RE: [Dvr-devel]need recommendations for a dvr solution

[Mike H. <hi...@el...>]

Thanks for the input. Do you think 1.4 ghz will be able to encode
realtime, and also decode something else while its encoding?  I have
made an adjustment to my plan. I'm going to have it encode to a local
drive.  I got to thinking that it probably wouldn't be able to encode to
a network share and decode video throught he same interface.

I might just go AMD.  I have a 1.2 K7 with 512MB of DDR on an MSI
K7Master and its awesome.  I like the idea .13 micron though. I will
definitly do DDR or RAMBUS depending on AMD or Intel.  From what I've
heard RAMBUS outdoes DDR when encoding with Intel chips.  I have no
personal experience though.  Do you know?

I think I'm going to go with an ASUS deluxe geforce 2 video card.  I'm
gonna have to gank it out of my other machine and test it out with
linux, but hopefully it will do the job.

If I can get enough free time together I'll probably do a little bit of
software development and put together a complete package for a do it
yourself headless DVR system.

Thanks for your help.
--Mike

-----Original Message-----
From: dvr...@li...
[mailto:dvr...@li...] On Behalf Of scott fagg
Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2002 1:26 AM
To: dvr...@li...
Subject: Re: [Dvr-devel]need recommendations for a dvr solution


On Wed, 30 Jan 2002, Mike Hull wrote:

> Sorry for the cross posting, I'm not getting any responses.
>  
> I'm building myself a digital video recorder computer. I want to be 
> able to encode divx 4.12 or whatever the latest codec is and play it 
> all realtime. I'm going to build one unit and if i like it I'm going 
> to set them up on all the TVs in my house. I already have an above 
> average collection of Divx Movies (131) and MP3 music (21951). I 
> really want to add TV shows to my collection. And I'd like to be able 
> to control everything through my TV and remote.
> 
> What I want:
> 1) Realtime Divx Encoding @ full frames and full resolution (Mp3
audio) 
> 2) Divx Playback 
> 3) MPEG2 Playback including DVD 
> 4) MP3 playback 
> 5) IR Remote Control 
> 
> What I need to know:
> 1) What kind of hardware would you recommend? 
> a. Motherboard 
> b. CPU (I prefer Intel products) 

I'd say the fastest you can afford. I'd go for at least 1400MHz (AMD or 
INTEL)

> c. RAM

Again, as much as you can afford. Using DDR instead of SDRAM will help 
with thruput. I think there are intel DDR boards available now. 
 
> d. Video input/output

I'm using a flyvideo card ($99AUD) without any dramas. Cant comment on 
video out though, as i haven't got that far yet.

> e. I have storage - my raid 0 of 60 gigs x 8 will be enough space - It

> will be through smb however I read at near 100 mbit and write at about

> 93 mbit (will this be good enough)
> 2) What kind of software?
> a. Is this Digtal Video Recorder software capable of doing this? I'd
> really like to use linux 

DVR should be fine for recording, i'm not sure how it goes for timed 
recording though. The interface currently doesn't lend itself to 'record

2hours at 9pm'

Alternatively you could using something like ffmpeg to capture to divx
and piece together your own interface for controlling it.

Check out the kDVR project. It's based around euro DTV-B cards, but the 
ideas might help out.

> b. A lot of video cards with caputer and video out come with thier own

> dvr software, but for windows.

Depends on the chipset. If it's zoran or BTTV then you shouldn't have
too 
many dramas.
 
> c. Remote control software?

check out lirc

> d. GUI TV interface of somekind?

Hmm .. not sure. Perhaps one of the twinview nvidia cards. One head can
be 
a monitor and the other head a TV. X can then be configured to treat the

two as one display.

> 
> I want to keep the cost under $1000, but if I can't it doesn't really 
> matter. I work at a computer/networking shop so I get stuff at or just

> below the price you see stuff on pricewatch for.
> 
> Thanks,
> Mike Hull
> 

-- 
--
sc...@bi...



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