Monday morning discussion: home theater PC or set-top box?

[Tuan Huynh]

Monday morning discussion: home theater PC or set-top box?

[Tuan Huynh]

Building your own home theater PC is something a computer enthusiast would do. However, who here actually has a home theater PC in their living room. HTPC’s are powerful and can do pretty much anything you want but who has found keeping them running a headache? Personally I have a Motorola DVR from Comcast in my living room and I use a PS2 as a DVD player. I’ve tried the HTPC in the living room but I’d get constant nagging from my roommates for every little crash, every codec not installed, and even for not putting in a powerful enough graphics card for them to play games. The living room is my relaxing domain where I can just come home, sit down, turn on the TV, and not have to worry about any BSOD’s, Windows updates, virus scan definition file updates, etc…

Same thing goes with the DVD player, eject the tray, pop in DVD, and a few seconds later I can enjoy a DVD without having to say, MCE or ATI DVD Player. It has come to the point where I just want something that’s hassle-free and plug’n play. Nonetheless I still keep an HTPC in my bedroom because it serves as an extra source of heat and what kind of pro-HTPC person would I be if I didn’t have one of my own? For today’s discussion topic, has anyone else caved into the world of easy to use consumer electronics yet? While HTPC’s have come a long way in usability, its still lacking the simple plug’n play factor most consumer electronics has. Although the Shuttle MCE1000 is a step towards the right direction, it is priced a bit too high for most consumers who can buy a TiVO, Xbox, and an up-converting DVD player for a lower price.

[tom_mclaren]

Still an emerging technology that's or sure, and I find it annoying at times when something skips (especially TV), but I'm a techie at heart and so will always have it that way I guess! Luckily my wife understands me...

[gwimby]

It'll be difficult to ever get a HTPC to integrate with tv in the US.
With the move to HD and the closed standards of the cable companies boxes, its just a frustrating mess.

I've seen that you can pay like $350 for a tivo, and never have to pay a subscription fee for life.

That and most companies (Cable/Satellite) will give you a DVR box + HD reciever for like $10/month.

A $2000 XPC just cannot compete with that.

Now 10' GUI's and stored/streaming media may find a place in the living room, but nobody has really found the perfect formula yet.

[tom_mclaren]

Don't know about tivo, but I have a digital TV card in my PC in the front room - box is too big and the TVs annoyingly jumpy, so i'm going to build myself a new SFF after christmas. Still reckon it's the way to go in the long run though, especially if MCE is any good (haven't tried it) or Vista really does the 2-3 second boot it promises. Probably will never be a single box solution though unless they start integrating home cinema amps as well(!)

[Tuan Huynh]

HDTV is another one of my gripes, I can't get HBO with an HTPC >_<

[Jamawass]

I have a htpc in my den but a SD timewarner dvr in the living room. I have to say the settop  is ultrareliable, picture quality is great on SD tv I can record 2 shows and watch a third plus the kids can use it without me holding my breath.  
At present no htpc allows you to watch and record two different premium channels at the same time(by premium I mean channels accessible only thru the digital cable box like hbo, showtime etc) also there isn't any htpc hardware, software frontend combo on the market that is as robust as settop dvrs.

[Tuan Huynh]

I would say MCE is a lot better than my DVR software. I'm not too fond of the Comcast DVR software, the organization is just messy.

[Jamawass]

Originally posted by: Tuan Huynh

I would say MCE is a lot better than my DVR software. I'm not too fond of the Comcast DVR software, the organization is just messy.

 The key word I used was "robust". The DVR doesn't have bells and whistles like MCE but it's more stable, idiot proof and works out of the box.

[JQPublic]

Must agree with Jamawass as in my opinion a bit of kit doing a few tasks without any trouble at all sure does beat another bit of kit doing many things not quite as well.

I live in the UK and am looking at something along the lines of a pvr-9200 or something from the  Topfield range as after a bit of research I feel that trying to get all the functions offered by the set top boxes into a working SFF box may well be a bit of a slog. I just want something to work and work well evertime I press the remote button.

[Jasper]

I love my motorola DVR - it just flat out works - and works well. So I'd vote for a set top box.

Now.... I do still have a HTPC with MCE, but never use it for TV purposes, only to view photos or videos. Possibly some music too.

[OnefishTwofish]

I would agree with most of the points raised so far.  I have pretty much stopped using my HTPC for watching live TV.  For that I send the cablebox signal to the TV.  I primarily was using the PC for gaming, DVD storage/playback and storage/playback of my music library.  

But TV is changing.  Online content is already available (though technically illegal) and someday in the near future may actually become a viable alternative to cable.  Set top boxes to handle online downloads and store several seasons of shows are a years away.  My little SB51G2 is doing it now.  

I read a statment online the other day that I found interesting:
It took the music industry too long to realise that the internet is a valid and capable medium in which to deliver their product, and we hope the television industry acts sooner. For more than 2 years bittorrent technology has successfully been delivering television content to users. As demonstrated with the online music industry, users are gladly choosing to pay for media as soon as it is made available. The technology exists, the user base exists and online tv distribution needs only a content creator to exploit the circumstances and lead the way to the future of television.


Well I had better go, I am on episode 5 of season 1 of south park...

[yitbos1]

I personally have a HTPC that runs MCE 2005 and I have found it to be a very useful piece of home entertainment equipment.  Keep in mind that I do not have, nor ever had, cable or satellite.  I am quite satisfied with the HD content that is broadcast OTA.  I also had an extra computer (Dell 9100) that came in a package deal with my Dell monitor that I really wanted, or else I wouldn't have gone the HTPC route.  I'm glad I did, though.  My main reason for going that route was so that I could have a HD DVR without spending several hundred on a box that could only record, time-shift, etc.  Since MCE does so much more - and does it well - it was a no-brainer to me.

Sure, you still have to do a lot of research into the hardware and software that you add to make sure it will work well with MCE, but that is part of the fun.  If you spend the time to do it right the first time, you will be rewarded.  Now I have a box that does everything and is portable to boot.  I even took my HTPC and 24" Dell monitor with me when I drove home for Thanksgiving.

When all is said and done, I still like the picture from my HD STB tuner better, and I couldn't quite get ffdshow working properly so DVDs don't look as good as my upconverting DVD player.  These are but a few minuses compared to the many pluses, though.

[Tony_Park]

Hi,

I guess I must be an anomoly - we use MCE extensively in our lounge - most of the time it works well, just every now and then things go wrong.

We currently use a Digital Satellite box to receive a number of Sky channels, however as my Wife generally only watches terrestrial tv, if things do go wrong, she uses the pronto to change the tv to view these, and off she goes again...

I on the other hand, tend to watch more satellite channels, however if things go wrong on here, the digibox is also hooked up to the tv using a scart lead.

There are times when I think back to the days of having a separate dvd player, and a video recorder, but on the whole, I say the MCE experience is better.

Thanks
Tony

[gls_1959]

I hoping they can standardize the High Def DVD standards soon.  Its still a toss-up between
HD-DVD (30/45GB) and Blu-Ray (50GB).  Its only a matter of time before we'll be watching
HD DVDs and record them.   Remember way back when VCR competed against Beta
formats?