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[Jonathan DA]

I've been using MC for audio for years, but now I would like to set up a DVR for OTA HDTV.  I did some searching and wiki reading, but haven't found a recommended set up for my particular situation:

The MC HTPC is in an equipment closet on the second floor with an HD HomeRun hooked up to an antenna.
I have 4 tvs on the first floor that I want to have access to the MC recordings.
1 of the TVs has a PS3 connected.  I can use that to access recordings as a DLNA renderer, correct?
Are there recommended DLNA or Miracast renderers for the remaining 3 TVs?  I have a Roku and Chromecast, but neither of those seem to be supported.  I don't want to connect a PC to each TV in order to access the server's recordings.  I'd like something simple like the Roku that my elderly father can figure out how to use.

Thanks,

Jonathan

[adlelare]

jon it is pretty straightforward to do but a) are your TV's networked??? or how do you connect??.. in my house i have 3 tv's etc. on my main HTPC i hook the tv directly to the PC but this TV is also network enabled and so i can get both HDHomerun (Live) and MCTV on it directly, my other tv's aren't networked but i run them via Android devices (Minix) and access MCTV via gizmo interface.  within MC tools > options >Media Network > Advanced > DLNA (?) i set up a PS3 profile which works for the mainTV (but i don't use it, but you could) and you could set up other profiles to handle video quality etc...key limitation is i don't know how you would get a liveTV EPG capability...hope this helps, i'm sure others are more skilled at this but it was pretty easy to setup (once i got to the right spot within MC)

[eapool]

Chromecast is supported through Gizmo.  If you have an android device, it is pretty straight forward to send recordings to the chromecast.  We have three in the house and use them all the time with Gizmo.  You can't watch live tv with it, but it works great for recorded, etc.

Alex

[adlelare]

PS i forgot to add you best make sure your HTPC is hardware capable, i had to build an new HTPC to do all that you want to do.  for instance, i pvr a lot via MCTV in big honkin files (2.5 gb/half hour) that i believe get transcoded by MC to serve/stream out to my various devices and that seems to take some good CPU strengths.  As i found out yesterday via MC Help, then benchmark, you can see what your machine's performance is, which is a guide to what you can expect to do.

[Jonathan DA]

Thanks for the replies.

Adlelare, I was thinking I'd connect the TVs to the DLNA devices, which would be connected to the LAN (wired, not wireless).  Something like a WD TV seems like it would work, but they recently dropped support for Netflix, which I also need, so that doesn't work anymore.

I think I'll have to rule out Chromecast, as we have Android, iOS, and Windows Phone devices amongst the various family members.  Sounds like I need to find something like a WD TV that also supports Netflix. That should give me everything I want (except live TV, but that's not a big deal, I really care about the recordings).

[adlelare]

jon, i own a Minix 7 Android device (i don't like those closed devices like WD). i think it came from geekbuying or tmart (direct from Hong Kong i believe). This device can do gizmo, netflix, xbmc, offsidestreams, etc. etc., is both hard and wireless capable.  i use this in my masterbedroom and it works like a charm.  It has some minor Android based limitations but.  Also using HDHR (the non-transcoding model) i use an Android app "instatv" i believe to stream to these devices.  PS if you are just starting out in this area LiveTV whole home DVR etc. you may want to look at the Hardware area to get your HTPC hardware right unless you have a real recent build. some folks have paid more for their GPU than i paid to build my entire HTPC.  PS Gizmo is great for any MCTV PVR viewing.  It is highly customizable

[RoderickGI]

Also make sure that the DLNA device you pick, which will be the audio/video renderer, is capable of rendering all the formats you want. The WD, for example, can't render the higher quality audio formats.

[Jonathan DA]

Adlelare, the Minix 7 looks perfect.  More expensive than I was hoping for once you add in the remote, but it looks like it will do everything I want, and more.  Thanks.

[adlelare]

Jon, re. remote, i control Minix and all other devices via tablet apps (i believe minix has one)... but as another option, there are usb to nic adapters (i have one) that if you have a current tablet with usb 2 or 3 you could try that, i do this with a cheaper device tronsmart 908??? (it is about the size of google dongle but better as it is full Android) and it works fine also.. no matter what if you are pushing video throughout your house i use hard wired whereever possible (which for me is a combo of powerline (works well) and regular network)... regards

[Jonathan DA]

Good to know about the tablet apps; that'll save me buying three extra remotes.  It looks like none of these Android mini computers can stream Netflix HD due to unlocked bootloaders interfering with Widevine DRM.  That sucks.  I guess I can just use the PS3 and Roku for when I really need Netflix.

[adlelare]

jon, re. Netflix could be i don't use it (i did use it for a while but IMO it is shallow content for the money) (does Netflix not show via Gizmo??)...i use XBMC for all my inet viewing and it is a very, very good platform (almost ditched JRiver for it but JRiver does have certain advantages for OTA folks) and offsidestreams for live TV via Inet (OTA is very sports channels limited) and Playon/Playlater to PVR various Inet content.  regards

[Jonathan DA]

Funny you should mention XBMC - I've been looking at OpenELEC as an option.  XBMC seems to be able to connect to the HD HomeRun, so I'm exploring that.   Tonight I tried recording a show on the HTPC and playing it back on my PS3 via MC's PS3 DLNA settings.  The video was choppy and the audio was way out of synch.  It also wouldn't fast forward correctly.  I'd press FF and the video would jump to beginning of the recording, then FF.  When I pressed play again, the video jumped back to the beginning.  Useless.  I think your point about having a powerful enough HTPC may be part of the problem.  It's an old Athlon II with only 4GB RAM.  Scores are below; this looks pretty weak vs. what I'm seeing the main JRMark thread.  The system works fine for audio, but video transcoding is probably beyond it.


Running 'Math' benchmark...
    Single-threaded integer math... 10.160 seconds
    Single-threaded floating point math... 5.377 seconds
    Multi-threaded integer math... 5.335 seconds
    Multi-threaded mixed math... 2.716 seconds
Score: 805

Running 'Image' benchmark...
    Image creation / destruction... 1.789 seconds
    Flood filling... 1.135 seconds
    Direct copying... 1.210 seconds
    Small renders... 5.224 seconds
    Bilinear rendering... 2.783 seconds
    Bicubic rendering... 2.329 seconds
Score: 1520

Running 'Database' benchmark...
    Create database... 0.670 seconds
    Populate database... 3.132 seconds
    Save database... 0.839 seconds
    Reload database... 0.297 seconds
    Search database... 2.564 seconds
    Sort database... 1.793 seconds
    Group database... 1.366 seconds
Score: 2016

JRMark (version 16.0.181): 1447

[adlelare]

jon, what you posted is pretty much my old setup which failed as you are finding.  on a long journey you will yes eventually conclude what you have concluded.  so now you are crossroaded...XBMC is a good choice, i set it up everywhere in my house, but eventually chose back to JRiver (integrated dbase, Gizmo, better tagging, better picture quality, etc.), except for Inet TV (which i use XBMC and other stuff for)

But you will need a new PC to transcode/stream and/or video convert..there is lots of good stuff on this site about HTPC builds, some very high end (some paid more for their GPU's than i did for my entire build+).. i got 3300 Jmark with this build AMD 8320, 16gb ram, gigabyte MOBO, AMD 7770 GPU, OCZ SSD, Seagate 3Tb HDD, win 8.1, water cooled  and it works like a charm and only steady 100% CPU utilization when i am converting a lot of PVR'ed TV.

My fun/objective was being as "cheap" as possible to meet my expected need so it took me 3 months to fully put together (eg. GPU was only $65 and the last piece).. and i have no plans to move to 4k TV but if you have that as best i know will be a big issue for the build..but many others are much more knowledgeable than me.  

PS i got about a 55 page document of my journey, as you may end up doing a lot of testing, and having a cookie crumb trail is quite helpful (about 15 pages of trouble logs, tried this didn't work then tried this it worked, then...) have fun.