[mythtv-users] HDTV on Myth -- is it a "myth?"

[Jarod Wilson]

On Tuesday 12 October 2004 07:48, jack wrote:
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Jarod Wilson
> >
> > On Oct 11, 2004, at 18:13, jack wrote:
> > > I had pretty much all the problems you described but I knocked them
> > > off one
> > > by one on an AMD64 3400. The one I can't get rid of is signal
> > > strength... I
> > > can only get into the high 80's on one channel at a time with a highly
> > > directional antenna (the silver sensor).
> >
> > You don't need a high 80s signal to get a good recording though. My
> > *strongest* signals (I live about 20 miles outside Seattle) are in the
> > high 60s. All the high 60s recordings are perfect. A few of my stations
> > come in with signals in the low 50s, and while I get the occasional
> > failed recording due to lack of signal lock, when they do record, 99%
> > of the video is perfectly fine (every once in a blue moon, there's some
> > pixelization in the video stream where I presume the signal dropped a
> > bit).
>
> Really?! I thought the signal quality was what was holding me back. Gonna
> have to go back and investigate more, but I am almost positive if the
> signal strength isn't 85 or better mythtv just craps out early on in the
> stream.

Huh. I wish I could get 85s... But I'm ecstatic when my high 60s stations 
occasionally come in over 70. The local NBC station is really pissing me off, 
they're right on the border of recordability during prime-time (signal 
fluctuates between 47 and 53 usually), so I keep missing shows when the 
signal is a touch low at program start time (the recording never starts). Fox 
also sits right on that threshold, which is making watching the MLB playoffs 
a bit annoying, but after a few tries (in Live TV mode), I can usually get it 
to lock on.

> I am almost 50 miles away from the tower, for some reason I don't 
> think my high 85 equals one of your low 60's =p

Dunno. I should add that 20 miles outside Seattle also includes hills, very 
large trees and spotty weather that impede my signal, so distance isn't the 
only thing to factor in. I'd take 50 miles and clean line of sight over what 
I've got. :-) I have a massive directional yagi antenna on my rooftop (w/a 
10ft mast extension), about 100ft of RG6-QS and a decent signal amp, and 
still rarely see any station bump over 70. I still have some excess cable to 
cut out of the picture (I moved my TV, need to drill a new hole in the 
house), and I'm now investigating a better quality signal amp to get me over 
the 50 hump w/NBC and Fox...

Judging from the issues Kyle Rose was having getting HD to work on his dual 
Opteron, maybe you have some other issues w/the Athlon64 there?... What is 
processor usage like while playing back a stream?

-- 
Jarod C. Wilson, RHCE
jcw at wilsonet.com

Got a question? Read this first...
     http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
MythTV, Fedora Core & ATrpms documentation:
     http://wilsonet.com/mythtv/
MythTV Searchable Mailing List Archive
     http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://mythtv.org/pipermail/mythtv-users/attachments/20041012/fa27ca1f/attachment.pgp