Audio and Video Distribution (HD)

[jduncc]

I have been reading and searching many forums online before making this post. I know this topic has come up several times, but I haven't found the answers for my specific situation.

Currently, I have a single HDDVR box in my home theatre, which is directly connected to the TV, as well as the RCA outputs are connected to a Channel Vision Channel Modulator. All of the cable jacks in the house run to a central wiring closet, so basically I am injecting the output from the channel modulator into the splitter, and when you tune to channel 90 on any tv in the house, you see and hear the (analog) output from the hddvr. For the IR, I am using some IR repeaters, and I have 2 extra cable remotes so we control the HDDVR from the 2 other rooms.

This setup works great, BUT.... It's not HD. I have purchased another HDTV, and now I'm trying to get some suggestions on how I can get HD video into all of the rooms.

In each room I have a single COAX cable, and two CAT5 jacks. Currently, I am using one of the cat5's for the IR.

I would really love a way to have maybe two HDDVR's that are shared for all of the TV's in the house, so that way two different shows can be watched on any TV.


What suggestions do you guys have?

Thanks in advance!

 

[sic0048]

What type of TV are you watching? OTA digital, Cable or Satellite?

Since most cable and all satellite is encrypted, you really need a STB and then record the HD stream from that box. For cable and Dish network, you can google r5000 to see an STB solution. If you have DirectTV this solution doesn't really work with their new Mpeg4 satellites.

The only other option right now is the Hauppauge HD-PVR which simply records the component output of the STB (in HD quality).

There are several options on software to record the HD-PVR stream, and if you only want to distribute this to one TV, it is pretty easy. But it get's harder when you want to distribute this to several TVs around the house. One of the easiest solutions IMHO is to use the SageTV software in conjunction with the Sage HD extenders. The extenders are stand alone boxes that are hooked up to the network (so it would use 1 network run) and allow you to view pretty much any video, pictures, and even play music over the network. So it would allow you to have complete control of the system using just that one network wire.

Of course a SageTV software and Sage HD Extender package runs about $250 when they are in stock. The individual extenders run about $200 and the HD-PVR runs about $200 (or a little less). So this isn't a cheap solution. For a two room solution, you would need 1 package ($250) an additional HD extender ($200) and at least 1 HD-PVR (need one for each HD stream you want to record at the same time). So that would run at least $650.

Of course you don't have to pay an on going DVR fee from your source provider. So that generally saves $5/mo or more.

 

[jduncc]

Currently, I am using a cable box (HDDVR) from TimeWarner. I plan to switch to DIRECTV though in the near future.

 

[jduncc]

Does anyone else have any suggestions? What other options should be considered besides SageTV?

 

[electron]

I don't think you can beat the SageTV setup.

 

[CollinR]

Agreed and it can also meet your power requirements if thats a design focus.

 

[sic0048]

Currently, I am using a cable box (HDDVR) from TimeWarner. I plan to switch to DIRECTV though in the near future.

Another good reason to consider the Hauppauge HD-PVR (with or without Sage). If you switch providers, you don't need all new equipment. Simply take the HD-PVR and plug it into the new STB.

Honestly I think there are only two software packages out there right now that are endorsed on the Hauppauge site for use with the HD-PVR. SageTV and the Arcsoft Total Media Extreme software that ships with the device. So there isn't a lot of other programs out there that can handle the HD-PVR.

 

[AceCannon]

I use Directv. My current plan involves sharing multiple sat tuners - I plan to use a component video matrix switch. Some of my locations will be via cat5e baluns. You can certainly run component video, digital audio (or analog audio probably) over one cat5e run. There are also some baluns that will incorporate IR, but you likely have enough cat5e to keep your existing IR setup.