I'm currently recording cable programming through analog and QAM capture devices. I would like to plan for the future where I may be forced to use some sort of STB to receive programming.

I would like to capture some sort of HD programming. I know that direct firewire/dvi/hdmi capture is out of the question but I'm thinking that capturing at a high enough resolution using a component connection would probably be good enough.

I saw the ADS Tech PYRO A/V which has component inputs and would connect via firewire. Does anyone know if this would work with Myth? Does the box actually encode an MPEG stream or would I need a high performance server to use this?

I am almost positive that device captures SD and not HD.

OK, I found specs on this page and it's definitely SD.

http://www.tapestockonline.com/adstepyavlid.html

It says capture resolution of 720x480.

Did you see the other current thread talking about a truly HD-compatible analog digitizer coming this year from Hauppauge? That's the only device I'm aware of that will do what you want and that has a chance of being supported via Linux.

Why? If you're talking about HBO, then yeah -- but otherwise, I've been recording HD via Firewire from my STB for a few weeks now, since our Comcast added a bunch of HD channels. There's no flag on SciFI-HD, TNT-HD, USA-HD, Universal HD, Food Network HD...

I have a 6200 and am getting only about 1% success capturing using test-mpeg2 and 0% success using MythTV.
What is your firewire setup?
P2P or broadcast?

_________________
Dragon 2.0. Knoppmyth.
Gnome.
Samsung 56" DLP.
Comcast Cable Baltimore County.
Source 1: QAM_256
Source 2: Firewire

I'll have to go into the setup to check my settings -- can't remember off the top of my head. I'll get back to you later on that. I do remember that I've got a SA 3250, but I'm using the SA 4200 settings as recommended. I futzed with the ports, nodes and wires until I got MythTV to be able to change channels and record something. I still have to unplug and replug the Firewire cable after every reboot of my Myth box for some reason, but that's a small price to pay.

I'd think that the availability of HD content via firewire is going to vary by location. Also, Comcast would be able to change this at their whim like they just did to some of my clear QAM channels.

P2P, node 0, port 0. I moved that Firewire cable every which way, from all three locations on my Firewire card to both ports on the STB. Some configurations would change channels but wouldn't record; one magic configuration works flawlessly.



True dat. But if you've got Firewire on your Myth box, I'd at least give it a whirl. Why lose out on TV you can record for now?

Plus, this was the only way I could reliably record SD channels on digital cable. Using my PVR-150 with analog outs from the STB would work about 60% of the time, but the other 40% I'd get annoyingly garbled sound. Via Firewire, no problems with audio.