OT Remote TV Viewing

View live or recorded TV.

Location 1
Win 7 Pro with Media Center and Dual TV Tuner to roof antenna.
High speed internet up and down.


Location 2
Win 7 Pro PC
medium speed download internet.

what are ways to get
1) Media Center recordings from Location 1 to Location 2

2) Live TV from Location 1 to Location 2

Please consider all possible methods including buying additional
software and hardware.

In article , says...

View live or recorded TV.

Location 1
Win 7 Pro with Media Center and Dual TV Tuner to roof antenna.
High speed internet up and down.


Location 2
Win 7 Pro PC
medium speed download internet.

what are ways to get
1) Media Center recordings from Location 1 to Location 2

2) Live TV from Location 1 to Location 2

Please consider all possible methods including buying additional
software and hardware.

Well you can simply copy the recorded video files. They're no different
than any other filetype.

I'm sure there are numerous way to "stream" video from the one pc to
another. The only one I've ever used was Windows Media Encoder (or some
name like that) did it for me few years ago now when I went down same
road. I remember that package as not intuitive and you had to read and
understand fair amount before it'd work but once past that hurdle it
worked fine even viewing streamed video on old pcs.

On 8/7/2017 10:04 AM, Oft wrote:
View live or recorded TV.

Location 1
Win 7 Pro with Media Center and Dual TV Tuner to roof antenna.
High speed internet up and down.


Location 2
Win 7 Pro PC
medium speed download internet.

what are ways to get
1) Media Center recordings from Location 1 to Location 2

2) Live TV from Location 1 to Location 2

Please consider all possible methods including buying additional
software and hardware.


I use VLC to watch all my .wtv time-shifted files.
Shouldn't be any problem with watching a remote file.
VLC has the ability to speed up the playback. I watch
at 1.7X and skip the commercials.

You can watch while it's recording. Not exactly real-time,
but can be a short delay.

VLC has the ability to stream, but I've never been successful
making that work.

Media center should be able to play a file while recording.
I don't use it because I can't speed it up.

Part of your problem is finding your remote PC.
You probably don't have a fixed external IP address.
You can fix that with FREE DNS and mooo.com.
Start with mooo.com for instructions.

Not sure your concept of high speed and medium speed internet.
..wtv files are HUGE. IRRC, it takes almost 20Mbps to play
one competently without hesitation.
Laptops and tablets I've tried tend to bottleneck at the
network. Playing .wtv takes most of the CPU. Add network
access and encryption and antivirus and firewall to the
mix and there just isn't enough CPU to make it all work.

..wtv is very efficient. With a dual-core 2.8GHz PC, I can
record 4 channels and play a file simultaneously, but it
maxes out the CPU. If you're trying to compress two
TV channels to a highly compressed format
then decode it back out to the network,
It'll take a lot more horsepower. Some external tuners
do the compression internally. That can ease the PC task
considerably.

Handbrake can be used to convert .wtv to something lighter.
IIRC, it takes about as long to convert a file as it does
to watch it.

Somewhere around here I have a HomeRun tuner that records in
a format that's much more space-efficient. But, to get that,
I'd have to use their recording application. I really like
the freedom from motion artifacts that I get with .wtv format.

I stick with mediacenter for recording because the program
recording scheduler and EPG are very easy to use. Never found
anything close (and free) for setting up scheduled recordings.
If I needed to watch it over the internet, I might have to reconsider.

I picked the programs referenced above because they're all
easy to setup and use. I've tried a lot of others that turned
out to be a nightmare to setup and use. Linux looks like
an alternative, but I've never made any Linux TV recording apps
operate conveniently.

Per Oft:

Please consider all possible methods including buying additional
software and hardware.

SageTV v9 (the latest open-source version) on the Location 1 PC.

SageTV "PlaceShifter" on the Location 2 PC.

The slick thing about PlaceShifter is that the Sage server dopes out the
bandwidth and adjusts rez accordingly. I have had it work on some
pretty pathetic connections.

It also does a nice (IMHO) job of presenting lists of the material that
can be viewed.
--
Pete Cresswell

On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 13:38:29 -0700, mike wrote:

.wtv is very efficient. With a dual-core 2.8GHz PC, I can
record 4 channels and play a file simultaneously, but it
maxes out the CPU. If you're trying to compress two
TV channels to a highly compressed format
then decode it back out to the network,
It'll take a lot more horsepower. Some external tuners
do the compression internally. That can ease the PC task
considerably.

Somewhere around here I have a HomeRun tuner that records in
a format that's much more space-efficient. But, to get that,
I'd have to use their recording application. I really like
the freedom from motion artifacts that I get with .wtv format.

I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

--

Char Jackson

Per Char Jackson:
I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

Somewhere, I came away thinking that HD HomeRuns could be viewed over a
WAN.

--
Pete Cresswell

On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 19:17:33 -0400, "(PeteCresswell)"
wrote:

Per Char Jackson:
I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

Somewhere, I came away thinking that HD HomeRuns could be viewed over a
WAN.

In theory, I don't see why it wouldn't work, but I haven't tried it.

--

Char Jackson

On 8/7/2017 3:12 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 13:38:29 -0700, mike wrote:

.wtv is very efficient. With a dual-core 2.8GHz PC, I can
record 4 channels and play a file simultaneously, but it
maxes out the CPU. If you're trying to compress two
TV channels to a highly compressed format
then decode it back out to the network,
It'll take a lot more horsepower. Some external tuners
do the compression internally. That can ease the PC task
considerably.

Somewhere around here I have a HomeRun tuner that records in
a format that's much more space-efficient. But, to get that,
I'd have to use their recording application. I really like
the freedom from motion artifacts that I get with .wtv format.

I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

Does media center have any way to record in anything but .wtv format?
It's not the tuner, but the recording format that is at issue.

On 8/7/2017 9:48 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 19:17:33 -0400, "(PeteCresswell)"
wrote:

Per Char Jackson:
I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

Somewhere, I came away thinking that HD HomeRuns could be viewed over a
WAN.

In theory, I don't see why it wouldn't work, but I haven't tried it.

I have watch shows recorded at home by HDHomeRun from my machine in
Tennessee on my laptop while staying at a Bed and Breakfast in Florida.
I was using TeamViewer to access a PC at home and it basically ran the
TV show with me piggy-backing on it with the Team Viewer program.

I'm sure if I set up something using DDNS either on my file server or on
a PC at "home" and connect that way eliminating the use of TeamViewer.
Either directly to the file server holding the files or through a PC
that can access the file server. I just have not taken the time to try.

On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 20:24:07 -0700, mike wrote:

On 8/7/2017 3:12 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 13:38:29 -0700, mike wrote:

.wtv is very efficient. With a dual-core 2.8GHz PC, I can
record 4 channels and play a file simultaneously, but it
maxes out the CPU. If you're trying to compress two
TV channels to a highly compressed format
then decode it back out to the network,
It'll take a lot more horsepower. Some external tuners
do the compression internally. That can ease the PC task
considerably.

Somewhere around here I have a HomeRun tuner that records in
a format that's much more space-efficient. But, to get that,
I'd have to use their recording application. I really like
the freedom from motion artifacts that I get with .wtv format.

I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

Does media center have any way to record in anything but .wtv format?
It's not the tuner, but the recording format that is at issue.

I don't know the answer to that question. Hopefully, someone else does.

As I recall, it was WMC's .wtv recording format that sent me looking for
an alternative. I ended up with SageTV, which was excellent. Recordings
were in .mpg (as in, mpeg2) format, so a 1 hour HD program would run
about 7.5GB. You can eat up some serious disk space that way.

--

Char Jackson

In article , says...

On 8/7/2017 3:12 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 13:38:29 -0700, mike wrote:

.wtv is very efficient. With a dual-core 2.8GHz PC, I can
record 4 channels and play a file simultaneously, but it
maxes out the CPU. If you're trying to compress two
TV channels to a highly compressed format
then decode it back out to the network,
It'll take a lot more horsepower. Some external tuners
do the compression internally. That can ease the PC task
considerably.

Somewhere around here I have a HomeRun tuner that records in
a format that's much more space-efficient. But, to get that,
I'd have to use their recording application. I really like
the freedom from motion artifacts that I get with .wtv format.

I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

Does media center have any way to record in anything but .wtv format?
It's not the tuner, but the recording format that is at issue.

I've not found it any problem to convert the wmc files to whatever
format I desire so provided you have enough disk spoace for original
recording plus converted copy ...

On 8/7/2017 11:59 PM, pjp wrote:
In article , says...

On 8/7/2017 3:12 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Mon, 07 Aug 2017 13:38:29 -0700, mike wrote:

.wtv is very efficient. With a dual-core 2.8GHz PC, I can
record 4 channels and play a file simultaneously, but it
maxes out the CPU. If you're trying to compress two
TV channels to a highly compressed format
then decode it back out to the network,
It'll take a lot more horsepower. Some external tuners
do the compression internally. That can ease the PC task
considerably.

Somewhere around here I have a HomeRun tuner that records in
a format that's much more space-efficient. But, to get that,
I'd have to use their recording application. I really like
the freedom from motion artifacts that I get with .wtv format.

I have a pair of HDHomeRun tuners that worked very well with Windows
Media Center. You should be able to get that to work.

Does media center have any way to record in anything but .wtv format?
It's not the tuner, but the recording format that is at issue.

I've not found it any problem to convert the wmc files to whatever
format I desire so provided you have enough disk spoace for original
recording plus converted copy ...

Yes, but that's not the issue. If you want to save disk space
and data rate required across the internet,
you need a more compact format.
Transcoding takes a LOT of time. Way too much time to be practical
for everything you record.

Per mike:
Does media center have any way to record in anything but .wtv format?
It's not the tuner, but the recording format that is at issue.

I use SageTV and HDHomeRun OTA tuners.

AFIK, Sage does not do any transcoding.

Instead, the HDHomeRuns feed it their own .MPG streams that get written
directly do disk.

As cheap as disk space is getting, I don't worry about file size at all.
--
Pete Cresswell

On 8/8/2017 7:14 AM, (PeteCresswell) wrote:
Per mike:
Does media center have any way to record in anything but .wtv format?
It's not the tuner, but the recording format that is at issue.

I use SageTV and HDHomeRun OTA tuners.

AFIK, Sage does not do any transcoding.

Instead, the HDHomeRuns feed it their own .MPG streams that get written
directly do disk.

As cheap as disk space is getting, I don't worry about file size at all.

Go back to the subject line.
File size does matter when you have a thin pipe.
When you have a bigger file storing the same video duration,
you need a higher data rate to view/move it. Makes a difference
for remote viewing.
The OP didn't make it clear, but remote viewing often
takes place where internet throughput is less than optimum...like
a vacation home or cabin in the woods.

IIRC, it takes a lot more horsepower to software decode/play a .mpg file
than
a .wtv file.
Depending on your playing device, some don't support .wtv...
some may not have the horsepower to software decode high resolution
files in other formats.

I find the motion artifacts in the HDHomeRun files to be distracting,
so mine's in the closet gathering dust.

Lots of issues related to remote viewing.

Oft wrote:
View live or recorded TV.

Location 1
Win 7 Pro with Media Center and Dual TV Tuner to roof antenna.
High speed internet up and down.


Location 2
Win 7 Pro PC
medium speed download internet.

what are ways to get
1) Media Center recordings from Location 1 to Location 2

2) Live TV from Location 1 to Location 2

Please consider all possible methods including buying additional
software and hardware.



You can try transcoding some of your existing collection with this.
I modified the command a bit, to convert the whole video (two hours
worth). Since the command here "implies" stream copying, this
should go as fast as the hard drives can go. I used two different
partitions here when making up a path, so that two different
hard drives could be used while copying.

http://www.dirkbertels.net/video/wtv.php

(unpack to C:\ffmpeg\bin first...)

cd \
cd C:\ffmpeg\bin

ffmpeg.exe -i C:\sample.wtv -vcodec copy -acodec copy -target ntsc-dvd D:\sample.mpg

Then figure out a way to serve "sample.mpg" to some other media server stuff.
Windows Media Player can stream, and I think VLC can stream,
amongst others.

FFMPEG can be obtained here. Use the release one
rather than the nightly, as the nightly seemed to have
some broken dependencies the last time I tested it.
On other occasions, I've had no trouble with the Zeranoe
stuff.

https://ffmpeg.zeranoe.com/builds/

Other programs in the package are ffplay

ffplay sample.wtv

and ffprobe. ffprobe can dump packets from the video,
which you don't need at the moment.

Paul