I'm thinking about getting the SD HomeRun Prime (cable card version) for a first phase in cutting the cord, dropping DirecTV for Verizon FIOS (which will only be about $30/mo. more than I'm paying for FIOS internet already, minus the $100+/mo. DirecTV racks up) but trying to save on the equipment costs, and transition to a HTPC-based system, by providing my own tuner and computer-based DVR solution.
My HTPC of choice will be a Mac Mini, and its jobs will be:
1) serve as a Myth TV box (for DVR-like activities)
2) provide iTunes Home Sharing services for Apple TV units in the house
3) serve as an "Apple TV" for one TV set, hooked up directly via HDMI
4) transfer TV recordings I want to keep into the iTunes library (probably as overnight jobs)
The upcoming prime units will have H.264 transcoding built in, but the question is whether it's worth waiting for, as a) nothing for Mac (including Myth TV) currently supports the feature, and b) there's no guaranteeing that the bit rate from the Prime will match what iTunes will want, making transcoding necessary anyway for anything I want to keep. I'm sure a) will be resolved in time, but not b), so I'm wondering if I'm better off not waiting and just picking up a previous version for cheaper.
My understanding of Myth TV is that it assumes it has full ownership of all tuners, so the DLNA features that might otherwise be accessible from other devices is kind of a no-go under this setup anyway.
Side question: can the Prime unit be used for OTA capture in the future, if/when I drop Verizon down the road?
My HTPC of choice will be a Mac Mini, and its jobs will be:
1) serve as a Myth TV box (for DVR-like activities)
2) provide iTunes Home Sharing services for Apple TV units in the house
3) serve as an "Apple TV" for one TV set, hooked up directly via HDMI
4) transfer TV recordings I want to keep into the iTunes library (probably as overnight jobs)
The upcoming prime units will have H.264 transcoding built in, but the question is whether it's worth waiting for, as a) nothing for Mac (including Myth TV) currently supports the feature, and b) there's no guaranteeing that the bit rate from the Prime will match what iTunes will want, making transcoding necessary anyway for anything I want to keep. I'm sure a) will be resolved in time, but not b), so I'm wondering if I'm better off not waiting and just picking up a previous version for cheaper.
My understanding of Myth TV is that it assumes it has full ownership of all tuners, so the DLNA features that might otherwise be accessible from other devices is kind of a no-go under this setup anyway.
Side question: can the Prime unit be used for OTA capture in the future, if/when I drop Verizon down the road?