View Full Version : Tivo vs HTPC Capture Quality?
I have a ATI AIW 7500, and I am looking to update. Picture Quality is the most important to me. I have seen Tivo's for $150 with a $100 rebate. My question would be how does the qualty of a Tivo capture transfered with TivoToGo compare to a capture from a PVR 150 or ATI TV Elite (the two cards I am looking at). Keep in mind user interface is not that big of deal only PQ and sound. I also understand Tivo has a monthly fee. I appreciate any input, Thanks
Laserfan
10-20-05, 10:03 AM
I've been a Tivo fan since its inception, and it's a great system, but I haven't used it since getting my MyHD MDP-130. Now I use the 130 to record HD & digital TV OTA, and the quality is wildly better than an SD Tivo. Maybe the HD Tivo works as well, but my understanding is that it's expensive.
Anyway the MDP-130 captures are network-routable, and while the card plays-back directly to your HDTV w/o needing any additional super-duper video card what I do is edit-out commercials and play them back via my tiny little silent Pinnacle SC200.
The MyHD system uses free Titan tv and while not nearly as nice as the Tivo interface it works very well indeed to easily set-up recordings.
I think the OP was only interested in SD. To me the best SD system would be a DTivo.
Haggis!
10-20-05, 12:43 PM
The Tivos you're seeing for $50 after rebate are the 40 hour stand alones, which will only have about 12 hours of recording time when the unit's set to best quality. If picture quality's a primary concern, you're not going to be able to tolerate the basic quality (40 hour) setting.
Depending on how much recording you plan to do in a day, or how often you plan on shuffling content over to the PC, the amount of storage at best quality could be a significant consideration, there are HME apps like Galleon that can automate that transfer process.
I have got ~1.6 TB of storage, I plan on having it set to the highest record quality. That automation sounds cool, I will look into it. HDTV would be nice but I live against a mountain and can't get good line of sight for a good HD signal. So I am stuck with Comcast. So for SD Tivo has a better picture (sharpness, color, etc)? Even if I tweak a pvr 150 or TV Elite and record at 6-8 mbs, the Tivo will look better? Thanks for the help.
stanger89
10-20-05, 12:57 PM
[QUOTE=heemid]I have a ATI AIW 7500, and I am looking to update. Picture Quality is the most important to me. I have seen Tivo's for $150 with a $100 rebate.[/QUOTE]
Keep in mind it's another $300 (or $13/month) to actually use it.
My question would be how does the qualty of a Tivo capture transfered with TivoToGo compare to a capture from a PVR 150 or ATI TV Elite (the two cards I am looking at).
From my limited experience with a Tivo, and basic understanding, Tivos are optimized for maximum recording time at the expense of PQ, ie 40hrs on a 40GB HDD, that's just not good. As mentioned above you can turn up the quality but the recording time drops dramatically. Basically, at a given rate Tivo or PC will be about equal, but a PC can record at a much higher rate (PCs can go to 12Mbps or 5.6GB/hour).
Keep in mind user interface is not that big of deal only PQ and sound. I also understand Tivo has a monthly fee. I appreciate any input, Thanks
Are you using this for a DVR/PVR or just to archive? For archiving a Tivo is the last thing you want. If for a PVR/DVR, I'd say since you're already using a PC, stick with it, you have many more options.
Deathstalker
10-20-05, 01:37 PM
heemid,
If you are going to use DirecTV, then the DirecTiVo is the only way to go. Both the SD and HD DirecTV TiVo's capture the signal without needing to convert or compress, since it is already in a digital format. So there is no loss of signal between live and TiVo.
Take Care,
Richard
def&dum
10-20-05, 01:55 PM
I've got a Tivo. I've got a PVR-150. I've always had better picture quality with a Tivo, even with the 150 on it's highest quality.
stanger89
10-20-05, 03:23 PM
How are you comparing the two though? If it's on an SDTV then the PC (150) is severely handicapped by limitations of PC "TV-out"s.
def&dum
10-20-05, 03:43 PM
Hi Stranger,
Maybe you can help me out. I use the s-video on a 9800 pro to my sdtv. I've always had less than stellar quality with my 150. Any help would be much appreciated. Never had any issues with a Tivo.
def,
Have you compared a Tivo and PVR 150 file on a computer monitor? Also what is the bitrate on the highest setting on Tivo? Thanks
miketech
10-20-05, 11:03 PM
[QUOTE=def&dum]Maybe you can help me out. I use the s-video on a 9800 pro to my sdtv. I've always had less than stellar quality with my 150. Any help would be much appreciated. Never had any issues with a Tivo.[/QUOTE]
Nothing is going to look good from a PC S-video out. It just has terrible PQ regarless of content. Any STB, Tivo, DVD, will have better PQ than a PC.
That just how its been and will continue. What you need is high resolution and that is what this forum is all about.
You seem to have the hardware for hi res. Save up for a HDTV. That will really make this fun.
BTW, a Tivo is a dedicated PVR w/ a great interface. It's hard for a PC to beat.
stanger89
10-20-05, 11:12 PM
Just to add to what the others said, there's really two issues:
1) The quality of the recording, and basically Tivos and PCs work the same way, with PCs having a capacity and bitrate advantage.
2) The quality of playback, and on a SDTV, it's very hard (not impossible) for a video card TV-out to match the output of a hardware decoder like a Tivo. One way to do it on a PC is with a hardware decoder like is found on the Hauppauge PVR 350 or Sigma Xcard. Either of those should quite easilly match the Tivo's quality all around.
def&dum
10-21-05, 12:33 AM
Hi Mike,
I'm recording at 12.0 Mbits sec. I've even used it with my Dell 2405 FPW through DVI and the same artifacts and noise remain(even at very small resolutions). Even recording shows from the Tivo over an analog connection to a crappy stand alone(I forget the brand) DVD burner looks far better than a 150.
stanger89
10-21-05, 05:55 PM
Have you calibrated the 150? Try this:
http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=1699&highlight=brightness
def&dum
10-22-05, 12:54 AM
thanks Stranger, I wil give it a shot.
john12345
10-22-05, 04:22 AM
[QUOTE=stanger89]
2) The quality of playback, and on a SDTV, it's very hard (not impossible) for a video card TV-out to match the output of a hardware decoder like a Tivo. One way to do it on a PC is with a hardware decoder like is found on the Hauppauge PVR 350 or Sigma Xcard. Either of those should quite easilly match the Tivo's quality all around.[/QUOTE]
I'm still using my trusty old (ancient) Matrox G400 dual-head to output SDTV. Quality has always been pretty good.
I'm not sure about the other Hauppauge cards but the capture quality of the PVR150 was a bit less than I hoped for. It's very convenient having mpeg2 capture files but I went back to recording stuff I want to keep using an Asus TV Tuner card writing to mjpeg files and converting the mjpeg to mpeg2 with TMPGEnc.
photodyer
10-22-05, 06:42 AM
heemid,
I know that you said interface is not an issue to you per se, but you might look for comments on Tivo-to-Go functionality here and on the Tivo forums. I currently have our two Tivos hooked up by wireless cards and it is SLLLOOOOOWWW transferring to PC (wireless b standard is all the boxes support). Also, look into whether you can use the transferred Tivo files in the manner you intend to . . . there are some funky aspects of the service due to concerns over content protection.
Just my opinion . . . the idea was appealing to me, but the implementation of Tivo-to-Go is just too clunky and time-consuming to me.
vBulletin v3.0.6, Copyright ©2000-2010, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.