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The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Inspect Your Gadgets > The HTPC Thread - Dont buy an HTPC
 
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drivel
Feb 24, 2005
Drivel is what comes forth from your mouth why don't you SHUT THE FUCK UP,Mods?


Nap Ghost

more falafel please posted:

I'm pretty much completely oblivious to this whole thing. Here's what I want to do, can someone tell me if it's possible?
..
The big-ol' box is running Ubuntu. It can be running something else if that'd be easier, but right now it's running Ubuntu. If we got a tuner card, would we be able to record digital cable? Would it only take some channels? Would we be able to watch one channel and record another one?

If it could work, what would it look like? I would assume it'd be like this:
Cable comes in from the wall, into the cable box. It goes out into a coax splitter, one end plugged into the TV, one end plugged into the tuner card.
..
The cable box also has RCA composite out, could we just plug that into the capture card? Would that change things?

Note: I'm no expert with cable (my HTPC takes satellite in). You will be able to do one of two things - either plug the cable directly into a PCI cable card on your HTPC and tune/decode the cable on the PC, or take the video out from the cable box into a video capture card on the PC, offload the decoding to the cable box and drive the box with an IR blaster type device.

The 'nicest' solution of course is to do away with the cable decoder box altogether. However you most likely will be limited by your ability to decrypt the tv content. If you can find a card that lets you decrypt the content on the PC somehow you should be able to make this work, dependent on the OS support for your card and the software you want to use to drive it all.

The easiest solution is to use a video capture card. Then just get your PC to drive the cable box using the PC as a big remote control and feed the video output of the cable box straight into the capture card. The downside to this is needing the extra decoder box, extra cables etc.

Either solution will only let you watch one channel at a time. I'm no cable guru so I'm not sure if its possible to receive two channels simultaneously even with a dedicated tuner card. Its definitely possible to do with satellite if the channels are on the same multiplex.

* # ¿ May 2, 2007 04:48
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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 10:16
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drivel
Feb 24, 2005
Drivel is what comes forth from your mouth why don't you SHUT THE FUCK UP,Mods?


Nap Ghost

more falafel please posted:

Even if I have two cable boxes? If I had 2 TVs, I'd just need two boxes to get cable on both of them, right?

If you have two cable boxes with the video output feeding into two capture cards, yep you would get both channels. By using capture cards, your PC is effectively just replacing the tv and recording the input.

It would start to get pretty ugly at this stage though, 2 cable boxes, 2 power cables, 2 IR blasters, 2 sets of video out to in cables etc.

* # ¿ May 7, 2007 07:36
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The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Inspect Your Gadgets > The HTPC Thread - Dont buy an HTPC