External A/V devices

[nisse]

Hi guys!
I've been reading in the Wiki on how to control external A/V devices with serial or ir, but is it possible to grab the video and input the audio into lmce and use it in the same way as if it was a TV-card? recording, timeshifting...
Maybe by using a device like: http://www.terratec.net/en/products/Grabster_AV_150_MX_2248.html

And another thing, is it possible to get IPTV working?

/nisse

[totallymaxed]

Hi guys!
I've been reading in the Wiki on how to control external A/V devices with serial or ir, but is it possible to grab the video and input the audio into lmce and use it in the same way as if it was a TV-card? recording, timeshifting...
Maybe by using a device like: http://www.terratec.net/en/products/Grabster_AV_150_MX_2248.html

And another thing, is it possible to get IPTV working?

/nisse

Welcome.

vdr or MythTV (the two TV application integrated into LinuxMCE...you choose one or the other when you initially install) can be setup inside LinuxMCE to grab video/audio from external analog SD sources like PVR's etc. There is plenty of information on the wiki about this. The Grabster does not look like the way to go here as it has no hardware mpeg encoding and is not currentl supported.

By IPTV I guess you mean external services from a provider. Certainly vdr can be used to watch some IPTV services (and i expect MythTV could also) but LinuxMCE is not configured out of the box to do this currently.

All the best

Andrew

[nisse]

Thanks Andrew
Yes IPTV in Sweden are provided by the ISP.
If you subscribe to a fast ADSL connection, you can get all TV chanels via that ADSL connection.
They provide a box with ethernet in and Scart out (and integrated card reader).
Would be nice if lmce and a card reader, could act as that box

Anyway, after reading more in the Wiki, I found out that my TV card are not supported (Fire DTV),
so I have to postpone my transition from M$ to Linux
And my ATI x1250 are not recomended, found that out the hard way   

/nisse

[posde]

vdr [..]can be setup inside LinuxMCE to grab video/audio from external analog SD sources like PVR's etc.

I am not sure, if the grabing audio/video from external sources is supported within VDR. I know there is a plugin for the PVR-xxx available for VDR, but afaik, that plugin is flaky as hell.

Andrew, do you have any installs like that?

[niz23]

nisse,

Thanks Andrew
Yes IPTV in Sweden are provided by the ISP.
If you subscribe to a fast ADSL connection, you can get all TV chanels via that ADSL connection.
They provide a box with ethernet in and Scart out (and integrated card reader).
Would be nice if lmce and a card reader, could act as that box

Anyway, after reading more in the Wiki, I found out that my TV card are not supported (Fire DTV),
so I have to postpone my transition from M$ to Linux
And my ATI x1250 are not recomended, found that out the hard way   

/nisse

These are fine units. Unfortunately they use use firewire.
I have heard rumours that there are new units coming up with ethernet interface.
Butr so far we have to stick with the fw units.

There are patches to make FireDTV work under Linux.
See, http://user.in-berlin.de/~s5r6/linux1394/firedtv/


Haru några frågor så skicka ett PM om det är intressant.
Använder inte själv Fire-DTV.

/niz23

[posde]

Haru några frågor så skicka ett PM om det är intressant.
Använder inte själv Fire-DTV.

Easy for you to say

[totallymaxed]

vdr [..]can be setup inside LinuxMCE to grab video/audio from external analog SD sources like PVR's etc.

I am not sure, if the grabing audio/video from external sources is supported within VDR. I know there is a plugin for the PVR-xxx available for VDR, but afaik, that plugin is flaky as hell.

Andrew, do you have any installs like that?

We do have installs of Dianemo that use the IPTV plugin and vlc to stream video grabbed from a PVR150/250/350 - the source being any composite/S-video signal attached to the card. The streams appear as 'TV channels' in vdr's EPG and can be interacted with just like any other 'TV channe' (ie live pause, schedule a recording, instant recordings etc etc...no EPG data is handled currently though).

This works well...but the picture quality is less than ideal when compared with 'real' DVB-T/S channels and you do get a bit of lag when controlling the source via IR (this is in the grabbing/encoding process not the IR control) which makes the user experience a little frustrating.

So although this route is technically feasible it really needs much better quality & faster video capture to be totally acceptable.

All the best

Andrew