HD100 - LOVE IT, LOVE IT, LOVE IT!!

[bmcraig]

I have a couple of questions about this-- I assume you still must have a pvr that records in HD (OTA or otherwise), right? This new thing doesn't have one built in, correct?

Also, if I record in HD, can I play it back on my regular MVP that is used for a standard TV in another room?

Thanks,
Brent

[matt91]

Originally Posted by bmcraig

I have a couple of questions about this-- I assume you still must have a pvr that records in HD (OTA or otherwise), right? This new thing doesn't have one built in, correct?

Right. This just plays whatever you've recorded; it has nothing to do with getting recordings into sage.

You can play SD through this as well. You don't *have* to play HD to use this.

Also, if I record in HD, can I play it back on my regular MVP that is used for a standard TV in another room?

You can, but it requires transcoding from HD -> SD on the server. This requires a fair amount of horsepower to achieve.

Matt

[carlgar]

Yes, you still need an HD tuner, which is listed as a requirement on the description of the HD extender.

You can view HD using the MVP extender if you transcode the show. If you system has enough power you can transcode while watching, otherwise you need need convert the show before watching with a MVP extender.

[doc]

I was hoping it would be up and running within 5 minutes.

It was nearer 10, I had lots of cabling to tidy at the same time.

The quality wasn't bad, but not as good as I expected, but then I added the line

extender_resolution_extra_modes=1280x720p@50|standard\=720p50

into the properties file as mentioned on the PAL thread, started playback, hit the Video Out button a few times, and wow, its fantastic.

I've just watched 2 Torchwood episodes and have another 4 lines up, along with Hero's. It's going to be a busy (lazy) weekend in front of the TV.

At the same time I've dropped another Nova-HD-S2 into the PC, all I need now is more HD channels.

I still find it hard to believe that something so cheap can produce such good results. Thanks Sage

[DFranch]

I have to say the HD100 is awesome. I had it working within 15 minutes. It took me longer to set up my Harmony remote than it did to set up the HD100. I only had 2 issues. One was with my computer and the other I found an answer within 10 minutes on the forum. It was a missing property in the client property file. It is a little early to tell for sure but HD programs seem to look better, and SD programs look at least as good as they did on my computer. Now I can move my server into the office and I won't have to listen to the fans blowing in the family room anymore. I can also sleep the server during the day as the HD100 will wake my computer from sleep when I turn it on. It was truly money well spent.

[valnar]

Originally Posted by DFranch

I can also sleep the server during the day as the HD100 will wake my computer from sleep when I turn it on.

Huh? What witchcraft do you speak?

[DFranch]

Originally Posted by valnar

Huh? What witchcraft do you speak?

I had to turn on Wake On Lan in my motherboard bios, then I had to check a box under power management in the device manager properties. Now I set the server to sleep after 1 hour of inactivity, and when I turn on the HD100 it sends sends data to the server and the server wakes up.

[valnar]

Ah, I didn't think the HD100 sent out magic packets.... so you just set it to respond to any data?

[DFranch]

Originally Posted by valnar

Ah, I didn't think the HD100 sent out magic packets.... so you just set it to respond to any data?

Yeah, My nic has an option to only respond to administrative packets (magic packets I assume) or any data. At first I did not think it was going to work, but then I found the power management options for the nic and it works like a charm.

[stroths]

I am a recent HD extender convert, having used a higher end PC for my main client previously. I was about ready to send it back until I found the beta firmware upgrade sticky. Once I updated, I was able to play the recordings that it would give me a black screen on the latest official (non-beta) firmware update.

Other than the remote, I love this little box. It is so quiet and small compared to my old PC.

[lobosrul]

A couple weeks back my living room client PC started giving me problems out of the blue after a whole 6 or 7 months of it actually working perfectly. So I ordered an STX-HD100. It arrived on Monday. Setup was easy as could be; I was watching live TV maybe 5 minutes after unpacking. After loading the beta firmware every single type of video file I have works just fine. Picture quality thru component (720p) is every bit as good as the DVI/HDMI I had thru the client PC.

This morning the cheap HTIB (Onkyo HT-SR600 650W 5.1 ) I ordered came in. I have it hooked up via optical audio. The few movies with DTS I have sound awesome, Dolby Digital ain't bad either. It's much better than the sound card driven PC speakers I had before.

While so far I'm impressed with this little box, I have some gripes, maybe some of them can be fixed. I'll list them from most important to least.

1) I can't seem to adjust the audio delay. This is a big time problem because my local PBS-HD station's audio gets way (150ms or so) out of sync sometimes.

2) No internet radio!!!!

3) Can't switch between audio streams in mkv files!

4) Doesn't support many kinds of subtitles.

5) The volume on the remote does nothing when outputting optical audio. I have to hold my AV receivers remote in one hand and Sage's in the other kinda annoying.

6) Doesn't have the same kind of power in adjusting AR's (zooming in and out at will) that SageTV itself does. This is somewhat resolved with the custom AR modes that can be made.

7) The video button on the remote doesn't go to "My Videos" in SageMC.

[stroths]

Originally Posted by lobosrul

5) The volume on the remote does nothing when outputting optical audio. I have to hold my AV receivers remote in one hand and Sage's in the other kinda annoying.

7) The video button on the remote doesn't go to "My Videos" in SageMC.

I can't speak on all of these points, but here are my thoughts.

#5 is the way optical audio output is as far as I know. Its output at a set volume and the receiving device is used to adjust the volume. I ended up remapping my volume buttons to skip forward/back since its easy to hit with my thumb.

#7 - You can remap the button to go to my videos within sagetv's advanced properties.

[gatkinso]

Originally Posted by DFranch

Yeah, My nic has an option to only respond to administrative packets (magic packets I assume) or any data. At first I did not think it was going to work, but then I found the power management options for the nic and it works like a charm.

I have played around with WoL on a number of occasions but have been disappointed that often any traffic on the LAN causes the machine to wake up. Do you find this?

[gatkinso]

Originally Posted by meep

I had the WHS demo installed for a while and even though non-pooled drives were used for Sage recordings, I found it n undatisfactory solution. Since I've reverted to Windows Server 2003, performance has improved.

This intrigues me. I have tried unsuccessfully over the last year to build a Linux based Sage server - I thought I would get better stability. I was going to use XP Home SP3 but Server 2003 looks interesting. This would allow me to add multiple HD extenders and put the powerful server in my office. Would you rate Server 2003 over XP?

[OldPCGUY]

I have been using Sage TV on an HTPC for about 1 year. I just converted from COX to OTA + DISHnetwork (TURBOHD Bronze $25/month).

I need the extender to drive an upstairs TV. But reading all these posts has me convinced that I should buy 2 extenders. One for each TV.

One nagging problem has been my USB IR. I use a long 30'F cable and the IR just seems to go away sometimes. It is quite frustrating. So I ordered a USB repeater cable and I am going to try a different remote (snapstream). (IE is it a long cable problem or an unstable driver from ATI remote? Or worse is it an XP SP3 problem with USB?)

After reading all this stuff I see that an extender is more bullit proof since the IR is built into the box and ethernet is the comm/transport mechanism. My in home network only goes down when I turn off the power.

I am faced with another dilema. R5000 HD or Hauppauge HD PVR. I bought the HD PVR from FRY's to check it out but I am concerned with IR blaster problems. The R5000 interface is through USB 2.0 (same stability problems as above?)

Kind regards to anybody with thoughts.

[Taddeusz]

The HD100 is definitely the way to go for playback on a TV. Mine is currently running from a 108Mb 802.11g wireless bridge and as long as it's getting a decent signal HD plays fine. I'm probably going to try and get a CAT6 cable to it somehow if at all possible. Just moved into a house that has some weird attic space. I haven't been up yet and am crossing my fingers that the cable tv coax is coming from there and not running outside somehow.

I am on Cox Cable and have my STB hooked up via Firewire to change channels. I don't have any experience with Dish but you may be able to change channels with serial if your box has it or, I think, with the USB.

The USB would be the better way of capturing video since you'd be getting the exact stream that's coming down off the satellite. With the HD-PVR the picture would be going through a digital to analog to digital conversion process that would lose some quality in the process. If you can get the USB to work well I'd go with that. But you can always fall back on the HD-PVR.

My HD-PVR is working quite well right now. My only problem right now is that I have a bad battery in my UPS and it's caused my system fits and is still giving me grief since my roommate moved the power to different jacks but did not unplug the USB from the computer (not his fault). So it apparently shut it self down some time between last night and this morning.

[OldPCGUY]

Originally Posted by Taddeusz

The HD100 is definitely the way to go for playback on a TV.

Hi Taddeusz,

Yes I agree the source video from the R5000 through USB would be great and I think I have a solution for my USB IR problem. I switched to a snapstream remote from and ATI remote and that cleared it up.

The ATI remote drivers are buggy? I think.

I also ordered some USB repeater cables.

Another reason to go with the Extender for video playback is that I don't think HD Playback with VRM9 and the ATI3850 is working properly. There are bunch of people complaining about the same problem here http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30498

I spent alot of time look at this check out this link
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=36176

As a last effort I am going to look at different Resoltions and possible noise emminating from the hard drive.

The extender would solve this issue nicely.