DVR's, TV's & Laptops- Baseball Reasoning

by ohtobe21likehuston on Feb 1, 2007 2:02 PM PST Comment 20 comments

With all of the technology improvements in today's world... it takes the younger folks to help us middle-aged (30's style) people keep up with everything. I humbly request the aid of the most intelligent sports-bloggers around. It's new laptop time and I feel clueless even after educating myself over the last couple of weeks.

So many of you have posted live shots of TV on AN and if Directv monopolizes EI, I will promise to do the same once I figure it all out.

I purchased an HDTV last year but Directv didn't have any HD DVR's available so I had to make a choice- a. miss the playoffs in HD or b. go with their HD receiver minus DVR. Easy choice, eh. I really miss being able to rewind and pause live TV, but more than that, I hate the fact that I can't record things.

Here are my questions from the AN brain-trust-
What kind of processor do I need in order to watch and record HDTV? Dual Core? 2duo? Size?

Should I worry about a hard drive bigger than 120gb?

Is XP Media a good product?

Should I get EIDE or SATA memory?

Are there any tricky ports that I should make sure and purchase?

--Any help available would be greatly appreciated. I know that most of you are very smart people and I would love to borrow your brains before my 6-month love affair with baseball on TV starts. The laptop is going to be used almost 100% in relation to the A's!

I sincerely appreciate your help!

ohtobe

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Processor speed

shouldn't matter too much for you. 120gb hard drive will fill up fast if your recording HDTV, figure roughly one hour = 3+ gbs.
I can recommend a few places where to get good info-one is to research via www.newegg.com

Another thing would be to post in a forum like
Overclockers.com forums
Some guys there can give you excellent advice on best price to performance.

XP Media a good product? Sure, it works fine. You might think of getting Vista though, it was just released two days ago.

Most people say SATA is better than EIDE, I agree.

"Choosing between Milledge and Gomez is like choosing between Mozart and Beethoven" --NY Mets Message Boards

by apilgrim on Feb 1, 2007 2:11 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

thanks for the info

I wasn't aware that each HD program took up that much space so that will be something to consider. SATA memory came up as a higher price than EIDE so that makes sense.

"Shitburger, Skip?"

by ohtobe21likehuston on Feb 1, 2007 3:58 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

I recently purchased my laptop

I have XP Media and record from my DirecTV (not HD) frequently. No problems. I have a 120g hard drive, like apilgrim said, it fills up pretty quickly. I recorded 3 hours of UFC 66... it was about 10g. Most programs aren't a problem to burn to DVDs, though.

"i was not told that this blog would involve math."

by Jennifer on Feb 1, 2007 3:00 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

How do you get it from....

DirecTV to computer? I have some show on DirecTV Tivo I want to put on computer, then burn to DVD

Bring back Hammer.

by OaktownPower on Feb 1, 2007 3:14 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

My laptop has a TV tuner.

You just plug in the satellite cable. I don't know anything about TiVo, sorry.

"i was not told that this blog would involve math."

by Jennifer on Feb 1, 2007 4:14 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

you can use tivo to go

If you have series 2 or better and the tivo is connected to your network. Its rather slow, but gets the job done eventually.

http://www.tivo.com/4.9.4.1.asp

The only thing that sucks is you can only burn using toast or mydvd. There are programs that can strip the DRM off tivo as well.

"...we don't score six, seven runs. We score three, four runs and play defense and pitch" - Eric Chavez

by pickinmachine on Feb 1, 2007 6:31 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

External USB TV tuner or TV Tuner PCTV

Did you get one of these thingy-ma-jiggys to record? Here is the laptop that I am considering...

PROCESSOR Intel® CoreTM Duo T2050 (1.60GHz, 2MB L2 Cache, 533 MHz FSB) edit
OPERATING SYSTEM FREE Upgrade to Genuine Windows VistaTM Home Premium with 1GB of memory edit
LCD PANEL 14.1 inch WXGA+ UltraSharpTM TFT Display with TrueLifeTM edit
MEMORY 1GB DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz, 2 Dimm edit
HARD DRIVE 160GB 5400 RPM SATA Hard Drive edit
OPTICAL DRIVE 8X CD/DVD Burner (DVD+-RW) with double-layer DVD+R write capability edit
VIDEO CARD Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 950 edit
SOUND OPTIONS Integrated Audio

Is there anything you wish your laptop had now that you were unable to get at the time of purchase?

"Shitburger, Skip?"

by ohtobe21likehuston on Feb 1, 2007 4:15 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

It's an external USB tuner.

I think I would've went with internal one, though. And I really enjoy the remote that comes with it.

I have:

Intel® Core Duo Proc T2250 (1.73GHz/533MHz/2 X 1MB L2 Cache)
17 inch Wide Screen + somethingsomething
1GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MH
120GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive

I have no idea what all that means, btw.

I love my 17 inch Wide Screen and my double-layer DVD burner.

Really long story short... I got a free "skin" with my purchase. Something happened, I didn't get it. I was sent a coupon for a free skin at skinit.com and was able to get an A's skin. I'm much happier with the A's skin. :)

Downside:

The thing is REALLY heavy. I would've upgraded my battery and got a bigger hard drive. That's all I can think of right now.

"i was not told that this blog would involve math."

by Jennifer on Feb 1, 2007 5:05 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Just go to Best Buy...

They have HD DVR's for DirecTV

Man, gotta have the DVR...I would pick that over the HD if I had to choose.

Bring back Hammer.

by OaktownPower on Feb 1, 2007 3:12 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

new HD channels

I'm concerned that the HR20 HD DVR will not be useful when the new HD channels are added so it's a risk to spend $300.00 now and then have dead technology later this year.

Trust me, dude. I am dying w/o a DVR.

"Shitburger, Skip?"

by ohtobe21likehuston on Feb 1, 2007 3:55 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Last tiem I spoke with DirecTV about it...

They said if you get one thr them or best buy, they will upgrade you when a new tech comes out.

Bring back Hammer.

by OaktownPower on Feb 1, 2007 4:54 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Some notes

Core2Duo is the best processor on the market right now, but I am not sure it matters much for you.

Get as much HD space as you can.

SATA is much faster then IDE.

Vista is complete crap. Media Center is a joke in that its basically XP Home but with a fancy new label. Just use XP Pro or whatever you have that you can get.

You should be more concerned with your video card and RAM.

If you're planning on using this comp as your main computer as well, you could just go all out.

by Zonis on Feb 1, 2007 4:44 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

I know I know but........

If you are not really into playing and changing your system around, your best bet is to by a dell. Everybody who is into computers would say build you own for desk and name brand for lap, but really, dell supplies support and repairs that could be very helpful to you down the road.

My opinions are as follows:

Stay away from media center, it will severely limit your ability to use your computer in a work enviroment, (no networking) and no matter what you do, which OS you decide to upgrade to later you cannot ever remove media center.
Unless you have a desktop, stay away from Vista as it is very VERY resource heavy and even when tuned down negates much of your hardware speed.
get the computer with the most possible RAM capacity as this is really more important than processor speed.
DVD-RW is a must, (so you can burn that HDTV programming and get it off your hard drive)

5)SATA is easier to work with down the road

try to get a dual core, but for what you want/need you don't need cutting edge tech, (ie, if you can get a 2.8 processor for $200 less than a 3.5, go cheaper as you will not be able to tell the difference.
as many high speed USB 2.0 ports that you can (for adding fun stuff, printers and external memory)
integrated wireless
at least one expansion slot
NIC
monitor out

Good Luck

by norcalfan on Feb 1, 2007 9:01 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

great post

I've never had a Dell myself, I have heard mixed reviews.

"Choosing between Milledge and Gomez is like choosing between Mozart and Beethoven" --NY Mets Message Boards

by apilgrim on Feb 2, 2007 3:51 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

I have a couple of Dells ...

and am happy with both of 'em.

Read my latest articles

by devo on Feb 2, 2007 11:16 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

I have had HPs for years!

And recently switched to Dell, because they offered all the high end entertainment oriented computer gadgets I needed at a much cheaper price.

I am very happy with it. I am even more happy with the customer service. They are extremely helpful! I thought HP was good, but they were lazy in comparison to Dell.

I highly recommend Dell. I also highly recommend getting the extended Warrenty. I had my laptop for 6 months and my keyboard broke. I thought I was screwed due to it being past 6 months. Turns out I had the extended warrenty and I am covered till 2010! They sent me a new keyboard overnight! I was able to pop out the old one and pop in the new one with little issue. Before I would have been with out a computer for a good week if that had happened!

"We don't rebuild in Oakland, man," Swisher cackles. "We re-load." Pics

by BobbyCrosbysGirl on Feb 2, 2007 11:34 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

holy schnikes

Now THAT is a lot of detail and every bit of it will be useful.

"Shitburger, Skip?"

by ohtobe21likehuston on Feb 2, 2007 8:42 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Where are the Mac Fanboys

Apple's Mac Book Pro is an excellent laptop that lets you run every app on the planet. It has so many cool features like a built in camera and microphone. The only caveat about getting the larger HD is that you will have reduced throughput speed. This is the number one bottleneck in todays architecture.

"We're Menudo," -BB

by eshock on Feb 2, 2007 11:03 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

this mac fanboy

Isn't buying any macs right now,he's waiting for leopard to come out later this year with ilife 07

by J Rod on Feb 3, 2007 1:03 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

desktop

If what you're building is a HTPC / home-brewed DVR system then I'd think about building a desktop system instead of getting a laptop.

Norcalfan makes some great points. I'll also add that Dell desktops are generally 'tools free' which means you can change around the innards without needing a screw driver- this is very helpful for these kinds of projects.

Also- the graphics card is important if you'll be streaming HD content through your box.

I didn't have good luck w/ the system I constructed- it crashed whenever I tried to tune digital signals. I hope you have better luck w/ your setup :)

A man amongst boys, Towering and imposing, One very Big Hurt

by Tim J on Feb 2, 2007 2:59 PM PST reply actions 0 recs