HD PVR

[Comitizer]

Is the HDPVR really that bad? I've been considering it for quite some time now but if it's that unreliable it's not something that I want to mess with.

Has anyone here had a good experience with the device? All I seem to find are threads where people are trying to work around its issues (restarting it daily for example).

[Evil_Attorney]

I think there are plenty of people who have good experiences, but are not posting about it. I have been running 2 for a long time now with few problems. Basically, if you use the RCA stereo inputs it can be rock solid. When you use the SPDIF cable for 5.1 sound, it sometimes crashes.

Originally Posted by Comitizer

Is the HDPVR really that bad? I've been considering it for quite some time now but if it's that unreliable it's not something that I want to mess with.

Has anyone here had a good experience with the device? All I seem to find are threads where people are trying to work around its issues (restarting it daily for example).

[gplasky]

And then again some of us don't have any issues. It just works and always had. I just installed the latest driver (1.5.6.1) and have used SPDIF (optical) since the driver supported it. I don't have to power it off or restart it or the server. I have one HD-PVR and use the USB-UIRT for changing channels. (not the HD-PVR built-in IR blaster)

Gerry

[pedz25]

Originally Posted by gplasky

And then again some of us don't have any issues. It just works and always had. I just installed the latest driver (1.5.6.1) and have used SPDIF (optical) since the driver supported it. I don't have to power it off or restart it or the server. I have one HD-PVR and use the USB-UIRT for changing channels. (not the HD-PVR built-in IR blaster)

Gerry

Same here, but I am still on 1.5.6. No reason to upgrade since it is working for me. Using the UIRT and setting the 4 second tuning delay really made it solid for me.

[Clift]

I just recently about 2 weeks ago switched to S/PDIF and I still have no stability issues. The only thing that I never attempted was using the IR Blaster (I use Firewire) and locking my STB to 1080i, and mostly because I don't like the tuning delay.

[Nate]

Originally Posted by Comitizer

Is the HDPVR really that bad? I've been considering it for quite some time now but if it's that unreliable it's not something that I want to mess with.

Has anyone here had a good experience with the device? All I seem to find are threads where people are trying to work around its issues (restarting it daily for example).

I read about it before purchasing. As you can see, plenty of people post that they have stable systems, etc, so I tried it out. Don't be fooled, it will lock up and require you to unplug it. You can't fix the lock up without physically being there to unplug it. You'll then proceed to uninstall Sage, use the hcwclear, and other voodoo magic to try to coax it into stability. Of course, you have to let it run for a while to check if it is stable, so when it locks up that means your shows won't get recorded (and your wife will be pissed). Finally it will seem stable for a while, then the lock ups will come back. It is completely ridiculous.

[toricred]

I have 4 running and they've been incredibly stable. The only time I run into problems is when the drive they're recording to gets too busy. I have a total of 8 tuners with the HD-PVRs each locked to their own recording drive. In addition I run up to 2 instances of SAV1 for commercial detection on each drive. With a total of 4 extenders running I will occasionally run into a problem where the HDD won't respond fast enough to the HD-PVR and I get problems. In each case I just have to stop something that is going to the drive and I'm good to go. Lately I've been noticing that my problems only come on a 2TB drive I bought that runs at 5900RPM when I try to detect commercials on live recordings. I'm going to try to only detect commercials on shows after they are done recording and see if that fixes it. For me this only happens every other Friday night.

[rwc]

Is the HD-PVR still the only game in town for recording (non-QAM or OTA) HD TV? Or has somebody else started grabbing the signal from the component source? If there's a "competitor" are they any better?

rwc

[Fuzzy]

for capturing fro component, no, there is no other option. (Not one that will compete price wise, at least)