MediaPortal TV: HD channels

I have solved viewing of HD channels using MP! After trying a few things, including un-installing PDVD8 and installing PDVD9, it did not work, I had a read on the MP forums.

No such luck on solving my problem specifically, but did find this SAF codec bundle. This did help me though. I downloaded the beta and started installing it... First of all it recommend that I unistall codec packs - so I removed CCC codec pack on my system - and then it detected I had an old version of DX. The nice thing was that it pointed me to where I can download the newer version which I did so. Unfortunately it errored out at the HD codec... saying that it could not find the PDVD HD DLL - even thought PDVD9 was installed!

Well this prompted me to install PDVD8 at the same time as PDVD9. I then pointed the HD decoding to the PDVD8 codec via MP configuration, and magically it worked. Now I can view BBC HD and ITV HD via the TV plugin... Weird!

Star Wars: A New Hope - ITV HD

Here's some screenies of what I did manage to record with a manual timer!

Setting a manual timer to record!

Well, I think I've lost the skill of setting a manual timer to record a programme - like we all would have done once upon a time on our VCRs... It was an experience a bit like writing a letter with a pen... The skill was long forgotten, as I am so used to using an EPG to schedule a record timer, and hence I got it all wrong! :(

Well, with Star Wars: A New Hope showing on ITV HD over the weekend, I decided to get my HTPC to record it... I had a paper guide with me and looked up when it was on and set a manual timer in MediaPortal accordingly... I managed to put the HTPC in S1 sleep mode, set WinOff to turn off accordingly and went out for the evening...

I returned and looked at the HTPC to see if it had recorded, and fair enough it had. However, I checked the recording and it turned out the programme had started late and the recording end midway through! I was puzzled to why it ended so early, and checked the guide again, and noticed Star Wars was in two parts! If I had used my Humax FOXSAT-HDR it would have setup the 'split event' recording and recorded both parts without trouble - and also would have coped with the late running of the film - both features are part of the Freesat+ specs.

There's more to this sad tale... As I have recently returned to Windows XP as my prefer choice of OS for a HTPC, I have not managed to set up the TV viewing and recording properly. For some unknown reason, I am unable to view BBC or ITV HD (using PDVD8 or 9). This is with the new install of MediaPortal 1.0.2. I am able to record the HD channels (as above) and view the recordings in PDVD9, but I can not view the live channel in MP! MP just freezes, and on BBC HD, I just have sound... I think another re-install of MP is needed!

TV Server

What was the reason I removed the 7010iX tuner card from the HTCP, you wonder... Well, I wasn't using it much to watch TV or record from... so I had the bright idea of building an energy efficient PC as a dedicated TV Server...

I was worried about the power consumption of my HTPC - averaging 150W at times - and leaving it on to record programmes late at night. The idea was that if I could build an energy efficient box - using 50W when running - I would sleep better at night ;) and use it more to record TV...

Just today, I see this Acer PC for sale on eBuyer: Acer Aspire X1300 SFF Desktop PC.

It has the energy efficient AMD processor in it: the 5050e and according to the guy on Coding Horror, he's built a energy efficient PC using it.

But after a quick calculation of the components making up that PC, I think it can be built for less. Using near-equivalent bits from Scan, I can make a box cheaper than the asking price of £250:

CPU: AMB Althlon 64 X2 5000+ @ £43
Mobo: Asus M3N78-VM @ £48
RAM: 2 x 1Gb Hynix 667 @ £33
HDD: 320Gb Hitachi £31
DVD: Samsung SH @ £18
Case: mATX case @ £31

Total: £204

Admittedly, there's no OS or warranty costs, but still a saving of about £45... Well I think I'm going to wait for the AMD X2 240e processor (as I don't seem able to get the 5050e anymore) to be released to start building this box...

Another reason to pull of the 7010iX card is to reduce the energy consumption of the HTPC, and speed up the boot process. Uninstalling TV Server or configuring it so it does not start up the service on boot or on MediaPortal start, means that MP loads faster for Movie watching...

Back on the blog!

Hello! Sorry, I've not been blogging of late - did anyone miss me? No..? Oh well...

A lot has happened to my Freesat/Freeview HTPC since my last post... so here's they are itemised!

1. Windows Vista HTPC
So I tried moving to Vista on my P4 based machine, and found it quite slow. I upgraded the memory to a full 4Gb - to find that the bios can't deal with more than 3.4Gb. I bought a Readyboost USB stick to improve performance, but that did not help too much. The machine was still a pain to use... so I tried...

2. Windows 7 HTPC
Windows 7, initially gave the impression of being speedier, but after a while I found it was pretty much like Vista in terms of performance. I also found Windows 7 to be lacking drivers and codecs that I needed to play some media files.

I was so un-impressed with both VMC and 7MC that I had no time for it. I suppose I could have made an effort and installed some mods or skins but found the V/7MC experience so poor compared to MediaPortal that I didn't...

3. Windows XP HTPC
So after all the faffing about with Vista and Windows7, I had to return to Windows XP. What a great version of Windows this is... really. A brand new install, and tweaked immediately to give a faster boot up.

Now it boots up so fast that if I put MediaPortal in the startup menu item, it starts up way before the other applications (such as anti-virus) starts that it no longer becomes the foreground application - and the remote does not control it!

4. MediaPortal 1.0.2 and 1.1.0
5. Removal of 7010ix tuner!
6. Dreambox plug-in
7. Dead PSU!