Multimedia PC's

[leonardmp92]

Hello,

Anybody have any luck building a multimedia PC w/ a TV tuner, etc and getting rid of cable? I'm looking at the costs and just not sure if everything is worth the trouble yet. Maybe in the next 2 yrs, the technology will catch up to make it easier?

 

[KSoD]

Well if your going to try and get rid of cable, then you wouldnt need a TV Tuner. Cause that only accepts input from a cable source. So kinda defeats that whole purpose. As you would need the input from teh company to have it go to the Tuner to record to your PC. That is the purpose of a TV Tuner Card.

So your just looking to find a service like Hulu, Vudu and Netflix. Sadly there isnt to much out there. Cable companies still have the rights to the primetime shows they offer. So they have every right not to provide them to such services, or to charge you to watch them on services like their website. There is no legal way around that. They own the rights, they can do what they want.

Right now i can watch about 90% of my favorite shows on any TV in my house just by having my XBOX or PS3 Hooked up to it. I connect it to my PC and stream the media. With new TV's you have the built in Internet Apps which can have any of the 3 services mentioned above. So they can do it themselves now.

But still that doesnt eliminate all the cost. As Netflix still costs you $8 a month. Hulu is $8 a month for their Premium Service which offers the most of everything. Vudu is pay per use where each itme costs a different amount. So really your never going to eliminate the costs. But you can make it much more cost effective.

 

[CntdwnToExtn]

If you're just happy with OTA transmission, it can be done no problem.
My boss actually does this. He has a Win7 box (and Thermaltake case that supports Media Center w/ remote) and simply put in a Hauppauge tuner.
He's integrated it with Media Center and records, plays back, watches, etc whenever he likes.
It's actually his main TV and watches/uses it nightly.

All recorded or watched live in the HD 1080i transmission of OTA. He has a few TB drives to handle all the recording, which...can handle a huge amount.

Media Center records perfectly (although once and a while he does have a time issue being off since there isn't a cable company/cable box synchronizing the transmission). Recording features from one time deal to recording the whole series.

He's extremely happy with it and doesn't even touch cable/satellite/etc...
The only problem I find is...there are no sports channels. Something he doesn't care about however.

He's actually picking up 20 channels right now with a directional antenna (much better than OMNI) and lookin' to put in another directional to pick up about 15 more stations the other way.

You can get away with just using a dual core system and 2gig RAM (I'd suggest 4gig though).