Building my first HTPC

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

The biggest telltale PC requirements is PIII class for these latest 7 series of DVICO Fusion tuners means low datarate, too much loss even capturing or watching live on 480 via s-video. Based on CX23886

I had a video/tuner capture card that is based on CX23883 and had to modify it to screen the long unshielded traces from s-video input to stop herringbone pattern to the chipset. Conexent is not stuff of good stuff if one wants quality.

But no matter how much I tinkered with software downloaded from various sources, the consumer chipset betrays the quality. I was not able to turn off hardware compression.

I forgot to tell you how much processing power of a typical TV chipset, it usually have 1 or 2 CPUs usually based on ARM 8 or so, and DACs but they tend to put bit depth too low on analog input except component. This results in banding. And due to chipsets used, they don't use good one to get high quality cap/quality scaling due to wattage issues and using small chipset heatsinks.

I forgot to address another issue. Some need closed caption functioning of acceptable quality. I had seen many makers not put their effort to give a crisp, easy readable font design. One generic plasma tv brand I worked on was so TINY. Some made it so large that I find this comical or so shaggy and rough. Second issue with some TVs, many lost CC decoding on component (have witnessed this) even at 480.

I had sent email to Anchor Bay that made DVDO series about embedding decoded EIA-608 text onto video during video processing and send it out via HDMI or component and they refused because they said several methods they found were unacceptable. HUH? In fact I had told them about Panasonic doing this already with DMR-EZ28K when I posed the question last year.

FYI:
Datarate on EIA-608 is only 960 bps and not very many character set, very easy for a simple chipset even to extract data and translate EIA-608 to digital EIA-708 (this is digital CC data) and mux into upconverted video and out via HDMI or component. This is what quality upconverting boxes should have done.

I was that close to save up and buy DVDO box. The lack of CC support is what killed it.

If VLC was able to support the Intensity Pro uncompressed or MPEG2 low compression from analog input I would be all over it as well. VLC has outstanding CC decoding and font quality and quality video was very good.

The chipset for video capture devices that you can buy except few is what letting me down.

Also, ATi Radeon Theater 550/650 enforces compression despite outstanding 10 bit depth and potential for outstanding video but software and not able to adjust the compression up and down, support direct like VLC is what let it down BIG TIME. Very unfocused and fuzzy even they tried to hide the raggies by defocusing. I did use MythTV before but it was still immature and not easy to set up and use.

I had tried at least 4-5 capture even with tuner cards and all had these issues.

Oh yes, I tried Dscaler but the software development have not kept up so it got fell wayside few years ago. It had TONS of potential but chipset makers even ATI are very unwilling to have this info avaible with this such flexibility.

The only letdown with DMR-EZ28K is lack of video adjustment to fix the "errors". My analog TV doesn't react to this extremes due to correct low and high levels of adjustments. My LCD TV does not handle this well even it has RGB adjustments. What is needed is another six adjustments covering magenta, cyan and yellow. And ability to adjust in DMR-EZ28K is needed as well but it only have 2 levels of outputs. That is it.

I was seriously thinking of grabbing the LG 32LE5300 has this features built in already but people would think I'm crazy having two 32" LCD TVs in short time. LOL

The issue I'm trying to fix right now is COGECO cable is putting too green tint on the video signal. Adjusting this out results worse picture (purple). Not R-G tint.

Cheers, Wizard

Wow, I've used both the 5 and 7 series with [true] YPbPr to the TV and I haven't experienced any problems with either one for OTA viewing or recording.
[The 7 series uses CX23885 BTW. - typo??]

They can get by with a P3 because the CPU doesn't do the work, the card does.

You are going to have problems until you shit-can the S-Video.
S-Video can handle HD-resolution but does not have the bandwidth for HD-quality.
[That's what I saw talking about before.]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-Video
.

[stretch0069]

Re: Building my first HTPC

I had the files on my HTPC. Then I used the PS3 to play them on the TV using HDMI.

I'm thinking about going the ISO route and getting a good video card with HDMI out. however, I do like the feature of dvdshrink in that I can pull out all the BS and have TV episodes as individual files.

.....but that would take research and i'm a bit lazy right now.

[Deft]

Re: Building my first HTPC

@stretch
I've always just ripped all my DVD's as ISOs and when I want to watch one I mount it as a drive using MagicISO. This is probably the simplest method there is without losing any quality/features of the original disc.

How were you hooking up your HTPC to your tv before? DVI would be no different than HDMI aside from not passing any audio to the TV. S-video and even worse, vga are vastly inferior and I wouldn't even bother with those.

After putting together my HTPC and spending hours installing/configuring software I watched some tv shows in Divx HD 720p by streaming them wirelessly from the computer in my room and it worked flawlessly. There was a bit of lag at first but once it started playing it was fine. After fine tuning some settings on my tv specifically for the HTPC, the picture quality really wasn't any different from what I watch via satellite.

[stretch0069]

Re: Building my first HTPC

<my head hurts now....>

I started building an HTPC a while back. I wanted a place to store all my DVDs. My main concern was the investing all the time to rip the DVDs and then losing them to a bad hard drive. The solution: 2.4TB RAID5 using 6 500MB drives (that was the largest cost effective drive at the time)

Now...I'm known for being a great project starter, bad project finisher. What hung me up was a lack of quality of the video. I was using a PS3 as a media center. It just didn't look good to me....and yes the video files were H.264. I tried a couple DVD rippers as well. Lately, I've been thinking about getting a new video card with HDMI output and hooking it directly to my A/V receiver, but I'm lazy. (heck....the htpc doesn't even fold anymore )

btw....i run on a wired gigabit network. (again...too lazy to learn about wireless... )

[Wizard]

Re: Building my first HTPC

The biggest telltale PC requirements is PIII class for these latest 7 series of DVICO Fusion tuners means low datarate, too much loss even capturing or watching live on 480 via s-video. Based on CX23886

I had a video/tuner capture card that is based on CX23883 and had to modify it to screen the long unshielded traces from s-video input to stop herringbone pattern to the chipset. Conexent is not stuff of good stuff if one wants quality.

But no matter how much I tinkered with software downloaded from various sources, the consumer chipset betrays the quality. I was not able to turn off hardware compression.

I forgot to tell you how much processing power of a typical TV chipset, it usually have 1 or 2 CPUs usually based on ARM 8 or so, and DACs but they tend to put bit depth too low on analog input except component. This results in banding. And due to chipsets used, they don't use good one to get high quality cap/quality scaling due to wattage issues and using small chipset heatsinks.

I forgot to address another issue. Some need closed caption functioning of acceptable quality. I had seen many makers not put their effort to give a crisp, easy readable font design. One generic plasma tv brand I worked on was so TINY. Some made it so large that I find this comical or so shaggy and rough. Second issue with some TVs, many lost CC decoding on component (have witnessed this) even at 480.

I had sent email to Anchor Bay that made DVDO series about embedding decoded EIA-608 text onto video during video processing and send it out via HDMI or component and they refused because they said several methods they found were unacceptable. HUH? In fact I had told them about Panasonic doing this already with DMR-EZ28K when I posed the question last year.

FYI:
Datarate on EIA-608 is only 960 bps and not very many character set, very easy for a simple chipset even to extract data and translate EIA-608 to digital EIA-708 (this is digital CC data) and mux into upconverted video and out via HDMI or component. This is what quality upconverting boxes should have done.

I was that close to save up and buy DVDO box. The lack of CC support is what killed it.

If VLC was able to support the Intensity Pro uncompressed or MPEG2 low compression from analog input I would be all over it as well. VLC has outstanding CC decoding and font quality and quality video was very good.

The chipset for video capture devices that you can buy except few is what letting me down.

Also, ATi Radeon Theater 550/650 enforces compression despite outstanding 10 bit depth and potential for outstanding video but software and not able to adjust the compression up and down, support direct like VLC is what let it down BIG TIME. Very unfocused and fuzzy even they tried to hide the raggies by defocusing. I did use MythTV before but it was still immature and not easy to set up and use.

I had tried at least 4-5 capture even with tuner cards and all had these issues.

Oh yes, I tried Dscaler but the software development have not kept up so it got fell wayside few years ago. It had TONS of potential but chipset makers even ATI are very unwilling to have this info avaible with this such flexibility.

The only letdown with DMR-EZ28K is lack of video adjustment to fix the "errors". My analog TV doesn't react to this extremes due to correct low and high levels of adjustments. My LCD TV does not handle this well even it has RGB adjustments. What is needed is another six adjustments covering magenta, cyan and yellow. And ability to adjust in DMR-EZ28K is needed as well but it only have 2 levels of outputs. That is it.

I was seriously thinking of grabbing the LG 32LE5300 has this features built in already but people would think I'm crazy having two 32" LCD TVs in short time. LOL

The issue I'm trying to fix right now is COGECO cable is putting too green tint on the video signal. Adjusting this out results worse picture (purple). Not R-G tint.

Cheers, Wizard

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Hi Wizard
Have you ever tried any of the DVICO Fusion tuners?
.

[Wizard]

Re: Building my first HTPC

PC do outstanding upconversion on DVDs and quality stored files playback but the MAJOR issues I had is nearly all consumer (50 to 200 bucks) tuner cards/video capture cards I find are mediocre especially on SD. These tuner cards/video cards have too small bit depth and too low bitrate to capture sufficient resolution. Decent SD video feeds IS decent and I'm very disappointed by their lack of efforts on capturing nice quality and people deserves this. I have tried many cards so I know this issues.

DMR-EZ28K I bought for about 250-270 was much better in this regard on capturing and processing but processor is not strong enough, it still trips up on some videos and some mosquito noise. And much convenient to use.

There is high end video capture boxes (cost upwards of 400 and up) do exists to capture analog video with high level of quality but software to use is very few and expensive.

FYI: HDTV stream is digital stream MPEG2 format and is not processed at all thru capture at end user. These decent capture card/tuners with MPEG2 decoders easily decodes and sent on to video card with little processing and preserves quality. The quality of video depends on how much stream is compressed and bit rate levels also the source of video quality before converted into HDTV data stream. That's the difference.

PS:

Currently these capture video device does not compress the datastream and requires powerful CPU and minimum mainboard chipsets. Issue is I have not found support for live watching even windows or linux even not capturing to hard drive which I do not need. Just live watching. These requires adobe's video suite or one other expensive software and they only capture to hard drive and is not for HTPC usage. That why I'm stuck at this moment. I did 1 year on and off researching options on quality capturing-live watching options and tried many software and they were terrible due to terrible choices of capture cards. I put no fault on the software, it is simply awful hardware used in capture cards and tuner cards.

http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/

TVs have issue of limited watt this limits the power processing to capture video from tuner on SD channels and analog inputs. They are very poor that why I use DMR-EZ28K for SD inputs. Till then find another solution for better than this DMR-EZ28K quality.

Cheers, Wizard

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Okay. - Covered that in post 31. - I think you get it now but if not say so.

[Toasty]

Re: Building my first HTPC

I'm not sure what you are doing now.

Are you wanting an amp between the cable box and the TV or between the cable box and the cable company?...

Neither. Amp on antenna.

My question was, if the antenna amp had to be digital capable, because of the change to the digital OTA signal (DTV). I didn't know if the older amps (analog) would pass the digital signal.

[Deft]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Today I was looking at my roof to see where it would be best to put an antenna and I saw that our old Look TV (a digital OTA tv service provider) antenna from a few years ago is still up there on a tripod on the peak of the roof. I always thought they had took it back when we canceled our service with them but luckily for me they didn't. I was kinda excited about this discovery but when I searched the digitalhome boards I learned that that antenna was for designed for higher frequencies than the OTA we have now :/ All is not lost though.. I can use the tripod to mount a bi-quad antenna and the existing antenna is already facing the right way and still has a run of coax attached to it

Hopefully by next weekend I should have something built and mounted to try out If the bi-quad design isn't good enough I'll spend some time building something more complex.

Also, I caved in today while I was out buying a 92mm fan and bought a Silverstone LC-17 case which was marked down to $100 because someone bought it and returned it because it was missing it's bag of screws. No big deal to me really. And then while I was waiting in line to check out, I was checking out their clearance bin and I saw some off brand NTSC/ATSC usb tv tuner for $10 so I grabbed that too. I don't have high expectations for it but I'll give it a try once I get everything assembled... which I'm off to do right now.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

I'm not sure what you are doing now.

Are you wanting an amp between the cable box and the TV or between the cable box and the cable company?

cable company - cable box
You''l need to figure out what frequency they use.

cable box - TV
Will depend on what it connects through.
If it goes through the RF [antenna connection] then yes those amps are the right frequency..
But, as the cable box is essentially the transmitter [as far as the TV knows] in that set-up, I can't see that side of the box as having a signal strength problem. [Unless maybe you have a really long run of wire to the TV.]
.

[Toasty]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Antenna I have is an old CM rated for Deep Fringe (70 miles). 9 foot long, I think it'll do nicely

I may chuck the rotator on it and with the amp, see if I can pull anything out of the grass.

Toast

[Toasty]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Board lost -another- post. I think I'm just gonna type em in textpad from now on and copy-n-paste.

Anywho-

Short version: Need digital amp when you have TV and internet cable. Not needed for OTA digital. Correct?

Have old CM V/U/FM mast mount amp I'll use.

Thanks!

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Yeah, I'm at ~20 miles to transmitters, and the ones I want are all in the same general location.

My last house was at 24 miles.
Had a full size antenna on the house but I didn't want to tap into that and run wires just to test TV's out in the shop.
In the shop I used plain old Rabbit Ears and a 20dB.
With the Rabbit Ears inside I got 20 or so stations. [w/amp]
[Shop had a metal door at the end towards the TV transmitter/repeater farm on the hill.]
If I put the ears on the outdoor work table in front of the shop I got around 30 stations. [w/amp]
[Metal roof over the work table.]

So I was bored one day and,,,
I duct taped the rabbit ears to a 20' 2x4 and stuck them up in the air out in front of the shop.
I didn't actually check for every single station but I'm pretty sure with Rabbit Ears + 20dB Amp and 'line of site' I got all 40+ stations at 24 miles.
[That was a day with great weather too. That can matter.]

Were I in your shoes I'd either:
[Assuming line of site.]
Get a big antenna that claims it's good for over 60 miles and just use that with no amp.
Get a medium antenna that claims it's good for ~40 miles and use a 10dB or so amp.
Get a smallish [traditional style] antenna that claims it's good for 25-30 miles and use a 15-20dB amp.
[The over-kill is for those bad weather days.]
.
NO, I didn't do any math.
That's just an opinion from reading and tinkering.
.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Yes for OTA TV the old V/U/FM amps work fine. - They are just an RF amp.

Remember, the HD data is modulated into a RF signal for transmission.
It doesn't turn back into HD until it's inside the demodulator which is after the tuner.
So, all that's needed is an RF amp, which is exactly what the old V/U/FM amps are.

I have seen some VHF only or UHF only models made that don't cover the whole frequency range so make sure the amp is good for the full range.
They generally say something like [close to] 50-900 MHz.

Not sure what you mean by 'digital'.
Satellite digital does the same thing but they use a different frequency range for their RF.
The 50-900MHz amps won't work for Satellite but there are other amps that will.
.

[Toasty]

Re: Building my first HTPC

ROFLMAO!!

And he's -not- a -self annoited- Grumpy Olde Farte.

I did that

Now that was some good debunking! I saw that site and said, gee that looks like the stuff we used to put up for installations when I started out.

So you really just need the $29.95 Radio Shack POS V/U/FM antenna for the attic or roof and digital would likely be fine. Yeah, I'm at ~20 miles to transmitters, and the ones I want are all in the same general location. I hate cable and the crap they are now pulling by moving "standard" channels to a digital one where you need to "rent" their damned box for $3 a month. To get a PBS station, mind you.. i.e. FREE

I use absolutely the lowest basic, basic service they have. I only want internet, and if they had a service that was -just- that, I'd be fine. I was the last one to go cable in my area, and that was only because the antenna came apart after a storm. It was there over 30 years.

I've another though, and I think it's time to put it up, because my cable now gives me only 9 channels that are worth anything. Not a big TV watcher, but I ain't paying for a box to watch OTA signals.

So, what is needed for an amp? Will the old V/U/FM one work, or one optimized for Digital?

Toast

Yo! Comcast - - ->>

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Baloney.

Take some time away your 5,000+ posts, and go check out the antenna design site mentioned above.
You will find the rising curve for the commercial antennas is optimized at the highest channel in the design range.
It is not done in the center of the range.
There are some very smart guys over there, and you will no doubt learn something about flat response curves.

I really don't care if you want to be the self-anointed grumpy old fart and pick on my typo of "UHV" which should have been "UHF". I could not care less.
BTW, in American English "Response" is spelled with an "s", not a "c".

.
Umm, no it's not baloney. - And antennas aren't rocket science.

I did look at your hero Denny's HD Stacker. - Did you even look at the data for that thing?
First:
Despite the ad-hype, it's a just a -LARGE- plain old-fashioned TV antenna. [Which as I said is all that's needed for HD.]
When it comes to antennas bigger is better. There is nothing new or fantastic about that at all.
All he did was split the VHF and UHF in a BIG old-fashioned antenna into two separate parts.
http://www.dennysantennaservice.com/...na_design.html
That technique is probably 60-70 years old.
Second:
He avoids using the industry performance numbers of gain in dB and instead uses the strength bars from some TV set as his indicator.
Not a sign he actually knows what he's doing. Either that or he's trying to hide something.
Third:
Looking here:
http://www.dennysantennaservice.com/...V_Antenna.html
The only place in it's response curve where the HD Stacker does -noticeably- better [or is flatter] than the next 4 or 5 down [down according to Danny] are the channels below 12.
And again here:
http://www.dennysantennaservice.com/...na_design.html
It's only significantly better at the low numbered channels.
HARDLY indicates 'optimized' for Ch 51. - It's not even -noticeably- better at Ch 51 than the others.
In fact the data shows clearly that it's 'optimized' for channels: 12, 16, 22, and 36.
As are EVERY ONE of the others in that table, which are commercial antennas and thus this is debunked.

You will find the rising curve for the commercial antennas is optimized at the highest channel in the design range.
It is not done in the center of the range.

The U8000 you have is a fancy version of the loop antennas on rabbit ears only with more elements.
More elements [surface area] gives better reception. Nothing new there. Same reason is for multiple antennas on a WIFI routers.
It's called a bow-tie antenna. Some Rabbit Ears used bow-tie elements instead of the loop elements beginning ages ago.
It's a 1950's design that wasn't popular for out-door TV antennas and was brought back to 'the front' by marketers feeding on gullible people that think they need a special antenna for HD. People aren't used to the 'look' so they think it's new and 'special'. - NOT!
- If you take 8 rabbit ear loops and connect them together you basically have the same thing as a U8000.
- In fact I compared a commercial 1-bay bow-tie antenna to a pair of umpteen year old Rabbit Ears with 1 loop.
- The Rabbit Ears won hands down so 8 Rabbit Ear loops might do -better- than a U8000.
The Gray-Hoverman project is just a home built U8000 type bow-tie antenna.
Nothing new in that -antenna design- at all. The only thing different is how the antenna parts are held together.

Your 'oh so smart' buddies in that forum are using basic antenna principles and math I learned in 1981.
They are really 'into it' and that's fine but what they are doing is nothing new, it hasn't changed in decades, and it does not require a particularly high IQ.
- That said, I forgot antenna crap shortly after finishing that school because it's useless info if you aren't going to design antennas and it's -easy- to look up if you ever care to try. However I DO clearly remember how EASY it was to learn and do. Easy topic. NOT rocket science!

I see no reason to reinvent the wheel when there are PLENTY of good well tested designs out there and all you have to do is to be able to read and interpret data sheets to find a good one. And even if paying $200 or more, it's something that will probably last much longer than 20 years which means that price ain't shit.

~
I'm amazed that someone that has been around as long as you have looses it with terms related to performance and data.
"Optimized for xxx" does not guarantee "better than" something else not optimized for xxx.
It's a marketing/advertising word game and all it is.
See the little drawing. It's not a tough to grasp concept.
[I thought I'd draw it vice writing another 1000 words.]

~
- A large share of my 5,000+ posts are me helping people with problems.
- I try to teach the concept vice just giving the answer. [Teach a man to fish thing.]
- I also follow up when I can.
- And I bother to go out of my way to help someone when needed.
I'm not the least bit embarrassed about that.
>>> On a number of occasions YOU were one of those people I helped.
OTOH:
I never see you show up -just- to help other people, nor do you go out of your way to do so.
I only see you join or start a thread when you want [to know] something.
-
In my mind if I help someone they should help someone else, and that person should help someone else, and that person should help someone else, and that person should help someone else, and on and on.
One Way people break that chain.
But this Grumpy Old Fart helps One Way people when he can anyway. [Maybe some day they'll get it.]

~
And yeah, I call bullshit when I see it. I'm not embarrassed about that either.
That amounts to warning someone about a pit-fall.
I stop people before they walk in front of moving cars too.

~
And just twisting the situation blade a bit.
All our local stations have repeaters on the same mountain, so all are the same direction.
Where we live now [~14 miles to repeaters] we get 40+ channels [all of them] with set-top Rabbit Ears and a cheap POS amp.
I never put up an outdoor antenna here because we don't need one.
-
Your location SUX!
You are smack in the middle between stations.
If you want all the channels either need a REALLY FREAKIN' BIG antenna pointed S by SE or to use two in different directions.
If they have an omnidirectional that's good for over 100 miles that might might work but I've never seen one.
[Due in no small part to never having looked.]

~
YEah I dOn't tyPe tOo well witH somEonE yaCking in MY Ear about a DaMned mOvie.
She won. We went out and saw RED at the -real- big screen. - Thumbs up.

I hope that's enough to quell the jealousy issue you have with me spending time with other people.
-
Smooch smooch.
.

[bgavin]

Re: Building my first HTPC

Baloney.

Take some time away your 5,000+ posts, and go check out the antenna design site mentioned above.
You will find the rising curve for the commercial antennas is optimized at the highest channel in the design range.
It is not done in the center of the range.
There are some very smart guys over there, and you will no doubt learn something about flat response curves.

I really don't care if you want to be the self-anointed grumpy old fart and pick on my typo of "UHV" which should have been "UHF". I could not care less.
BTW, in American English "Response" is spelled with an "s", not a "c".

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Building my first HTPC

I fail to see how stating that you don't need a new antenna is negative.
Except perhaps to someone looking for an excuse to buy one.

A ~peak~ in a curve at 51 doesn't necessarily mean ~more~ at 51 than some other option.
That's an advertising word game.
One design might be optimized for 51 and it's peak is 10dB where as another could be optimized for 69 but it's dB at 51 is 20dB and it's dB at the low end also double the first.
A well designed antenna wouldn't have much of a peak at all. It's responce curve through it's range would be nearly flat.

IOW a GOOD good old-fashioned tv antenna could still kick it's butt depending on the specific parts.

Not to mention that 51 is UHF.
Not going to optimize 2-13 [which are VHF] by tweaking the UHF section of an array.
.

[bgavin]

Re: Building my first HTPC

OK, I can give you a good reason: bandwidth optimization.

UHV is designed specifically for the highest channel.
That used to be 80-something, then dropped to 60-something, now dropped to 51 in the US.

Redesigning the antenna to peak at channel 51 provides a lot more gain in the lower end of the range.

Are you having a bad day?
Every comment in this thread is negative so far...