Newb question about Quality.

[Kraft75]

Ok, I'm trying all the popular PVR software, and SageTV seems the most promising, but I have issues that I can't seem to be able to resolve.

When I watch LiveTV, the quality is downright puny. I tried to fiddle around with VMR9 and other settings, and the quality doesn't change. I'm using an ATI TV wonder PRO. How can I get a clear and nice image with LiveTV, the same quality I get from my other viewing software(ati, shadowstream, dscaler, etc..)?

I have another issue, which I was really looking forward to try out, is pausing live tv, rewind and such. It doesn't work. I watch TV, I can see the pause/play/rewind/fwd buttons when I click in the screen, but clicking on any does not produce anything. I've looked around in the settings and I can't seem to find anything.

Thanks for the help.

Kraft75

[mls]

It almost sounds like you are recording at VCD quality. If I recall correctly you can not do time shifting with VCD quality. That would also explain the poor picture quality as well (VCD is really low quality).

Try changing to a higher recording quality. I normally use DVD Extra Long Play, but you can pick whichever looks best to you. Higher quality settings use more hard drive space so you may not want to use the higher ones unless you have a larger hard drive (and have allocated a large amount of space for SageTV to use).

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Kraft75

I'm using an ATI TV wonder PRO....
I was really looking forward to try out, is pausing live tv, rewind and such. It doesn't work.

Your TV card isn't supported for recording (pausing/rewind/etc). In fact I wasn't aware non-Hardware encoders (like your card) were supported at all. Must be one of the undocumented features Jeff snuck in on us, or you're lucky.

As for recording, you need a supported hardware encoder card:
http://www.sage.tv/requirements.html?sageSub=tv

[mls]

I was assuming he was only using the ATI TV Wonder Pro as a video card for display and actually did have some type of hardware encoder card (such as a PVR-250). If he is trying to use the ATI for recording with SageTV, well I'm suprised it works at all.

[Kraft75]

Thanks for the quick feedback guys. Recording doesn't seem to work at all, and playing around with the Recording Settings doesn't seem to change the image quality in LiveTV.

By the sound of you two, seems like if I really want to get into building an HTPC, I should get an Hauppauge card or something. The Hauppauge WinTV PVR-250 looks promising, I'll try to see if I can find one over here(Canada).

Kraft75

[stanger89]

The ATI TV Wonder Pro is just a simple Conexant based TV card.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Kraft75

By the sound of you two, seems like if I really want to get into building an HTPC, I should get an Hauppauge card or something.

You won't be sorry, for a PVR, there's just no substitute for a true hardware encoder.

[Cayars]

SageTV DOES support non-hardware cards but you need to change a property setting.