Not quite: the one area where {G,M}Hz still seems to matter is in video encoding/decoding. An AthlonXP 2600+ is not on the edge of an Intel 3GHz chip, it's woefully behind (and besides, it runs at 2.13GHz!). Yes, it handles other stuff very well, sometimes even better than the Intel, but not the video stuff.

Waiting to hear about the new X2s and encoding/decoding performance, of course...

-brendan

The X2s do well according to the first reviews I've seen, but they're also quite pricey.

So what, exactly, is the HD-3000 capable of doing?

Clearly, it can do over-the-air (OTA) ATSC channels, to include HD channels, using the DVB driver. Is it tuning non-HD ATSC channels as well?

Apparently, it's able to do digital cable channels, which is what I assume the successes with QAM indicate. True? At least in some areas?

Rolling back to a standard Linux install and doing things by hand using a non-DVB driver, I am able to get my HD-3000 to tune all my cable co's analog NTSC channels using TVtime, and it works okay (contrary to a report that it works poorly).

With KnoppMyth and DVB drivers, I've never been able to get it to find any of my cable co's channels, NTSC (not expected with DVB), digital cable, or HD. Channel scans come up with nothing, but no conspicuously reported errors.

Laramie

I was being optimistic

So, in all respect, it is probably running fine, just not enough horsepower to playback in real time. Recorded content isn't too bad, and content that I tune to and pause plays back pretty well.

Do you think I can record the HD content and just playback at another time and be happy until the wife approves the purchase of something in the 3+ghz range?

non-HD ATSC channels? Do you mean non-HD (aka SDTV aka analog) NTSC channels?



If you have digital cable, and you're lucky enough that some of them are non-encrypted and you're lucky enough that they are in one of specific QAM formats that the card understands under the most recent firmware...maybe. That is, works for some folks.



Well, remember the HD-3000 has two separate interfaces for HDTV and SDTV. Older bttv drivers can get the NTSC/SDTV channels. There were some transitional HDTV-only drivers specifically for the HD-2000/HD-3000 that were based on modified bttv drivers that can tune ATSC/HDTV but not NTSC/SDTV.

I don't think the DVB drivers (which now support the HD-3000) handle the SDTV at all... It also sounds like you have analog cable, so unless your cable company transmits both analog and digital at the same time over cable, the HD-3000 isn't going to be able to get the HDTV channels from anything but over the air anyway. What does antennaweb say about HDTV coverage in your area?

-brendan

yes, but with one caveat:

The recording process uses very little CPU due to the fact that the audio/video encoding happens not on the machine, nor in the card, but far far away...you're just storing a datastream sent over radio waves.

However, if you're watching recorded HD content on a machine with too little horsepower and your CPU is pegged...there's a small chance that might cause you to lose some of the incoming HD stream on the program being recorded.

You can experiment by playing back the content on another faster machine (say, via samba/nfs) to see if that's a problem.

-brendan

actually no the 3000 does not have two interfaces it only has one. The 2000 I believe had two inputs one for ntsc and one for ATSC.

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I mean lower-resolution digital channels. It's my understanding that the ATSC spec defines multiple resolutions, not all of which may be considered "high" definition. I do not mean NTSC=analog.



Cable service here is both analog and digital. The lower channels are analog, the upper channels are digital. The change-over from analog to digital happens somewhere in the low 100's. About 5 of the digital channels are HD.

antennaweb.org shows no digital stations available from my current location - I live in the boonies. Fortunately, I'm moving in a few weeks to a civilized location where there are a few already on the air.

Laramie

The 3000 has only one antenna input, but it's available to both the ATSC and NTSC tuners aboard the card.

Laramie

I got everything working last night and recorded Alias in HD and Revelations in analog cable. I'm impressed eveything looks great. The only problem is that the guide had ABC and NBC switched on the digital channels, so it thought Alias was on the wrong channel. I checked the XML id of the channel and it all matched. I'm going to check it this afternoon and see how some other stuff recorded during the day.

One positive note is that the Athlon XP 2600+ plays recorded HD pretty well using the Nvidia MX440 128mb 8xagp card.

I have to migrate over from my test hdd to the real hdd (200GB Hitachi) and setup LVM using another 200 GB drive so I'll have plenty of storage space. After I reinstall I'll post again with results of what I have learned during this process.

ok so you claim you managed to get analog ntsc and atsc hdtv presumably qam working on the same hd3000 card at the same time? I would really like to have a walk through of that if it's true.

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Yes, I have analog NTSC working on the PVR-250 and ATSC HDTV working over the hd3000 (not all three on the hd3000). If I want to use QAM over the hd3000 I would go into the setup and erase the channel listings and use the scan utility. I believe it's the second page where it asks you whether it's terrestrial or cable you would pick terrestrial (for ATSC with antenna) or cable (for QAM when plugged into the regular cable line).

I can't use QAM and ATSC at the same time with the same setup (as each requires either the cable line or the antenna hooked up). If I had two cards I may be able to use each card for one, but at this point I have to resetup the card to switch between them.

I'm not sure if I want to buy another card just to try that, though it would be nice to have two HD cards in the machine.

ok makes more sense now. I missed the part where you had the pvr250. I thought you were claiming to be getting analog ntsc and digital atsc both on the 3000 card at the same time from the same cable connection. And while this would be the cat's meow I don't believe it's possible.

And I do know how to do qam however unfortunately on probaby 80% of all cable connections out there the scan will do absolutely nothing in it's current form.

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We're pretty lucky here in Raleigh, the channels come through in QAM pretty well. Though, I have trouble with playback (due to CPU speed I think).

what cable provider do you have?

Have comcast here in nashville,and they do not send the plip information, so mythtv won't enter the channels from the scan.

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