What PVR/DVR are you using today?

[CanadianEh]

Hey guys,

It's been a little over nine months since SageTV ceased development of their product, and selling new licenses. Due to the fact that I needed additional client licenses, I decided to move away from SageTV and switch to MediaPortal. I still check in here, from time to time, to see if Sage/Google releases an update to their software.

Anyway, I'm curious how many others still check out the SageTV boards on a routine basis, and what they are currently using for PDR/DVR functionality - so I've put together this pretty simple poll. I think it would be interesting to see what we have all done over the past 9 months

[Fuzzy]

I would rather reimage/reinstall a client running in trial more every 20 days than switch to MediaPortal (or pretty much anything else for that matter).

[jbrandon]

After looking at the options I couldn't agree more...

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

I would rather reimage/reinstall a client running in trial more every 20 days than switch to MediaPortal (or pretty much anything else for that matter).

[CanadianEh]

I will agree after personally looking at many of these options. I do have to say I'm somewhat pleased with MediaPortal, however it's a give-and-take between MP and Sage as far as features are concerned.

[davephan]

I'm still using SageTV. It seems to be taking forever for Google to do anything with GoogleTV. Maybe Apple will improve their lousy AppleTV before Google improves their lousy GoogleTV.

If one of my HD-200s breaks, I would have to image back to a pre-SageTV client status, then install the client trial again, every 20 days. But I wouldn't do it manually. I would automate the whole process, so it occurs every 20 days, overnight while I sleep. Then from my perspective, the trial client would work forever without any hassles. If SageTV or Google ever opens the store again, I would buy client licenses in a heartbeat.

It sure looks like we'll have to wait for years for any viable replacement for SageTV to be offered.

Dave

[Fonceur]

Still mainly using BeyondTV with my addon to handle Firewire recordings...

[PiX64]

Im currently still using sage but have gotten a bug lately that i want to play...so

I have been playing with mediaportal, NextPVR, and the illusive MythTV. I have to say myth has come a long way and isn't nearly as impossible to install and setup as it once was.

I think I am going to get myth under ubuntu up and running in virtualbox, and then get a network boot going on another machine. I LOVE the idea of 1 image sitting on the server ready to go for any client to connect to and consume. it will take some work to setup, but doesn't look impopssible..

Silent front end with no disk, network booting mythtv seems really cool to me.

thats what im doing as of most recent

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by PiX64

Im currently still using sage but have gotten a bug lately that i want to play...so

I have been playing with mediaportal, NextPVR, and the illusive MythTV. I have to say myth has come a long way and isn't nearly as impossible to install and setup as it once was.

I think I am going to get myth under ubuntu up and running in virtualbox, and then get a network boot going on another machine. I LOVE the idea of 1 image sitting on the server ready to go for any client to connect to and consume. it will take some work to setup, but doesn't look impopssible..

Silent front end with no disk, network booting mythtv seems really cool to me.

thats what im doing as of most recent

To be fair, you can network boot windows/sagetvclient as well...

[CanadianEh]

Pix, I find that interesting. I set up MythTV back before I found SageTV (~2004), but taking a look at their site and the fact that it's not a Windows-based system, I fear incompatibility with stuff like Hulu, Youtube, Netflix and other online types of integrations. I'm curious to hear how you make out with it.

Also, I want my client PCs to be Windows-based....

[simonen]

Not to be rude, but a poll about what DVR/PVR solutions people are using on a SageTV forum is not going to give you any data that means anything. Just a tad bit biased don't you think?

[PiX64]

Originally Posted by CanadianEh

Pix, I find that interesting. I set up MythTV back before I found SageTV (~2004), but taking a look at their site and the fact that it's not a Windows-based system, I fear incompatibility with stuff like Hulu, Youtube, Netflix and other online types of integrations. I'm curious to hear how you make out with it.

Also, I want my client PCs to be Windows-based....

Myth isn't for u then for sure. For windows based, I'd look at NextPVR or media portal. IMO each has pros and each has cons when compared directly to SageTV...unfortunately this is what we are left with. I have low hopes for the sagetv google offspring, but that's just me

Fuzzy - yes this is true,
But being that I have 1 windows client license, and the way that sage only allows u to use a single client license 1 at a time I'm kinda screwed with that. I have plenty of extenders and such for my tvs, but just looking at something new. Sage plugin debs is dying, and while my system is awesome and stable it doesn't mean I can't play :-D

CanadianEh - I don't have Netflix, don't much care about YouTube or Hulu. I have read that these things are doable in myth though... I can't give nymore info cause I don't know anything about e solutisosn sorry. The new xbmc looks kinda cool also and that is def multi platform and supports everything u mentioned. Ia don't know if they have a stable dvr branch yet, but have heard and read many times that it is in the works.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by PiX64

Fuzzy - yes this is true,
But being that I have 1 windows client license, and the way that sage only allows u to use a single client license 1 at a time I'm kinda screwed with that. I have plenty of extenders and such for my tvs, but just looking at something new. Sage plugin debs is dying, and while my system is awesome and stable it doesn't mean I can't play :-D

Refer to my earlier post:

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

I would rather reimage/reinstall a client running in trial more every 20 days than switch to MediaPortal (or pretty much anything else for that matter).

[willplaice]

Guys,

I'm also looking at all these options, as i'd just like something that has a better UI than sage,

I really like the extenders, and so there's nothing out there i can find that can replace sage, which is a shame, mediaportal v2 might get there, but i'd have to use a pc or a boxee or similar as a client, which sucks.

i'm hoping that the "new" sage is an android app / client type setup with an overhaul to the backend.


i guess i can hope can't I.

Will

[Bagal]

I'm still using Sage and can't see myself switching until either my HD300s die or something better comes along.

I used to be a MediaPortal user and while I loved it, setting up multiple clients to playback everything flawlessly and keeping it all up to date was a PITA. Honestly, I can't see myself choosing another solution that doesn't have hardware extenders as they make life so simple, I just wish I'd chosen Sage when I first tried it many years ago but unfortunately it lost the WAF test to MediaPortal due to the UI and cost (though one could argue MP cost me more in the long run due to all the time I spent on it...)

[cncb]

I am using NextPVR with multiple PC clients but am regretting selling my HD300s. I hope that something with similar capabilities comes along soon...

[ybrew]

I've got two HD100s. One hardly works at all. I may try to replace the capacitors on that one. The one that works - I did replace capacitors (2 of the 3).

I've got one HD300. It locks up horribly if the weather outside is over 78 degrees. I've put a fan under it, but it doesn't really help. I may try to replace capacitors on that, or I may end up selling it as is.

I've got 2 client licenses. Up until yesterday, I had one of the client licenses connected in my media room. Not anymore. I still have plenty of Hauppauge MVPs (I've got 3 in use today).

In my media room, I replaced the PC client with a Sony SMP N200 streaming media box - and I couldn't be happier.

I'm using Serviio (free) on my sage server as my DLNA Server and it's working great with the Sony N200. While I don't have meta data with the Sony box, it has organized all my TV (archived & ripped TV, along with recorded TV) into nice Series folders and it's done a fairly decent job of creating Genres for my movies. However, I can also browse my movie folders and browse my sage recording directories just fine with the Sony Box.

This sony box is faster than the HD300 (by a large margin) and probably faster and definitely easier to use than the PC Client. And now Vudu HD & HDX work since I'm no longer on a PC. The only thing I don't have with this is live TV (if that was really important, I could use Nero Home Media and setup a tuner to be used for live TV - but it's not important).

On my other main TV, I have the HD100, and I think I actually prefer the Sony box. I have no problem using a PC to setup my recordings. I guess the only downside to using something like this is it can be a bit of a pain to have to use a PC to delete recordings (although using an iPad or something else with the web interface would be fine).

Obviously this won't work for everyone, but for me, I'm quite happy with this setup.

(and there was a reason I went with the Sony box. The main thing is I needed both component video and optical audio from the same box. I was limited to either the WD Live Hub Plus or the Sony N100 or N200. I imagine the experience would be so much better if you could use a roku (with plex) or a boxee box)

As long as I can get EPG data, I'm good.

[jorton]

Still happily using Sagetv full time, but got nervous last summer and added a backup Shaw Gateway (Arris based hardware, same as Bend Broadband Alpha),

- 6 HD Tuner
- MPEG4, 3D
- DLNA in the works for Videos/Photos/Music
- Ipad/Iphone App in the works
- The Gateway has 500GB internal storage and 4TB Raid esata storage (home brew addon)
- 3 Portals (up to a max of 6) can access all recordings on Gateway
- No commerical skipping, and I can tell you that we hate pressing buttons to skip after being spoiled for so many years....

Funny thing is that Sagetv has actually been more stable than the cable co solution as far as stability and features as they are always finding bugs and working on fixes.

As long as Sagetv keeps working it will be used.

J

[PiX64]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Refer to my earlier post:

That's fine and u can. I would not like to repeatedly do that. To each his/her own

As to canadianeh

Still using sage and check in several times a day here.

[bunch92]

Still using SageTV as it is still very stable , I even added a 2To drive lately to my system as I was running out of disk space.

[macsupergeek]

I would say the Ceton Q and Echo maybe the next real DVR solution to rival SageTV. I might go with the Echos to replace my extender's and then they would connect back to my current sage server just running windows media center, just waiting to see the price point. Only downside I can see is loosing my Playon capabilities and netflix/hulu/pandora integration, but then I was thinking that I could also drop a roku 2 box at every tv and that would also give me HBO GO.