Anyone still using DVCR?

[mlbdude]

I have long since converted over to Hauppauge 250's but am curious if the sync problems were fixed on the Creative card. Would love a third tuner A fellow user of Sage reported to me that wit h a clean install of the latest build of Sage he still had the audio sync issues. I have not seen the issue come up in the forums for awhile so I am just curious - Is anyone still using the Creative DVCR with SageTV?

[Lester Jacobs]

I converted to the PVR 250s as well. However I'm planning to setup the DVCR as a network encoder tonight or tomorrow to see how that works. My idea was to set the Creative card at a lower merit value than the the PVR 250s so that they would always get used in preference to the DVCR when it comes to recordings (I believe that this is how the merit functionality works). That way if both PVR 250s are tied up recording I can still limp along on the Creative card for live TV watching.

If you've got a spare slot, why not try it? Certainly can't hurt. I have no more PCI slots left which is why I am going the netwrok route

I'll post my results back in this thread when I have any.


Cheers
Lester

[shodge]

I too am a PVR-250 convert. Jeff has made a lot of improvements as of 1.3 with the DVCR issue. I was successful as using it as a recorder as long as I did not mess with the machine. So I decided to move to something more stable for my network PVR server. Its working great.

Presently am using the DVCR card with SageRecorder. Sometime I may try it as a second tuner....

FYI,
-Stan

[cellarboy]

So you guys are all converts to the PVR250? How is the picture quality of the 250 in comparision to the DVCR? Any other improvements you might mention?

I gotta admit, I'd really like a card that's supported by a manufacturer, so I'm seriously considering switching too.

[mlbdude]

Video and audio quality is as good if not better than the DVCR. Plus it supports up to 12 Mbits for the MPEG2 stream (though it is overkill for TV). The tuner is a bit stronger than the DVCR so I don't need to amp the signal as much.

The drivers are not too good though. I get frame skipping/blips and audio skips on average 10 per hour. However, while the drivers need some work they are supported! They put out regular driver updates and being an owner of a 6 year old Hauppauge TV tuner, I can attest that the driver support will probably continue for awhile.

All in all I am glad I swtiched since I love SageTV, and the Hauppauge only very rarely gets audio sync problems (I have seen it happen only once so far in about a month of use). So overall I am pretty happy with the cards.

[Lester Jacobs]

I've just finished doing a couple of days testing with SageTV 1.3.8 and the Creative DVCR card. The results seem to validate what Stan (shodge) noticed. The recordings stay in perfect sync if you don't do anything on the machine. Start running a few apps and you quickly lose a/v sync. I was going to run my Creative card as a network encoder but with the unreliable sync issue, I've decided not to. I just can't afford to risk screwing up a recording. I even tried running SageTV at realtime priority but still had the sync issue.

If Jeff later adds the option of restricting certain encoders to "view only" then I would be inclined to buy SageRecorder and set up the Creative card as a network encoder so I can watch live TV in the event that both of my PVR 250s are tied up recording shows.

In the meanwhile the Creative card lets me create a great test environment on which to evaluate future versions of SageTV without having to touch my main SageTV server machine.

Cheers
Lester

[rhsmcc]

I just pulled out the old DVCR and wanted to play with it also however I've discovered that the install CD is missing. I called creative and they charge $15 for the replacement disc. I have a favor to request from anyone with the Creative card. I would really apprecate someone with DSL or Cable who could send an image of the CD to me. I'll wait a few days before I order the repacement. I think the dog ate it.

[-LD]

i'll make an image of it when i get home

[-LD]

i have an ISO...it's about 41.5MB...how do you want to get it?

[randyest]

aha! so audio sync on DVCR with Sage TV IS a known issue. Several other forum searches failed to turn up this thread , but now that I know, I have just one question:

why not put a note in the readme, release notes, and/or website that this problem exist? It would have saved me hours of fruitless debugging and frustration.

and it might have made me consider buying a new card + sage bundle.

instead, I feel misled by the claims that sageTV works with Creative DVCR, which I guess if having synchronized audio and video isn't important to you, it does.