total n00b: is gbpvr for me?

[sddave]

Background: I'm running mythtv, but my roommate is hogging it with his nascar/formula 1 racing. It's time for him to get his own PVR. I think mythtv is beyond his computing abilities to maintain.

I looked at Windows Media Center, but it has two major flaws:
- Can't burn the shows to DVD (DRM?)
- It wasn't clear to me how to get tv listings

I looked at the haupauge recording software, but I think it's manual scheduling only. I'd prefer to use Zap2It.

Here's my requirements:
- Need to be able to schedule recordings (it looks like gbpvr uses Zap2It for listings)
- The recordings need to be able to be burned to DVDs
- Should work with Hauppauage (sp?) 250 (it looks like gbpvr supports this)

edit: also is the 250 a decent card? or should i get the usb one or the 350? it will be in a 1ghz computer.

Thanks!

[sub]

Yes, GB-PVR works with the PVR250.

GB-PVR uses zap2it for it's listings.

It records standard MPEG2 files, so you should have no problems burning these to DVDs. It doesnt have built in DVD burning.

[sddave]

Excellent. Mythtv also outputs mpeg-2 so our windows video editing / dvd burning software is all setup for this.

Would the 350 give a better picture?

[sub]

The PVR250 and PVR350 use the same chip for video capture, so the recording will look exactly the same.

[daphatty]

GB-PVR is by far the easiest to use windows-based PVR software. Other, more fancy, PVR software is certainly available on the net but they all fail miserably where GB-PVR excels. It truly is the best windows PVR software available. And it's free!

[reven]

there is dvd burning via the "My Videos" plugin (shameless plug, i hate doing these, but oh well) which is pretty easy to use, its nothing fancy, just burns them to dvd video (multiple files) and auto create chapter points every 5 minutes (if no comskip file is found, if there is a comskip file, it uses the ad breaks as chapter points). it works best if you have nerocmd (nero 6.x or neroexpress) but can work with free software aswell (just takes an extra 5minutes).

[sddave]

it looks like the gbpvr supports the 350's tv-out so i'll be going for that. very nice.

[sub]

To be honest, I dont think I'd suggest anyone uses the PVR350. Its got a great picture when it works, but lots of people have problems with it locking up their PC, and if it doesnt work for you, there is not much you can do about it (no settings to tweak to resolve the issue etc).

[sddave]

so you recommend an nvidia with a tv-out?
and then a 150 or 250 to do the capture?

[sub]

Yes, a regular video card for output (dont ask me which is good - I hate that question), and a PVR150 or PVR250 for recording.