Fastest Channel changes and PVR's

jaipal2004

Prominent Member
Joined
Feb 14, 2009
Messages
3,363
Reaction score
583
Points
791
Location
Walsall
I'm still working my way thru different TV servers (ideally Windows based) so determine one that gives me the fastest channel changes with byt BLackgold 3600 card.

Ideally it would be good if it has a nice GUI (or at least functional) but channel change speed is a must.

What have others used and what do you think is the quickest?

I am tempted to move my card to a Linux machine and try TVheadend but this means a massive 're-jig' of what PC goes in which room and I only want to do that if there is a real chance of it making a difference. From some videos I've seen it does seem that TVHeadend is very quick :)
 
I've tried TVheadend with a satellite card and xbmc as the front end, it was quick to change channel (about 1 second or just under) but the setup was a total pain in the ar$e. A scan would get about 900 channels that I then cut down to the 50 or so that I actually watch, but editing it down to the 50 was hard work as it's all done via a web interface.

In the end I gave up on it and installed VDR which changes nearly as fast but is a lot easier to setup.

The best for series recordings etc is MythTV, it's very good at getting all the episodes with no repeats and it's very good at resolving clashing timers by itself but no where as slick as XBMC, and myth+xbmc was dog slow for me.

I'm currently running XBMC on linux on a AT5-Ion-T machine (it's a Atom processor and Nvidia ION GPU).

That one machine records my freesat & feeds my music to my squeezeboxes & my dvd & blu's collection and plays back everything in HD to my Tv. :) soon to record freeview as well.

My biggest problem is ripping blu-rays to it as I only run linux and the best tools are all windows based :-(
 
Last edited:
I've tried TVheadend with a satellite card and xbmc as the front end, it was quick to change channel (about 1 second or just under) but the setup was a total pain in the ar$e. A scan would get about 900 channels that I then cut down to the 50 or so that I actually watch, but editing it down to the 50 was hard work as it's all done via a web interface.

In the end I gave up on it and installed VDR which changes nearly as fast but is a lot easier to setup.

The best for series recordings etc is MythTV, it's very good at getting all the episodes with no repeats and it's very good at resolving clashing timers by itself but no where as slick as XBMC, and myth+xbmc was dog slow for me.

Thanks for the headsup mate.

Wasn't too sure of VDR - only just checked it out.

Did you find VDR good then? I particularly want something that gives me good Web recording features, EPG download, some type of series record (proper or not). Currently NextPVR seems to be doing the job but it's just really slow.

I might move my TV card over from my WIndows server to a Linux machine and see if it makes any difference :rolleyes:
 
Thanks for the headsup mate.

Wasn't too sure of VDR - only just checked it out.

Did you find VDR good then? I particularly want something that gives me good Web recording features, EPG download, some type of series record (proper or not). Currently NextPVR seems to be doing the job but it's just really slow.

I like VDR, it has it's quirks but that could be the XBMC plugin I'm using, The web interface is ok, nothing to rave about but it works.

EPG Download ? what's that ?

Series record, it has it but I can't get it to work, I just set up searchtimers that are limited to a channel and a time of day, say between 7pm and 11pm on ITV4.

To be honest VDR isn't the best PVR setup I've tried but it is by far the most reliable, and that means a lot to me. It's no good having a stunning looking HTPC that crashes and doesn't record a program and it's always the program you really really want that goes wrong :facepalm:


I might move my TV card over from my WIndows server to a Linux machine and see if it makes any difference :rolleyes:

Is your card one of the ones that is well supported under Linux ? Mine is, but that's because I chose it because of Linux support.
 
Argus TV is as solid as a rock. Whilst the channel changes using XBMC aren't that fast I never watch Live TV so it doesn't bother me so much although it is the OPs main requirement. Web interface is very good.
 
Argus TV is as solid as a rock. Whilst the channel changes using XBMC aren't that fast I never watch Live TV so it doesn't bother me so much although it is the OPs main requirement. Web interface is very good.

To be honest I don't think live TV is a priority - just would be good to have fairly good channel switching.

I know everybody's environment is different, but on average how fast are channel changes?

Thanks for your help!
 
but on average how fast are channel changes?

Channel changes are 1-2 seconds, for some reason it's slower about 2-3 seconds when switching to a HD channel.

I'm running XBMC 11 with VDR for TV recording/watching on Linux, that's frontend & backend on the same machine.

I'm currently trying XBMC 12.2, the EPG comes up a lot quicker than my setup but I've stuck with 11 as it's been rock solid and IMHO that's more important than the latest features.
 
To be honest I don't think live TV is a priority - just would be good to have fairly good channel switching.

I know everybody's environment is different, but on average how fast are channel changes?

Thanks for your help!

Hmm. Around 6-7s here on Win7/XBMC 12.2/Argus. Annoying but I do it so rarely it's not an issue. Isn't the beauty of a PVR not being a slave to live schedules?
 
Isn't the beauty of a PVR not being a slave to live schedules?

Yes absolutely but to be honest I think I've spent more time messing about with standalone PVR's & HTPC based ones over the years than I have spent actually watching the programs I've recorded :rotfl: but that might be because there seems to be less and less on the tv I actually want to watch.

Having said that 3 weeks of the Tour de France :thumbsup: I don't care about doping, I just assume they all cheat and therefore end up back at a level playing field.
 
Hmm. Around 6-7s here on Win7/XBMC 12.2/Argus. Annoying but I do it so rarely it's not an issue. Isn't the beauty of a PVR not being a slave to live schedules?

Thanks for that parting comment :)

You're right and I think I'm happy with Next PVR. Yes it's slow but maybe a quick tweak or change in wifi settings will make it more liveable.

I won't bother messing around with making changes until some point in the future when I perhaps get another micro server.

:)
 

The latest video from AVForums

Is 4K Blu-ray Worth It?
Subscribe to our YouTube channel
Back
Top Bottom