HTPC folks who use CableCARD tuners - have you moved from WMC to Kodi?
3I've got the original Ceton InfiniTV4 in my HTPC. I use Windows 7 Media Center (WMC). I had 2x2TB HDD that went tits up recently. Rather than replace them, I decided it's as good a time as any to build a NAS and get PLEX going. I'm ok there (for now).
Have you moved from WMC to Kodi? If so, are there still restrictions on what can be recorded? I know at one point there was concern that none of the PVR backends could support the copy protection bits and that WMC was the only game in town. Is that still the case?
I figure if I'm doing some jiggery-pokery with the HTPC setup, I could move to Kodi as well, but I don't want to lose the ability to record most things.
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I've been a big time Kodi (XBMC) user for a while now.. And I do my PVR on there as well, using NextPVR as the backend.. However, all my recording is OTA, so I can't help with your specific issue.. I went through most of the rest of what you're asking though.. Bought a QNAP TS420 NAS (4x 3TB drives for now). I'm glad I did that before my drives died though, that would have been a real pain.. I did it when my 3TB internal drive filled up.. (I'm a digital hoarder I guess).
The only problem I've had with NextPVR and Kodi is related to Comskip.. I have it set up and mostly working (this was my latest project), but I guess the npvr backend streams locally via http to kodi for all playback.. And the Comskip edl file doesn't pass over http (even though this is all on the same computer!).. So I had to install the X-NEWA addon for NextPVR, and use it for my playback. I still use the built in pvr for watching live tv, and setting my recordings..
If anyone has another idea for a backend PVR that will work well with comskip as well as with Kodi, feel free to let me know ;)
@kadagan comskip never appealed to me. I can skip 30s with my remote and it seemed like a small inconvenience compared to having to explain to the wife why her show is cutting off parts when comskip goes wrong.
I don't remember what the DRM bits are set to for the channels and shows we watch. If it turns out that it's not supported, I'm going to be a sad panda. WMC is dead and I don't want to hang onto Win7 forever.
Cable companies and content providers have learned nothing from the music industry, except to control more rather than adapt. Netflix will rule the media world and they're no better.
@JerseyFrank I saw recently that Sling's service to get ESPN also includes ESPN 3 access. Pretty soon I think we'll just be directly buying access to multiple services like that.
@jqubed Luckily for me, no one in my household cares about Sportsball or any of the myriad of stations that cover the different Sportsball games.
I only set up my WMC 7 / InfinityTV6 a year ago, and the main reason I chose that setup was because of copy protected recordings (the international channel my wife watches has it on). So far, the only solution to sharing copy protected recordings across the network is to use Xbox 360 or Ceton Echo as extenders for WMC 7.
Looking at this discussion, it looks like WMC is still your only option this year, and cable companies are intentionally setting the bit more to force you to rent their DVR.
@Odi http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=8720&start=180 might be an alternative depending on how it goes
@Odi http://www.avsforum.com/forum/26-home-theater-computers/1513854-cablecard-vs-copy-once-why-only-wmc.html is an interesting read on why open source code could never support it
@Odi oh, now that DOES look promising. I'm sorry I missed it. I'd gladly drop a few bones towards that. I hope they make enough.
@Odi Man, I hope that Silicon Dust project works out; I've been getting frustrated with WMC deciding to not record programs more and more lately, but my only alternative is to take the cable company's DVR. I have Ceton's InfiniTV card but I'd get an HD Homerun if they get it to work.
@jqubed Same. I hope it's faster at tuning though. The InfiniTV makes channel surfing impossible.
MediaCenter is really the only thing that supports Copy Once & Copy Never, so if your provider flags the majority of your stuff with that, you're kinda stuck. Supposedly Kodi will offer a way to do this, but I would imagine Kodi on Windows won't offer that.
The HDHomeRun Prime unit does have some companion apps that will let you watch protected TV on your iPhone/iPad/Android device, but not sure about recording protected TV.
@dashcloud I believe the app for the iPad does allow protected shows. I just recently replaced my HD homerun Prime with a Tivo.
@dashcloud there's an HDHomeRun Prime app for iOS? I gave up trying to find a decent DLNA client that works. Eventually I realized my Samsung TVs had a DLNA client built in.
@shawn the Hd Home run app stopped working on newer firmware older works good. There is a different app they suggest and you have a $15 in app purchase.
@shawn Apparently not for protected channels, but InstaTV (Pro) does work (although my experience is mostly around the InstaTV Pro+ server portion to allow channels to be streamed.) I briefly tried HDHRFling, and it did seem to work, but InstaTV worked out better for what I needed, and I haven't worked with anything else. On DLNA, you can set channels to be favorites and show up in the favorites list by going to the device IP, the channel list, and starring the channels you want.
@dashcloud OK, it's been that long that I guess protected doesn't work on it... (I haven't used the software in 12+ months)
@dashcloud @sohmageek @shawn HDHRPrime users... can you comment on channel change speed? It's abysmal on the Ceton InfiniTV4. Like 5+ seconds.
@JerseyFrank I had it almost the same speed As the comcast $2 boxes for basic TV. But if it was on an extender it was longer. I had my pc connected to the tv also for big screen gaming :)
@JonT I've been posting links to this thread and begging my friends to translate. My reputation as a senior technoslut (on Medicare and buys quadricopters for self) is in serious jeopardy. We are the generation who lived through all the Halt & Catch Fire years, but we are going down in flames here.
@OldCatLady @JonT Don't listen to us. It's just our way of spending thousands of dollars to save $15 a month.
@JerseyFrank This is literally my whole VHS conversion project- which is an even bigger timesink than digital tv/home media center.
@JerseyFrank It's mainly about more storage space for me. I have 3TB striped for recording shows.
I've been using WMC since 2007 (then VMC) and have also upgraded my InfiniTV4 to an ETH6. The box is still Windows 7 and I have no intention of switching to anything for as long as possible. I have three extenders and they all work flawlessly.
Between comskip, dvrmstoolbox and a few other choice add-ons, this is one reliable, robust system. At present, I have it automatically taking shows I request, removing commercials and converting to MP4 so it's ready for syncing to my Android Tablet, automatically.
My X1 box from Comcast is great, and does a lot, but I can't give up the flexibility I have with this HTPC setup. I love it.
@ACraigL Does that setup descramble encrypted cable channels? Or only the Clear QAM?
@jqubed It's a digital cable tuner that uses a cable provided m-card (cable card). So, yes you get all the channels you are subscribed to from your cable Co as you would on a set top box, with the exception of on demand.
Is the channel change speed significantly better or worse on the ETH6?
@JerseyFrank It's been a while since I had the old one, but they're both laggy. Ultimately, It never mattered to me since I timeshift almost everything. Very little live tv outside of sports, and then I pretty much stay put.
@ACraigL I'm hoping the HDHRPrime users chime in and tell me that channel changes take 100ms
@JerseyFrank I'll try to get you some numbers tonight.
@JerseyFrank I did some quick tests on my Windows desktop that's hardwired, and the channel switched nearly instantly and the video cleared up within 2 seconds. I'll test out the DLNA feature on my TV and the app hopefully tomorrow. What would you like me to test ideally?
@dashcloud In WMC, the time it takes from pressing ch+ to the point I get a visible picture, preferably between two HD channels
The InfiniTV presents a black screen for multiple seconds.
@JerseyFrank In my testing, it took about 2 seconds to be ready- you might get picture a little earlier, but within 2 seconds on HD channels, the picture & sound are ready & playing.
@dashcloud thanks! I'll probably hold off on switching until the hdhrdvr project has stabilized and has the cablecard DRM stuff sorted out.
Somewhat on topic:
I just recently put OSMC (kodi/XBMC) onto my old Raspberry Pi and use it as a media center to stream TV Shows/Movies from my computer to the living room.
It was fairly easy to setup using the OSMC installer and the remote control app for android, Kore, is a pretty cool companion.
So far, I am happy with the setup, but it isn't really anything too crazy.
FYI: WMC cannot use a $1200 4x4TB RAID10 NAS as recorder storage. FML.
@JerseyFrank http://www.ctrl-r.org/?p=101
@Odi I opted to salvage a 1TB disk from a machine that doesn't need it now that the NAS is online. I considered iSCSI, but I've never had an easy time after breaking Microsoft's rules. See also: Letting every development team customize their TFS work item templates.
@JerseyFrank Why RAID 10? Why not just RAID 0 if it's just for recorded shows? Do you really care if the drive fails and you lose the reruns on it?
@jqubed @jqubed a few reasons
1. I'm married with children.
2. Interruption of service is worse than losing recordings, but both are bad.
3. Picture storage with auto-sync to amazon cloud drive, and auto-upload-to-NAS from phones
4. I'm a nerd that knows that if it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing.
5. 4 drives in RAID 0 sounds like I'd be failing all the time.
@JerseyFrank So, I looked into this for you, and came up with two possibilities. Haven't tested either of them because I don't record much TV on the computer now.
Option 1: How to record TV with Media Center (Windows 7) to a network drive? The answer at the bottom of the first page.
Option 2: Use Windows Media Center Recording Storage Pooler (3rd party program)
In the thread from the first option, someone says they did get sharing over iSCSI to work, but there are some issues, like not being able to share the drive.
@JerseyFrank You can set up a symbolic link to fool WMC into thinking the files are on your local drive when they are in fact on your NAS. I do this with my Steam library, it works great.
@ChunkyBitz Good idea. I tried that first. I thought it would work, but WMC actually knew it was a symlink and wouldn't take it.
I don't need to solve this anymore. I've got a small app running that renames and move the wtv files into show/season/episode format so that Plex picks them up and does the metadata fetching right.
I just didn't have a drive on-hand that day when I thought the NAS would be sufficient. I have one now.