watching without recording; possible?

[alanPr]

Newbie question! Can SageTV be used *only* for watching TV, without recording? No matter what settings I tried, even in the Channel setup, the software will record the a active chnnel! It's very cool to be able to record a show or a movie, but watching TV is most of the time, the only function I need. I'm trying SageTV with ATI e-Home Wonder! Can you please help?

[stanger89]

Nope, there's no way to bypass the MPEG encoder on these cards currently.

[jptaz]

Actually that is not exactly what he is asking...Unless I am mistake he does not want files written to disk all the time when just watching. I don't think SageTV has this option, but it could be done as the MPEG2 Data stream could be sent driectly to a Decoder.

[alanPr]

Thank you for your prompt answer stanger89! It looks like I've wasted $75 then! As far as I'm concerned, recording happens very rarely when watching TV! What's the purpose of a card which will record continuosly, is beyond me!!!

[alanPr]

Thanks for your contribution jptaz. I'm no expert but I assume that the analog (or digital) TV signal is directed to the MPEG2 chip on the card which converts it to a MPEG2 stream. The MPEG2 stream is then taken over by the MPEG2 decoder which in turn gives it to the video renderer to display it on the screen. SageTV is also righting the MPEG2 stream to a MPEG2 file on the disk.

Can you help me understand what you mean by the "MPEG2 stream can be directed to a MPEG2 decoder"? Thank you in advance for your patience!

[Opus4]

Originally posted by alanPr
It looks like I've wasted $75 then! As far as I'm concerned, recording happens very rarely when watching TV! What's the purpose of a card which will record continuosly, is beyond me!!!

Because it allows you to easily pause & rewind at any time you want... which pretty much seems like the entire point of a PVR, which includes the term "video recorder". It might help for you to know that by default, SageTV will automatically delete the files for live TV shortly after the show is over, so they don't stick around forever. The default installation auto-deletes everything that is not a manual recording or a favorite.

A lot of us rarely watch live TV anyway -- perhaps consider changing your viewing habits to include recording what you want to watch & then watch it any time afterwards at your convenience rather than the networks' convenience. One benefit of this is the ability to FF through commercials, something that gets a little bit difficult when watching TV live, meaning caught up to the present time. You can't FF past the current time.

- Andy

[alanPr]

Thank you opus4. Very valid points! I still don't see much merit in recording everything, even in Cannel setup mode, or when browsing through the channels, etc... It could be only me, but I don't like the lack of the option to turn off recording. Writing on the hard disk is a very complex operation, involving a lot of computer resources and extensive use of the disk surface...

[jptaz]

Originally posted by alanPr
Thanks for your contribution jptaz. I'm no expert but I assume that the analog (or digital) TV signal is directed to the MPEG2 chip on the card which converts it to a MPEG2 stream. The MPEG2 stream is then taken over by the MPEG2 decoder which in turn gives it to the video renderer to display it on the screen. SageTV is also righting the MPEG2 stream to a MPEG2 file on the disk.

Can you help me understand what you mean by the "MPEG2 stream can be directed to a MPEG2 decoder"? Thank you in advance for your patience!

You are close. In the Case of SageTV it Goes from the MPEG Stream from the card is written to disk and then it is read from the Disk and sent to the MPEG2 Decoder which sends it to the video renderer.

I rarely watch live TV, but my wife does in the kitchen on her computer there. She is actually starting to get used to the idea of watching all recorded material. She was happy when I set up a favorite for the "Young and the Restless" as she can watch it while she is working on dinner when she gets home from work.

John

[alanPr]

Thanks John! So, what you're saying is that the MPEG2 stream from the card, could (or should as far as I'm concerned), go to the MPEG2 decoder first, then to the video renderer and then, if so desired by the user, written to the disk.

I dont' watch TV at all! I bought this card for my daughter's computer. I needed a half-height TV tuner and I fell upon this ATI e-Home Wonder. My daughter is not interested in recording all the TV shows and movies either. She'd just like to have a small TV window somewhere on the screen, while mainly using her PC for other stuff. Unless one uses a very powerfull machine, you can't do much else on a computer which is continuosly writing many hundreds of MBytes on the disk. This is what I meant about wasting $75.

Many thanks for your expert explanation!

Alan

[Opus4]

I'm no expert on the hardware encoder cards, but it might be their drivers that are set to write to the disk like that. I don't think they provide a way to have a live image. I seem to remember someone saying that the Roslyns can provide a lie preview image, but SageTV doesn't make use of that ability right now. Perhaps what you really want for your situation is a card that doesn't do hardware encoding? (I'm partially saying this so that someone who _does_ know will comment on that thought... and how much cpu power is needed to watch TV on such a live-capable card.)

- Andy

[alanPr]

Thanks for your follow up Andy! I do have two of those cards. One is an ATI WinTV Pro and one is an ATI all-in-wonder. Both are capbale of capturing in MPEG1 and MPEG2 format, but only when you want to. The rest of the time, they play files, or DVDs, or live TV. CPU usage is minimal, so one can work in Adobe Photoshop, while having a TV widow open.

The problem with those cards is that they are full height and they don't fit in a thin case. That's why I purchased the e-Home Wonder.

[stanger89]

Originally posted by alanPr
Thanks John! So, what you're saying is that the MPEG2 stream from the card, could (or should as far as I'm concerned), go to the MPEG2 decoder first, then to the video renderer and then, if so desired by the user, written to the disk.

The problem with that is the playback gets tricky. The MPEG stream is comming out of the MPEG encoder at one speed, and the MPEG decoders are likely playing it at a different speed. Whether it plays too slow or too fast there would be problems, that's the reason why it has to be written to disk, to provide a buffer to compensate for the difference in speeds.

Is the computer you have it in really slow? The Recording takes almost no CPU so it sounds like you're having trouble with the playback.

If true live TV is your only goal, and you'll never record, you'll be far better off going with a non HW encode card. Newegg has several low profile ones:

This one should be pretty good:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...122-180&depa=1
This one's cheaper, but has an older TV decoder:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...122-181&depa=1

FWIW, I can't stand ATI's TV software, and I can't imagine going back to a SW encoder for recording

[chrysek]

Originally posted by alanPr
Thank you for your prompt answer stanger89! It looks like I've wasted $75 then! As far as I'm concerned, recording happens very rarely when watching TV! What's the purpose of a card which will record continuosly, is beyond me!!!

I never seen any PVR that would not record anything while watching TV. See purpose of doing that is so you can pause live TV and go for a coffe or take a leak or something... Software/Hardware would not be smart enough when you would like to do such so it does dump info to a HD at all times. This is not only with SageTV but any PVR's I've worked with....

[thatdude90210]

I thought the TV wonder pro was half height card with a full height bracket, at least that's how I remember it. I installed mine over half a year ago.

Just checked on Newegg, they have some pics: (link)

It's a good card, much better for just watching live tv in a window. A couple of issues that I've seen: do not use the setting "best video quality" it'll create sound sync issues, and ATI's multimedia center 8.2 works best with it.