Best (cheapest) Extender Option for Viewing TV & DVR

[adam1991]

New to the forum, but long-time SageTV user. Although my setup could have used some refreshing, it worked flawlessly with a dedicated SageTV Server in the basement and an STP-HD200 extender upstairs. With SageTV being hijacked by Google, I'm forced to look at my next HTPC setup and I'm ready to upgrade to a Ceton quad tuner.

My concern is primarily the extender situation. I'm not too excited about having 3 or 4 Xbox's to simply serve as extenders and would prefer a smaller, fanless, silent solution.

Are you concerned about size, or are you concerned about noise, or are you concerned about price, or are you concerned about "look at all that XBox functionality going to waste! All I want to do is watch TV!"?

I'm considering the Linksys DMA 2100/2200 as alternatives, although something tells me 2-3 year old technology that is no longer supported might not be the best option. The Echo seems to be ultimate answer, but ETA is unknown. I'm surprised that with such a well tauted W7 capablity as WMC that there are so few extender options available. Should I look to pick up a some used Xbox's for extenders? If so, what should I be looking for exactly? Is one make/model better than another when considering used hardware?

The fact is, there *is* only one extender option--XBox. You can't get around it. On the plus side, it is highly reliable and fully functional. Plus, it has a DVD player in it--never a bad thing.

Get new. $200. Cheap at the price. You're right about the Linksys and Ceton units.

I don't think $200, or even $150 if you find them on sale at Amazon, is too much for an extender that does all of this.

Also, I read somewhere that in order to utilize full streaming/functionality of an Xbox extender, an Xbox Gold annual subscription is needed. Any truth to that?

Thanks!

The XBox has full extender capability, no extra anything required.

To stream any movies you may have on disc in .mp4 format, you'll need the codec that's available only if you're signed on as an XBox Live member. But the free subscription suffices for that. (Unfortunately, you end up with a unique Live ID for each XBox for that...)

To access Netflix requires that you be an XBox Live Gold member on the XBox in question.

Note that these restrictions do NOT apply to the main PC in question. Windows 7 can play .mp4, and the Netflix add-on is nicely integrated into the main 7MC setup.

[slowbiscuit]

Yep, I have the DMA-2100 and the Xbox Slim and the Xbox is definitely the way to go if you can get one on sale for $150 or so (these happen all the time, so just wait for one). Or find one with a broken DVD drive on craigslist for $50-100 if you really want to save money. Much better user experience for the Slim at the cost of a little fan noise and greater power use. The big advantage for the Linksys is that you can leave it on all the time and get into shows quicker, can't do that with the Xbox because of the power draw.

Don't even bother with the older Xboxes, go Slim if you want one.

[QingGuy]

UPDATE: Someone gave me a used DMA 2100 that I'm going to install today! Saves me buying an X-Box for our 2nd most used TV and will tide me over until the Ceton units come out! Very cool.

[bmblank]

Make sure to get the slim xbox. It still has a little hum but its way more quiet than the older console I borrowed for proof of concept.

[barnabas1969]

Yep, I have the DMA-2100 and the Xbox Slim and the Xbox is definitely the way to go if you can get one on sale for $150 or so (these happen all the time, so just wait for one). Or find one with a broken DVD drive on craigslist for $50-100 if you really want to save money. Much better user experience for the Slim at the cost of a little fan noise and greater power use. The big advantage for the Linksys is that you can leave it on all the time and get into shows quicker, can't do that with the Xbox because of the power draw.

Don't even bother with the older Xboxes, go Slim if you want one.

I would sure like to borrow an XBox to try. I don't see what all the hype is about. My HP and Linksys extenders are snappy and responsive. No problems whatsoever. I'm totally satisfied. However, I don't have any MKV's or anything encoded in H.264. I know that if you want to play stuff encoded in H.264, you need an XBox360, but I use mine for recorded TV.

[newfiend]

Yep, I have the DMA-2100 and the Xbox Slim and the Xbox is definitely the way to go if you can get one on sale for $150 or so (these happen all the time, so just wait for one). Or find one with a broken DVD drive on craigslist for $50-100 if you really want to save money. Much better user experience for the Slim at the cost of a little fan noise and greater power use. The big advantage for the Linksys is that you can leave it on all the time and get into shows quicker, can't do that with the Xbox because of the power draw.

Don't even bother with the older Xboxes, go Slim if you want one.

I would sure like to borrow an XBox to try. I don't see what all the hype is about. My HP and Linksys extenders are snappy and responsive. No problems whatsoever. I'm totally satisfied. However, I don't have any MKV's or anything encoded in H.264. I know that if you want to play stuff encoded in H.264, you need an XBox360, but I use mine for recorded TV.

You should try one. They aren't much better.. but the added ability of being able to play .mkv is nice. There are lots of TV options out there for it now with all the added apps for Xfinity etc.. Plus I have a zune music subscription and I can access that through the xbox and use it for music as well.. I like it better than the DMA-2100 I have. The DMA just seems a bit under powered and with menu animations turned on its laggy and clunky feeling, turn them off and its ok and for just watching TV they are fine. I sometimes have an issue with my DMA trying to boot and it just sits there.. with the blue light flashing...and flashing... and i have to unplug it, let it sit, plug it back in.. it's just a PITA.. The xbox always just works plus it sends a WOL packet which turns on my HTPC. Something the DMA won't do.
newfiend~

[slowbiscuit]

Yep, that was something I forgot to mention - the Xbox is more reliable than the Linksys, which requires a reboot every once in a while. Not much of a fair comparison if you turn off the Xbox all the time though (I do, sucks too much juice to leave on but the Linksys only uses 9 watts or so).

[barnabas1969]

Yep, I have the DMA-2100 and the Xbox Slim and the Xbox is definitely the way to go if you can get one on sale for $150 or so (these happen all the time, so just wait for one). Or find one with a broken DVD drive on craigslist for $50-100 if you really want to save money. Much better user experience for the Slim at the cost of a little fan noise and greater power use. The big advantage for the Linksys is that you can leave it on all the time and get into shows quicker, can't do that with the Xbox because of the power draw.

Don't even bother with the older Xboxes, go Slim if you want one.

I would sure like to borrow an XBox to try. I don't see what all the hype is about. My HP and Linksys extenders are snappy and responsive. No problems whatsoever. I'm totally satisfied. However, I don't have any MKV's or anything encoded in H.264. I know that if you want to play stuff encoded in H.264, you need an XBox360, but I use mine for recorded TV.

You should try one. They aren't much better.. but the added ability of being able to play .mkv is nice. There are lots of TV options out there for it now with all the added apps for Xfinity etc.. Plus I have a zune music subscription and I can access that through the xbox and use it for music as well.. I like it better than the DMA-2100 I have. The DMA just seems a bit under powered and with menu animations turned on its laggy and clunky feeling, turn them off and its ok and for just watching TV they are fine. I sometimes have an issue with my DMA trying to boot and it just sits there.. with the blue light flashing...and flashing... and i have to unplug it, let it sit, plug it back in.. it's just a PITA.. The xbox always just works plus it sends a WOL packet which turns on my HTPC. Something the DMA won't do.
newfiend~

Well, I must admit that my only Linksys is a DMA-2200 and it is plugged into the only SDTV I have in the house... which is in our 5-year-old's bedroom. I don't use it much... we usually play DVD's on it for her or use it to play kids' shows that we've recorded. And... we don't leave it turned on all the time, so I wouldn't notice the need to boot it periodically. All the other bedrooms have HP X280N extenders. I do remember that when I first got the Linksys, I noticed that it wasn't as fast as the HP extenders when navigating menus and such (and the remote that comes with the DMA is crap)... but I'm completely satisfied with the HP extenders... once you get used to their two main quirks, which I believe I listed earlier in this thread.

[jasmithvr6]

[/quote]
Welcome to the forum...
I have two Ceton Tuners (one PCIe, one USB) They have worked really well for me so far. I have had the USB unit a short time and the PCIe since the first batch of cards hit the U.S. It's been a very good tuner.
I have both The Xbox and a DMA-2100. The DMA's work. They are quiet and fanless units. However I much prefer the Slim Xbox (newer version) to the DMA's.
It is a bit on the noisy side as it has a fan but after it's on the the TV volume is up at normal levels you really don't hear it. It is MUCH quieter than the older Xbox as well. If you can get your hands on the Xbox Slim (newer black version) That's going to be your best bet in the short term.
If your looking for a smaller quiet extender the Ceton Echo is going to be the best option.. but like you said.. ETA is ??? I want one of these also and will order one (maybe two) once they are available. The thing looks very impressive.
As far as Extender functionality goes you do not have to have a Xbox Live Gold account for this to work. If you want to use Netflix, Hulu Plus, or the Xfinity Apps etc.. you will need a gold account for this. But for regular extender streaming functions you do not.
HTH,
newfiend~[/quote]

Thanks for the insight newfiend. My internal struggle is that I loved SageTV. It did everything I wanted with the HD extender setup...timeshifting, streaming TV, movies (VOB format), music, etc. I was running an older version of Sage (6.x.x I think) so I wasn't pulling in Netflix or Hulu Plus. I'm not a subscriber to those services anyway, so not a big deal for me. And if I wanted to eventually tap into them, my Sony BD can handle that function. That and the fact that I never updated hardware/software to pull in scrambled cable channels in HD (was still using old analog tuners for that ). But I had an HDHR dialed in for local HD channels, which was sufficient. I suppose those were the only shortcomings to my Sage setup. Of course I'm looking to recreate and improve on that with WMC7 although I'm finding it's not that easy. Seems like no extender on the market will stream VOB files, which means I'll need to convert my movies to another format. MP4 is probably the logical choice as it will play on the Linksys or Xbox as well as other portable Apple devices (I'm a fan of a single format solution). Not that I have a ton of movies to convert, but it'll add to the setup time. Do you know if the Sage extender will work with WMC7? From what I've read, it doesn't seem like it's supported but curious if anyone has gotten it to work. Hate to discard a perfectly good piece of equipment.

Thanks!

[Phonger]

New here as well... just set up a pc as a htpc after many years of wanting to do so. I thought WMC looked like the perfect Multi-Room DVR, but I guess not.

My follow up to this the use of the HDHomerun Prime and its network tuner ability. This would provide a tuner to any computer on the network... just to clarify the downside is that its not a true multi-rooom dvr i.e. it doesnt centralize recordings, sync recordings, share centrally stored video/pictures/music. Is this right? or maybe I'm missing something...

Also as far as getting an xbox, do I need online capabilities? there are some banned xbox's for sale that would serve as a cheaper extender

Looking forward to replies!

[barnabas1969]

Thanks for the insight newfiend. My internal struggle is that I loved SageTV. It did everything I wanted with the HD extender setup...timeshifting, streaming TV, movies (VOB format), music, etc. I was running an older version of Sage (6.x.x I think) so I wasn't pulling in Netflix or Hulu Plus. I'm not a subscriber to those services anyway, so not a big deal for me. And if I wanted to eventually tap into them, my Sony BD can handle that function. That and the fact that I never updated hardware/software to pull in scrambled cable channels in HD (was still using old analog tuners for that ). But I had an HDHR dialed in for local HD channels, which was sufficient. I suppose those were the only shortcomings to my Sage setup. Of course I'm looking to recreate and improve on that with WMC7 although I'm finding it's not that easy. Seems like no extender on the market will stream VOB files, which means I'll need to convert my movies to another format. MP4 is probably the logical choice as it will play on the Linksys or Xbox as well as other portable Apple devices (I'm a fan of a single format solution). Not that I have a ton of movies to convert, but it'll add to the setup time. Do you know if the Sage extender will work with WMC7? From what I've read, it doesn't seem like it's supported but curious if anyone has gotten it to work. Hate to discard a perfectly good piece of equipment.

Thanks!

VOB files are easy. Simply do a binary copy to append them all together, and name them as MP4 files. Works fine... even on extenders.

There may be software solutions to play DVD's that you have copied into a folder that preserves the original DVD's folder structure, but appending all the VOB's into a single MP4 works fine.

Also, Sage could never support premium cable channels... only analog and ClearQAM... so I'm not sure how you would have pulled in scrambled cable channels into your old Sage setup.

[barnabas1969]

New here as well... just set up a pc as a htpc after many years of wanting to do so. I thought WMC looked like the perfect Multi-Room DVR, but I guess not.

My follow up to this the use of the HDHomerun Prime and its network tuner ability. This would provide a tuner to any computer on the network... just to clarify the downside is that its not a true multi-rooom dvr i.e. it doesnt centralize recordings, sync recordings, share centrally stored video/pictures/music. Is this right? or maybe I'm missing something...

Also as far as getting an xbox, do I need online capabilities? there are some banned xbox's for sale that would serve as a cheaper extender

Looking forward to replies!

Media Center is a perfect whole-house DVR. With extenders, you can connect your tuners to a single PC and then all the extenders will share a common EPG and recorded TV listing. I've read that even a banned XBox will work as an extender, but I have never owned an XBox, so I cannot confirm this. I have three HP X280N extenders and one Linksys DMA-2200. You can still buy them on e-bay and amazon. They are not supported anymore by their manufacturers, but they still work fine.

Both the Linksys and the HP have their quirks, but I prefer the HP over the Linksys. Most folks like the XBox360 the best of all the extenders, but I didn't want the noise, heat, energy consumption, and red-rings-of-death that come with an XBox.

EDIT: Read this post about banned XBoxes: http://experts.windows.com/frms/windows ... spx#551654