Satellite and High Definition Questions

[mike1961]

Hello - I have a few questions. I'm looking to switch to Satellite and if I go high definition I'm wondering...

1. Can I just use the standard WinTV cards or do I need something different?

2. Do I still just record in the 2gb / hour quality mode or do I need to go higher for good quality?

3. What do I set the pc screen resolution to?

4. What graphics cards are recommended for the client workstations?

Thanks,
Mike

[mike1961]

In addition to the four question I have yet another...for those who have satellite, do you need to have several of the top boxes at the file server or you can you just use a splitter?

Thanks

[JUC]

okay--short answer--you cannot record HD satellite with Sage. There is currently one mod available that lets you record over firewire or USB i think but it is very very expensive...very!

so that answers all from the first post. Also, you cannot split satellite signals because you need the set top boxes to change the channel. This requires some sort of IR blaster or serial cable to control. I just started a thread under general discussion about using HD directv and sage this morning. There really is no way of integrating the two unfortunately. I plan on either just switching to my HD set top box when i want to watch live HD channels OR forking over a few hundred and getting a directv HD DVR and just use sage for the music/pictures function (which i do not want to do).
hope this helps
JUC

[stanger89]

If you really want to record HD from satellite, your only options are:
http://www.169time.com/
http://www.nextcomwireless.com/r5000/products.htm
http://froogle.google.com/froogle_ur...5yVAAAAAAAAAAA

[dbfresh23]

Option #4 - Wait patiently like the rest of us for DirecTV to release their PC tuner card later this year.

If you do go with DirecTV you should make sure that you get one of their MPEG4 dishes so you don't have to change it down the road.

[mike1961]

What about non-HD format with DirectTV? Will that work? Or if you get HD and try to record with sage does it just record in regular definition or not at all? I'm trying to set everything up at the file server so does this mean I have to have a separate top box for each tuner in the server? And what about the Win TV 500 card which is a dual tuner card? Does this mean that is only meant for cable TV? It seems like it could be a lot of work if one wants say at least 4 tuners in the file server.

Thanks again,

[stanger89]

SD, is "easy", just pipe the S-Video from your box into the 500 and control it with serial/IR. DirecTV is a bit better in that you can use serial on some boxes. Dish doesn't support serial on any. Yes, you'll need a box for each tuner. The 500 comes with a second backplane (fits in an empty PCI slot cover) with a second set of A/V inputs.

Technically you can record HD channels, with a 500, you just can't record them in HD. The box should downconvert and output over S-Vid which you could record.

Originally Posted by dbfresh23

Option #4 - Wait patiently like the rest of us for DirecTV to release their PC tuner card later this year.

That (along with the news that some TAN stuff is on PPV on DTV now), has pretty much made up my mind to go with DTV when I move. However I don't hold out a great deal of hope that we'll be able to add a DTV reciever to a current PC. I'm assuming, bare minimum Vista will be required.

[mike1961]

But then does this mean that if I want to use four tuners I need four boxes? It seems that in that scenario, cable TV is advantageous over satellite in that I don't have to have a tuner box for every tuner.

ALMOST FORGOT - also, does this mean that with the 500 can one control two boxes or only one?

Mike

[stanger89]

The 500 doesn't control anything, SageTV controls the boxes, the 500 just sits there and records.