[mythtv-users] Standard Cable??

[Andrew Dodd]

Quoting "Brian M. Bennett" <brianbennett at nc.rr.com>:

> I am considering building a MythTV and have a couple brief questions as
> I begin my research. 
>  
> Can I run MythTV from my standard cable line that comes from the street?
> I do not have a box from the cable company. I simply run the coax cable
> from the wall to my VCR and then from my VCR to my TV. I subscribe to
> Time Warner Cable and only get the basic and standard tiers. I am not
> interested in the digital platform yet as I am trying to minimize my
> cable bill. Do I need a converter box that comes with either a DirectTV
> box or a Time Warner Cable box in order to use MythTV?
>  
> Also, seeing how I do not have a fancy converter box with an integrated
> TV guide, where would the MythTV get its TV guide from in my scenario?
> Is there a third party vendor that supplies the TV listing for my area
> and my cable provider? 
>  
> Does anyone have any architecture diagrams that would portray the MythTV
> setup at a high level. I would like to see the cable source going to the
> computer and then linking into various AV components (i.e. Stereo, TV,
> VCR, DVD Player, etc). I realize that everyone setup is different for
> the most part but still would like to see a high level conceptual layout
> of the infrastructure.

You only need a cable box for cable if:
a)  You're using digital cable (you're not)
b)  You're using scrambled analog channels (TW's basic/standard packages are
usually unscrambled, whether you get them or not is dependent on an RF filter in
the locked box outside your house.)
c)  You have a tuner that is not cable-ready.  (Basically any PC-based tuner is.)

In general, the structure for analog unscrambled video (cable or OTA broadcast) is:
Coax comes from cable system or antenna.
Coax enters a splitter if you choose multiple tuner cards.
Coax cable goes from splitter to tuner cards on backend.  (or direct from
ant/cable system to tuner card for a single-tuner setup.)

Frontend and backend may be seperate machines connected via a 100 Mbit (or
greater) LAN.  Some people use 802.11 a/g wireless.  802.11b will only work
reliably if you use very low bitrates.  I would personally reccommend using
wired Ethernet.  (If the FE/BE are on the same machine, this is irrelevant.)

Audio output from soundcard of frontend machine goes to the TV's audio input or
to a stereo system.  (Can be multiple frontend machines/TVs)

VCRs and DVD players are usually not part of people's systems - The VCR is
replaced by Myth, and the DVD player is replaced with the frontend's DVD drive
and MythDVD calling mplayer,ogle,xine,whatever.

Video output from the PC to the TV...  This is the subject of endless
discussions on the list.
The Hauppauge PVR-350s have TV-out which is supported by Myth, but there are
frequent problems with crashing atm.  Hopefully these will be solved by the time
ivtv 0.2.0 is released.  Also, they have no acceleration support for anything
other than MPEG1/2, which means they are not optimal for playing back arbitrary
video files in other formats or for gaming.
NVidia boards are popular for TV-out - they tend to have the highest-quality
onboard TV-out available.
External scan converters are usually regarded as being even better than NV's TV-out.
The highest-quality TV-out solutions involve either video cards outputting
interlaced timings to an RGB->Composite converter (such as the one Cory
designed.), an RGB->Component converter with a TV that has component inputs
(Recently component inputs with support only for 480i have started showing up on
cheaper TVs, such as 27" TVs in the $280 range.), or a video card outputting
progressive timings (easier) through an RGB->Component converter to a TV that
supports progressive video.  (Usually an HDTV, but there are 480p-capable TVs
that exist, albeit rather rare.)

Many more options for the PC->TV video connection exist...