Comments on: Why I use vdr for TV

By: Oli

Oli — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 19:55:42 +0000

Dale,

Got it today and it’s working perfectly. Many thanks for the recommendation. I advise other linux users to steer clear of Afatech based dvb-t tuners and give this a go instead.

By: dale

dale — Sat, 04 Dec 2010 22:03:59 +0000

Oli – Yeah, no problem with both of the twin tuners working at once. In fact, with vdr, it’s been good at handling three or four channels at once. (You can record from multiple channels in one multiplex using just one tuner, so with the right combination of channels, I can record three or four programmes at once using just one PlayTV).

By: Oli

Oli — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 20:52:47 +0000

Good news. Currently £33 at Amazon… think I’ll get one.

Do both tuners work simultaneously ok? I know a lot of usb tuners have problems with this.

By: dale

dale — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 18:58:03 +0000

Oli – I’ve been really happy with it – no problems at all. In fact, if the price hadn’t gone up since I got it, I’d buy another.

By: Oli

Oli — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 04:46:44 +0000

How reliable has the PlayTV been? I’ve already wasted money on one unreliable USB tuner, I need one that works.

Thanks.

By: Making YouTube (very slightly) more child-safe with a Firefox extension « dale lane

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 23:49:37 +0000

[...] can happily spend a half-hour sat in front of the TV on Firefox (our TV set-up is a Linux-based media centre, so it’s proper Firefox with a keyboard and mouse) clicking from video to [...]

By: Following twitter hashtags on TV « dale lane

Following twitter hashtags on TV « dale lane — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 20:00:02 +0000

[...] Unfortunately, I don’t have a spare laptop kicking around to show tweets on. But I do have a hackable TV. [...]

By: Using my mobile as a TV remote control for vdr « dale lane

Using my mobile as a TV remote control for vdr « dale lane — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 00:09:05 +0000

[...] phone. It’s definitely a quick-and-dirty chunk of code, but it does now mean that I can work my TV from my mobile if I can’t find the real [...]

By: dale

dale — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 12:25:10 +0000

Alexis – It’s a good point… with the exception of Sky+ I don’t often see set-top boxes competing on features.

Shame about TiVo – not only was it an easy-to-setup appliance, but even now they’ve got some features that you can’t easily get in vdr.

By: Alexis

Alexis — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 16:52:10 +0000

It’s interesting that almost everything mentioned here can be done with TiVo.

Whilst there is a definite satisfaction factor in hacking something like this together yourself, it is a shame that we have no set-top box providers in the UK who are offering this kind of feature-set to people who don’t have the desire or knowledge to set up their own system, but would find the features provided extremely useful.

It constantly amazes me how pathetic the majority of STBs are in terms of flexibility — as Dom mentioned, recording programs based on keywords is a hugely valuable feature and I find it amazing that this isn’t present on every STB. (The UK TiVo offering supported this 10 years ago, but obviously they long since pulled out of the market over here)

By: dale

dale — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 18:32:21 +0000

That’s a good point.

For example, I’ve got a few search timers set up to record anything which mentions the name of a favourite actor of mine in the description. And they do record stuff that I would otherwise not have noticed was on.

By: Dom

Dom — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:00:17 +0000

Another big win for a VDR-based system are search timers. Being able to specify any number of regexs that will automatically be pattern-matched against programme title, subtitle or description in the EPG data is a godsend!