[mythtv-users] How can I disable this "feature"?

[Gabe Rubin]

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 9:41 AM, David Brodbeck <gull at gull.us> wrote:
> On Mon, December 29, 2008 9:22 am, Mark Jenks wrote:
>>> Why not get her to use the "WatchTV" in myth?    That's what I did with
>>> my
>> setup.   Just train everyone to use the frontend no matter what.
>
> That's what I did.  They actually like it better because they don't have
> to worry about switching remotes or knowing whether a channel is on analog
> or digital.
>
> In fact, I hid the cable box remote so no one would screw up Myth by
> messing with it. ;)
>
This is somewhat funny given the fact that anytime there is a
complaint about live tv in myth, the common response (and I am not
saying that is the response of anyone in this thread) is "Live TV is
not a good feature of myth, never has been, never will be, use myth as
a dvr and get all the advantages).

That said, I do exactly what the OP does; I have an HD box connected
both to my tv via as a regular input and to my mythbox via firewire
(in addition to a SD box connected to my mythbox via PVR-350 card).  I
am not about to spend an additional $5-10/month just to have a
dedicated firewire input to myth, and I understand the OP's
apprehension to doing so.

Why do I connect the HD box to the TV as well?  Because, as many have
pointed out, live tv is not a good feature on myth.  My HD recordings
play fine on myth, watching live hd via myth is stuttery and jerky.  I
have no idea why this is so, it is just is, so I learned to accept it
as I don't have the time to troubleshoot (and I suspect my system is
just barely able to play HD recordings, and it would require upgrading
the CPU, which means upgrading the mobo, which means upgrading the
video card, memory, and possibly HD as I have components that are
several years old; and once I do that, might as well just wait until
VDAPU is rock-solid stable, and just get a system that supports that).
 Why else do I connect the HD box to the TV as well?  Channel changing
has always taken close to 10 seconds (I have been on myth since .14
days, and it always took that long).  Again, I know this shouldn't be
the case, but it is, and I could never troubleshoot it successfully.

So in short, I have learned that if I want live tv (and I want it to
watch sports, well, live, as well as the few other programs when
friends come over and want to watch something immediately).  I need to
have the stb plugged straight into the tv.  I have bought into the
mantra that mythtv and livetv are not really a good mix (for me at
least, I am sure some have very quick channel changes, beautiful,
stutter-free live tv output, and no fear that if I switch the channel
in live tv mode, that the system will hang up. To those people,
congratulations, I wish we all could be so lucky).

So to the OP, do what I do (and what it sounds like you already do),
just live with the channel changes when they happen and avoid watching
live tv around the time things are scheduled to record.  Tell your
wife, "see, this thing makes watching recorded shows that much better,
but it will sometimes change the channel and we have to live with that
or spend $60-120/year to rent another cable box."  Annoying, not the
best solution, but I think changing the channel back is worth the
$60-120 savings.  Plus, I like the fact that the STB changes when
mythbackend starts up; it lets me know for certain that firewire is
working (and the cable operator who upgraded some of my boxes thought
it was real cool that you could control and record off the box via
firewire).