MythTV 0.20 Released

An anonymous reader writes "The latest version of MythTV, the open source PVR application for Linux, has been released. New features (as documented in the release notes) include a new menu system, an improved internal DVD player, support for DVB radio channels, and mouse support. There is also a new plugin – MythArchive – which allows recordings be written to DVD. You can download MythTV from MythTV.org."

Re:A Year of MythTV

[grasshoppa]

You missed some of the best features; Video storage.

I burn a backup of my dvds, store them on my myth box. Watch them whenever I want, with just the click of a button.

Re:new features

[chrismcdirty]

It's a changelog, not a marketing statement. It lets you know what changed. Plain as that.

Controlling Cablebox?

[Doc Ruby]

Can MythTV control my existing cablebox (Scientific Atlanta Explorer 3250)? It's got a USB port, what looks like a smartcard slot, and analog+digital audio/video outs.

If I could use the cablebox's tuner, maybe I would need only a video digitizer, or even just transcoder. It would be great to use the cablebox to covert digital video signals to TV. I've already got the cablebox and TV, I'd like to spend that money on better quality for the parts I actually require.

Re:A Year of MythTV

[Erwos]

Problem is, TiVO isn't really their main competitor in that space - that honor goes to Windows Media Center Edition.

I'd also point out that I've installed MythTV on several boxes in the past year, and I'm not nearly so ecstatic about it as you. Doing a secure setup is an absolute pain in the neck if you want to use that fancy backend/frontend architecture, and only slightly less so if you keep everything on the same box. I also found performance and stability less than I would have preferred - not bad, mind you, but not really all that amazing, either. The protocol changes were the most frustrating, though - I had embedded extenders become unusable frequently because the MythTV folks would change protocols often.

This is not to say WMCE is all peaches and cream, because it's not - but for people who can tolerate its limitations (which aren't terribly bad - yet), the easy setup and relatively cheap (compared to a new PC) Media Center Extenders give it some appeal.

I sound like an MS shill, I know, but for all of MythTV's strengths, it's not for everyone.

-Erwos

What the parent poster meant...

[CyberLord Seven]

...is that MythTV could use a bit of exposure to the great masses of people out there who are completely unaware of this software, yet who could use it to their benefit. The parent understands the purpose of the release notes while observing that something else could help the program more.

Re:Questions

[slashbob22]

One thing I want to know... how well does it support smart "season passes" like TiVo? (I've never used myth, sorry)

It works very well in this way. You can set fine grained priority settings to each individual recording or entire season recordings. In my experience (and I haven't seen a setting otherwise) the application stores information on shows within the next 2 weeks. If the first conflict arose as described: the high level one would be postponed to a later viewing IFF it has a later viewing (within 2 weeks) and the low priority did not.

I only run a single tuner, but I find it enough for my tv habits. I _think you can run as many as physically possible in your box. I can't give you examples of every single recording conflict an how it handles it - there is likely some documentation on it (site is slashdotted though).

I have been extremely happy with the season recording features and once the system is configured MythTV runs like a charm.

HDTV Lockout

[Krondor]

I love MythTV. I'm very excited to try 0.20 (UPnP especially). It's a great piece of software and IMO handily beats MCE (though I hear BeyondTV puts up a fight). The level of control is great, I absolutely like to OWN my media. I have a looming fear though that poor MythTV is about to get 'shafted' so to speak.

MythTV has HDTV support for broadcast and Cable HD, but lacks a means of decrypting these streams. In fact, PCs in general do at this point, but I suspect that will change. Vista MCE will undoubtedly have encrypted HDTV playback support, Tivo as well (if it doesn't already). How is a free OSS solution like this to compete against imposed proprietary restrictions? I smell a DeCSS debacle all over again. Perhaps it will get cracked. Maybe I can still watch my streams if I subjugate myself to a DMCA violation or two.

Lets face it, another case of a superior product getting kicked to the curb by an industry that likes to wear tinfoil hats at the detriment of its consumers. I guess I have a decision in the future. Use the software I love and watch the shows it can view, or relinquish control impair my viewing experience and broaden my media options. I think I'll stay with Myth, the studios just lost a viewer (though I doubt they'll notice).

Re:Mac? Please?

[Thumper_SVX]

The frontend already runs on Mac, but the backend? Eeehhhhhh... no.

I think the primary reason is that the majority of Mac owners who are interested in this kind of setup are usually the kind who have a Mini for hacking. No encoding capability. Myself, I run a Macbook Pro; no supported encoders there either. To get PCI, you gotta get a Mac Pro; an expensive proposition. Most people who would build a Myth box are building it from commodity hardware or from their own "bits boxes". In other words, doing it on the cheap. Hell, I know I did.

Yes, I know there are firewire encoding boxes, but these don't tend to be well supported by Linux. Porting to OSX and using OSX native APIs would be a significant undertaking.

I think another thing is the average Mac consumer is not the kind to fiddle with this kind of thing. While there are some developers on MythTV that use Macs, I'm not sure there's a large enough community to pull together a port.

Of course, you could start up a Sourceforge project to port it and prove me wrong :)

My feeling is that when the project itself stabilizes a little (note the 0. in the version number... that means we're at least 80 versions from production ;) ) we might see more effort to port it to OSX. At the moment, it's a moving target as much of the API is still "in flux" and will be for some time to come. As I mentioned above, to port to OSX interfaces would not be trivial, and to have to redo it every 3 months because a new version has changed a core piece of code would be a pain in the arse. That's the reason you don't see much activity on a BSD port either... or Windows... though I know some have tried it.

Re:What the parent poster meant...

[AJWM]

1) Better software for them to personally use
2) Experience/enjoyment of devel.

Neither of these are any better or worse based on number of people using the software,

That's not strictly true.

1) The more people using the software, the more likely (though still a low percentage) it is that some of them will contribute back suggestions (or maybe even patches) for improving the software.

2) That enjoyment is enhanced, at least for some developers, by the knowledge that other people find the software useful.

If neither of those were a factor, why make the project open source in the first place? Just quietly develop it for yourself and don't bother telling anyone.