Before I Buy

[dietzgw]

I'm thinking of setting up a PVR for my 86 year old mother. She had been using a VCR to record shows when she is out, but her TV source is over the air (free) TV and with the switch to digital, her analog VCR no longer works (she does have a digital, HD capable TV). I could buy her a new VCR/DVD with digital tuner for around $275. But am wondering if this is the time to move her to a PVR. She's not really tech savvy, but she does use a PC with email and web browsing. And hey, she learned to program a VCR, so if the Sage product is anywhere near as simple to use as my Dish TV DVR, this should be a piece of cake for her, right?

The Sage options are confusing to me so I would like to know if I'm on the right track. She has a fairly new Dell PC with 2GHz Core 2 Duo CPU, 3GB RAM, and 320GB hard drive. The PC sits in the bedroom at the back of the house and she won't want to move it into the living room where the TV is. She will want to record both SD and HD TV, but in reality her recording use will be fairly small. She only uses recording on the infrequent times that she is away for grocery shopping or a Dr. appointment. She's not likely to get into recording big time. So, I'm thinking that I need:

- The STVBSTP bundle with media center extender and PC software.

- A dual tuner card of some sort for the PC. Maybe Happauge 2250.

- A Cat 5 cable to run between the PC and media extender.

Is that it? Am I missing anything? And a related question: The media extender says it ships with a remote control. But the tuner is in the PC and not in the media extender, right? And the PC is in the back bedroom and not in the living room. How does this work? Does the media extender talk to the PC tuner card? Does it require a specific tuner card?

Thanks in advance for helping me figure this out.

[GKusnick]

Your parts list pretty much covers what you need. You'll want to check whether the existing TV antenna is suitable for digital OTA reception.

The extender does not control the tuner directly, but rather requests a media playback stream from the server. If it's a pre-recorded media file, the server just plays it back. If it's live TV, the server assigns a tuner to record it, and then starts playback of that recording. All tuner management is done by the server software to accommodate scheduled recordings and client playback requests. Any compatible tuner will work.

That said, I'm thinking that if you've never set up a SageTV system before, your 86-year-old mother is probably not the right person to experiment on. Set one up for yourself first and get familiar with how it works and how to troubleshoot it before inflicting it on anyone else. For your mom, a dual-tuner Tivo might be a better fit.

[freedml]

Ditto. It might install and work flawlessly forever, but more likely is that there will be some issues which you'll be over there trying to fix and she'll be frustrated that she can't "just watch tv." A PC-based DVR is still in the 'hobbyist' world. Go with a Tivo here.

[Texas-Hansen]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

That said, I'm thinking that if you've never set up a SageTV system before, your 86-year-old mother is probably not the right person to experiment on. Set one up for yourself first and get familiar with how it works and how to troubleshoot it before inflicting it on anyone else. For your mom, a dual-tuner Tivo might be a better fit.

Well said. Given it's your 86 year old grandmother, I would agree that SageTV would likely not be the best choice in this instance and a Tivo PVR would be a really good fit for her. Much less complicated from a maintenance standpoint and simplistic in its set up for her.

[freedml]

Originally Posted by Texas-Hansen

simplistic in its set up

Grammar police: Simplistic means 'too simple'. You meant to say that Tivo setup is 'simple' (at least compared to computer based DVRs).

[dietzgw]

Thanks for the replys. So it sounds pretty unanimous that this isn't something for my 86 year old mom. I knew that regular PVR stuff was a bit complicated, but I thought maybe the media extender might eliminate enough of the codec and related problems that it would be a solid choice. And if she can learn to program a VCR that she shouldn't have any problem with this. I did look at the TIVO option and would go that way in a heart beat, but she is not willing to incur the $13/mo fee for the program guide. Maybe I should just foot the monthly bill for her and get her the TIVO anyway...

Anyway, thanks for the good info.

[Clift]

For OTA I think you should consider a DTVPal DVR

And I think they qualify for the gov't DTV Coupon program.

No monthly fees

http://www.dishnetwork.com/dtvpal/dvr.shtml

Although they are currently unavailable. From what I read over at avs forums there may be an overheating issue with them, butit's being worked IIRC.

[johnmacd]

Originally Posted by dietzgw

I did look at the TIVO option and would go that way in a heart beat, but she is not willing to incur the $13/mo fee for the program guide.

Check ebay for a used series 1 or series 2 with lifetime.

[freedml]

Are all Tivos ready for digital OTA???

[TorontoSage]

Originally Posted by dietzgw

She's not really tech savvy, but she does use a PC with email and web browsing. And hey, she learned to program a VCR, so if the Sage product is anywhere near as simple to use as my Dish TV DVR, this should be a piece of cake for her, right?

I love my Mother too much to ever want to have her using SageTV.

And I love myself too much to want to run over to her place to fix and tweak it on an ongoing basis.

[dietzgw]

I looked into the DTV Pal DVR but aside from the fact that they are (at least temporarily) pulled off the market, the other problem is that the TV guide isn't available in my area. She could still program it with their "VCR style" programming capability but I'm not that excited about that option.

Tivo is a good option now that I've been educated to the fact that it will indeed work with over the air signals. However, she absolutely refuses to commit to $13/mo for the TV guide (or to pay the annual or lifetime fee). Bu maybe I should go ahead with the Tivo and just pay the monthly fee for her.

Or maybe just go with a new VCR with digital tuner since she already knows how to program a VCR.

Anway, sorry to hear that Sage and the media extender isn't solid enough for her. I thought that maybe the media extender would remove enough of the challenges of a PVR but I guess not. But thanks for the honest feedback. Better to know before I make the investment.

[GKusnick]

Just to be clear: it's not that SageTV isn't solid. Some people have ongoing issues, but many have trouble-free setups that just work for months on end. The point is that it can take a fair amount of tinkering to get to that point, and the learning curve is somewhat steep. So best to take those lumps yourself before exposing Mom to it.

[freedml]

Even if you start out with a brand new PC, there is no guarantee that it will work reliably even after a lot of tinkering (as in my case).

Just to be clear on which Tivos will work, see:

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/sho...d.php?t=392361