MythWeb buggering on NBC

So a little while ago I wanted to pull up a Chuck I had recorded OTA from our local NBC affiliate using MythTV. Seeing as how my home theater PC is Windows currently (VLC, and therefore Linux can't handle Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD Master yet unfortunately), I used MythWeb to download the episode to my hard drive, and tried to play it using VLC for Windows.

I was greeted with no audio, and a video track that went through the entire ~hour episode in a matter of minutes. It would show a couple seconds of a scene, then skip forward a number of minutes, rinse and repeat.

I tried downloading the file again, and then tried opening on Linux VLC on a different computer. No go, same issues. A friend of mine who originally got me into MythTV suggested I try reencoding the video using mythtranscode. A bit of research later, and I entered the following command into the Linux command line:

mythtranscode --infile /var/lib/mythtv/recordings/1061_20081110185800.mpg --mpeg2 --showprogress --outfile /home/pcjjman/videos/chuck.mpg

Most of the options are self-explanatory. The --mpeg2 tells mythtranscode to convert the TS stream to a PS stream, and reencode any frames next to commercials. The end result of the operation was the reencoded file played perfectly and I was able to enjoy Chuck in 1080i and 5.1. It also allowed me to skip through the episode using the Alt-Arrow Keys shortcuts in VLC, which didn't work previously.

So if you download a file straight off MythWeb and it's not playing correctly, try reencoding it. It might just do the trick.

HDHomeRun

So late last year I needed a way to view OTA HD broadcasts. I searched around, and while I originally was thinking about purchasing a PCI or USB based capture device, a friend mentioned that he had been looking at the SiliconDust HDHomeRun device.

Essentially the HDHomeRun is an ATSC/QAM tuner with an Ethernet output. The device connects to an over the air antenna or unencrypted cable coax jack and then sends beautiful MPEG2 signals across your home network. They have a rather primitive Config tool for windows to allow you to look up and view channels, but to really use the device you should connect it to MythTV, BeyondTV, or some other computer based DVR program (I personally use MythTV and highly recommend it).

Next post: a review of the Over-The-Air Digital signals in my area!