with. Over the years my system has grown from a standalone HTPC - this is it now in more detail >>here<<

 

[desmond]

I have it mostly how I want it now and have the audio sorted after working out the codecs. I have ordered an a10 and ssd etc to build a new PC and also a ssd for my current one while will go to the bedroom. Cheers for the help guys.

 

[Neild7744]

I have switched from MCE to Mediaportal. If you want ultimate customisability then Mediaportal is the way forward (in my opinion).

I had the same issue with codecs on HD channels and also use TBS S & T cards which asre well worth the investment.

Get rid of all your codecs apart from LAV Filters (standard which are downloaded with MP).

Got to TV Server, and under 'TV' you can see an 'audio' tab. Select 'Prefer AC3'.

Got to 'LAV audio configuration' and select all the dolby settings (ie DTS, True HD). Got across to file types supported by LAV in the LAV configurator and select all file types.

Reboot your PC and try HD. This worked for me. I have my PC feeding a Sony AV amp over HDMI fibre optic, then HDMI to 42" LCD.

Works a treat.

 

[desmond]

Yea I installed the saf codecs which work OK but on the reinstall with the new hardware I will stick with the stock lav codecs to see what happens. I find that the less stuff you add and install the better computers seem to work. So this was a worthwhile test on my machine before I do it proper on the new machine.

 

[porky996t]

Hi Des,

Great to hear all is working well, and as Neild7744 says, check the "prefer AC3" box under TV in the TV Server config as this will stop the audio description you can sometimes get when watching HD channels. It used to drive me mad until I worked out what was happening.