First, I would say that 8Mbps should be plenty of bitrate for virtually anything you would want to record with the TV tuner or even the S-video input. Keep in mind that DVD's upper limit is 9.8Mbps.

Second, MPEG1 is low-bitrate and low-resolution, meant for playback from CD (as in VCD). I think it's around 1Mbps and 320x240. A wikipedia search will probably turn up specifics.

Third, you can't get a HDTV signal over S-video so there's really no connection between the two.

Fourth, why would you want to run the S-video out of your computer INTO your S-video in of your PVR card? That's effectively a feedback loop. The S-video in of the PVR cards are meant for people who want to record (say) a satellite set top box's signal.

If you want to record two signals at once, whether it's cable and cable, or set-top box and VCR, or cable and set-top, you'll need two tuners, as in the PVR-500, or two PVR-150s.

there are several threads that talk about recording from a VCR or camcorder...I think there are two basic techniques that most use. 1) configure the composite input of the PVR board as a capture device in Myth and 'manually record' 2) cat /dev/video > vcrVideo.mpg (each of these has been simplifed, find the threads)

I would guess that the 500 would have /dev/video0 and /dev/video1. I cant think of any reason that you could not record from the cable box and the VCR at the same time.

My TV out is no on the MoBo but rather a separate nVidia card. The quality is close to cable box output. maybe a little washed.

As far as the remote...I have tossed both PVR250 remotes into my box-of-misfit-computer-parts. I found the number of buttons limiting. I now use an RCA universal remote ($7) and a home built receiver ($10)

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R5F1 - Dell P4 2.4Ghz 500MB - PVR250 x 2 - GeForce FX 5200 - Onboard sound/NIC 80GB ATA/250GB ATA/400GB SATA

ceenvee703,
Thanks for the info.
When I'm recording from the set-top box (temporary files), I can satisfy in low bitrate to preserve hard disk space. However, when I'm recording from the VCR (home videos), I want to record on the highest quality, so I can convert the MPEG-2 files to VOBs, and burn them on DVDs with IFOs and BUPs, so they can be watched in any DVD player.
The Hauppauge PVR cards support maximum 12Mbps. You say the DVDs support maximum 9.8Mbps, so I should record on 8Mbps or 9.8Mbps. Suppose I record on 12Mbps, will I've a problem on certain DVD players, or the burned DVDs will work fine on any DVD player, only there will be no difference in the bitrate (the DVD player will read it like it's 9.8Mbps)?
The GeForce 6600GT has an adapter that allows HDTV signal out.
I didn't mean to connect the video-out of the 6600GT to the video-in of the PVR card. I meant that I want to connect the composite connectors of the set-top box to the video-in of the PVR card, and the video-out of the 6600GT to the s-video or component connectors of the TV. So, I can record a TV show and play it back on the TV from 'pause' mode.
I'm considering the WinTV-PVR-500MCE dual hardware encoders.

khrusher,
I'm having difficulties in finding the threads that you talk about. Can you please help me out? I didn't understand your explanation.
Hauppauge support said that I can record from a set-top box and a VCR simultaneously with WinTV-PVR-500MCE using the included A/V header cable. The question is how I configure it in MythTV.
If you say that your dual WinTV-PVR-250 work fine with MythTV using an RCA universal remote and a home built receiver, that I see no reason why the WinTV-PVR-500MCE won't work with Marantz SR4500 universal remote control.

You may find this thread useful:

http://mysettopbox.tv/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=5943

You'll see that the author feels there's a quality difference when encoding at a very high bitrate. I feel that given the source (low-quality VHS) you aren't gaining anything. We agreed to disagree.

Yes, if you try to make a DVD with a bitrate > 9.8Mbps, you (a) won't be able to get an hour of footage on it, (b) will probably get a message from your authoring program that the MPEG2 file has too high a bitrate, (c) you will have playback problems due to DVD-R being less able to play back at high bitrates than a replicated DVD, (d) even if your authoring program supports "illegal" bitrates, the player will likely croak on it.

Thanks for the link for that thread. Indeed, I found it useful.
VHS recordings are 1.5Mbps. I want to convert the VHS cassettes to DVDs that can be played on any DVD player. So, in order to play on safe side, I'll use maximum bitrate of 4Mbps to preserve VOBs size.
The bitrates of the set-top box are about 2-8Mbps (News: 2Mbps, Movies: 4Mbps, Sports: 8Mbps). So, I'll record from the set-top box on 8Mbps. HDTV movies use at least 16Mbps. However, Hauppauges PVR cards can record on maximum bitrate of 12Mbps.
I want to connect the set-top box to the WinTV-PVR-500MCE, and the VCR to the A/V header cable of the WinTV-PVR-500MCE. That's way, each A/V source will be connected to a different MPEG-2 encoder on the WinTV-PVR-500MCE.
The recordings from the set-top box will be on 8Mbps, while the recordings from the VCR will be on 4Mbps.
I want to set the resolutions and bitrates of each of the two hardware MPEG-2 encoders of the WinTV-PVR-500MCE just once (different bitrates for each encoder), and record from the two A/V sources simultaneously at different bitrates. How can I configure it?
I'd also need to know how to convert the MPEG-2 files that I created from the VHS cassettes to VOBs, IFOs and BUPs, and record them on a DVD. In case the size of the MPEG-2 file is two large, than I need a program that reduces its size with minimum quality lose, before I convert it to VOBs.
Two more questions: Does the size of a VOB file match the size of a MPEG-2 file? Is the maximum size of a VOB file 2GB?

You don't configure the cards to do it, you would configure a recording profile and then attach that to the particular recording. MythTV comes with four to start with: high quality, low quality, LiveTV, and Default. You can modify or add profiles accordingly.



You don't convert them to VOBs, IFOs, and BUPs. You take the MPEG2 file and author a DVD out of them, which creates the proper VOBs, IFOs and BUPs. If you search the forums you'll find various solutions for making DVDs out of your recordings.



No and no. VOBs are limited to 1GB, so a single DVD track (which can be made up of multiple video, audio, and subtitle tracks) gets split up into as many 1GB VOBs as needed, when you're creating a DVD-Video disc.

So, Is it possible to configure one of the MPEG-1 encoders of the WinTV-PVR-500MCE to use the LiveTV profile, and the other one to use a customized profile?


Can you please recommend me on a good and easy to use authoring program?


Does the authoring program automatically split the MPEG-1 file into VOBs in an appropriate file size?
Do you know a program that allows to cut frames out of a MPEG-1 file from one point to another point wihout re-encoding the file?

/me ponders WTH this thread is going...

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cesman

When the source is open, the possibilities are endless!