Bummer but thanks. This is the type of thing that would benefit from a reference platform. It could be known that pvr350 tv-out worked out of the box if and only if you adopted the reference platform.

The parts to morph my Pundit into my copy of the KMRP are ordered and on their way.

Thanks again for all of your hard work and patience.

unfortunately until the ivtv drivers become more stable I don't think the pvr350 will work "out of the box" on any platform.

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Have a question search the forum and have a look at the KnoppMythWiki.

Xsecrets

i did a test run on an athlon 700 with a bt878 card. KnoppMyth was a breeze to install. i only partially configured the system before i decided to go ahead and purchase new hardware.

so i've basically gone with the 'semi-reference' platform:

Chaintech 7NIF2 MoBo & Athlon XP +2700
512MB (2x256) RAM
Hauppauge PVR-250 (hoping to add PVR-500 when supported...)
Seagate 45GB drive for main system and cache
Seagate 300GB drive for /Myth partitions
Plextor PX716A DVD/CD Burner
CoolMax 450W PSU

i'm currently going to reuse a cheap case i have until i find something that's affordable and looks similar to my other A/V equipment. otherwise i'll build my own.
eventually i'll be using an xBox frontend and this backend can go in the closet.

i'm looking forward to receiving my hardware and installing KnoppMyth!
i'm sure i'll be entering my config in the Tier 1 section of the forum in a week or so.

Have you noticed their shipping. To VA $40. That seems a bit much.

To what extent are the "reference" platforms mentioned silent, or possibly fanless??
I have been looking at VIA EPIA boards, but it seems to be difficult to get them working properly (including video/DIVX playback).

well no the reference platforms mentioned are not fanless or silent. The 7nif2 has a chipset fan and of course any athlonXP will require a CPU fan. The problem with the via boards are that will they are great for many tasks video is just too demanding. Though with conciderable work it is possible to get the mpeg2 acceleration working. I too would love to use the epia boards, but they simply do not have the umph. They can be made to work for standard def tv, but I don't think you are going to have much luck trying to play HDTV on them for quite some time. at least until the mythtv devs do some serious work to fix all the xvmc problems.

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Have a question search the forum and have a look at the KnoppMythWiki.

Xsecrets

My brother and I are going together to build a Myth box. We were looking at getting a VIA M10000, but with all the problems people seem to have with them, I'm a little worried.

The idea of having a Myth Reference Platform is great! I really like the price for the Barebones system listed earlier (we already have a PVR-250 and a 160 GB Seagate).

I'm wondering about noise considerations. That was one of the highlights of the VIA: no noise. This part is critical for the wife acceptance factor. How noisy is this setup? Anyone have any comparisions? Should we just wait until the VIA issues get ironed out?

Thanks!

As for the noise issue, a few observations from my personal "war on noise":

1. A CPU fan is not necessary a big problem. I have an AMD with an artic-cool fan speed controlled from the MB. Admittedly, the rest of my system doesn't generate much heat, but even after adding 2 case fans for safety (no PSU fan providing circulation), I can barely hear the difference with the case open when I stop the fans. The major noise comes from elsewhere...

2. PSU fans are a big problem. Fanless technology is either hit and miss (I had to extend my heatsink) or expensive. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to determine the impact of a particular fanned PSU without installing it in your living room first.

3. Next are HDs. I just replaced a western digital (known to be noisy) with a Samsung (one of the quietest). It resulted in probably a 5x reduction in overall noise. However, the HD is still the noisiest thing in my system if the CD/DVD is not spinning.

4. An interesting thing to note. I had problems with my fanless PSU getting hot and added additional heat syncs. After adding two slow (almost no noise) case fans, there is a huge difference in heatsync temperature (from very hot to touch to barely warm now). I guess that without vents in the PSU, the heat collected at the top (MB temp was okay). I suspect that a few holes in the top would have made a difference as well. The heat syncs made a noticable difference, so I am going to leave them in for the heat of summer.

In summary, from my experience, noise impacting components can be ranked roughly as follows:

1. PSU Fans
2. HDs
3. CD/DVD (I have still to experiment with reducing the speeds of mine)
4. CPU/case fans (assuming they are not running full speed)

I don't want to sound too negative. With my latest HD replacement, I am quite satisfied with the sound level (but it could always be better).

Allen

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ASUS AT3N7A-I (Atom 330)
TBS 8922 PCI (DVB-S2)

This is interesting reading on how to quieten down your myth box. I like the case sound proofing idea.

http://www.mythtv.info/moin.cgi/HardWar ... ietlyHowTo

Well.. good news i guess ?!? my mobo blew up..

well.. just the 12V lines that run things like.. oh the CPU fans and so forth..

luckily i found out before my amd chip went up in smoke.. but now i got a nasty buzz on the audio out.. and lots of interference on the svideo out...

so.. for an AMD reference is the official recommendation the Chaintech 7NIF2 ?

already got the HD's and Nvidia 440MX-SE and PVR-250

Also... this just happened when i FINALLY got R4V5 working.. (it worked right outta the box! Kudo's.. cause i could never get R4v4.1 working right)

I'll be ordering one shortly and would love for it to be as close to the "reference" as possible.



Keep up the good work.. Myth rocks!

Is there a recommended "addition" for speed and memory on a per tuner basis?

I mean, would an Athlon 1.7 with 256M RAM handle 4 PVR-250s ... 3 recording and one live without noticeable usability impact, or how does the math work here?

Thanks!

4 pvr250's most likely. a pvr250 takes about 3% cpu or so to record since it does it in hardware and all that is really used on cpu is to write to disk. so each additional might take about 3% or less cpu. and it takes about 40-50 % on the 1700 to decode mpeg2 from the 1700.

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Have a question search the forum and have a look at the KnoppMythWiki.

Xsecrets

I might add more memory and bring it up to 512Mb so there is a bit more buffer space, but that's easy to do later. Otherwise that hardware should be adequate assuming that the DMA to you HD(s) is working and the bus doesn't get choked.
BTW - What is the FSB speed on your system, 266?

I just wanted to say that I ordered the "Reference system" posted earlier. But not from that link, Newegg had all the parts for cheaper so I went that way. Except, I got a Sempron 2200+ since I have a PVR250 and don't need the extra juice (and saved $30).

The HSF I got is a Tr2-M1 that cost $10 (I needed one anyway, OEM processor), it's really quiet as is the case. I can't wait to get it built and working, unfortunately, after I put it together and flipped the power switch, the video didn't work. Everything was spinning and I thought I could hear it POST, but the video didn't work, even with an add-in vid card (instead of on-board). So I RMA'd the processor back to Newegg (could be the motherboard too, but that's more effort to RMA). All of the fans were pretty quiet!

Here's my parts list:

dang.... the Chaintech 7NIF2 mobo aint avaliable in australia. dammed crappy country without good vendor support

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