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  #1  
Old 06-27-2007, 01:14 PM
cpa-ny cpa-ny is offline
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Why sage cost so much

As I am new to pvrs I need help in deciding which software to use. I already ruled out a couple like mediaportal - too complicated and beyond tv - lacking pictures, music etc. I bought ctpvr for 3 bucks with a special coupon. I currently have it installed on my computer. Everything seems well, but not having any expirience with other software kinda makes wonder what I'm missing. I was also considering gbpvr but the guide listing will not be avalable in the near future.

Well that is part of my history and thoughts on whats on my mind. I want to try sage but for $80 bucks it seems a little steep. Now for my questions.

1 - Is sage that much more different than other pvr software?
2 - Will it run on vista with uac kept on?
3 - Will it interfere with recordings of my current install of ctpvr?
4 - I've read theme are difficult to install. Is this true?

Thanks in advance
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  #2  
Old 06-27-2007, 01:54 PM
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robk robk is offline
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I'll give you a very un-technical response, my feelings on SAGE after 2 years of use:
1. Different? Yes, better. Much better - it works smooth, very logical menus, records DVD ready MPEG files to burn DVDs if you want, great support through this forum - lots of very knowledgeable people here. I still consider myself a beginner.

2. Vista - can't answer that one. I don't like Vista, I install networks for a living and Vista is not ready for prime-time in my opinion.

3. If your current recordings are standard files like MPEG1 or 2, AVI, or other common types, they can be watched as imported videos. If the files are proprietary like T*vo (I used for a few years) you will have to find some way of converting them, which is not always quick or easy.

4. STVs or themes are easy to install, as are other add-ons like the web server, Placeshifter, Client, etc.

Setup is not a 15 minute job. To get optimal picture quality, you will spend time tweaking, trying different decoders, settings, etc.

Also, make sure your hardware is sufficient for SageTV, TV card must have on-board hardware MPEG2 encoding, quality video cards are recommended for optimal monitor or TV-out display.

There is a free trial, you've got nothing to lose!

Rob
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  #3  
Old 06-27-2007, 01:56 PM
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oddjob oddjob is offline
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Money well spent
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  #4  
Old 06-27-2007, 01:58 PM
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teknubic teknubic is offline
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I recommend installing SageTV and use it as much as you can during the 15-day trial period. The product really speaks for itself.
Make sure your hardware meets the requirements and post here if you have any questions. If, at the end of the trial period you don't feel SageTV is worth the pricetag, you can un-install it.

now i'm going to take a closer look at that ctpvr thing you pointed out. looks interesting.
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  #5  
Old 06-27-2007, 05:06 PM
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tmiranda tmiranda is offline
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I've tried all of the major PVR packages out there and Sage tops the list. BeyondTV is $70 (download only) or $80 (if you want a CD mailed to you) so Sage is not out of line on price. As for the free alternatives; they are fine for tinkering on a PC but not ready for "production" deployment in the house.

When I first installed Sage my wife thought it was another "toy". Now she (and the kids) can't live without it.

Considering how much you spend on hardware for ANY PVR package, the cost of the software is minimal.
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  #6  
Old 06-27-2007, 07:18 PM
SprDtyF350 SprDtyF350 is offline
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What would it cost you to buy a tivo? Or rent a box from the local cable rip-off company? How much does the guide data cost on the Tivo? Can it record as many shows as you can add tuners? I believe that Sage is well worth every penny, and maybe even then some.. I have tried every one of the other programs. I bought BeyondTV and hate it. GB-PVR works, but is not anywhere near as refined as Sage. Media Portal is a bunch of pretty pictures to go with the rocket science degree you need to set it up.. It depends on what you want. I want a TV server that is absolutely reliable. Sage wins.. Want to be able to watch TV, Movies, listen to music in any room without a PC. Using the extender, and an MVP I can. The extender works wonderfully, and the picture quality is just fine. I want something my wife, and kids can just use.. Never having to ask me about it.. Sage does it..
I have used Sage since version 1.4. It has progressively become more stable, and feature filled. I cannot even remember when the last time was i had to touch my Sage server.

So, yes... It is worth the money....
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  #7  
Old 06-27-2007, 07:39 PM
Wirenut Wirenut is offline
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Sage Rocks!

Even my mom can operate it. It's powerful, expandable, and very intuitive. I've tried all the others. ...and for the last two years it's been SAGETV for me.

This forum is one of the most helpful groups I've ever used.

Give it a shot.

Peace,

Wirenut
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  #8  
Old 06-27-2007, 08:22 PM
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mattdcknsn mattdcknsn is offline
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I have to agree with everybody else here. Sage so far has been great. Extremely easy to setup but it also has a ton of extra features you can mess around with. I have also tried alot of others and stock Sage blasts them away.

The one thing I liked about ctpvr is the LCARs menu system. But with a little knowledge it could easily be done in Sage.
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  #9  
Old 06-27-2007, 08:49 PM
malbec malbec is offline
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I may well get roasted for this by the rest of the guys here for this, but...

If you are truly as new as you say you are to a PVR, I would recommend giving gbPVR a try first as it is free and provides good deal of the same basic functionality.

However, so you understand my story and why I am here...

I dipped my toe into this PVR thing about 2 years ago and here is how I would summarize it from when I did what you are doing:
1) BeyondTV - Looks sexy, might even argue a better picture, but from what I could see they treat their customers like crap. They censor their bulletin board! What the ? Their implentation of things like the MVP extenders (a key feature for me) was shoddy at best.
2) MCE - I don't know. I just don't like Microsoft because they are Microsoft. I also feel like their attempt to walk the line on DRM, and what felt to me as restricted features as a result, was bothersome at best. Also, again, the extender feature of Sage was key to me and from when I was looking around Microsoft did not have as cheap and efficient of a solution here.
3) Mediaportal - Never tried it. To much on again, off again, changes, etc.
4) gbPVR - It was free. It supported MVP extenders. However, I found the quality of the picture to be horrible. I also found that I was spending hours upon hours tring to figure out how to add a function, tweak this, or tweak that.
5) SageTV - Yeah, it cost money, but damn it was nice. The setup was click, click, click and things were working right there out of the box and the picture was a lot better than gbPVR. Now, don't get me wrong, it has been a learning experience (What's the service for? Oh, you need to turn the service off when edit the property file? What's the property file? Where is the property file? How do I add commerical skipping? Oh, I need to download an import and import it into my STV? How come commerical skipping is not on my MVP? Oh, it uses a different STV file. How come it only shows three days of planned recordings? Oh, I need to edit the property file. And on it goes) But the beauty of the whole thing to me was that while I was figuring this stuff out (and it has become one of my favorite hobbies right next to wine) is the people here on this board are freak'n awesome. Yeah, there is a loser every once in a while being an ass about this or that, but the sheer number of friendly, helpful people here have been second to none in helping me figure things out. And, well, I obviously can't promise this will continue, but the upgrade policy has been outstanding as well with virtually all upgrades having been free except this last one which was a nominal fee. And, well, there is also the promised HD extender that I have yet to see nary a mention of by the other PVR software apps.

So, if you are dipping your toe in and need more than 15 day trial, you might give gbPVR a go of it. However, the money has been worth it for me.
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  #10  
Old 06-27-2007, 09:31 PM
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davephan davephan is offline
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SageTV is not expensive for the value it gives to you.

SageTV changes the way you watch TV. You spend far less time just watching junk that 'happens' to be on when you want to watch TV. SageTV learns what you like and don't like. In other words, the good television comes to you, while the lousy TV and commercials go away from you automatically.

SageTV is updated periodically and has a very good forum with people that are willing to help you when help is needed. There are many free or nearly free extra programs, available from the forum that improve the SageTV experience, such as the web server, automatic commercial skipping, Mpeg2 to Xvid compression, and many more extras.

SageTV is addicting and can become a hobby in itself, far beyond a Tivo appliance. Depending on your use, the price of the software may be very cheap compared to a computer system with a high-end processor and many TB of disk.

If you rarely watch TV, then maybe SageTV isn't for you. If you watch a fair amount of TV, then try SageTV.


Dave
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  #11  
Old 06-27-2007, 09:46 PM
cpa-ny cpa-ny is offline
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You guys have all been great with your replies. They were focused not becoming a sage vs others thread. I just did not understand how other software could be free or very low priced and sage cost $80. I know I will not be using the free ones because no guide listing service come with them. The other is ctpvr which like I said cost me $3 with some special coupon. I believe the normal price is near $30. It is just a big leap going from $3 to $80 but I feel it is worth it not to have to worry about the software being any good. There is still the matter of these 2 questions.

2 - Will it run on vista with uac kept on? I need this computer to stay safe.
3 - Will it interfere with recordings of my current install of ctpvr? I would like to test sage but not if it will stop ctpvr from recording what I already have scheduled.

If the anwser to these 2 questions are no problem, then I would definitly give sage a try.

Thanks again
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  #12  
Old 06-28-2007, 01:54 AM
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motobarsteward motobarsteward is offline
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What you need to do is write down what you want from a PVR.
I wanted the following: -

Server client setup - I wanted my server and Sky boxes out of the way and just have low cost and silent Windows client boxes in the house.
Rip complete DVDs to NAS and play them through the GUI on the clients
Web Interface.

The only four products that met these requirements were Sage, MythTV, MCE/Vista and ORB.

I found Orb's web-only interface unacceptable (LOW WAF) and it would'nt stream ripped DVDs. MythTV is Linux only. Vista or Windows MCE only works with XBOX clients and doesn't stream DVDs. So that left Sage. So, in my mind, was Sage worth $79 for the server and $29 for each client? With the UK/USA exchange rate close to 2 for 1, the answer was yes! Sage does everything I wanted where as none of the 'free' options did. No-brainer really.

I would point out that, to a complete newbie, 15 days is not enough time to set up the system and evaluate it. We could ask Sage to extend this to 30 days?

So, to conclude, before spending money/time, work out exactly what you want. If you don't want advanced features offered by Sage, don't use Sage.

Answering your last two questions...

Yes, I believe it will work on Vista provided that you have the vista drivers for your hardware. Note that vista will turn off it's eye-candy to allow you to use Sage.
No, only one piece of hardware can use your capture hardware at a time. Sage Server will not install (if I remember correctley) if you have no available capture hardware. I use Orb on my server so that I can stream to my windows mobile phone. I don't set up the capture capability of Orb though.
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Setup: - Server - Intel 3.4G D + XP, 2Gig ram, 3TB of raid. All running in service mode with 2 Hauppauge HVR4000 Running v7 with LMGestion's XMLTV and DG2XML. I also have the web server running.
Client - x2 plus PlaceShifter on various machines including eeepc Ubuntu 8.04. I am streaming Live TV to my PocketPC.
Stable but can use DVB-S on second HVR400.

Last edited by motobarsteward; 06-28-2007 at 01:58 AM. Reason: Can't count!
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  #13  
Old 06-28-2007, 02:14 AM
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nielm nielm is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cpa-ny View Post
2 - Will it run on vista with uac kept on? I need this computer to stay safe.
yes (there are some curious issues related to locations of properties files -- see the vista threads -- but it does run)
Quote:
3 - Will it interfere with recordings of my current install of ctpvr? I would like to test sage but not if it will stop ctpvr from recording what I already have scheduled.
well, only one application can use your capture cards at a time, so you can either run Sage with no capture device (so no way of making recordings, and no channel lineup), Or, you stop ctpvr during a period where there are no scheduled recordings, and then start Sage This should be able to play a little with it -- remember that you will need to stop sage and restart ctpvr afterwards

Note to MotorBarsteward: Sage will install and run even if you have no capture devices on the system at all. It only starts using capture devices when you configure them

PS: $80 is not that much when you compare it to other, more transient things -- a night at the cinema for instance - and in the 4 years I have used Sage, they have only asked for 1 upgrade fee while releasing numerous other free-upgrade versions.

Also consider how much software development time $80 can buy.

And finally, if you are in the US and Canada, your $80 also gives you a program guide source for the forseeable future -- something that the 'free' PVRs will have a problem with soon, as the XMLTV data source for the US/Canada is going to be shut down next month...
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Last edited by nielm; 06-28-2007 at 02:17 AM.
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  #14  
Old 06-28-2007, 07:05 AM
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JUC JUC is offline
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Just to echo the majority of the other replies: sage has the best support forums out there. And obviously the best products.

That being said--i never heard of ctpvr so i went to their website. Not so pretty BUT--they have PIP!!!!!!! What!


Oh--as an aside. My wife and I are thinking of starting a family soon but she ruled out me naming a kid Sage (my first choice!-thats how much i love this software).
Juc
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Client: MVP Extender running SageMC
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  #15  
Old 06-28-2007, 08:32 AM
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jbarr jbarr is offline
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To echo some of the comments above, when figuring cost of a home-brew DVR, I think too many people get hung up on the specific cost of the software. You really need to look at the big picture. First determine what are your wants and needs, then determine what are the available alternatives based on those needs and wants. And don't forget to include Cable/Satellite DVR's, and TiVo too as viable options. Then consider the overall cost, and you may see that the $80 spent on SageTV really isn't that much. And remember that with SageTV, there are no monthly or recurring fees, and that includes Guide information--a HUGE asset.

In general, SageTV is a solid choice, because out of the box, it offers a versatile, complete solution. But more importantly to me, SageTV offers a level of customization that exceeds the competition in most respects. I finally installed the SageMC STV, and couldn't be happier. But still, the stock SageTV STV is very nice. (Just install the Dynamic Menu add-on to make some menu changes--to me, this is essential.)

Good luck with your testing, and should you settle on SageTV, let us know, so we can help you with any setup issues. To me, the real goal of this SageTV Community is to help get as many people set up with, be satisfied with, and become comfortable with SageTV.
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  #16  
Old 06-28-2007, 08:49 AM
ybrew ybrew is offline
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I really liked BeyondTV. I thought their interface was better and the product looked really nice.
I've got a few friends running mythtv, but even though I've played a unix admin in real life, I'm more comfortable in the Windows world.

So since I was going with windows, it was between sage & beyondtv. BeyondTV combined with BeyondMedia seems like a really good product, but both products would be significantly more costly than SageTV which includes media functionality (imported videos, music, pictures) in their core product.

But if BeyondTV was worth more, I'd have bought it. We watch a lot of TV (me, my wife, son, and inlaws, 4 media MVPS, two client licenses and I think 1 placeshifter license). A good, stable product was important to me. I've been with Sage for about a year now and couldn't be happier.

But what SOLD me on sage - the MediaMVP support. I didn't want noisy, expensive hot computers at every TV. The mediaMVP is cheaper than any client I could build and works great. My 5 year old son is turning into a pro at navigating the menus and finding his shows and imported videos.

Although my wife and son both cringed when I try to change the default STV to SageMC. They overuled me and I had to put the default back.
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  #17  
Old 06-28-2007, 01:11 PM
stevech stevech is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by malbec View Post
I may well get roasted for this by the rest of the guys here for this, but...

If you are truly as new as you say you are to a PVR, I would recommend giving gbPVR a try first as it is free and provides good deal of the same basic functionality.
I did. Oh my. Talk about Geek-ware, not ready for mere mortals.

And there's now the looming issue of the demise of gbpvr's EPG data source for No. America.
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  #18  
Old 06-28-2007, 01:17 PM
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sainswor99 sainswor99 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by malbec View Post
I dipped my toe into this PVR thing about 2 years ago and here is how I would summarize it from when I did what you are doing:
1) BeyondTV - Looks sexy, might even argue a better picture, but from what I could see they treat their customers like crap. They censor their bulletin board! What the ? Their implentation of things like the MVP extenders (a key feature for me) was shoddy at best.
2) MCE - I don't know. I just don't like Microsoft because they are Microsoft. I also feel like their attempt to walk the line on DRM, and what felt to me as restricted features as a result, was bothersome at best. Also, again, the extender feature of Sage was key to me and from when I was looking around Microsoft did not have as cheap and efficient of a solution here.
3) Mediaportal - Never tried it. To much on again, off again, changes, etc.
4) gbPVR - It was free. It supported MVP extenders. However, I found the quality of the picture to be horrible. I also found that I was spending hours upon hours tring to figure out how to add a function, tweak this, or tweak that.
5) SageTV - Yeah, it cost money, but damn it was nice. The setup was click, click, click and things were working right there out of the box and the picture was a lot better than gbPVR. Now, don't get me wrong, it has been a learning experience (What's the service for? Oh, you need to turn the service off when edit the property file? What's the property file? Where is the property file? How do I add commerical skipping? Oh, I need to download an import and import it into my STV? How come commerical skipping is not on my MVP? Oh, it uses a different STV file. How come it only shows three days of planned recordings? Oh, I need to edit the property file. And on it goes) But the beauty of the whole thing to me was that while I was figuring this stuff out (and it has become one of my favorite hobbies right next to wine) is the people here on this board are freak'n awesome. Yeah, there is a loser every once in a while being an ass about this or that, but the sheer number of friendly, helpful people here have been second to none in helping me figure things out. And, well, I obviously can't promise this will continue, but the upgrade policy has been outstanding as well with virtually all upgrades having been free except this last one which was a nominal fee. And, well, there is also the promised HD extender that I have yet to see nary a mention of by the other PVR software apps.
That is perhaps the most succinct well-written survey of the PVR landscape I've ever read.

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  #19  
Old 06-30-2007, 03:40 PM
cpa-ny cpa-ny is offline
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I would like thank all those who provided some feedback. I decided to install sage base on your replies. I've been using it for about 2 days now. So far everything has worked without any problems. My biggest hurdle has been my lack of understanding of some of the concepts and terminology. I do have to say the manual is way too big and complicated for someone like me.

From my short experience with it, sage is not working any better or worse than ctpvr. Although all I'm doing is recording a few shows, a little live tv and watching my recordings. Performance wise I find no difference but the interface is another thing. Here are a few things my wife and I felt are weaker in sage than in ctpvr.

1. We find sage's buttons and text look too big on our 42 inch lcd.
2. The menus are more complicated to navigate.
3. Installation of plugins is not as simple.
4. Installing STV or themes is more difficult.

I will continue to run sage up until the end of the trial period, but as of right now we are leaning to ctpvr.

Thanks again
Kevin
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  #20  
Old 06-30-2007, 08:36 PM
bcjenkins bcjenkins is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by malbec View Post
I may well get roasted for this by the rest of the guys here for this, but...

(and it has become one of my favorite hobbies right next to wine)
Roasted by the guys or the wine??
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