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HOWTO: BYOPVR with Dish Network 301, PVR-150, & GBPVR
Page: 1/4
(2242 total words in this text)
(50431 Reads) 
Contributed by: Ssky
posted on: 6/1/2005
I had been lingering around in the BYOPVR forum for months before I decided to fish out some money for my dream PVR. My objective was to build a PVR that will record and playback tv recordings, be able to playback my ripped DVD's, be able to be a music MP3 jukebox, and showcase my digital pictures (either as a slide show or individually). The other main objective was to do all of this as cheaply as possible!
It's important to consider the hardware I had on hand as "spare" hardware drives down the project price considerably.
Here's what I started with:
- Athlon XP 1800+
- ASUS A7V333 mobo with VIA chipset.
- 2 HD each 40 gb.
- Nvidia Ti4600 AGP with S-video out.
- Onboard Realtek audio
- Win XP SP2
- Cheap case with 500 w power supply (noisy)
On the TV side of the equation I have Dish Network service with a DP301 dish receiver and a 27” Sony Wega TV (S-video input).
I needed to buy only 2 items for my PVR project: a Hauppage PVR-150 "retail" which comes with a 45 button remote and the all important IR Blaster. I also picked up a wireless network card (some cheapo from Newegg). Wifi network access allows the PVR to download the EPG over the net and makes remote administration easier.
So far the total project cost was $80.00:
Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150 $60 USD (after $40 rebate from Circuit city)
Generic Wireless NIC $20
GBPVR software FREE!
The following is how I did all the connections between the PC, DN 301 STB, and the TV:
This setup allows me to watch "live" TV bypassing the PVR whenever I want (rampy note: but why would you ever want to go back to "live" TV? :) )
The PVR to be PC already had Windows XP installed on it, so my next step was to install the wireless NIC card. I configured the network so that my "main" PC and the PVR PC both can share folders as well as internet connection. Remember that the Internet connection is crucial for DIY PVRs to get their EPG data.
After the home network was up and running, I installed tightVNC. TightVNC is a remote desktop application. This is handy for controlling and admining your PC PVR from the "main" PC as the windows desktop looks awful on a standard defintinon 480i screen (video and PVR applications designed to run at 480i look great though!). TightVNC was installed as a server (and a service) on the pvr while it was installed as a client on my main pc.
I physically installed the Hauppauge WinTV PVR-150 PCI card into the PC. In order to have better air flow and to avoid unnecessary resource conflicts I put the PVR-150 card a couple of slots away from the AGP slot used by my Nvidia Ti4600 video card.
After booting my pc I was confronted by the Windows "Add New Hardware" wizard. I cancelled the "Add New Hardware" wizared and then put in the driver CD that came with the WinTV PVR-150. By default the WinTV PVR-150 install wizard has most of the items as checked but I chose to install only the Hauppage drivers, WinDVD MPEG codec/decoder, WinTV 2000, and the IR Blaster and IR Remote applications. Installation went smoothly.
I rebooted my pc again and double checked under windows Device Manager (HINT: Control Panel->System->Hardware tab->Device Manager button) if there were any yellow exclamation marks indicating a problem with any devices. Everything was good!!!! Note that I used the WinTV PVR-150 drivers that came on the included cd and didn’t download more recent drivers from either the Hauppage Support site or from the SHSpvr WinTVPVR Forum.
(rampy note: YMMV, I usually recommend using the latest drivers from the manufacturer's website whenever possible, but that's more personal preference/experience than anything)
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