New to forum with a few questions (1 Viewer)

[kameleon]

Hello all. I am getting ready to redo my media pc. I am looking at a few options and MediaPortal is one of the top of the list.

Here is my situation, I have the following machines/hardware:

PC1:
C2D E8400 (dual core 3Ghz cpu), 8GB ram, 6 x 1TB drives, Nvidia 9400 onboard video that does audio over HDMI, etc

PC2:
P4 1.8Ghz, 1GB ram, 1 x 8GB drive, 2x Hauppauge PVR-500 tuners for analog cable tv (NTSC)

PC3:
Acer Revo 1600; Atom 230 single core cpu, 4GB ram, 250GB disk, nvidia ION video w/ HDMI out

Currently I have the two tuners in PC1 where I had to "burn" 4GB of ram to get them to work as they cannot operate with more than 4GB ram. I was running WMC on win7 ultimate 64-bit. So in order to gain the total 8GB ram back I am needing to move the tuners out of this machine to PC2. Then I can use PC1 as the media server/main client and connect to the tuners that are in PC2 for the live tv and PVR functions. This should be fairly straight forward I think.

The next question is this: Can I use PC3 as a second "client" elsewhere in the house? It would need to access all the live tv stuff plus the recordings and the stored media. Basically does the live tv stuff get encoded on the PC1 or PC2 so the poor atom 230 doesn't get taxed too badly?

In the end I am doing this on a budget of $0. I am having to use only the hardware I currently have so new tuners is not an option. I feel this should be possible though, I just need a little guidance from someone who knows the intricacies better than I.

Thanks in advance!

 

[mm1352000]

Hi and welcome kameleon

First, sorry for the delayed response. :sorry:

Currently I have the two tuners in PC1 where I had to "burn" 4GB of ram to get them to work as they cannot operate with more than 4GB ram. I was running WMC on win7 ultimate 64-bit. So in order to gain the total 8GB ram back I am needing to move the tuners out of this machine to PC2. Then I can use PC1 as the media server/main client and connect to the tuners that are in PC2 for the live tv and PVR functions. This should be fairly straight forward I think.

Yup, you can do that. Install PC2 as a single-seat or TV Server only depending on whether that PC will also be used as a client. PC1 and PC3 should be installed as client-only installations.

The next question is this: Can I use PC3 as a second "client" elsewhere in the house?

Yes

It would need to access all the live tv stuff plus the recordings and the stored media.

Not a problem - just share media folders on PC1 (your media PC and main MP client). PC3 and PC2 can connect to PC1 and access the shared media.

Basically does the live tv stuff get encoded on the PC1 or PC2 so the poor atom 230 doesn't get taxed too badly?

You're using PVR-500's to receive analog cable channels. What happens is the PVR-500's have dedicated hardware for encoding the signal. Therefore, the PC that they are plugged into doesn't do any work on that front - it just receives the digitised streams from the PVR-500s. TV Server can pass those streams to any PC on your network with very little effort. Think of it like copying a file from one PC to another over the network - very little CPU used. The only CPU/GPU intensive process is the video *decoding*, and that happens on the computer that you view the video/TV on. Even your PC3 *should* be able to handle that for MPEG 2 (which the format that the PVR-500s will encode to). Viewing h.264 videos on PC3 *might* be a problem. You'd *definitely* want to use codecs that support hardware accelerated decoding so the power of the ION graphics is used, however that may not be enough in some cases. At least we can say that TV should work fine on PC3.

mm

 

[kameleon]

Thanks for that. That is exactly how I was hoping it worked. At least that is the way it appeared from what I had read on the site so far. As for the revo doing HD media, I know it can do full 1080p h.264 with the best dolby my receiver can handle as long as I can use the proper codec.

One thing I was hoping is that if I start a movie in the living room and pause it, would I be able to pick up where I left off in the bedroom on pc3? That would be awesome along with doing the same on a recorded tv show.

Lastly, eventually I plan on adding some HD OTA tuners to pc1. Shouldn't I be able to have two tuner sources for the front ends?

Thanks for the reply!

 

[mm1352000]

As for the revo doing HD media, I know it can do full 1080p h.264 with the best dolby my receiver can handle as long as I can use the proper codec.

h.264 1080i was what I would be worried about. As you say, 1080p, 720p and 576i should work fine with the right codec.

One thing I was hoping is that if I start a movie in the living room and pause it, would I be able to pick up where I left off in the bedroom on pc3? That would be awesome along with doing the same on a recorded tv show.

With recorded TV maybe, but I don't think so with movies. Video, picture and music databases are not usually shared between the clients.

Lastly, eventually I plan on adding some HD OTA tuners to pc1. Shouldn't I be able to have two tuner sources for the front ends?

If you install the PVR-500s in PC2 then the OTA tuners would need to go in PC2 as well. This is because clients can only connect to one backend source. If expansion slots in PC2 are a problem then perhaps consider a network connected tuner like the HDHomeRun. TV Server supports ATSC and clear QAM digital tuners, including the HDHomeRun. CableCard tuners are not currently supported.

mm