New to HTPC

JepTV

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New to HTPC

#1

Post by JepTV » Fri Apr 03, 2015 4:52 pm

I've been tasked by my father to come up with a cord cutting solution since he is tired of paying $90/month for Satellite TV. However they have quite a few programs they like to watch and it seems we will need OTA DVR, Hulu, Netflix, and possibly PC video because some of their shows are not on Netflix/Hulu. I have built half a dozen computers and think the technical hardware aspect won't be that difficult, however I have a few concerns and questions.

We have a standard definition 150lb 42inch TV with a composite input and a coax input in the main living room. This is the main TV and it only supports standard definition with no current internet activity. The cabinet is built almost perfectly for the TV and I'm not sure the idea of a new TV would be well received, however I am keeping it as a possibility. I also dislike the idea of having to carry the 150lb brick to wherever its final destination will be. We have a small basic DVD player attached to the TV and the other attachment is our satellite TV currently.

We have Time Warner standard 15mbit/1mbit coming through our own modem and ASUS RT-N16 router running Tomato.

My parents love DVR and I doubt they would be able to go back to watching live TV at this stage without the ability to pause. I have looked at Tivo, ChannelMaster, and a few others, however I think a PC will be the ultimate solution if I can configure it properly. The issues/concerns I have are:

- Will each tuner require its own antenna if I pick up two dual tuner cards for quad-channel recording.
- Is there an interface simple enough or similar enough to satellite tv that two 60 year old parents will be able to navigate.
- If the HTPC has internet TV(watching a program inside a browser.. ie Youtube), DVD, OTA, and Hulu/Netflix capability, is there an easy way to switch between all of these input sources.
- How much of this could be controlled by a media center remote and how much will have to be driven by mouse/keyboard.
- Would the HTPC require a hardwire ethernet cord or how does wireless-G stack up in real world testing?

We have tried Hulu/Netflix on a Roku already, and the interface left something to be desired and many programs were missing from these selections. I have a Mohu leaf hooked to my television and could give it to them as I do not watch TV at all. As I do not watch TV at all, I also have no passion for this project or TV in particular.

They really require DVR functionality(watch anytime, pause, FF, REW) on everything they watch, and want to keep as many of their current shows as possible. They also rent movies from RedBox. I am fairly sure that everything here is possible on an HTPC with keyboard/mouse, however I am wondering how much of it can be simplified into a single menu and on a remote, making it closer to satellite/cable. They are used to satellite/cable and if the interface is too complicated, that will mean many more trips to "fix" problems.

We already have a Dell Dimension B110 laying around that was their old PC. It has been replaced by a pentium Haswell that I built. The B110 has a Celeron 2.53ghz with 1.5gb DDR PC3200 ram, PCI slots, an 80gb hard drive, and I am 99% sure it will not be strong enough to serve as the HTPC. It does not have SATA interfaces that I recall, and being a socket 478... it's not really upgradeable.

I'm fairly certain of the hardware I will need, however the software and a few other questions concern me, so I posted this is in the software section.
I was planning on relying on the integrated graphics of an i3 chip along with a SSD for the operating system, a large hard drive for storage, a blu-ray or DVD(since its only a SD TV), two Happauge dual tuners, and a wireless NIC. I was planning on putting it all in a tower as I've got ogre hands and doubt i could handle a HTPC case.

Any ideas/thoughts would be appreciated.

mdavej

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#2

Post by mdavej » Fri Apr 03, 2015 5:40 pm

My 2 cents:

I'm a huge HTPC fan and user, but would never give my parents one. If/when something goes wrong, I'm several hundred miles away, and remote desktop sometimes isn't enough. That's why I gave them an old Tivo Premier with lifetime ($300 on CL). Added a $20 universal remote to make everything (Roku, BD player, etc.) one button press away.

If you still go through with it, yes, all can be controlled with a remote if you set it up properly. What I would do is get an old Xbox 360 for the main interface as an extender. It will do WMC (live and recorded TV with full guide and DVR), Netflix, Youtube, Hulu, etc., all by remote, with no chance of exiting to the PC. Plus it can connect to an old TV and a newer one if you upgrade in the future. They can also play DVD on the Xbox. Give them a separate BD player for blu-ray. Doing that on a PC is also awkward, expensive and unreliable. I wouldn't attempt other streaming or disc playback on the PC itself, at least not for your parent's system.

That old PC might work fine.

To answer your other questions:

- Just add a splitter to get the antenna to both tuners
- WMC is very simple. Others are too complicated, IMO.
- DVD, Hulu, Youtube, etc. are going to be a pain on a PC and will require keyboard/mouse. Use an Xbox as I said or separate devices integrated with a decent universal remote (Nevo C2 is very powerful, easy to use and cheap).
- 100% remote control is possible if you configure as I said.
- Wifi and HD MPEG2 bitrates don't mix. Stars need to align for it to work. Stick with hardwired.

rvbvolney

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#3

Post by rvbvolney » Fri Apr 03, 2015 6:47 pm

JepTV wrote: - Will each tuner require its own antenna if I pick up two dual tuner cards for quad-channel recording.
- Is there an interface simple enough or similar enough to satellite tv that two 60 year old parents will be able to navigate.
- If the HTPC has internet TV(watching a program inside a browser.. ie Youtube), DVD, OTA, and Hulu/Netflix capability, is there an easy way to switch between all of these input sources.
- How much of this could be controlled by a media center remote and how much will have to be driven by mouse/keyboard.
- Would the HTPC require a hardwire ethernet cord or how does wireless-G stack up in real world testing?

We have tried Hulu/Netflix on a Roku already, and the interface left something to be desired and many programs were missing from these selections. I have a Mohu leaf hooked to my television and could give it to them as I do not watch TV at all. As I do not watch TV at all, I also have no passion for this project or TV in particular.
Welcome JepTV!

- You will only need one antenna; an inexpensive coax splitter can be used. But you may need a signal amplifier: each dual tuner card with one coax input also splits the signal, too, so you have actually split it 4X, weakening the signal about -7db.

- Yes, Windows Media Center's interface is quite similar to cable and sat TV's. WMC remotes are readily available and easily used to navigate the menus. (up,down,left,right buttons,OK,ch up/ch down, vol up/vol down, mute, etc.) There are dedicated buttons for the Recorded TV (DVR) and Guide.

- I don't know of an easy PC transition from WMC to Netflix, Hulu, etc. and remote usability, except for, believe it or not - an xBox 360 slim. Think about adding the tuner cards to their Haswell PC. Are there enough expansion slots? ...and using the xBox 360 as a media center extender. It has component and composite video output (or HDMI if they should upgrade the TV). It has a DVD (not bluray) drive built in. It has wifi built in. It can be navigated with the WMC remote (an xBox controller initially needed to enable the remote) and can be configured to launch Media Center on startup. There are free Youtube, Netflix and Hulu apps available from xBox Live. They can be accessed from the xBox dashboard, after exiting WMC.

- Wireless ~may~ be okay for SD which requires less bandwidth, but probably not wireless-G; N is much better, and even then the receiver (xBox) can't be too far from the router/AP. Wired is no question preferable.

Flat screen LED TVs (think way lower energy consumption than the huge tube TV as well as the HD picture quality) have come way down in price and multiple HDMI inputs would allow more options such as a HP x280n extender (great remote!) and a Roku for the streaming apps..

The risk that support for Media Center by Microsoft could be dropped at their whim and fancy is the question. Not a matter of if, but when.....

3rob3

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#4

Post by 3rob3 » Fri Apr 03, 2015 9:03 pm

mdavej wrote:I'm a huge HTPC fan and user, but would never give my parents one.
Agreed. I did set my parents up with one, and to be honest the support has not been that bad, but when something does go south it's not fun.

I also agree with rvbvolney above about using an Xbox extender if you did go this route. I think that has been my saving grace with my parents because all their TV viewing goes through extenders. Especially in your case hooking up to a non-HD TV. It would be much simpler with an Xbox because it will take care of the overscan for you.

adam1991

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#5

Post by adam1991 » Fri Apr 03, 2015 11:03 pm

yeah--like my cableCARD going south.

I can't imaging foisting this onto someone else and being his support. I would rather dive into a cesspool headfirst.

JepTV

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#6

Post by JepTV » Sat Apr 04, 2015 12:12 am

So the XBox 360 would be the best all in one choice if I can set it up to pull recordings/live OTA from a server that I setup with the antenna. Set the server to share the files and the Xbox is able to stream them over the home network. That will get me OTA, OTA recording, Hulu, Netflix, and DVD playback. That just leaves a few shows on USA, TBS, etc... which will be difficult to obtain. Completely unfamiliar with an Xbox 360, so I'll have to look into how easy they are to use. Always been a playstation person.

Perhaps the PC could be hooked up to one input on the TV, and the Xbox hooked up to the other. The PC would not have to do anything except WMC, and the XBox would handle the rest. Could even use the PC for any web browsing if needed to find a video if its not on youtube. Hulu/Netflix are fairly easy to get onto an XBox 360 I assume? We were looking at possibly dropping it to just the monthly price of Hulu/Netflix if possible.

mdavej

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#7

Post by mdavej » Sat Apr 04, 2015 2:06 am

You misunderstand. Xbox does WMC, no file sharing required. Does all the other streaming apps too.

You can't get USA, etc. without cable, or sling TV, even online.

JepTV

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#8

Post by JepTV » Sat Apr 04, 2015 8:59 pm

Yea, I think I can make a box with two tuners, and use an Xbox360.

His computer is next to the router, and presents a possible problem, however it should be fixable. Windows 7 Home Premium seems to have WMC as well.
It only has a PCI Express 2.0 x4, PCI Express 3.0 x16, and two PCI slots. All are free as its running off the integrated graphics of the G3220. Strange for a Haswell motherboard to not have PCIe 1x. Guess I should have looked at that more when I built it, but was in a rush at the time. ASrock H87M Pro4. May be some special jumpers or bios tweaks to get those x16 and x4 slots to work with x1 cards. Also the 500gb WD Black won't hold a ton of video, so will need to throw in another hard drive.

They typically record USA, TNT, FX, CNBC, A&E, HIstory, Discovery, CMT, TLC, FOOD, along with local channels, according to their timers. So maybe I'll hook up the antenna in his room with two cards in the Haswell box, then save that to the 500gb and eventually a 2tb. He'll have to configure his timers on the PC though I guess. Then the XBox will link to that via the home network over ethernet cable and the xbox will have hulu and netflix as well along with taking the place of the DVD player. That will just level the cable channels and those just aren't going to be possible unless I can find the shows on Hulu/netflix. Hrm.

Have a Roku 1, but it looks like the XBox will completely obsolete that.

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#9

Post by mike_ekim » Mon Apr 06, 2015 6:30 pm

JepTV wrote:I've been tasked by my father to come up with a cord cutting solution since he is tired of paying $90/month for Satellite TV.
Who is their local cable provider? Have they considered just shopping around for cheaper satellite or cable plans? They might be able to get what they want (possibly only giving up one or two stations) for less money. WMC needs an internet connection for guide data. If they need internet, then they can usually bundle it with cable and save $5/month or so.

I have cable but I use my WMC for the DVR, so I'm saving the DVR rental fee and the "DRV guide data" fee. Cable costs me $39/month (regular price, not a promotion) plus $2 for the cablecard but I'm "saving" $5 with my internet bundle, so cable is an added cost of $36/month because I would have internet even without cable. I know I haven't really cut the cord, but $36 is a lot better than $90. I get most of the channels your parents watch (I don't watch all of them so I can't say for sure).

Bryan

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#10

Post by Bryan » Mon Apr 06, 2015 7:07 pm

JepTV wrote:All are free as its running off the integrated graphics of the G3220. Strange for a Haswell motherboard to not have PCIe 1x. Guess I should have looked at that more when I built it, but was in a rush at the time. ASrock H87M Pro4. May be some special jumpers or bios tweaks to get those x16 and x4 slots to work with x1 cards.
This is the same CPU and board I'm using, it doesn't care what card I put in what slot. As long as the card fits (ie, not putting an x16 in an x1 slot) it works.

Honestly, to cut the cord, you have to adjust what you're watching some. Newer options like Sling will take care of some of what you're after, but sometimes you just have to wait for a show to make it to Netflix.

JepTV

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#11

Post by JepTV » Mon Apr 06, 2015 10:59 pm

mike_ekim wrote:
JepTV wrote:I've been tasked by my father to come up with a cord cutting solution since he is tired of paying $90/month for Satellite TV.
Who is their local cable provider? Have they considered just shopping around for cheaper satellite or cable plans? They might be able to get what they want (possibly only giving up one or two stations) for less money. WMC needs an internet connection for guide data. If they need internet, then they can usually bundle it with cable and save $5/month or so.

I have cable but I use my WMC for the DVR, so I'm saving the DVR rental fee and the "DRV guide data" fee. Cable costs me $39/month (regular price, not a promotion) plus $2 for the cablecard but I'm "saving" $5 with my internet bundle, so cable is an added cost of $36/month because I would have internet even without cable. I know I haven't really cut the cord, but $36 is a lot better than $90. I get most of the channels your parents watch (I don't watch all of them so I can't say for sure).
DISH Network
Hopper, one room, one DVR.
He is wanting to get down to $30/month total if possible and keep DVR features. I'm going to check his timers next chance I get and see what is on Hulu/Netflix. He also wants to try just one tuner for dual channel recording instead of quad so we'll save some money there.

So a Mohu Leaf 50 mile, a Hauppauge(or another brand? I had heard they were one of the best) Dual tuner PCIe. Hook those into the Windows 7 Home computer and configure WMC to record. Then buy an XBox 360 and link that to the WMC on the computer. Thanks everyone for all the help so far.

Will the recording of WMC affect system usability at all since that computer will also be his Flash Game/Email/Browsing computer, with a few cheap CD games like Pac-Man and SimCity? I know encoding used drain systems to a crawl years ago, however I'm not sure if its a simple background task that's not even noticed now? Or will said games/browsing slow down the recording?

All that PC is going to be doing is capturing OTA shows, recording and serving them to the XBox.

mdavej

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#12

Post by mdavej » Tue Apr 07, 2015 2:05 am

DVR duty on a PC isn't very taxing, but the hard drive will be doing a lot and it will eat up a couple of gigs of RAM. Browsing and light gaming shouldn't be impacted. What OS do you have exactly? You need Win 7 Home Premium, Pro or Ultimate.

Silicon Dust makes the best tuners, not Hauppauge. But Hauppauge should be ok.

JepTV

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#13

Post by JepTV » Tue Apr 07, 2015 11:18 am

It's Windows 7 Home Premium, G3220 dual core pentium processor, 8 gigabytes of ram, 500gb Western Digital Hard drive.
SiliconDust looks like it only makes external tuners, as long as they would work with the PC the same as an internal tuner would, that would be fine.

Bryan

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#14

Post by Bryan » Tue Apr 07, 2015 1:39 pm

I recently cut the cord, and am very happy with my SiliconDust tuner (whichever is the cheapest dual-tuner). It's a network tuner which makes placement very flexible; mine (and therefore my antenna) aren't near my HTPC. No extra cards also means my HTPC needs less cooling and nothing more connected to it.

For antenna recommendations, I would try TVFool. You can map exactly where you're at, where the broadcasts are, and go from there.

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#15

Post by bobstr » Tue Apr 07, 2015 6:39 pm

A few additional thoughts to add to what others have said:

Antennas: You can't use an antenna -unless- you can get over the air reception on the local channels that you/they want to watch. With the transition to only HD broadcasts, the transmission range is much, much shorter than it used to be - and is more reliant on 'line of sight' aka (no obstacles between you and the transmitter) than it used to be. If you want to go that route, unless they used to receive fantastic quality standard definition TV over the air, it's questionable whether it will work for HD.

Costs: Go add up the costs of the packages that you want to use - Hulu (paid subscription), Netflix, etc. compare that to what they pay now. You may be shocked that you are likely to not save anything, depending on what the channel requirements are (Local Channels are generally not available -at all- without cable, Satellite or good reception over the air).

Complexity / ease of use: Having to switch back and forth between -many- different interfaces (Hulu, Netflix, Windows Media Center, and all the others) to find the shows can quickly ruin any desire to use whatever system you put into place. I know my 70+ year old mother would -NEVER- be able to handle more than a single interface (She's got basic limited cable with Comcast, won't even pay for HD even though she's got HD flat screen TV's) - and that's almost too much.... The 'spousal acceptance factor' of a pure Windows Media Center system is very, very high in my household.

Network: If you're going to be using networked tuners like the Silicon Dust HD Prime, a wireless G network is probably not going to have the bandwidth to keep up, You can go with some of the newest wireless network technology, or go with a hardwired network.

DVR: Windows Media Center does do DVR for TV and Movies that are watched on TV Channels that you can receive. However, you can't 'DVR' from streaming sources (I don't know of any streaming sources that allow you to).

Me, I don't do much streaming, but have used a windows media center PC as my HTPC for as long as Microsoft's had media Center. I've evolved it many times (I even had the beta DirecTV USB connected tuner for about 2 years - until DirecTV killed the project. I loved that combination - Media Center with DirecTV built in... Man that was good, but when they killed that, they left no way to connect the two without a bunch of only semi-reliable fiddly bits in-between the two). Current config is a PC dedicated to Media Center for my living room (wired over into the pantry so that I don't have the PC in the living room), dedicated media center PC's in the master bedroom and family room - and they all share two Silicon Dust HD Prime units (3 tuners in each of the two Primes). I also have a PC with a ton of hard drives in it that I use to store DVR'ed TV shows and movies, ripped movies, ripped CD's and purchased music, all of our digital pictures, etc. All PC's can reach all of that data via a hardwired network. The media center software works nearly flawlessly, and works with Netflix. Hulu has an add on app that seems to work well with it. Not sure about the others - I haven't tried it.

JepTV

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#16

Post by JepTV » Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:40 am

Hulu - 7.99/month
Netflix - 8.99/month
XBox360 250gb - $279.00 once
SiliconDust HD dual tuner ATSC - $89.00 once
Mohu Leaf 50 mile - $69.99 once
Some cat5/5e/6 cabling.
Coax splitter

DISH satellite - $87-$90 per month

I currently have a Mohu Leaf 30 mile and have tested it on their TV, they get all but one local channel they want, and I believe the 50 mile will pick up that one.

The router supports Wireless N, however i have it set to G/B mixed for compatibility when guests come over.

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#17

Post by Sharks » Wed Apr 08, 2015 7:12 am

bobstr wrote:
DVR: Windows Media Center does do DVR for TV and Movies that are watched on TV Channels that you can receive. However, you can't 'DVR' from streaming sources (I don't know of any streaming sources that allow you to).

Me, I don't do much streaming, but have used a windows media center PC as my HTPC for as long as Microsoft's had media Center. I've evolved it many times (I even had the beta DirecTV USB connected tuner for about 2 years - until DirecTV killed the project. I loved that combination - Media Center with DirecTV built in... Man that was good, but when they killed that, they left no way to connect the two without a bunch of only semi-reliable fiddly bits in-between the two). Current config is a PC dedicated to Media Center for my living room (wired over into the pantry so that I don't have the PC in the living room), dedicated media center PC's in the master bedroom and family room - and they all share two Silicon Dust HD Prime units (3 tuners in each of the two Primes). I also have a PC with a ton of hard drives in it that I use to store DVR'ed TV shows and movies, ripped movies, ripped CD's and purchased music, all of our digital pictures, etc. All PC's can reach all of that data via a hardwired network. The media center software works nearly flawlessly, and works with Netflix. Hulu has an add on app that seems to work well with it. Not sure about the others - I haven't tried it.
On DVR: There is a program called PlayOn - Playlater that will record streaming sources just like a DVR. It can be integrated into Windows Media Center with some ok results. It is currently $49.99 for lifetime usage, it is $89.99 when not on sale, they have sales periodically so if you miss one I would just wait until the next one.

On the apps: Netflix works well after implementing a fix that is posted on the forums here. (PlayOn/PlayLater will pull videos into that app but the interface is less pleasing in-side windows media center.)

The Hulu Desktop app you have a 50/50 shot of getting it work, I see people who have it working but it won't work for me and or a number of other people. (Theoretically, you don't need as PlayOn/PlayLater pull videos from hulu. [Though the inteface isn't as nice as hulu desktops.])

I would also look into Amazon Prime as the AmazonMCEaddin works great for integrating amazon prime videos into windows media center. (PlayOn/PlayLater will also integrate these videos in, and again I don't like the interface as much.)

Hope that helps.

Bryan

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#18

Post by Bryan » Wed Apr 08, 2015 12:03 pm

JepTV wrote: XBox360 250gb - $279.00 once
.
You don't need one with a hard drive, the cheaper 4GB unit is fine for this. Used would be cheaper too; I got my last one (a 250GB model, actually) for $100.

Ed 

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#19

Post by Ed  » Wed Apr 08, 2015 2:10 pm

Yeah, all my XBOX extenders are just the 4GB ones.

JepTV

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#20

Post by JepTV » Thu Apr 09, 2015 12:53 am

I'll just get a 4gb on then.
Not really needing to record Hulu/Netflix. The shows are there, and you can play them at anytime to my knowledge, with FastForward/Pause/Rewind, unless my understanding is off?
Once they watch something, they don't watch it again, so as long as Hulu/Netflix holds shows for a week or two from their air date.....

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