Thursday, March 9, 2006
Wired: Build Your Own PVR, Then Trash It
Posted by Damion Chaplin in "ARTICLE" @ 03:00 PM
"First, the good news. Plummeting storage costs and the availability of special hardware have finally made it cheap and easy to shrug off the shackles of TiVo and build your own personal video recorder out of an old PC. The bad news is digital-rights management technologies will probably make your homebrew PVR obsolete faster than you can say 'Super Bowl Sunday.'"
This is a great article about the struggles involved with building your own PVR in today's DRM-happy world. I found it very interesting because I personally experienced what he's talking about. It's all summed up in this line: "But now, his shared apartment in San Francisco sports a Comcast PVR so he can record high-definition cable shows from HBO. Now he uses his old MythTV box as a music server." This is exactly what happened to me. Trying to tweak a PC to be as responsive and easy-to-use as any generic DVR from a cable company proved futile. And, of course, there is no over-cable HD tuner card available, thanks to pressure from the Entertainment Industry. Eventually (and with much 'encouragement' from my wife) I ditched it in favor of an HD DVR from my cable provider. Anyone else had this experience?
This is a great article about the struggles involved with building your own PVR in today's DRM-happy world. I found it very interesting because I personally experienced what he's talking about. It's all summed up in this line: "But now, his shared apartment in San Francisco sports a Comcast PVR so he can record high-definition cable shows from HBO. Now he uses his old MythTV box as a music server." This is exactly what happened to me. Trying to tweak a PC to be as responsive and easy-to-use as any generic DVR from a cable company proved futile. And, of course, there is no over-cable HD tuner card available, thanks to pressure from the Entertainment Industry. Eventually (and with much 'encouragement' from my wife) I ditched it in favor of an HD DVR from my cable provider. Anyone else had this experience?
