[steveog]

I am trying to build out a system that allows me to -

- Capture over the air digital television
- Record and display on a PVR and allow me to view through my Raspberry Pi (B) running Raspbmc
- Play back on one television connected to the Raspberry Pi. Optionally, I would love to know the options to stream this content in the future.
- Save and stream saved media - movies and tv shows

I have the Raspberry Pi connected and it is working great. I also have an over the air antenna.

I would love some direction on -
- Find a TV tuner solution. Looking into HDMI tuners, but unclear on ones that are tested for this set up. Some pro/cons on different setups would be appreciated.
- I believe I can install both a backend and frontend of tvheadend on the Pi and not run another server, which would be my preference. Is there a good guide that shows how to do this?
- Are there trade-offs with my system that I may be missing?

Thank you so much for the help!

[danbutter]

I've been looking at doing the same thing and the route I'm thinking of is using a hdhomerun for the TV tuner.
Not seeing a ton of support for it though so there may be better ways to do it.

[noggin]

I've used a Raspberry Pi with TV Headend. It's OK with the recent USB fixes for DVB-T SD content, but still struggled with DVB-T2 HD content (in the UK) Suspect a networked tuner solution might be better. Have a Go Flex Net running Arch Linux and TV Headend and that works well with my USB DVB-T2 tuner (and a SATA HD for recording). Have also used a PogoPlug Pink and a PogoPlug v4 for TV Headend as well.

[noliaboy]

I just ordeted an HD Homerun Prime this morning with hopes of getting rid of my extra Comcast boxes once I get the Pi to stream from it. I haven't spent a lot of time looking into it but I'd like to have a server setup on my PC to record, and I'd like for the Pi to pick up the streams and to have a program guide. I'm not sure how/if this will work the way I imagine but I'll keep you posted. I'd also appreciate any advice as well.

[DrDaxxy]

Is your local broadcasting standard DVB?
DVB tuners with open-source drivers should work on a Pi. So should Sundtek's tuners, as they provide drivers for ARM systems too. I haven't personally tried either though.
Tvheadend should also work fine. It's about the best server-only tuning software you can get, so I'd definitely say it's the way to go with an XBMC frontend.

Note that XBMC is not ideal for TV-first media consumption. It's a media library first and foremost - designed to give you a pretty interface for your movie/TV show collection. It won't have a traditional settopbox interface.

[noggin]

The Raspberry Pi USB issues can cause issues with USB DVB tuners. There have been improvements - but I still had "continuity error" issues with DVB-T2 HD broadcasts in TV Headend even with the USB kernel fixes. AIUI Sundtek tuners may be better in this regard because they added some workarounds for the issues that the Raspberry Pi was suffering from. I have been using a PCTV 290e DVB-T2 USB stick - DVB-T SD broadcasts (low bitrate and presumably less stressful to the USB infrastructure) were much better with the new kernel, and the frequency of errors with the higher nitrate HD DVB-T2 stuff was reduced compared to the old kernel, but it was still nowhere near perfect.

I don't have the same problems with PogoPlug or Go Flex Net ARM solutions running ArchLinux and TV Headend with the same tuner and signal feed. (The Go Flex Net with a SATA HD is a neat little TV Headend PVR solution)