Built myself a “TiVo”

Categorized | General, Technology

Posted on 20 March 2006 by Tim Schmoyer | Trackback link

TiVos and other “Personal Video Recorders” (PVR) have been out for a while now and seem to be quickly replacing VCRs. A year or so ago I looked into purchasing one but decided against it not only because of the high retail price, but because of all the restrictions, the minimum subscription cost of $17 a month, and limited expandability. TiVo didn’t allow me to add on modules, customize it the way I want, nor did it give me the networking capabilities I wanted. A year later, the TiVo hasn’t improved much. So, for the cost of a tv-tuner card, I decided to build my own instead.

Taking an old computer I put together of spare parts, I purchased a PVR card, plugged it in and installed KnoppMyth, a Linux distribution built solely for the purpose of setting up a program called MythTV. MythTV is free, works beautifully and does everything I always wanted in a PVR and more. Just check out this features and screenshots list! My favorite feature: commercials can be automatically cut from recorded programs. Plus, everything I’d ever want to do with a photo gallery, personal videos, games, weather forecasts, music playlists, DVD burning, live TV control, and more, all from a remote control. And, with my 250 GB hard drive, I can store around 115 hours of TV and movies at DVD quality and stream it to any web-enabled computer.

Yeah, I’m a nerd. It’s fun.

6 Comments For This Post

Dana Says:
March 20th, 2006 at 9:23 pm
It works pretty well too! I’m glad you got to play around with putting it together before I got back in town. Good timing! I still miss you like crazy ’cause we haven’t gotten to hang out too much yet.
Matt Brannon Says:
March 21st, 2006 at 3:20 pm
Hey..was wondering if we possibly had some mutual friends..or how you came across my site? Forgive me if I have met you somewhere and am not remembering..
Tim Says:
March 21st, 2006 at 3:43 pm
Hey Matt! I try to keep up with youth ministry blogs through technorati.com and yours popped up the other day. I enjoyed your site. Keep up the good work in youth ministry!
Lynn Says:
March 27th, 2006 at 8:29 pm
Hey tivo is only 12.95 a month. we have 3. hehe…
Tim Says:
March 27th, 2006 at 9:19 pm
I pay $0 a month.
JesPeachy (Brian Steele-Sierk) Says:
October 10th, 2006 at 10:12 pm
Sweet Stuff, Tim. I am less familiar with Linux. Would you mind if I refer people to you when I get questions?

1 Trackbacks For This Post

Life in student ministry » Some nerdy tech updates Says:
August 14th, 2006 at 7:31 pm
[...] SyncBack Backup I really don’t wanna wait until after my data is destroyed to wish I had backed it up, so I finally have a backup system in place. Using the freeware version of SyncBack, my system now automatically backs up the important files I need to a folder on my home-made TiVo. Once I build Dana a computer with something other than Windows 98 our “TiVo” will double as a file server, giving us shared access to all our music and digital pictures. (Man, ya gotta love Linux.) [...]

About me: I am married to my beautiful wife, Dana, and together we live in Minnesota where I serve as the youth pastor at our local church. The opinions expressed here are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of my church. More about me...