Diary Of My Switch To Internet TV

[Mondrin]

My wife and I cut our cable Jan 2009 and haven't looked back since. We don't have a very advanced setup and I keep watching how things are progressing with the various packaged units. Currently just use the laptop with S-video out to my older HDTV and stereo sound out to my receiver. We watch all our TV on Hulu and the networks with an occasional search for those rare TV shows not available on the main sites. We don't use storage. I've love to output something better than S-video but am not interested in buying a new laptop yet, nor do I have any open DVI plugs (no HDMI) on the set.

I'll keep watching your experience with keen interest.

 

[KarylFStein]

SageTV

I'd recommend looking at SageTV on a server with HD200 appliances at the TVs. I know there are some people in their forums who have cut the cable and only do OTA and Internet feeds via community-developed PlayOn integration. It is highly configurable so you can make it look like you want. Although I haven't used the PlayOn integration, I believe you can cut out all the cruft you don't want to see. The HD200 also supports playback of BluRay rips, (although unfortunately not the HD audio formats and just the main movie), and of course DVD rips.

I use SageTV running on WHS, (they have a WHS add-in version), and the older HD100 appliance to record OTA (uncompressed) and cable. Plus my kid's DVD collections are all available to them without them having to touch any media or equipment.

The default install looks pretty bland, (SageTV 7 which looks to be in private Beta is supposed to bring an updated "3D" UI), and out of the box it won't do what you want. However, there is a very active community plugging the gaps and doing some amazing work. This is possible because SageTV has taken the approach of providing development tools to integrate with the system.

 

[chaz]

Thanks, everyone, for your posts. Lots of useful info that I'll be following up on.

I'm surprised at the multiple suggestions I've seen regarding Windows Media Center. Last time I looked (well over a year ago), their TV options were very slim. Have offerings really improved that much?

Tim, you are correct that TV options were slim before on the Windows Media Center 2004/2005 editions. They have now improved by offering internet TV, which grabs media from CBS, MSNBC, G4TV, and many other channels.

It's a lot better than what it was before (basically a DVR only), but it is still somewhat limited. The big plus of using Windows Media Center is with networking and streaming, so you can centralize and integrate all of your media in an easy-to-use, and reliable interface.

 

[AlterEcho]

I have been running HTPC's since the days of ATI's first All-In-Wonders. And things have progressed quite a bit.

I am currently using a spare AMD Phenom II X2 and ATI 4850 (with a Blu-Ray drive) for my media chores. This is hooked up to a 50 inch Panasonic THX Plasma, through HDMI. Attatched to this is a IR receiver being controlled with a Harmony 610. The Harmony has been setup to allow the wife to reach any media, be it drive, hulu, netflix or hard disk. A wireless keyboard is connected for the times that I have to enter text. Operating system is VISTA Ultimate with the Media Center being used. So, the above covers:
DVD and Blu-Ray disks (Blu-Rays are played through Arcsoft TotalMedia)
Netflix.com
Hulu.com
Fancast.com
Surfthechannel.com
NBC, ABC...
Any video that is on the 16 terrabytes of hard drive space.

There is also another avenue that has not been stated here. Most of my shows have been gotten either through the Usenet (my first choice) or BitTorrent. Once downloaded my programs (NewsbinPro and Vuze and JDownloader) automatically extract the video. So the wife doesn't even have to interact with this process. I also use RSS feeds to automatically download any shows that are weekly or that I want. You would be surprised on how much content is available.
I also use StreamTorrent, TVAnts and SopCast for streaming content (I am on Fiber for my internet). I use these programs for watching Football games and the Olympics. Not the best quality, but it was sure nice watching way more content than NBC was showing.
I know it sounds like a lot, but once I setup everything, the wife only sees the Vista icons for all of the above. She loves it and she is not a techie!

-=AE=-

 

[BiggAW]

That's what I thought. We're definitely addicted to DVRs. But the only option for us satellite users are the models from the service provider. And we want out of the $100/month that DirecTV is charging us.

I'm a college student, and while my family does have cable, I do have some experience with using a computer as a DVR and streaming content online, partly because my family refuses to upgrade from god-awful analog cable.

Don't give up on Satellite. Dish Network has a package that is $31 for what amounts to an all-digital version of expanded basic cable, including a multi-room DVR. For $60 you can get America's Top 120, your RSN, and the multi-room DVR.

If you are going to go completely away from paying for TV, then you need a good DVR for OTA content. I have used Elgato's eyeTV for the Mac, and while it is great for watching stuff in HD on my laptop, it's not exactly something you'd use as a day-to-day DVR.

Windows Media Center is probably the most well-known computer based DVR, but SageTV and BeyondTV are in many ways more advanced, and are an open ecosystem, using common file formats and allowing multiple machines in a house to seamlessly share content.

For a media PC, don't get anything less than a C2D with 4GB of ram. My Macbook can be pushed to its limits on high-resolution flash video or HD H.264 video at 720p. Beyond that, since it will have to be a 24/7 DVR machine, make sure it's fairly low power and very quiet.

I use Logitech's Touch Remote on my iPod Touch to control my laptop when viewing on the TV, and it works great. It gives you full mouse and keyboard control while sitting on the couch, although I couldn't seem to unlock my computer with it. For a family HTPC that's not locked down like my personal laptop, it shouldn't be a big deal.

Whether Media Center supports things or not is rather irrelevant, as the browser is the platform. Most streaming video is dependent on the browser, and running Firefox or Chrome is the only way to have that all available. That also requires a full mouse/keyboard system like the Logitech Touch Remote, although the MCE part of the system can be controlled with a more traditional remote.

With a full Windows PC, you are free to switch and upgrade as needed, which no box can offer. Boxee, MCE, and Hulu Desktop (software to access Hulu content that has a 10-foot interface) all offer ways to watch some content from the internet or OTA, as is MCE's case, while using a regular remote control.

SFF Mini-ITX machines or other barebones machines could offer a relatively inexpensive C2D system to use as a media platform.

Another question you have to ask yourself, is do you want any content that is not available OTA? If there is a significant amount, sourcing it online may be more of a hassle than it's worth. If you mostly watch network stuff, then OTA is the way to go, as it not only provides the best picture quality, but it has subchannels, and is free once you buy/build a DVR to record it.

 

[protoplasm]

First up, I shall say outright that I don't have much experience with Flash on these devices, so my comments below are more for playing H.264 from files than streaming from Hulu, but there may be some overlap that people might find useful.

Using XBMC on Ubuntu I have played ~20GB H.264 movies over the LAN on my Acer Revo 3600[1]. The CPU usage while playing these movies hovers around 15%. This was before I increased the amount of memory allocated to the video adapter, which you can only do if you have >1GB of RAM in at the time.

Basically, if the hardware assisted decoding is working and all other things are equal (i.e. it's not a wireless network bottleneck or something along those lines) then I don't see why there'd be a problem.

On Windows 7, to play the same sort of files, you'll definitely want the Haali splitter. That will give you hardware assist when playing H.264 files using Windows Media Player etc. Be careful when using players like VLC as they are great for playing every format under the sun, but they won't use these codecs, so you won't get the hardware assisted decoding.

Lastly, I'd also say that it's usually worth giving the latest NVIDIA beta drivers a go if you haven't already.

[1] Also on my 3610, but the 3600 is more relevant for purposes of comparison.

 

[Alek Davis]

I'm glad I found other people in the same boat, so I can learn something. I bought Revo 3610 based on the same reasoning that Tim outlined in his second post (price/performance). After tweaking Flash, codec, and other settings, I'm pretty happy with it. I don't have a solution for live TV, though. I was entertaining a possibility of using OTA TV, but the couple of channels I get have really weak signals (maybe it's my home location or the home structure, not sure, but without a big outdoor antenna, it does not seem to be an option), so I have no access to live TV. I'm not sure anyone in my family missed live TV, though. I can watch my favorite programs (PBS, The Daily Show, 60 Minutes, etc) online. I tried using Boxee a few times, but it was buggy: at first, the mouse did not quite work, then I noticed a few shows do not get displayed correctly. I tried a couple of other HT solutions, like XBMC, WMC, but I seriously do not see the point. I can watch a movie with the same success in Media Player Classic, and TV shows seem to look better in native interfaces (directly at the sources). Dunno, maybe I'm missing something. The best part is that I can all but ditch my DVD player, it's much more convenient to watch movies from the hard drive (relax, RIAA; these are legit). I wish I knew a quick way to burn my several sitcom DVD collections (Seinfeld, etc), though (hate to juggle with the disks and look for episodes I want to play).

P.S. If you're interested in Revo 3610, I posted a few notes with some helpful links at http://alekdavis.blogspot.com/2010/02/acer-revo-3610-review.html

 

[flamaest]

For me, the main decisions on using any appliance to watch DL'ed media content on my TV come down to:

-Hardware Stability over many hours of use.

-Fast Boot time, under 10 (ten) seconds after cold plug-in.

-True 1080 output, not just upscale of EDTV content.

-DVD raw ISO playback, not re-compressed captures.

-Open source interface software with large community [100k plus users] = fast updates and bug fixes.


I am able today to consistently achieve all of these from an XBOX V1 + XBMC.

The Boxee Box would be my move into 1080, h.264, and an RF keyboard for a better interactive experience. I hope D-Link gets the boot-time right, I hate waiting for reboots or staring at start-up screens.

F.

 

[BiggAW]

I don't think you can count on hardware acceleration, as it doesn't always work with all codecs. I would assume the need for HD flash playback in software (yes, it is possible on a C2D).

 

[vnangia]

Whew. I nearly bought a Revo that was on sale the other day. Glad I didn't. Unfortunately, that means I'm still back to thinking about how to get my media. I suspect next step may well be to build an inexpensive Core i3 box - Anandtech had measured the wattage of the i3-530+Zotac LGA-1156 Mini-ITX board between 36-76W, with a fairly heavy load of desktop-sized drives. If I can get a low enough cooler to fit the combination into a spare Mac Mini-sized mini-ITX case that last served as a firewall, then I think I may have my new media machine.

FWIW, are you considering only a free/ad-supported site option or is a subscription to an online service? For instance, one of the things I'd like to watch is BBC World, which can be had for $6/month using Realplayer, but can't watch using Boxee.

 

[bala]

Core i3 box

Posted on a german computer board, some guys managed to run a Core i3 box at 16 W. So with a fitting mainboard you should be able to get really good results.

 

[paladin252]

i pay $3.85 for basic basic cable, which lowers my internet bill by $10 so im not actually spending any more money on my tv, but i also want foxnews. i have tried calling comcast and giving them a hard time about offering just 1 channel i want to pay for instead of paying $30 to get 50 channels that i wont watch just to get 1 i will. i would watch my shows on foxnews.com but they arent offered, such as glenn beck and bill oreilly. any suggestions on where to get this content?

 

[convergent]

I will give an update on my quest to this from my last post a week ago. If you recall, I was testing a Revo 3610. I have now picked up the cheapest current gen Mac Mini to compare. To net out my findings, the Mac Mini was able to handle any of the media I've watched without any major problems. MLB.TV looks awesome and the Revo never could really get that done without struggling, which still baffles me since its CPU utilization was only 35% and it uses the same graphics chip as the Mac Mini. The Mini also was much more snappy and responsive. I'll go into a bit more detail about the pros and cons, because with this stuff... nothing is a clear winner. I'll also qualify my requirements to say that I'm not considering building a big beefy desktop for this... I want a quiet appliance type box... so the Revo or Mini are both in that bucket. Most of the other alternative WinTel boxes are pretty equivalent to the Revo.

Revo
- Windows 7 Media Center as the entry point. Hulu Desktop and Boxee on the WMC menu and launch and return fine. WMC handles live TV and DVR functions.
- Generic WMC remote FOB tied to Harmony One for control
- HDMI built in
- HDHomerun for OTA tuners
- Backend NAS for media and gigabit wired network connected to a 20mbps cable internet service.

Mac Mini
- Entry point is still being worked out. Plex (XBMC OSX version) is what I'm using at present, but it lacks integrated live TV and DVR.
- Remote function built in, but I'm using Remote Buddy application to enhance it.
- HDMI to DVI cable... still working to solve my audio problem because my receiver lacks and available Toslink port. For now using a mini to mini cable, but will deal with that later.
- HDHomerun for OTA tuners
- Backend NAS for media and gigabit wired network connected to a 20mbps cable internet service.

WMC has come a long way. Its live TV and DVR functions are very well done and though not quite to a Tivo, its the next best thing I've played with. WMC's also integrated their own internet TV into it, but its kind of useless because most of what you end up with are just clips, not full episodes. I also found that viewing internet TV via WMC it struggled a bit compared to watching it in Hulu. Launching Hulu from WMC works well though, and WMC will continue to record your DVR list while that is going on. Netflix directly from WMC worked fine.

The Mac Mini lacks that WMC seamless entry point. I haven't looked much at Front Row yet, but that's Apple's alternative. Ironically, even though it is really their Apple TV code base, it lacks any live TV and DVR function. The best alternative for that is EyeTV which I already had. I am still tweaking it to find the best way to get back and forth between EyeTV and Plex. If it were just me using it, I can control them both quite easily with my Harmony One and Remote Buddy, however I need this to be "wife friendly". I am still working on that. I believe its possible to get there, but still working through it. Because the Mini handles all the media so well, I want to give this a good attempt.

I've just been digging into Plex and it has some nice capabilties... here are a few that I've exploited.
- Integrated Hulu that works - a couple of people in this thread have mentioned using Boxee to get to Hulu. Hulu does not work with Boxee intentionally... people find ways to get around it and Hulu breaks it again... not a good long term strategy. Hulu has a direct plugin with Plex that works great. Better still, there is also an app that will take your Netflix queue and your Hulu subscriptions, and insert them in your library of TV and Movies.... seamlessly with your local/NAS stored content. So I can do a coverflow type look through movies and can't tell the difference between them all... very nice.
- Integrated with iTunes/iPhoto/Aperture - I've only done the iTunes part, but Plex automatically pulls in your whole iTunes library and presents it nicely.

I still haven't ruled out Boxee as an entry point... it is pretty snappy on the Mac has a lot more support than any other alternative, along with a commercial product providing some funding to the effort. In my case, it also has an MLB.TV plug-in and one for Clicker.com. If you haven't looked at Clicker, check it out. It aggregates all most internet/TV content so you can search on a TV series in one place. Their Boxee app is still in the early stages, but is pretty good. I haven't been able to really use the MLB.TV app in Boxee yet because its not turned on for pre-season. This is something that would be really nice to use.

So the trade-offs between the 3 entry points

WMC
- Integrated in the OS and well supported
- Seamless live TV and DVR
- Seamless internet TV, but weak content making it kind of useless
- Easy to launch Boxee or Hulu and easily get back
- Integrated Netflix

Plex
- Integrated Hulu and Netflix - best of all by integrating with local content
- Integrated with iTunes/iPhoto/Aperture
- Very flexible on content it can handle

Boxee
- Social networking (I don't care about this at all)
- Hulu tries to block Boxee accessing their content
- Integrated MLB.TV and Clicker.com
- Very flexible on content it can handle

From a control point of view, I'm assuming I'll use a Harmony One remote to control any of these which is what the family is using now with Tivo... so I am trying to model behavior to make this easier to use for them.

One guy I talked to on AVSForum actually merged this and is running WMC on a Mac Mini and says he's quite happy with that approach. I don't really want to go there. I'm finding the Revo has some benefits, but its overall sluggishness compared to the Mini lets you see that it is being stretched a bit to handle all of this.

 

[thiggins]

Don't give up on Satellite. Dish Network has a package that is $31 for what amounts to an all-digital version of expanded basic cable, including a multi-room DVR. For $60 you can get America's Top 120, your RSN, and the multi-room DVR.

Thanks for the tip. But is this $31 in addition to what I'm already paying? Or is this offer for new subscribers only? I'm not really interested in anything that puts me on another two-year commitment.

 

[thiggins]

Hi Alek and thanks for your post.

I agree with many of your comments about Boxee, More in my Part 3.

Thanks for the link to your 3610 writeup. Nicely done and good info. I don't really care for the Revo's power switch either!

OTA will be explored later in the series. I manage to get all the Networks, some better than others. I suspect I need to upgrade from Winegard SS 2000 SquareShooter panel antenna to a real UHF reflector.

 

[thiggins]

FWIW, are you considering only a free/ad-supported site option or is a subscription to an online service? For instance, one of the things I'd like to watch is BBC World, which can be had for $6/month using Realplayer, but can't watch using Boxee.

I'm fine with paying for access. But, it needs to be convenient, cover most/all the content I use today, reasonably priced $30/month) and good quality.

If I end up with a bunch of $6/month subscriptions and a bunch of players, that's not what I call convenient.

 

[thiggins]

I will give an update on my quest to this from my last post a week ago....

Thanks for the update. Very informative. I may repost it with a bit of fleshing out in the series for those folks who don't visit the SNB Forums.

 

[convergent]

Thanks for the tip. But is this $31 in addition to what I'm already paying? Or is this offer for new subscribers only? I'm not really interested in anything that puts me on another two-year commitment.

Yep, I'm not keen to signing up for a 2 year commitment either. I took a hard look at DirectTV and the first year would be great, but after that I'm back to the high fees and tied in. I'd rather by my equipment and pay a reasonable fee than have it subsidized I guess.

 

[thiggins]

USB IR adapter suggestions?

What are people using to add IR capability to their systems? I've been playing with Boxee and XBMC iPhone/iTouch apps that work via WiFi. But the end game may require using a Harmony One.

BTW, anyone notice that the D-Link Boxee Box remote is RF? Another complication we don't need...

 

[Unregistered]

boxee, internet & TV

I am so confused. Does the boxee box allow you to watch internet content on your TV?