[mythtv-users] commercially-produced mythboxes -- an idea

Brad Templeton brad+myth at templetons.com
Thu Jan 13 01:27:26 EST 2005


On Thu, Jan 13, 2005 at 01:03:19AM -0500, Gabe Rubin wrote:
> At the price range of 1K, who is your target audience?  If I pay that
> much for something tv related, I want it to work out of the box.  Who
> is going to pay that much of a premium?  I think $500 might be the
> price break point, esp if you are not fully functional and full
> support, otherwise it is a hobbyist device...and the hobbyists are
> here already ;)

A decent HD box is pricey, but not that pricey.  However, typically
if you do it cheap you will see:

P4-3ghz plus motherboard:       $200
250gb hard drive:               $140
Cheap Case:                     $60
Nvidia 5200 card:               $60
PC-HDTV card:                   $190        (For SDTV and 2nd tuner)
WINTV-PVR-250                   $130
512MB Ram:                      $70
Linux & Mythtv                  Priceless


Total:                  	850

That's doing it on the cheap, though not the cheapest.  For example,
I got the P4+MB for less at a special sale, the drives cheaper with
rebate, though I bought a more expensive case.  I got the pcHDTV in
a large bulk purchase.  It was work to get my parts as cheaply as I
did in many cases.   Chances are you want a premium low-noise case,
fancy cooling fans etc.

With the work to assemble and slightly better parts it can easily be $1000.
You could drop the wintv-250 card, or perhaps shortly get a 150 card
with the brand new drivers for just $84 (as I have done), but in reality
the pcHDTV isn't enough since it has just one RF input.  (Though it could
do digi-cable and HDTV on the same card but who wants tht?)

Of course, Mythtv and Linux have the ability to run on older hardware
you have lying around, which is part of the attraction.   I can make
a nice SDTV PVR for you by adding little more than a bigger drive
and perhaps a pvr-350 card, or a pvr-150 card and a $30 TV-out card
to your PC.   Use the pvr-150-mce and now we're talking just about $150
in add-ons.






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