Last night I finished my conversion to Mythbuntu. Mythbuntu is a distribution of linux based off Ubuntu that comes with MythTV pre-installed. Umm.. That’s great Matt. But what in the world are you talking about? Let me back up.
A few years ago I decided to build my own PVR or Personal Video Recorder. A PVR is much like a TiVo without all the costs. I started with a basic Dell Optiplex GX260 workstation with a tv card (PVR-150 video capture card from Hauppauge). I installed Ubuntu Linux and the installed a free PVR application called MythTV. Again what all can you do with it?
Well with MythTV, I can schedule shows to record at will. I can remotely watch those shows across my network. I can also watch live tv through my MythTV box. I can pause/rewind live tv. Basically all the normal stuff you can do with a TiVo. Not to mention I can schedule things remotely as well. So if you had all that working, why did you fool with an upgrade?
Well, long story short. I got a good deal on a second tv tuner card. I thought it would be awesome to be able to record two shows at once. I put the second card in and it all went down hill from there. My machine applied an update and then MythTV totally stopped working. It was a sad day. So I figured time to do a complete fresh reinstall. I debated for a while just going the route I went the first time. Install Ubuntu and add in MythTV with all its pre-requirements. Till I remembered Mythbuntu.
Mythbuntu is a ready to run solution. I was able to deploy it in less than an hour tops. Yea, that would have been a lovely story. But let’s not get into that one. That involved using a different card. Kept it all simple and the last install went great. Mythbuntu came with a lot of the extra MythTV goodies such as MythWeb. This allows you to schedule and watch recorded shows through a web interface. Some of the other stuff it came with, but I won’t be using. I mainly just use the box for recording. In the end, I give Mythbuntu 4.5 stars out of 5 for simple MythTV setup. If your looking to setup a MythTV box and don’t know much about linux. Then this is the best way to go.
So simple a cave man can do it. Oh wait did I say that?
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