alternatives to Sage to consider

[maceie]

It claims to let you "Watch DVDs and browse your video collection complete with poster art and metadata".
http://www.nextpvr.com/features/#n3

I haven't played with NextPVR for about 2 years, but I expect others here have.

But yeah, if it only did TV playback/recording, then that'd be a showstopper.

[emveepee]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Isn't NextPVR still limited to just TV?

Still? It never has been.

Martin

[BobbyDing]

And now there's this streamer:

http://www.zatznotfunny.com/2013-07/...er-on-the-way/

That's supposed to work with this DVR (incl cablecard and OTA):

http://www.entone.com/assets/File/Da...v2_1012NA).pdf
.
.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by emveepee

Still? It never has been.

Martin

Man, I could have sworn....

[SWKerr]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Isn't NextPVR still limited to just TV?

I have not tested NexPVR in awhile but it would do TV, Movies and Music.
Its core components are all there, it just lacks the polished finish of SageTV with all the plugins

There are a lot of things I liked about it.
My thinking was it is the mostly likely to replace SageTV for me.
Especially if it can become a back end for XBMC.

I just lost a DirecTV receiver last week and decided to review the DirecTV Genie and Dish Network Hoppers as a possible replacements since I was making a change anyway. Neither would really give me anything more than I have today. The Hopper looks like the best DVR but does not really integrate any of my Music or Movies. They just have the stuff they are selling and I don't expect that to change anytime soon. Providers just do not have any real incentive to provide a solution that does not make them money. Only an outsider like Google or Microsoft has the incentive to create something that plays well with others and they are generally shut out of content.


For now I have not seen a better solution than what I have now.
Just acquired a new H300 and two client licenses.
With the EPG plugin I am set to ride this puppy for quite some time if necessary.

[Skybolt]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Man, I could have sworn....

Nope, back when it was GB-PVR, it played everything. It even supported the MVP as an extender back then. ~10 yrs ago?

[SHS]

The only problem with NextPVR is it not easy to work with and Device Configuration is so over kill no where nor as easy as SageTV and don't for NextPVR clients that has to have open share folder for work

[valnar]

I'm not a Mediaportal guy, but I saw on another site they have a release 1.5.0 coming. Any comments from the experts here?
http://www.team-mediaportal.com/news...dy-for-testing

[Bagal]

Originally Posted by valnar

I'm not a Mediaportal guy, but I saw on another site they have a release 1.5.0 coming. Any comments from the experts here?
http://www.team-mediaportal.com/news...dy-for-testing

I used MediaPortal for a few years before switching to Sage, while it's a great system and very customizable it's biggest issue for me is a lack of a central DB, so you end up having to manage the media on each client.
When you've got one or two clients that's fine, but after that it becomes a massive chore keeping things in sync. There are ways of sharing the DBs by hosting them on the server but it's not 100% reliable and affects the performance.

The TV part is central though, so if that's all you need, then it won't be a problem.

Other things I remember:

• Non HW Analog capture cards needed a software encoder, so for instance I couldn't get my Blackgold BGT3595 to work
• IR blasting support wasn't great - though I'm sure I've read recently that the community has been working on the IRSS plugin that the original dev abandoned
• No support for 3rd party clients, such as Roku's etc meaning you have to use a full Windows PC (having gotten used to HD300's, this is a big issue for me)
• Lots of nice skins, though the skin has to provide support for the plugins or the plugin provide the necessary skin files
• External configuration app - I believe they've mostly enabled a lot of config from within the UI now
• Manual scanning of media - last time I used it you had to manually update music/tv/movie rips into the DB, I know they've done a lot of work on the built in video section, so this may have changed, plugins such as TV Series and Moving Pictures do this automatically.
• Plugins are usually installed manually (though most provide their own installers), they've been working on various plugin management methods over the years but I don't believe any have gained full traction with the plugin devs.
• Since plugins are installed manually, that means you have to update each client manually and usually not from within the UI
• Codec control is excellent, you can pretty much choose whatever codec you want for each format, so you can choose the best for your system
• Personally I always preferred the tuner and channel setup to Sage, it's also easier to manage tuner priority

That's about all I can remember for now, it sounds more negative than I was intending, I did really enjoy using MediaPortal, it just became a real pain keeping the clients up to date and you really can't beat the plug and play of a HD300...

[Biggen]

Man, I can't believe Sage has been gone so long now and there still isn't a total replacement yet.

At any rate, I decided to move onto DirectTV and am very happy using their Genie DVR system for watching recorded TV throughout the house. I also built a Plex server that I can stream my BD rips to Ipads, phones, and Rokus around the house as well.

The downside is there isn't an all-in-one solution yet but it is nice knowing that I can't "break" TV watching capability like I could with Sage if I messed something up when doing work on the server.

Oh well. I'll keep an eye on this thread in the future in cased there is something better.

[oldfolkie]

Originally Posted by Biggen

... it is nice knowing that I can't "break" TV watching capability like I could with Sage...

Maybe not, but the server itself can break. We have DirecTV with two DVRs and one of ours died, taking all the recordings with it. At least with Sage, you can do backups.

[Biggen]

Originally Posted by oldfolkie

Maybe not, but the server itself can break. We have DirecTV with two DVRs and one of ours died, taking all the recordings with it. At least with Sage, you can do backups.

Very true. However, I should have said, "It's not something I have to fix if the DirectTV DVR breaks other than swapping equipment out".

[Gustovier]

There's also J. River media center. These guys seem to have a very fast development life cycle, and are very involved I'm their user forums. The software for many years was focused on audiophile audio playback but within the last few years they have added TV/dvr and video playback. They recently added in cable card support (copy freely channels only). This software is not OpenSource. So you get real support.

Between these guys and media portal I think that's where my future will probably head. Especially as more folks start using jriver their dvr/video features and start giving feedback on how to improve. The developers tend to implement feedback features rather quickly.

http://www.jriver.com/index.html

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Fil...erViewInfo.jpg

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/File:Animated_list.jpg

[eqwalker]

Is there any extenders that work with JRiver so you can avoid a pc at the tv?

[Skybolt]

Has anyone tried using WMC with GoogleTv running Plex?

I haven't tried thatas yet, but I am thinking of getting a GoogleTv to try out. I was never really impressed with plex though. It may not be one device but possibly one interface, sort of.

[Gustovier]

Originally Posted by Skybolt

Has anyone tried using WMC with GoogleTv running Plex?

I haven't tried thatas yet, but I am thinking of getting a GoogleTv to try out. I was never really impressed with plex though. It may not be one device but possibly one interface, sort of.

You can't run WMC on googleTV. WMC works only on windows7/8 OSs. Plex also doesn't do Live TV/DVR it's strickly just for media playback/library mgmt, but it does it very well.

[Skybolt]

Originally Posted by Gustovier

You can't run WMC on googleTV. WMC works only on windows7/8 OSs. Plex also doesn't do Live TV/DVR it's strickly just for media playback/library mgmt, but it does it very well.

Yes, of course they don't.

GoogleTv does passthrough though ...

Use the GoogleTv for Plex and WMC for tv. For me it's one remote (Touch Screen). That also means same TV input as well, so the same would be for the AVR as well, Same aduio input as well.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Skybolt

For me it's one remote (Touch Screen). That also means same TV input as well, so the same would be for the AVR as well, Same aduio input as well.

OK, I don't get this, if you've got a good remote, and the interface is different anyway, why does it matter if the input is the same?

[Skybolt]

Originally Posted by stanger89

OK, I don't get this, if you've got a good remote, and the interface is different anyway, why does it matter if the input is the same?

Sorry, just trying to achieve one fluid interface. No screen flikering between inputs etc. No doubt any good remote these days will switch inputs. One thing we have all talked about here is everything under one hood. That may not be the case here, but think it might be close.

[stanger89]

Yeah, it was great when I could do everything within Sage. Then Blu-ray came out and that didn't work in Sage. Initially I started using PowerDVD, in addition BD players being really expensive at the time I still thought along the same lines, one box is better than two. Well using that for a while I realized that if it's not in the same interface, it's really no different than different box. The interruption when switching is just different.

That and you end up limiting yourself to potentially inferior solutions (like PowerDVD for a disc vs a standalone player in my case).