WholeHome

First, lets lay out the goal – Assuming you already have a PC of at least reasonable capability, what is the most cost effective way to convert it into a DVR? Not only is it a great project, you can ditch your cable company DVR or Tivo and save all those monthly fees. Recording shows should not cost you. While you are at it, creating a device that will play all your media files, display your pictures, and stream internet content is a huge bonus.

Good and lofty goals, but easily attainable. To start, though, we need to define some things and explain the different tuners and equipment out there. You will have to decide up front exactly what you want to record, how many independent outputs your system needs, and how you are going to serve it up to the entire home. Luckily, we have a BOCS system at our fingertips to distribute the signals home-wide and allow you to control your new creation even from across the home.

I’m doing a full writeup (with pictures and videos) but here, I’ll give a blow by blow as to the progress of the build and hopefully give some insight into typical problems encountered. So – this is the “diary of the build” – and the writeup will be published seperately – make sense?

DF

EDIT_ good news, the project has started – I’ve got a good portion of the equipment up and running and expect to publish the first section this week!!!