Need Advice on Hardware for Dishnetwork 3900 receiver

[spotted]

Hi,

I need some advice on what to get my system to PVR off my dishnetwork 3900 receiver.

I'm not really interested in watching TV on the PC, but to use SAGE to PVR off dishnetwork and replay/view live to TV.

The TV in my computer room has 2 sets of RCA inputs(yellow, red, white) and one Coax( currently connected to dishnetwork receiver.

The pieced together PC I was thinking of using:
p3-800Mhz
512 SDRAM
80 Gig
3com nic.
tnt2 32mb w/video out vanta AGP(willing to replace)

I'm getting more confused the more I read.

Questions:

1) What Video Tuner Card is needed for my output needs?
2) What Video Card should I upgrade to that would be compatible with #1?
3) How the heck does all this wire together?
sat. line in -> dishnetwork 3900 rcvr -> video capture card -> Video Card OUT -> TV ?


Thanks for your help.

[mikbro]

Your anwers :-) ...

1. The oft mentioned PVR-250 from Hauppauge works the best and you can get it directly from Frey for $120.

2. My current favorite is the ATI 9000 series, (9200 runs ~$70). There are those that like the discontinued Matrox 32 meg dualhead G400. These can still be found on ebay for ~$40.

3. You have it exactly correct.

You will also need an IR blaster that communicates with Sage and your Dishnetwork receiver so Sage can instruct it to change channels... These are also available from Frey and run $40.

[spotted]

Would this work?

Adaptec VideoOh media center 2.0 USB
Radeon 7200( RCA video out/ s-video Out)

Then connectivity:
sat. line in -> dishnetwork 3900 rcvr -> Adaptec VideoOh -> USB to PC

Then:
Radeon RCA OUT -> TV
Audio out -> TV


Then buy SageTV, Sage TV Client, and IR Blaster from Frey for dishnetwork controlling.

The reasoning behind going with the adaptec product would be so that I could DVR some other devices that have Video/Audio RCA outs like my VCR and Xbox.

Thanks for your help again .

[mikbro]

Couple points...

1. The Adaptec usb device you mentioned is not listed as being compatible, though it might indeed work.
http://www.sage.tv/requirements.html

2. You don't need Sage Client, just SageTV if you are only running a single machine. If you wanted to watch TV on another PC/TV that PC would have to run the Sage Client.

3. You mention running VCR or XBOX through the encoder as a reason for buying the Adaptec. The Adaptec and the PVR-250 have the same capabilities in that regard (same inputs). Also you would not want to run anything like a gaming machine since the video that is output by the xbox would be encoded and displayed on the TV resulting in a 1-2 second lag. You can not use the encoders as a simple switch or passthrough.

[spotted]

Thanks Sir!

After reading the forum, it seems that the WinTV-PVR-usb2 would be a better choice if I wanted to go external... both the PVR-250 and the USB2 are available to me near by.

I was way confused... I thought the PVR-250 only had s-video input, I didn't realize it had Composite RCA Video input as well.

Thanks!

[insomniac]

I know that this probably wont curb your decision, but just know that channel changing is quite slow using the ir transceiver(blaster).

I am running almost your identical config (3900, 2 pvr250's, 1 dvcr, server/recorder/client + cable) and it takes on average of 3 full seconds to change channels on the dish side (due to the delay between receiving your ir signal and relaying it to the receiver).

You get used to it, but it is quite annoying..

I.