# Thinking about MRV



## ptrubey (Jan 23, 2006)

There seems to be an assumption many people have been making on these boards about MRV (multi room viewing): that it is just a matter of time before this functionality gets added to the HR20/21. It occured to me that while the HR20/21 may be able to act as a remote MRV viewer, I doubt they could be pressed into service as a MRV server. Consider that the HR20/21 currently has to support three simultaneous HD streams coming from or to the hard drive since it can record two shows at once while displaying a third. I would suggest that the HR20/21 is pretty much maxed out just doing this right now - UI response time goes way down to barely acceptable levels when it is recording two HD shows and displaying a third HD show. If you throw in MRV, now it has to feed another one, two or more HD feeds to remote rooms. I just don't think the box has the ability to do this. Much more likely is that DirecTV will have to bring out a separate server box that can record two HD streams while outputting at least two HD streams, but more usefully four streams (presumably over gigabit ethernet, 100Mb ethernet would struggle with four HD streams, or maybe not if you used a 100Mb Ethernet switch rather than a hub). A four stream server would be one heck of a box, doubling the disk load of the current HR20/21. 

It is also possible that with SWM becoming more available and mainstreamed, DirecTV will declare victory and say you can just put an HR21 into each room fed by a single coax (for the two tuners) and drop real MRV entirely. I hope not since it is quite different functionality.


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

Actually, if MRV were implemented in the way I envision it, the processor has almost nothing to do with it and the unit will not have a problem handling MRV. It will not be decoding or encoding anything at all. It would simply be streaming the program over the network in the format that it is currently sitting on the hard drive. It would be decoded on the unit where the show was actually outputting the video to a TV. The only function I see as getting in the way would be any DOD coming down through the Interent. There is a simple workaround for that though. Simply delay the download until the streaming for MRV was finished, or even send it to another unit. The unit can currently run 4 streams either to or from the hard drive now. So eliminating the DOD while MRVing would keep that number the same. But alas, I believe that the Hard drive could be able to stream 5, or hopfully six feeds at once, in some combination of writing to and sending to. Actually, if it is only able to run 4 at once, then that might make more since why we would never see DLB. Wow, never though of MRV keeping us from getting DLB. If thats the reason, MRV wins hands down...


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## ptrubey (Jan 23, 2006)

It isn't decoding that I think is the bottleneck (since I assume that is done in a specialized chip anyways), it is disk access. Three simultaneous HD streams hitting the hard drive at the same time means a lot of disk head seeking and repositioning. And I don't think it can in fact do four since DOD can't keep up with an HD DOD anyways.


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## Thaedron (Jun 29, 2007)

Per features announced at CES, the HR2X will be an MRV server as you'll be able to watch DVR content from your PC. No such definitive announcement has been made concerning DVR-DVR MRV, but it's pretty much a given.

Edit: Added link to CES thread http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=115062



> View HR20/21 content on your PC
> -) We can watch PC content on the HR20/21 now... you will be able to do the reverse...


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## Thaedron (Jun 29, 2007)

ptrubey said:


> It isn't decoding that I think is the bottleneck (since I assume that is done in a specialized chip anyways), it is disk access. Three simultaneous HD streams hitting the hard drive at the same time means a lot of disk head seeking and repositioning. And I don't think it can in fact do four since DOD can't keep up with an HD DOD anyways.


I seriously doubt any of the keeping up with HD DOD has anything to do with HD speed. In fact one of the Hitachi CinemaStar drives I was researching, indicated they could handle up to 10 R/W streams simultaneously.

Hitachi Cinemastar 1TB drive



> Handles up to 10 SD/HD streams simultaneously


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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

Regarding MRV; with one HR20 equipped with a good OTA antenna would you be able to view/record OTA on other networked HR's without having to connect to the antenna? Would be a great feature.


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## carl6 (Nov 16, 2005)

davring said:


> Regarding MRV; with one HR20 equipped with a good OTA antenna would you be able to view/record OTA on other networked HR's without having to connect to the antenna? Would be a great feature.


I don't know if MRV will permit viewing any live tv, it might (probably will) only be recorded stuff. If it permits any live, then I see no reason why it wouldn't also permit live ota.

Carl


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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

Would surely eliminate extra coax runs and signal spliters.


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## houskamp (Sep 14, 2006)

Highly doubt any live veiwing will be possible.. but you might be able to tag it to record and watch a little behind live..
and I can't wait till they turn MRV on.. I got stuff recorded all over


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## armophob (Nov 13, 2006)

After a lot of thinking/drinking. I have considered that MRV may be, unfortunately, another device. 
Because of the nature of the exclusiveness of D*, it would make sense that if the Hr's are not able to act as routers, then one would be needed.
I hate to suggest the possibility of more money, but I think I would pay for it.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

armophob said:


> After a lot of thinking/drinking. I have considered that MRV may be, unfortunately, another device.


It's not going to be another device. You guys are overthinking all of this. The HR20 and HR21 can handle MRV, and they will be MRV servers and clients. It's really not as big of a deal as some of you are making it out to be.


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## DBordello (Dec 16, 2006)

HDTV streams max out around 20 Mb/s (MegaBits/sec). 

It is safe to assume a hard drive can sustain a read speed of 50 MB/s (MegaBytes/sec). 

# of Streams = 50MB/s*(8b/B)/20Mb/s = 20 streams.... 5 shouldn't be an issue. 

Hard drives are not the bottleneck of the system. If the box can handle the network overhead I don't expect any issues.


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## BGreen965 (Aug 12, 2007)

What I wonder is if there's a possibility of a non-dvr box being able to play content off the DVR. For example, could a H20 stream content off the HR20? This would be very cool and make it more economical to have some DVR function on every tv.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

BGreen965 said:


> What I wonder is if there's a possibility of a non-dvr box being able to play content off the DVR.


They didn't put the Ethernet jack on the H21 for fun...


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

carl6 said:


> I don't know if MRV will permit viewing any live tv, it might (probably will) only be recorded stuff. If it permits any live, then I see no reason why it wouldn't also permit live ota.
> 
> Carl


Technically there is no such thing as live TV on an HR20. It's all coming off the disk whether it's a recorded show or a "live" show which is actually being read off the live buffer on the disk seconds after it is written, so there doesn't seem to be any reason that you couldn't MRV a "live" program.


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## bakerfall (Aug 23, 2006)

cartrivision said:


> Technically there is no such thing as live TV on an HR20. It's all coming off the disk whether it's a recorded show or a "live" show which is actually being read off the live buffer on the disk seconds after it is written, so there doesn't seem to be any reason that you couldn't MRV a "live" program.


I would think the only way to access "live TV" would be to record the show you wanted on one box, and then be able to access it on another. I don't think you will be able to actively browse the guide on another box and access it's channels.


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## dervari (Dec 1, 2005)

BGreen965 said:


> What I wonder is if there's a possibility of a non-dvr box being able to play content off the DVR. For example, could a H20 stream content off the HR20? This would be very cool and make it more economical to have some DVR function on every tv.


How would the stream get to the H20? It has no ethernet jack.

A USB device, perhaps....


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## dervari (Dec 1, 2005)

armophob said:


> After a lot of thinking/drinking. I have considered that MRV may be, unfortunately, another device.
> Because of the nature of the exclusiveness of D*, it would make sense that if the Hr's are not able to act as routers, then one would be needed.


Why would they have to act as routers? In most cases, all the boxes will be on the same subnet. Even if they weren't (my case), you'd have a dedicated router acting as a gateway for both subnets that would handle the routing. The boxes already handle network communication, so no more would be needed.

I think in this case it may have been more drinking than thinking.


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## houskamp (Sep 14, 2006)

dervari said:


> How would the stream get to the H20? It has no ethernet jack.
> 
> A USB device, perhaps....


h20 no.. h21 yes...


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## carl6 (Nov 16, 2005)

cartrivision said:


> Technically there is no such thing as live TV on an HR20. It's all coming off the disk whether it's a recorded show or a "live" show which is actually being read off the live buffer on the disk seconds after it is written, so there doesn't seem to be any reason that you couldn't MRV a "live" program.


While I agree there is no techical reason, the software to allow/support MRV will determine what can or can't be done. My take on it (with no information to support it), is that the software will give you access to your playlist, not your guide. As a result, you will be limited to what is in your playlist.

Carl


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## dervari (Dec 1, 2005)

carl6 said:


> While I agree there is no techical reason, the software to allow/support MRV will determine what can or can't be done. My take on it (with no information to support it), is that the software will give you access to your playlist, not your guide. As a result, you will be limited to what is in your playlist.
> 
> Carl


However, shows that are recording do show up in the playlist. So, you COULD start recording the show and start playback a minute later...if you really wanted to go through all that trouble.

Then again, on the old ReplayTV, shows on a remote machine didn't show up until they were done recording.


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## HoTat2 (Nov 16, 2005)

To me, unless the HR20/21's were purposely built not to support future MRV, or if perhaps TIVO owns the patents to the technology. Then what's the big deal with implementing it? Since TIVO's HD DVRs have had this capablity, albeit with heavy copywrite restrictions on what content can be streamed, for a while now. And frankly I'm somewhat surprised there hasn't been more grousing about this by Directv customers for them to get with the program, and activate MRV on their HD DVR units to keep abreast with the competition. 

How can Directv allow themeselves to be forever out done by their competitors on a major feature like this?


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## ptrubey (Jan 23, 2006)

DBordello said:


> HDTV streams max out around 20 Mb/s (MegaBits/sec).
> 
> It is safe to assume a hard drive can sustain a read speed of 50 MB/s (MegaBytes/sec).
> 
> ...


It isn't as simple as that. Sure, reading from a single spot on the disk, you can do 50 MB/s. But what about five separate areas interleaved, with all that disk head travel back and forth? A disk isn't simply a large random access device, it has physical disk heads that have to be positioned before you get those burst data transfer rates. You have to factor in latency times and the like.

On the other hand, I had forgotten that DirecTV has already announced limited HR20/21 server functionality for acting as a server to a PC...


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## jpl (Jul 9, 2006)

It all depends on how they decide to design the system. I understand Dish allows live viewing on another TV off their DVR. I currently have a multi-room DVR with FiOS, and their multi-room capability is somewhat different. With fios you need, not only the DVR, but set top boxes on your other TVs. Those STBs give me access to the menu and guide. From the menu on that box, I can get to the DVR recordings off of the DVR. Note, the multi-room box does not give me access to the guide and stuff on the other TVs. It just gives me the ability to access (play back) recordings on other standard STBs. I can't even set up recordings and the like on those other boxes (although I understand that's coming) - just play back what's already recorded.

I am able to hook up 6 additional TVs this way, with the ability to feed out to 3 additional TVs simultaneously. There is a tad of a slow down when someone is on the DVR watching something recorded and I'm on that second TV also watching something off the same DVR - but it's really barely noticeable.

In terms of how everything is connected - the STBs that Verizon uses (the motorola QIP series) are QAM/IP hybrids - allowing IP feeds and QAM feeds on the same box. The cable splitter which feeds all of my TVs is also hooked to the router that Verizon gave me - all of the multi-room viewing is channeled through, and controlled by, that router.

Like I said, it really depends on how DirecTV decides to implement it. In terms of performance, I can't speak to the HR20, since I never had one, but if the motorola boxes can handle this type of setup without much delay, then I can't imagine that the HR20/21 can't handle it equally as well.


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## HoTat2 (Nov 16, 2005)

jpl said:


> It all depends on how they decide to design the system. I understand Dish allows live viewing on another TV off their DVR. I currently have a multi-room DVR with FiOS, and their multi-room capability is somewhat different. With fios you need, not only the DVR, but set top boxes on your other TVs. Those STBs give me access to the menu and guide. From the menu on that box, I can get to the DVR recordings off of the DVR. Note, the multi-room box does not give me access to the guide and stuff on the other TVs. It just gives me the ability to access (play back) recordings on other standard STBs. I can't even set up recordings and the like on those other boxes (although I understand that's coming) - just play back what's already recorded.
> 
> I am able to hook up 6 additional TVs this way, with the ability to feed out to 3 additional TVs simultaneously. There is a tad of a slow down when someone is on the DVR watching something recorded and I'm on that second TV also watching something off the same DVR - but it's really barely noticeable.
> 
> In terms of how everything is connected - the STBs that Verizon uses (the motorola QIP series) are QAM/IP hybrids - allowing IP feeds and QAM feeds on the same box. The cable splitter which feeds all of my TVs is also hooked to the router that Verizon gave me - all of the multi-room viewing is channeled through, and controlled by, that router....


Interesting...this was to be essentially the same concept behind once promised "Home Media Center" (HMC) Directv promised to offer several years ago. To be developed (the software at least) by Uccentric. In fact this was the main reason I held off on a HD upgrade with the HR20 at the time. Thinking that the HMC, which was much better for my situation, was in the production pipeline. However after Uccentic's aquisition by Motorola, the whole HMC idea seems to have fallen by the wayside. :nono2:

Therefore, I just recently went ahead with Directv's current HD upgrade and purchased the HR21, once I saw the AM21 off-air ATSC solution for it at CES2008.


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## BkwSoft (Oct 18, 2007)

HoTat2 said:


> To me, unless the HR20/21's were purposely built not to support future MRV, or if perhaps TIVO owns the patents to the technology. Then what's the big deal with implementing it? Since TIVO's HD DVRs have had this capablity, albeit with heavy copywrite restrictions on what content can be streamed, for a while now. And frankly I'm somewhat surprised there hasn't been more grousing about this by Directv customers for them to get with the program, and activate MRV on their HD DVR units to keep abreast with the competition.
> 
> How can Directv allow themeselves to be forever out done by their competitors on a major feature like this?


TIVO doesn't own a patent on MVR. They were years behind ReplayTV when it comes to MVR and IMHO didn't implement it nearly as well. Even if TIVO had a patent on MVR, DIRECTV has access to all of the TIVO patents.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

cartrivision said:


> Technically there is no such thing as live TV on an HR20. It's all coming off the disk whether it's a recorded show or a "live" show which is actually being read off the live buffer on the disk seconds after it is written


This is incorrect. When you are watching live TV on the HR2x, it is truly live. It is being buffered to the disk, but that is going on in the background. Unlike Tivo, you are actually watching the tuner output directly. You can see this by comparing live TV on an HR20 to an H20. They will be perfectly in sync, because they are both truly live.


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## Thaedron (Jun 29, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> They didn't put the Ethernet jack on the H21 for fun...


I hope your speculation is correct.


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

Thaedron said:


> I hope your speculation is correct.


years ago there was a term MIRV Multiple Independant Reentry Vehicle. that could be applied in this case, Multiple Independant Room Viewing.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> This is incorrect. When you are watching live TV on the HR2x, it is truly live. It is being buffered to the disk, but that is going on in the background. Unlike Tivo, you are actually watching the tuner output directly. You can see this by comparing live TV on an HR20 to an H20. They will be perfectly in sync, because they are both truly live.


Being in sync with what you see on an H20 doesn't mean that "live" TV on an HR20 is not being watched by reading it from the disk. There is no reason that a program stream can't be read back almost instantaneously after it is written to disk, as such a read would probably come straight from the disk's memory based cache buffer and not even require a physical read from the disk platter.

It's very unlikely that watching "live" TV bypasses the disk on an HR20 and then switches to disk reads only if the user pauses or rewinds for some amount of time. There is no reason to do it that way. It would just add complexity to the playback logic and it would gain you nothing. It's much easier to just always be reading from some point in time on the disk and never allow that point in time that is being read from the disk to advance past the current ("live") time.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

curt8403 said:


> years ago there was a term MIRV Multiple Independant Reentry Vehicle. that could be applied in this case, Multiple Independant Room Viewing.


Years ago there was also a term "Merv", but that was more associated with viewing interviews of people like Jack Carter, Totie Fields, and Dr. Joyce Brothers.... it had nothing to do with viewing in multiple rooms.


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

cartrivision said:


> Years ago there was also a term "Merv", but that was more associated with viewing interviews of people like Jack Carter, Totie Fields, and Dr. Joyce Brothers.... it had nothing to do with viewing in multiple rooms.


Griffin??


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

cartrivision said:


> It's very unlikely that watching "live" TV bypasses the disk on an HR20 and then switches to disk reads only if the user pauses or rewinds for some amount of time.


As unlikely as you believe it to be, that's the way it works. I was not posting speculation, I was posting fact. The HR2x isn't the only DVR that works this way, either.


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> As unlikely as you believe it to be, that's the way it works. I was not posting speculation, I was posting fact. The HR2x isn't the only DVR that works this way, either.


Maybe this explains why the HR20 had so many issues in the past. If they took this route with their "live TV" implementation then who knows how they coded other functions.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

GoBeavs said:


> Maybe this explains why the HR20 had so many issues in the past. If they took this route with their "live TV" implementation then who knows how they coded other functions.


Why is this implementation a bad one?


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> Why is this implementation a bad one?


I was mainly just talking out of my rear end with my statement since I don't design DVR systems.  Obviously I could be wrong, but it seems like since it has to support reading off the disk anyway why add the extra layer of complexity to bypass it? I can't think of a technical reason do bypass the disk. One reason might be non-technical. It's very possible that they do bypass the disk for live TV to get around any patents that might be out there.

Again, I admit, I have no facts to back up any of my statements. It's pure speculation, but the simplest implementation is usually the best.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

GoBeavs said:


> the simplest implementation is usually the best.


Maybe this implementation is actually the simplest?


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> As unlikely as you believe it to be, that's the way it works. I was not posting speculation, I was posting fact. The HR2x isn't the only DVR that works this way, either.


With all due respect, it sure sounds like speculation to me. That would be a really dumb design. There is no reason to implement it that way, and I highly doubt that it was implemented that way.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> Maybe this implementation is actually the simplest?


That you don't even understand why that wouldn't be the simplest implementation is one of the reasons that I doubt your other claims of knowing how it's done.


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## JBernardK (Aug 16, 2006)

Jeremy W said:


> Maybe this implementation is actually the simplest?


So the tuner sends live TV to the output and writes a copy to the disk. User presses pause for a few seconds, and then play. Now the output is coming from reading the disk. The user presses FF to catch up with live and now the DVR switches again to sending the live signal to the output. Is this anyway to program a DVR?


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

cartrivision said:


> With all due respect, it sure sounds like speculation to me. That would be a really dumb design. There is no reason to implement it that way, and I highly doubt that it was implemented that way.


I don't appreciate being called a liar. If it were speculation, I wouldn't have said that it wasn't. With all due respect, you don't know what you're talking about. Why do you think DLB hasn't been implemented? If the system ran like Tivo, with live TV always being displayed from the disk, DLB would be a trivial feature to add. You're basically just switching between two recordings in that case.

Instead of just spouting off assumptions and calling me a liar, put your mind to work and really think about it.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

JBernardK said:


> Is this anyway to program a DVR?


I am not a DVR programmer, and I have no insights into the reasoning behind the choices that were made in the HR2x DVRs. I do know that what I have said is correct, and the questions I have asked in this thread were simply to force people to think about what they're saying.

This method may certainly be a bad way to program a DVR. But it may not be. Lots of opinions are being thrown around without any backing, and I'm just trying to get some thoughtful responses.


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## JBernardK (Aug 16, 2006)

Jeremy W said:


> I do know that what I have said is correct, and the questions I have asked in this thread were simply to force people to think about what they're saying.


Could you give a reference, or identify yourself as a Directv employee?


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

JBernardK said:


> Could you give a reference, or identify yourself as a Directv employee?


No, and I'm not a DirecTV employee.


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## JBernardK (Aug 16, 2006)

Jeremy W said:


> No, and I'm not a DirecTV employee.


So why should we believe you?


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## Pink Fairy (Dec 28, 2006)

Gentleman, please...how about we wait till it is released before arguing about it? Or fighting?

Thank you...


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> Why do you think DLB hasn't been implemented?


Maybe because when DoD is delivered over satellite they will need a free tuner available. Just a possibility and again, this is nothing but speculation on my part.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

JBernardK said:


> So why should we believe you?


Don't believe me. I don't care anymore. Believe whatever you want to believe, it won't hurt me and it won't change reality.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

GoBeavs said:


> Maybe because when DoD is delivered over satellite they will need a free tuner available.


What if you're recording two things at once?


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> What if you're recording two things at once?


In that scenario the DoD recording would have to be paused and remain in the queue. Once a tuner frees up then the download could continue at the next available time. I don't know how the satellite delivered DoD works so I'm not sure. I can't imagine this would be much different from if you had two recordings going and then decided to record a satellite DoD. Three programs, two tuners, something has to give.

I only have two data points for all streams going to disk first. One is Tivo and the other is MythTV. MythTV used to bypass the disk for live TV, but they changed this a while back to make everything go to disk first. I'm not part of that project, but I've read that this made things simpler.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

GoBeavs said:


> I don't know how the satellite delivered DoD works so I'm not sure.


On the front panel of your HR20/21, press the right arrow and ACTIVE at the same time. Under Signal Strength, note how many tuners show up. I don't want to say anything more, because I am going to get jumped on and called a liar if I do. So I'll just let you draw your own conclusions.


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> On the front panel of your HR20/21, press the right arrow and ACTIVE at the same time. Under Signal Strength, note how many tuners show up. I don't want to say anything more, because I am going to get jumped on and called a liar if I do. So I'll just let you draw your own conclusions.


I haven't called you a liar. I have thought about each scenario you've presented and I have clearly stated that I don't know for sure how this works. In the end I really don't care how it works as long as I can watch TV.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

GoBeavs said:


> I haven't called you a liar.


No, you haven't. But others have, so I am not going to say anything further. Did you check out the menu?


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## 456521 (Jul 6, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> On the front panel of your HR20/21, press the right arrow and ACTIVE at the same time. Under Signal Strength, note how many tuners show up.


Interesting.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

GoBeavs said:


> Interesting.


It certainly is.


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

JBernardK said:


> So the tuner sends live TV to the output and writes a copy to the disk. User presses pause for a few seconds, and then play. Now the output is coming from reading the disk. The user presses FF to catch up with live and now the DVR switches again to sending the live signal to the output. Is this anyway to program a DVR?


Who says it ever goes back to live after using trick play the first time... I have two HD tv's set up next to each other, with a HR20-700 hooked up to each one... I have always noticed that if I tune a channel on both of them, they will be at the same point. If I use trick play on one of them, I can never catch back up to the other one. I don't think you go back to really being live until you tune into a new channel again.

Jeremy W... I completely agree with you.....


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

inkahauts said:


> I don't think you go back to really being live until you tune into a new channel again.


And I think that is a big reason why there has been a persistent problem with audio dropouts when "catching up" to live TV.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> I don't appreciate being called a liar. If it were speculation, I wouldn't have said that it wasn't. With all due respect, you don't know what you're talking about. Why do you think DLB hasn't been implemented? If the system ran like Tivo, with live TV always being displayed from the disk, DLB would be a trivial feature to add. You're basically just switching between two recordings in that case.
> 
> Instead of just spouting off assumptions and calling me a liar, put your mind to work and really think about it.


I'm sorry, but your claims keep getting harder and harder for me to believe. Even if the SLB was implemented the way that you think it was (which I still don't believe it was), that wouldn't in any way prevent DLB from being added. As the HR20 workarounds document shows, a version of DLB is already do-able on an HR20. All that would have to happen to make it function exactly like Tivo does it, would be a mechanism that does something similar to starting a recording on each of the channels of interest along with a mechanism that keeps the recordings truncated to no longer than ½ hour long, and then to make jumping between the last pause point of each of those recordings some simple one button function on the remote. To assert that DLB can't be done on an HR20 is laughably absurd, and is easily recognized as a completely untrue and baseless statement, and that assessment can be made with only the knowledge of how the HR20 currently operates&#8230; and purely from a user's standpoint&#8230; not even requiring any understanding of the internal software.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

cartrivision said:


> As the HR20 workarounds document shows, a version of DLB is already do-able on an HR20.


Yes, by breaking each tuner away from it's true live TV mode...


cartrivision said:


> To assert that DLB can't be done on an HR20 is laughably absurd


Aside from the text above my avatar, which is only there to rile people up, where in this thread did I ever assert that DLB was impossible? I said it hasn't been implemented yet because it's not as easy as switching between two recordings. Saying it's "not easy" is far different from saying it's "not possible." Again, if it were as easy as switching between two recordings, it would be done. There would be no reason not to do it.

I am tired of you calling me a liar, so I am going to stop responding to your posts. You obviously aren't going to believe anything I say, so there's no point in continuing the discussion with you.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Gentlemen! Play nice, please. There is a lady present.

Jeremy W has an uncanny knack for being correct and he is correct in many of his assertions in this thread. (I will not identify which, nor if there are any where he is not.) 

I will also say this thread will not turn into another "can the HR2x do DLB?" thread. It can and by present choice is not so enabled. So move on back to MRV. 

Thank you,
Tom


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## Thaedron (Jun 29, 2007)

Tom Robertson said:


> So move on back to MRV.


So, can you tell us on what date MRV will first be available in the NR of either the HR20 or HR21?


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Alas, I do not have that information. And if I did, I would likely not even be able to hint until it is very close. (As in after we've seen it in CEs.)


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

Ok.. so do you think its coming soon via a ce? I'm just looking for a month? Feb, March?


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

inkahauts said:


> Ok.. so do you think its coming soon via a ce? I'm just looking for a month? Feb, March?


I think it will bypass the CE process entirely, and be released directly into an NR. How's that for a bold prediction?


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

Eh.... I think its buried in our current ce on the HR20-700.... thats my bold prediction... And well get the access code to it with in the next 2 or 3 ce's.....


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## faspina (Sep 15, 2006)

inkahauts said:


> Eh.... I think its buried in our current ce on the HR20-700.... thats my bold prediction... And well get the access code to it with in the next 2 or 3 ce's.....


Dude, don't tease me like that. Now I am going to download EVERY single CE.

They did the same thing with VOD and the one night I did not download it the secret to unlocking the code was given out on Sunday.

I hope you are right, I have two hr2x in two different room already on wired ethernet waiting to do MRV.

BTW, if and when MRV is implemented do you think we will be able to COPY shows from the PC to the HR2x rather than just stream them. Not having pause or FF on shows coming from the PC is kind of a pain.


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## BkwSoft (Oct 18, 2007)

There is no reason they can't implement transport controls like FF, RW, Pause, Skip/Slip etc. with a streaming implementation. Replay TV did this quite well and various media extenders do it with Media Center servers.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

faspina said:


> Dude, don't tease me like that. Now I am going to download EVERY single CE.


Downloading a CE just because you're expecting a new feature is a bad thing to do.


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## Geekzilla (Jun 10, 2007)

inkahauts said:


> Eh.... I think its buried in our current ce on the HR20-700.... thats my bold prediction... And well get the access code to it with in the next 2 or 3 ce's.....


I have had this same view ever since they started concurrently releasing the CE's. To add fuel to the fire, look at Figure 10 of the HR21-200 first look document. I have tried IWANTMYMRV and several variations with no success. I am going to try to wire 2 of my HR20's like figure 10 and try it again.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Geekzilla said:


> I have tried IWANTMYMRV and several variations with no success.


The code, if there is one, will certainly be something completely different


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## Spanky_Partain (Dec 7, 2006)

Geekzilla said:


> I have had this same view ever since they started concurrently releasing the CE's. To add fuel to the fire, look at Figure 10 of the HR21-200 first look document. I have tried IWANTMYMRV and several variations with no success. I am going to try to wire 2 of my HR20's like figure 10 and try it again.


So the two HR20's you want to use to do this must be the HR20-100's that you have listed in your equipment. Remember the HR20-100 etheernet port 1 is active and usable and ethernet port 2 is not. These are seperate ethernet ports and are NOT a switch fabric type of chipset. It will NOT work to daisychain the ehternet ports on HR20-100's. The idea behind the Figure 10 of the first look of the HR21-200 is to show how one connection can be made to the router in the home network and run it to ethernet port 1. Then the ethernet port 2 is active for you to plug in your desktop PC, or your network TV, or you XBox network, or anything else that needs another network connection like another HR21-xxx or even a HR20-xxx. I hope that is clear for you and does not confuse you even more. Let me know if you need more explanation.


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## faspina (Sep 15, 2006)

Jeremy W said:


> Downloading a CE just because you're expecting a new feature is a bad thing to do.


I download it for fixes, updates, and new features. Anything that comes as a surprise is just extra.


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## tharron (Nov 2, 2007)

No longer thinking, but perhaps a bitter longing... :-D


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## jkrell (Oct 24, 2007)

Hey there, any updates on this? This thread has not had much activity of late. Does it seem like MRV will ever come out for the HR2* series? Any ETA?


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

jkrell said:


> Does it seem like MRV will ever come out for the HR2* series?


Yep. I'd look for it in the summer or fall.


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## Rhoq (Apr 27, 2006)

Jeremy W said:


> Yep. I'd look for it in the summer or fall.


Yep. It's part of DirecTV's announced "roadmap" for the 2nd half of 2009.


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

Rhoq said:


> Yep. It's part of DirecTV's announced "roadmap" for the 2nd half of 2009.


Do you have a link to the 'roadmap'?

:icon_cool


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## mcbeevee (Sep 18, 2006)

Athlon646464 said:


> Do you have a link to the 'roadmap'?
> :icon_cool


The Directv 2008 Annual Report is linked at the top of this thread:

DirecTV 2008 Annual Report now available online

Copied the following from post #2:

_In the second half of 2009, customers will be able to share content between two DVRs in the home, and in 2010 our Home Media Center will provide a true wholehome solution. The goal is to have all information and entertainment devices in a home connected to a central server that will provide seamless HD, DVR and other media services throughout the house.
_


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

mcbeevee said:


> The Directv 2008 Annual Report is linked at the top of this thread


Thanks - (I didn't read the old posts in this thread).


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