[PeteCress]

I want to set up a SageTV-like environment for somebody who is a stone technophobe.

The application would basically be recording and playing back TV shows.... no "Home Theater" stuff with movies and music.... just record a show and play it back.

I would just buy them a TIVO except for the EPG fees inherent in TIVO.

SageTV is what I know and love, but I expect care and feeding of both Sage and the host PC to be a bit much for this person - plus I am guessing there will also be EPG issues with the OpenSource version.

OTOH, I have recently discovered Kodi.

Reading the Wikipedia article at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodi_(software) I am starting to think that, with the right Plug-Ins/Add-Ons, Kodi might might have possibilities.

Has anybody been able to set up Kodi to record and play back TV shows?

Right now, I am in Information Overload mode and it would be helpful to just know if the TV record/playback scenario is possible under Kodi - and if it is, I'll dive into the fora/FAQ stuff...

[natethomas]

What you'll find is that Kodi itself mostly acts as a frontend for various other pieces of software that do that actual recording. If you're in the EU, you should be able to get the entire DVR system set up for free. If you're in the US, it's going to probably cost about $20 a year.

[RockerC]

First of all, it might be better to post in the PVR subforum since that is what it is meant for http://forum.kodi.tv/forumdisplay.php?fid=167

Kodi PVR (inc. Live TV, EPG, and series recording, working with a PVR backend) can be made simple to use, though it not easy to setup for a first time user. Don't get me wrong as PVR in Kodi can be great if you are not a technophobe, but so far PVR is not exactly what you can call mature. It is however getting much better with each release of Kodi, and I would suggest that you read these two wiki articles to understand the PVR concept in Kodi which differ from other PVR solutions; http://kodi.wiki/view/PVR and http://kodi.wiki/view/PVR_backend

Quickest installation is probably to install http://kodi.wiki/view/OpenELEC on a mini-PC or Raspberry Pi and direct connect one or more USB digital TV-tuner. You can find Linux compatible TV-tuners on the LinuxTV.org http://linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/Hardwa...nformation

Major benefits with OpenELEC is that it is a dedicated media player appliance JeOS (Just enough OS) Linux distrobution which not only comes preinstalled with Kodi and all the drivers you need, it also comes preinstalled with both Tvheadend and VDR. Tvheadend and VDR are what are refered to as "PVR backends". You only need one for PVR backend, and either Tvheadend or VDR will due, but can be good to try both to test which suits you best.

Buying a Raspberry Pi with a USB TV-tuner is not a huge investment, and if you don't like it you can always repurpose or resell then without a large finacial loss. The biggest investment will be your time, and considering that you get Kodi, Tvheadend/VDR, and OpenELEC all for free you can not complain it it takes longer to configure compare to commercial solutions.

[aedgington]

I was a loooong time SageTV user, started back in 2006.

Let's get some ugly truths out of the way. There's still nothing as good. The software is coming closer, but you can forget about anything like an HD300 client. I don't say this to turn you off, just to say that I totally get your expectation level.

What natethomas said is accurate, and different than what we're used to. You run a PVR in the background, then Kodi pulls in the feeds and manages the scheduling. There are different pvr servers and associated Kodi client add-ons, but I ended up going with:
- Windows Media Center server
- ServerMC addon
- Aeon MQ Mod skin by Angelinas

WMC is easy to set up and configure, and if anything goes amiss it's easy to just open up WMC and sort it out. It also is still the only pvr server software that handles CableCard DRM flags. So the answer is yes, Kodi will do TV. The scheduling is a little basic, and the EPG depends a lot on what skin you're using.