HD Theatre or Popcornhour c200?

[viperdiablo]

Hey guys I use to be a sagetv user about a year ago. Circumstances at that time required me to sell my extender. I am now in a position to get back into the media extender/server world again. However this time I am wondering or thinking about getting the new c200 popcornhour unit. I have no intent to use the extender as a pvr. So just wondering if you guys have any thoughts/opinions on what extender I should go with. All I will be using it for would be to stream music/pictures/ripped dvds/ blurays. Thanks.

[gplasky]

If you're only looking as an extender I would think the PCorn c200 has the advantages of installing a hard drive and a blue ray drive. By the same token I have heard it has some serious growing pains.

The HD Theater can play both DVD rips and Blue ray rips so the end result is the same. At this time the HD Theater seems to be more solid. And you always have the option of going back to using it as an extender with Sage or stand alone. And SageTV will now work with Playon so you have access to Hulu and Netflix (among others.)

Gerry

[Brent]

Not as easy of a decision as I once thought:

PCH C-200 is by far better, more capable hardware. But not easy to use, very buggy firmware and a poor UI. Will never work as an extender for any HTPC I'm told. The LCD on it is a wast imo and they spent more on throwing in the kitchen sink then the really had to.

SageTV HD200 is less capable player hardware-wise (No HDMI 1.3, maxes out on a certain # of imported images etc) but has a ton of advantages including constantly updating firmware, great access to online video, ability to use as extender etc.

I'm not 100% sure which one I would choose in your situation. Imagine how many players SageTV could sell if they had a HD250 (not a real device) HDMI 1.3 capable box with more memory, slightly faster CPU and ability to drop internal drive... One can only hope.

[eqwalker]

I, too, am looking at building a home media setup using WHS w/sageTV. I am attracted though to the Popcorn Hour C-200 due to it's flexibility of adding a blu-ray player and it's LCD display so I can play my music without having to turn the tv on. My question is this, will the C-200 be able to play my recorded OTA tv shows that have been recorded by SageTV? If not, then that pretty much knocks out the C-200 for me since it must be able to play them for me to consider it. Also, the reason I'm going the WHS w/SageTV route is because I could never get my Xbox360 (used as an extender) to play my recorded OTA HD shows audio in 5.1. Only stereo. The shows would play in DD5.1 just fine if you played them from the Vista machine that they were recorded on. Go figure. Thanks ahead for any comments on this.

[paulbeers]

Originally Posted by eqwalker

\ My question is this, will the C-200 be able to play my recorded OTA tv shows that have been recorded by SageTV? If not, then that pretty much knocks out the C-200 for me since it must be able to play them for me to consider it. \

Yes it can play items that are recorded by Sage.

The downside is that it will not have the Sage GUI and therefore can not be used for scheduling recordings and most will not be able to play a show until after it is completely finished recording.

[matt91]

Sage isn't know for naming the files in a "friendly" manner, either. So if you only had a handful of shows to browse through, it wouldn't be a big deal. However, once you get more than that it'd be a royal PITA to find the right file to play.

[emveepee]

First I don't have SageTV or and HD200 but I have a C200 which I will compare to using my PCH A110 and GBPVR and I can tell you what I miss and why I use both and given they are typical PVR functions, I assume SageTV has them

- LiveTV including access to all my tuners (OTA ATSC, QAM, firewire, HDPVR) navigate channels, prev channel etc.
- EPG
- unlimited resume vs 10 total
- shared resume positioning on my PC's and extenders
- simply access to recordings
- navigating in progress recordings
- some people like comskip (I don't use it)

I actually have a GBPVR client interface working on the C200 now, and it's got the full UI and the audio functions. I have partial video playback too and can watch files and liveTV, but at this point I lose the UI when I stop

Martin

[autoboy]

Seagate just released Netflix on their player. I'm not familiar with it's capabilities, but it's an interesting box for that feature alone. The HD200's playback support and UI are the best in the business. It is only held back by the hardware. But, if you lack HD audio at home anyways, it won't matter.

[valnar]

The only thing I miss from the H200 which is a big deal to me is DTS support. If that matters to you, the Popcorn Hour might work better.

[TwistedMelon]

This thread is in the wrong forum, it should be in the Theatre forum, for stand-alone use, since the OP says clearly they don't intend to use the product as a "PVR."

IMO, the only reason to own an HD200 is if you're running SageTV. The HD200 brings the PVR interface to any TV in the house without the need to have multiple computers. You set up one recording server and that can feed every room in the house with multiple HD200 boxes.

If you don't plan to use that functionality and want a stand-alone media player, there are a ton of options available. Most are terrible, but some are at least half-decent. Like Popcorn and WD TVLive. However, the two most proising boxes (BY FAR) look to be the PopBox (Popcorn's new UI) and Boxee/DLink's Boxee Box coming later this summer.

In fact, I wouldn't even consider anything else relevant.

That said, all of these units are quite lack-lustre for music. If you have more than a few dozen albums, I can only recommend two solutions for music. SqueezeBox or Sonos. Everything else either 1. Sucks very very badly (all the video media players stink at music, including Sage's box) or 2. is very very expensive with questionable merit over the first two I recommended (Olive & Sooloos).

Recap...

For Video: PopBox or Boxee Box
For Audio: SqueezeBox or Sonos
For PVR Extending: HD200 with SageTV running on a system acting as a server - HD200 is the single most notable advantage SageTV has over any other PVR solution at any price.

[bastafidli]

Originally Posted by TwistedMelon

That said, all of these units are quite lack-lustre for music. If you have more than a few dozen albums, I can only recommend two solutions for music. SqueezeBox or Sonos. Everything else either 1. Sucks very very badly (all the video media players stink at music, including Sage's box) or 2. is very very expensive with questionable merit over the first two I recommended (Olive & Sooloos).

Actually I use Sage for music quite a bit and have to disagree. 1. Using Sage for Music is not as pleasant and smooth as it could be nor it has all the features I would like it to have, but it does its job done just fine. I always get to hear exactly what I want, where I want, the way I want. 2. If you are using Sage for accessing your videos (home or backups), photos and recording TV, then you get the music functionality for free, therefore I would argue that getting Sonos or similar is infinitely more expensive.

[emveepee]

Originally Posted by TwistedMelon

This thread is in the wrong forum, it should be in the Theatre forum, for stand-alone use, since the OP says clearly they don't intend to use the product as a "PVR."

I was responding to eqwalker, often threads "twist" a bit.

For PVR Extending: HD200 with SageTV running on a system acting as a server - HD200 is the single most notable advantage SageTV has over any other PVR solution at any price.

The EGreat M34a (which is a second gen NMT HDMI 1.3a/w DTS downmix) with GB-PVR @ $140 can be directly compared to SageTV/HD200 bundle @ $225

Martin

[TwistedMelon]

Originally Posted by bastafidli

1. Using Sage for Music is not as pleasant and smooth as it could be nor it has all the features I would like it to have

Ok.

but it does its job done just fine

How can it do the job just fine if you said it's missing features? Do you mean "it's good enough?" I don't subscribe to "good enough" so "good enough" is never good enough for me.

Until you have used a Squeezebox or Sonos system you won't ever know what you're missing. I have about 40000 tracks on my server right now by the way. All full albums. Sage would completely choke with even half that much music. Not to mention having to use the TV to even select what to play. No thanks.

I would argue that getting Sonos or similar is infinitely more expensive.

I don't know how you can define $300-$1000 as "infinite." What does that make $1001? Anyway, there are more costs involved, but the experience, usability and not to mention sound quality are all measurably better. So much better in fact that it's preposterous to even compare.

Originally Posted by emveepee

The EGreat M34a (which is a second gen NMT HDMI 1.3a/w DTS downmix) with GB-PVR @ $140 can be directly compared to SageTV/HD200 bundle @ $225

Um, no, it really can't I'm afraid. You can't compare hacking something together against something built for the purpose. Just the same way you can't compare the music features tacked onto a video media streamer to the purpose-built Squeeze Server and high quality output of the Squeeze players.

While you're saving a bit of money, I don't see GB-PVR nor the eGreat device as a plug-and-play solution. Sage isn't what I'd recommend a grandmother set up, but it's as close to set it and forget it as can be had right now. All of this stuff is still for the enthusiast market of course, because the general public isn't going to buy into anything that needs any amount of setup at all.

[emveepee]

Originally Posted by TwistedMelon

Um, no, it really can't I'm afraid. You can't compare hacking something together against something built for the purpose.

Now I'm insulted. I have spend 100s' of hours programming the client using the same SDK's (older version) as the SageTV programmer. sub the programmer of GBPVR has spent lots of his time, and I have an excellent beta team go through every release. I do not consider it a hack. As I wrote GBPVR (which I hope you aren't also calling a hack) and SageTV

While you're saving a bit of money, I don't see GB-PVR nor the eGreat device as a plug-and-play solution. Sage isn't what I'd recommend a grandmother set up, but it's as close to set it and forget it as can be had right now.

Okay maybe you are calling GBPVR a hack. I am not saying SageTV is bad, far from it if you want to spend the extra money you will get a good commercial PVR, quite likely better but no more feature rich. The EGreat with DTS downmix is more advanced technically and I'd want it on my secondary systems without an AVR.

As for the less technical, with the state of digital television, I'd regretfully have to say buy an HDPVR or nothing, so for the cost, opt for the cableco or satellite DVR.

Martin