Quote:
Originally Posted by be236
Hi folks,
Any recommendations on any FTA receiver with Tivo-like features? Ie to record to hard drive selected shows or channels at a set time range, etc?  |
Seems like 4+ years ago, there was a FTA receiver for sale here, I think a Fortec 9800. Don't know anything about it, and haven't seen anything similar since.
I use all my FTA receivers with real TIVOs, but it involves going to an NTSC analog signal, so you lose quality via the D/A and A/D and D/A conversions. But if you have an old analog TV, you probably won't notice the quality loss. Pretty noticeable going into an
HDTV though. It is better quality than what you get from DirecTV or Dishnet through their TIVOs/PVRs though.
The "real TIVOs" above are standalone series I TIVOs.
For better quality, I use a PCI receiver, like
Twinhan 1020a, or the 102g, or any other computer card receiver would work just as well, and record to my computer. If your computer is pretty fast, and has outputs that can go to a TV, you can play back directly to a TV. If your computer doesn't have TV outputs, you can play SD to a TV through a box like a MediaMVP (used to be sold by Radio Shack), and SD or HD can be played back to a TV via a Roku HD1000 (no longer sold new, but you can still get them used). I have both a MediaMVP and a Roku, but use only the Roku, because I primarily record HD. Quality is as good as you can get from the FTA signals. Not nearly as user friendly and full of features as a TIVO, but it gives good quality.
Some people use the PCI cards, and use home theater programs that give TIVO like features, outputting directly from the computer to the TV, but since I use the Roku, I've never tried these. Also, if you intend to record HD, then you need an extremely fast computer if you go directly to the TV, however even a relatively slow computer will work going to a Roku, since there is no video decoding involved.
But if there is a wish list for receiver features, I think this would be a big one... ie a FTA receiver with recording capability, and better yet, one which had a digital out/in capability that would allow computer capture of either a transport stream or .mpg file, and input of a transport stream or .mpg file from the computer. Ie perhaps a USB port that would allow saving on a computer and later playing back the saved file. It would be really nice if Fortec would put a feature like this on the HD receiver that they promised us would be out by last September.
.jpg){kind=avatar}
Linear Mode
