On 7/30/06, Rob Terhaar <robbyt at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 7/30/06, Dave Carlson <thecubic at thecubic.net> wrote:
> > > One of my design goals is to NOT require a computer in every room, except
> > > maybe a laptop to access the server and tell it where to send the output.
> > > I'm not sure if we need to install separate sound and video cards for each
> > > room, or what.
> >
> > You're going to need some kind of computer to get multiple independent mythtv
> > outputs, there's no good/easy way around it.  You could install the frontend
> > on a laptop/minicomputer and whereever you plug it in, it'll get access to
> > the same backend data (video, etc) that the server has.  You'd plug the
> > laptop/whatever into the video and audio in that room.  Go for something like
> > a VIA epia (~300) if you want something small, cheapish, and quiet that can
> > handle multimedia.  Any video you'd stream through your house wiring would
> > have an extremely degraded signal, and the audio would lose some fidelity,
> > and you'd have to string a big mess of wires.
> >
> > > I've only just started doing some research on this, so I haven't really
> > > RTFM yet. Just hoping to get a few pointers from those of you who have done
> > > the same or similar.
> >
> > Definitely RTFM.  Mythtv is very complicated and specialized - it certainly
> > finds a way to punish you if you don't understand everything the first time
> > around.
> >
> > -Dave
> >
>
> Just a note, all of the Delta PCI cards from Maudio work well w/ linux.
> http://midiman.com/index.php?do=products.list&ID=pciinterfaces
>
> They're better quality then any creative labs card you can buy. I've
> used them in the past, but I'm too much of an audio snob for them
> anymore :)
>

another thing i just though of- you're going to be much better of
running balanced lines to all of the remote rooms. (that is + - and
ground) You don't have to use the ground if you don't want to. if you
ever want to run unamplified audio to any of the rooms, you're going
to be much better off with balanced vs. unbalanced lines.