Posting tweet...
This entry is one that i’ve been waiting to do for quite some time now. Today i’ll will be pitting my PS3 up against my Home Theater PC(well, mine is a Frankenstein’d laptop w/o lcd, hehe).
Sony has boasted about the PS3’s multimedia and computer-ish functionality since its launch in 2006, however can it really stand-up to a similarly priced HTPC? Does the PS3 live up to its multimedia hype?
Lets find out, read on for more and see the embedded video.
well, after using Media Center and other PC Based PVR/DVR solutions, i’ve been extremely dissappointed with all of the cable company dvr boxes. my SA HD box is pretty sad when it comes to searching, organizing, recording storage. however, amd/ati is here to the rescue! They announced the ATI TV Wonder HD for Digital Cable (cablecard compliant). here’s a link to the announcement over at businesswire.com:
http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20070107005072&newsLang=en
however, this will of course require you to have Vista to use too, but the cost of vista and the card may in the long run be cheaper than a Tivo Series 3 box (plus, no monthly subscription fees) and gives one much more flexibility. however, i may have to upgrade my home living room pc to be vista ultimate ed compatible (video card and memory upgrades would be a must).
perhaps we’ll see a nice influx of cablecard 2.0 ready pc tuners after CES 2007; supposedly Vista is/was the key to Cable HD TV on the pc. hopefully the card is sold alone or perhaps bundled w/vista vs being sold in a pre-built systems.
nonetheless, a step forward and some light at the end of tunnel for us PC HDTV PVR/DVRers
well, now that i’m going to be a true HDTV owner/user did some looking into Vista and its CableCard support and it appears vista is unable to convert and stream CableCard media. great, so it looks as though i’m stuck w/my cable company dvr system until i get 1) get enough for a series 3 tivo, but really don’t want to pay the monthly service or 2) wait till Vista gets a few patches to allow this and also for manufacturers to get a CableCard 2.0 (bi-directional) compliant tuner out! wow! you really have to read the full article to see what they are saying! i had just glanced a summary on another site and the real story is totally different.
http://www.ehomeupgrade.com/entry/3285/mce_cablecard_limitation
it appears Vista should be CableCard ready but just cannot stream the original signal to other pcs, only MCE Extender devices (which are few and far to expensive, minus an xbox+mce extender kit+wifi adapter which in a few months should be super cheap on ebay i’d say sub $100; the only few extender devices i found a while back were still in the $160 range on ebay and $200 range retail, sad since i could have really used one for my living room). also TivoToGo has been disabled on CableCard series 3 boxes too. so it seems that cable companies want to keep the media with in the very closed type of nework.
now when will we see some actual cablecard tv tuners pc???? come on guys, get going!!! i want my superior dvr box, my htpc!
well.. i’ve been doing the HD thing now for about a month or so. had to transition to a comcast HD DVR (scientific atlanta 8300HD) since there still is not a single manufacturer that has created a HD CableCard Tv Tuner.
I really loathe the dvr box.. it lacks the most basic function: ability to search for shows. but nonetheless the quality and sound from it are very good. 1080i looks pretty sweet on my 24″ widescreen. i’m still in love w/her and i’ve had her almost a year now. she’s a dell 24 widescreen; loaded with inputs and comes w/ a great stand. been using my PC and HD DVR to it and it lets you do PBP and PIP, so i can put on tv on the pip and do my thing on the rest of it.
so ok, i can live with the whole no search thing and just go online to find when my shows will be on. however, they still need more HD channels. i think i get a measly 12 or so and the digital cable looks like crap after watching some Discovery Channel HD in 1080i. so hopefully we see more channels go HD, preferably SciFi and Comedy Central.
getting back to the TV Tuner and CableCARDs or lack of; from what i have read around the blogs/sites/forums is that the reason why there have not been any PC HDTV Tuner w/CableCARD support is that they need to be approved for Vista and by the CableCARD creator. so it seems that us HTPC/Do-it-yourselfers have been left in the dark and forced to buy/rent a service based DVR box. hopefully, once Vista is officially rolled out in 2007 manufacturers will start developing HD Cablecard TV Tuner cards. The current offering of CableCards are the v1.0 (which do not allow two-way communication; thus things like On-Demand, guides, and payperview are not accessible w/the current slew of CableCARDs). A new version 2.0 of the CableCARD is coming, this version will allow two way communication and in turn allow us HTPC builders to go back to our superior DVR PC boxes. However the standard for CableCARD 2.0 is yet to be finalized so manufacturers are a little hesitant on creating Tuners which might not work w/the 2.0 format.
Once CableCARD 2.0 is finalized, we should expect to see a slew of CableCARD 2.0 Tv Tuners and by that time, Vista should be out in the wild too! So i guess i’ll have to make due w/my HD DVR box till next year (good thing its almost the end of the year!).
for those interested in reading more on CableCARDS, here are some links:
CableCARD Primer: http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/specsformats/CableCARDprimer.php
CNET’s Whats a CableCARD: http://news.com.com/FAQ+CableCard+Whats+that/2100-1041_3-5542400.html
Wikipedia’s CableCARD entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cablecard
well… i’m a true believer in technology and its use to make my own life easier… and up till about 3 years ago, was not a believer in network tv or just tv generally… i hated commercials and it made it so hard to keep up with a series when your in college and partying!.. hehe…
then… the PVR/DVR era took its first steps.. Tivo was unleashed to the mainstream and got fave reviews.. of course, homebrewers/diyers could always make their own PVR/DVR computer box using either linux or win flavors… i of course went the route of windows.. since my linux skills are not that great and i really have no need for a box just running linux and tv… a waste of a good pc imo.. (of course if i was running a webserver on it then that would be a whole diff story.. linux + webserver = solid!)
since that time period of first starting out in the PVR/DVR world (also about the same time that ‘dave’ killed the hu stream.. coincidence? perhaps.. 
), i’ve probably tried or demo’d every piece of windows pvr/dvr software available.. you name it… i have installed and used it for a day (on the windows platform that is..)..
however, my two faves still remain to be SageTV and good ole MS’s Windows XP MCE 2005 and now Vista.. of the two, MCE / Vista still rule as champ in my book due to MCE/Vistas integration of the tv recording into the os itself.. its pretty streamlined and uses very low resources..
and it looks pretty good too!..
anywho.. back onto topic.. as for the last 3 years.. well, they’ve been all prelude to my final project goal.. ability to take my media anywhere…
my latest cellphone actually completes this project by being finally able to sync w/my pc and convert tv shows to it for viewing.. and also its EDGE connection and ability to then stream my whole music library over shoutcast to my mda’s TCPMP… oh yea, did i mention its on demand? that i also have a webpage setup w/browseamp to add songs to the playlist, change songs on cue, even download the song to the pc i am listening to it on.. the only missing piece is video on demand serving.. for me its not too feasible since the realist network bandwidth i get on my phone is usually about 100kbps and i’d prob need that size stream to get a decent picture..
but maybe later this year when speeds increase, i’ll get back into my vod server project.. hmm.. i might be able to use my pc version of a video server and apply it to mobile file types/stream types.. hmmm…. perhaps a new guide…