HTPC Question

[MrDigital]

I am building a HTPC (Home Theatre PC) and am divided as to which software package I'm looking at would be the better choice. I don't have all my parts yet so I don't have any experience with either of them yet so I'm looking for some real user opinions. Thanks!

The two packages I'm looking at are:
Beyond TV (http://www.snapstream.com/Products/beyondtv/default.asp)
Sage TV (http://www.sage.tv/sagetv.html?sageSub=tv)

I'm not really interested in MythTV or any other Linux based solution.

I'm leaning towards Sage TV but the SmartSkip feature for commercials in Beyond TV looks like a winner. Discuss![/url]

[Catila Amano]

Personally, I won't have anything to do with Windows MCE-based systems because of the DRM (Digital Rights Management) restrictions involved in such systems. I think that what I do with digital media I record is my business as it's for my own personal use. That is, as long as I don't rebroadcast it, sell it, or claim it as my own.

Furthermore, because of the DRM in MCE (although I can't confirm this), there will probably be problems down the line when the "Broadcast" flag gets implimented into digital television. This flag prevents viewers from time shifting -- that is, watching a show outside of its scheduled broadcast time slot. Excuse me, but that's probably THE primary reason for recording a show for most people. What good is it to have a recorder that won't let you watch shows on your schedule? The Broadcast flag is the most idiotic concept ever devised in broadcast media (well, maybe second most idiotic, second only to the infomercial).

I'm wanting to build a HTPC also, so I'm looking into MythTV or Freevo. Although you're ruling them out, you may want to take a closer look due to the potential DRM problems.

[MrDigital]

That's all great information. However:

DRM isn't an issue whatsoever with either software package I listed above. Just because it's running on Windows doesn't mean I'm using Windows MCE. In fact Sage TV will even run on Windows 98. The video files in both packages are just plain MPEG2 files which can be directly burned to DVDs with various burning software.

I would consider MythTV but I have not the time or patience to deal with Linux. It's a fun OS to tinker with but I have no desire to troubleshoot it whenever it has a problem and an episode of Stargate is supposed to start recording in an hour and my Linux box isn't working :)

Before you respond to that last statement keep in mind that I am not a Windows Fanboi. I have two Mac systems at my house including an iBook along with my duel CPU Dell RAID5 Server running Red Hat Enterprise.