[mythtv-users] Is HD worth it?

[Meatwad]

William Munson wrote:
> Rod Roark wrote:
>> When my wife and I watch TV, the problem isn't so much getting the
>> clearest possible picture, but rather finding something to watch that
>> doesn't suck and that we haven't already seen several times.
>>
>> How much quality HD programming is out there?  BTW we very seldom
>> watch sports.
>>
>> And to make this more relevant to MythTV: am I correct in inferring
>> that DirecTV with HD is not workable with Myth?
>>
>>   
> Fist off, directv and myth do not get along well. IE, no way to capture 
> HD from directv. Even their datastream is non-standard so you cannot 
> bypass their STB with a DVB card. This means that your only source of HD 
> is OTA which is not all bad news.

Not quite. Some folks receive their HD programming from their cable 
company, unencrypted. I am pulling my local broadcast lineup plus the 
local access channels and a few other gimmes right off the cable. Other 
users have reported being able to receive even more unencrypted channels 
via the firewire port on their STB. Soon, I'll finally be paying the 
ginormous STB tax myself so I can't comment on firewire yet.

 >All the networks are running HD
> streams now and most stations include several other program streams at 
> the same time. However this means that if you do not currently watch 
> much tv that you will still not watch much tv so it really breaks down 
> to do you have a real need to see a much clearer picture and sound from 
> your rerun of Cheers and CSI. There are several other cost factors that 
> need to be thought about such as the new higher powered 
> motherboard/processor/ram you will need and the increased storage you 
> will want. (HD is usually ~7GB/hour so 300GB is about the minimum hard 
> drive partition.) I have 1TB of storage and still run out at times.

We record way more material than we can possibly watch and still lead 
productive lifestyles. With that said, nearly three quarters of the 
viewed shows originate from PBS. It does help to have three affiliates 
in a major market but even if you only have one, check out their 
programming. IMAX, Nature, Nova, etc are all top-notch productions with 
very good AC3.

--
mw