Hauppauge Colossus HD-PVR

[jptheripper]

according to hauppauge site only dd5.1 is supported.

[jalyst]

Yeah i know
But it has some other good qualities, so it remains on my short-list.
Don't suppose you know how to answer my other questions?

thank-you.

[stanger89]

I don't believe you can disable the compression.

[Tiki]

Originally Posted by Tiki

So the HD-PVR came with ArcSoft TME software and now the Colossus comes with ArcSoft ShowBiz Software...

Is ShowBiz an upgrade to TME? Can you install both at the same time?

Does Showbiz come with an h.264 codec that can be used with Sage (TME did)?

If we have both an HD-PVR and the Colossus and we are using Sage, should we install one, both, or neither?

:Bump

[SHS]

Originally Posted by Tiki

So the HD-PVR came with ArcSoft TME software and now the Colossus comes with ArcSoft ShowBiz Software...

Is ShowBiz an upgrade to TME? Can you install both at the same time?

Does Showbiz come with an h.264 codec that can be used with Sage (TME did)?

If we have both an HD-PVR and the Colossus and we are using Sage, should we install one, both, or neither?

1: No ShowBiz is not an upgrade to TME there way diff from each other
2: ShowBiz more about Capturing, Editing your home movies and DVD authoring which allow you to do transitions, special effects, and animated text all in one.
3: I have say most like there lock down but I can't say for sure being I still have got one dran it.
4: I not sure what you mean by, should we install one, both, or neither?.

[Tiki]

Originally Posted by SHS

4: I not sure what you mean by, should we install one, both, or neither?.

I mean, does installing or not installing TME and/or Showbiz have any effect on how the Colossus / HD-PVR works with Sage?

If I am only planning to use my Colossus with Sage, do I need to install this software, or is it just a bonus? Can I just install the Colossus driver and skip everything else on the install disk?

And, if I install Showbiz, should I un-install TME first? (Sounds like it doesn't matter, since you said above that TME and Showbiz are completely different).

[TechBill]

I noticed that some of the post mentioned about locking output at 720p on the older HDPVR and that they are doing the same on Colossus.

Can anyone explain why would one want to set at 720p?

Does it mean they set the STB output only at 720p disableing the native output etc?

Any benfits to it?


Thank you

Bill

[Clift]

Originally Posted by Tiki

I mean, does installing or not installing TME and/or Showbiz have any effect on how the Colossus / HD-PVR works with Sage?

If I am only planning to use my Colossus with Sage, do I need to install this software, or is it just a bonus? Can I just install the Colossus driver and skip everything else on the install disk?

And, if I install Showbiz, should I un-install TME first? (Sounds like it doesn't matter, since you said above that TME and Showbiz are completely different).

You don't need TME or ShowBiz in order to use the HD PVR USB or the HD PVR Colossus in SageTV.

[SHS]

Originally Posted by Tiki

I mean, does installing or not installing TME and/or Showbiz have any effect on how the Colossus / HD-PVR works with Sage?

If I am only planning to use my Colossus with Sage, do I need to install this software, or is it just a bonus? Can I just install the Colossus driver and skip everything else on the install disk?

And, if I install Showbiz, should I un-install TME first? (Sounds like it doesn't matter, since you said above that TME and Showbiz are completely different).

You don't need them as Clift said
But in order to use the HD PVR USB or the HD PVR Colossus out side of SageTV you must likey need to install both becuase must likey the HD PVR USB will not work with ShowBiz but I could be wrong there.

[SHS]

Originally Posted by TechBill

I noticed that some of the post mentioned about locking output at 720p on the older HDPVR and that they are doing the same on Colossus.

Can anyone explain why would one want to set at 720p?

Does it mean they set the STB output only at 720p disableing the native output etc?

Any benfits to it?


Thank you

Bill

One reason for that is 720p look way better then 1080i
It about progrssive vs interlaced
Another reason for that is older PC work better at 720p then 1080i
Yes that mean they set the STB output only at 720p
The problem with native output it is auto switch from one resolution to next resolution that is know to cuase problem with any Hardware Encoder unlike Hardware Decoder

[TechBill]

Originally Posted by SHS

One reason for that is 720p look way better then 1080i
It about progrssive vs interlaced
Another reason for that is older PC work better at 720p then 1080i
Yes that mean they set the STB output only at 720p
The problem with native output it is auto switch from one resolution to next resolution that is know to cuase problem with any Hardware Encoder unlike Hardware Decoder

Thank you for the explaination!

I will set it at 720p to give it a try to see how it is.


Bill

[cat6man]

Originally Posted by cat6man

well, since i was running component signals into the output jack, i think i have a clue why i got no video.................cockpit error of the first magnitude over here

nope, i wasn't as dumb as i thought i was after all.

i assumed the lack of a picture was an input/output switch but that wasn't it after all..........finally got some time to dig in this afternoon and the problem was the lousy component connector............if i jiggle it, i can get
a picture to acquire, but it won't stay.............fortunately, they ship two of these puppies, one for input and one for video passthrough, and the 2nd
connector works fine (whew, i won't have to RMA the board after all)

so, i was able to get video and audio spdif working and recording with whatever was on the STB...................took it apart and set the 2nd hdpvr back up so that tonight's recordings don't get compromised............tomorrow i'll go back into the basement electronics room and move one of the firewire channel tuners (exemultituner) from an hdpvr to the colossus..........and if that looks good, it will be time to give this puppy a workout.

p.s. anyone know what type of connector that is?

[cat6man]

Originally Posted by SHS

One reason for that is 720p look way better then 1080i
It about progrssive vs interlaced
Another reason for that is older PC work better at 720p then 1080i
Yes that mean they set the STB output only at 720p
The problem with native output it is auto switch from one resolution to next resolution that is know to cuase problem with any Hardware Encoder unlike Hardware Decoder

bill,

i will respectfully disagree with some of these observations (and of course your mileage may vary)

1. 720p does not always look better, though it often does for sports with lots of motion..........not always true though..........and converting 1080i source material to 720p can only degrade the picture due to an additional encoding step. setting the stb to 720p will not make 1080i sporting events look like 720p for motion as the original encoding was 1080i..........and 1080i can definitely be better for some other sources.

2. if the encoder has problems with native passthrough for the colossus, that would be unfortunate...........my hdpvr does not seem to have that problem but others have reported the problem..........it may be related to your provider and how they encode their programming and how/when they switch, as well as the implementation of the STB. i much prefer native passthrough and recording with no video processing at the stb (which is really poorly done as they use very cheap electronics) and no video processing at the colossus/hdpvr (a bit better than STB but not as good as the video processing in more modern HD tv sets, and not even close the video quality
of scaling/deinterlacing available with an outboard video processor such as the DVDO Duo, which i use)


3. if the colossus has problems with native resolution passthrough, they should just fix it and not compromise the video quality but setting the lousy
STB to do unnecessary video re-encoding.

finally, i'm fussy about video quality and your mileage may vary. if you are also fussy about video quality, this will be noticeable............however you may not be sensitive to the difference and this may all be irrelevant to you
and your home theater set up. only you can decide if this matters to you.

cheers

[TechBill]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Placeshifter is no where near as advanced as far as playback system as sagetv, client, or the extenders. It is designed to 'just work' on pretty much any system, portability over quality. It doesn't utilize most hardware acceleration as well as client does. Is there a reason you are using placeshifter instead of client? It might be worth the $30 client license for that system, as it is far superior to placeshifter for local LAN playback.

Originally Posted by TechBill

Yes but still if placeshifter is not working for me on LAN, then I cannot use it when roaming.

That is what concerns me right now ...


Bill

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Not true. Roaming, placeshifter will be paying back a much simpler MPEG-2 stream, created by the sagetvtranscoder on the server. As long as the server has enough power to do the transcoding, it will work fine.

It seem that setting STB lock to only 720p what fixed my placeshifter issue I was having.

It not perfect but it working a whole lot better now.



Bill

[Rico66]

Most people who locked the stb output to one resolution (either 720p or 1080i) did that for stability purposes. The HD PVR tends to have problems with switching resolutions while recording (at least some people reported that). By setting one output resolution you could avoid those issues. Whether you choose 720p or 1080i is a personal decision. 720p actually can make sense, if your tv only supports that resolution natively.

Unless Hauppauge addressed the core of these issues, it could be likely that we still see lock-ups related to resolution changes in the Colossus.

And yes my Colossus actually locked up late last night, after a number of channel changes...
(and no, it doesn't have a button to switch on/off, but you can disable/re-enable via device manager if that happens)

[autoboy]

Placeshifter:

Last I heard (which was awhile ago) was that the SageTV transcoder didn't like 1080i H.264 video. Try setting the STB to 720p instead and see if that fixes your placeshifter stuttering issues.

[AlphaCrew]

Originally Posted by cat6man

bill,

i will respectfully disagree with some of these observations (and of course your mileage may vary)

...SNIP...

finally, i'm fussy about video quality and your mileage may vary. if you are also fussy about video quality, this will be noticeable............however you may not be sensitive to the difference and this may all be irrelevant to you
and your home theater set up. only you can decide if this matters to you.

cheers

As you have mentioned, it is indeed a subjective issue. I noticed, using SageTV (Set to the highest setting) that 1080i recordings are bit rate starved, as compared to TME's recordings. TME's 1080i just look better then SageTV.

Interestingly I find, in general, SageTV produces smaller 1080i recordings then it's 720p counter part. (still not sure why this occurs) SageTV doesn't seem to max out the HD-PVR's bit rate maximums. They could have put a "protective" buffer, but I dunno...( or maybe SageTV locks to VBR instead of Constant, but again I dunno )

So bottom line for me, Lock my FiOS box to 720p...

[Rico66]

Originally Posted by AlphaCrew

As you have mentioned, it is indeed a subjective issue. I noticed, using SageTV (Set to the highest setting) that 1080i recordings are bit rate starved, as compared to TME's recordings. TME's 1080i just look better then SageTV.

Interestingly I find, in general, SageTV produces smaller 1080i recordings then it's 720p counter part. (still not sure why this occurs) SageTV doesn't seem to max out the HD-PVR's bit rate maximums. They could have put a "protective" buffer, but I dunno...( or maybe SageTV locks to VBR instead of Constant, but again I dunno )

So bottom line for me, Lock my FiOS box to 720p...

Are you aware that you can change bitrates for Sage recordings? As mentioned a couple of posts back, you can go to as high as 20 Mbps, so I'm not sure what is bit starved here. And you can select whether to use vbr or cbr as well.

[AlphaCrew]

Originally Posted by Rico66

Are you aware that you can change bitrates for Sage recordings? As mentioned a couple of posts back, you can go to as high as 20 Mbps, so I'm not sure what is bit starved here. And you can select whether to use vbr or cbr as well.

If you are referring to the "Fair" "Good" etc setting then yes, otherwise no.

I didn't know there was a selection for the recording method, please share with me how.

EDIT:
We are talking about the older HD-PVR here right?

[madas]

Hey Folks,

I just put both of my new colossus cards in my pc, which was a fresh Win7 64-bit install. Running 2.3b of the Hauppauge software and the latest sage beta.

I have 2x VIP 211k Dish receivers

When i'm connected through component audio and video are fine

When I connect HDMI the video is fine but the audio is nothing but a constant string of crackling. It happens on both receivers/both cards.

Any ideas?

I have done all the obvious things like replacing cables etc. The fact that it happens on both makes me think that something else is going on.

Help!