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Install MythTV 0.20 the easy way - MythDora 3.0 Walk-through & Screencast

mythpvr.com — MythDora 3.0 is the first MythTV "in-a-box" style distribution to include MythTV 0.20. Based on Fedora Core 5, MythDora 3.0 is designed to format your hard drive then install everything needed for a fully functional MythTV System. Here is a walk through of the entire installation process, including screenshots and a screencast.

Who dugg this? Made popular Dec 14, 2006

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  • xchino, on 10/12/2007, -1/+18Determining the maturity of software by its version number makes you stupid, stupid.
  • spisska, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12The info in your comment is mostly true but a little misleading.

    For one thing, MythDora is similar to Knoppmyth in that they are both single-disc installs that contain OS, Mythtv components, and all related dependencies -- everything necessary for a full MythTV system (backend and frontend) assuming one uses compatible hardware.

    The only big difference is that MythDora is based on Fedora Core (a popular distro among Myth Users thanks in large part to Jarod Wilson's excellent guide (Fedora Myth(TV)ology)) and is currently running version 0.20, while KnoppMyth is based on Debian, uses a lightweight windows manager, and currently ships with 0.19.

    MythTV for Xbox is based on using the Xbox as a Mythtv frontend. You can't get a capture device into the Xbox, so it is not really capable of being a full Myth machine, although it does make for a cheap and attractive, if slightly underpowered, frontend when you already have a backend running on your network.

    As far as the Monolith quote goes, it makes it sound as if MCE is the 'standard' and Myth is the 'copy', when it's actually the other way around. Myth runs laps around MCE to such an extent that they're not really comparable. MCE is the crappy, buggy, underpowered, proprietary and feature-lacking alternative to MythTV that you have to pay for.

    It's nice that buying a pre-built box is an option, but you're better off building it yourself to learn how it works and to leave room for expansion when you inevitably expand (remote FEs, additional storage, extra tuners, HD, etc).
  • schestowitz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11One among many MythTV distros. Here's a good overview.

    MythTV - Record and playback all your favourite TV soaps in GNU/Linux

    ,----[ Quote ]
    | KnoppMyth : This is an attempt at making the Linux and MythTV installation
    | as trivial as possible...
    |
    | MythTV for XBox - This is a project which aids in setting up MythTV on
    | ones XBox gaming station with ease...
    |
    | MiniMyth - This is a small Linux distribution which turns a diskless
    | computer into a MythTV front-end.
    |
    | Fedora Myth(TV)ology - This is a project started by Jarod Wilson...
    `----

    http://linuxhelp.blogspot.com/2006/09/mythtv-record-and-playback-all-your.html

    There's also one for the children, for mom, dad, grandpa and grandma (I didn't leave much room for stereotypes, did I?)

    Monolith Media Center brings MythTV to the technophobe

    ,----[ Quote ]
    | If MythTV's promise of a free Windows Media Center alternative sounds
    | exciting, but you can't quite bring yourself to navigate the trials of
    | a Linux install on your own, then you might be interested in
    | Monolith's pre-built Media Center PCs, which come with MythTV
    | pre-installed on top of Ubuntu Linux.
    `----

    http://www.engadget.com/2006/08/16/monolith-media-center-brings-mythtv-to-the-technophobe
  • colklink, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9@DaveV

    Sorry, I won't have time because I'll be watching all the shows I recorded using the "not production ready" software you turned your nose up at. =)
  • RyeBrye, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Watch less TV if you are watching the same shows - it will automatically delete the commercials...
  • dinki, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8I used KnoppMyth for about two years. It was fairly easy to set up, but upgrades for me were a nightmare. I had trouble getting my PVR 150 to work, then I couldn't get the built in ir remote to work. I finally got the card to work after a good bit of twiddling with IVTV. I decided to add another tuner that was also supported, but for some reason it caused problems with the 150 when they were both installed at the same time. Nightmare. I spent way too much time working on my KnoppMyth box than I did using it.

    After the last software upgrade attempt went wrong, I asked myself why I was putting myself through all the torture and formatted the drive and put GBPvr on top of an XP install. Everything worked right out of the box and now I use my PVR instead of tinkering with it.

    I am far from a Unix novice as my work workstation is a Sun Blade 2500 and I've been using *nix machines for close to twenty years. I know that others have setup Mythtv with very little effort, but this is just my experiences. Mythtv is rather nice once you get everything set up.
  • Protoss, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6But this makes it more YOUR TV. You don't sit down, and find nothing on, just go watch something you recorded.
  • spisska, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5@awp0

    You're right that MCE contains a lot of things that Myth doesn't and never will. Like DRM. And HDCP.

    The MCE UI was largely copied from Myth, so I don't really see how it's any better. It certainly isn't any faster and there seem to be a number of options missing. The entire 'Import DVD' submenu is nowhere to be found, and neither is there any equivalent to MythArchive.

    I can't seem to find any kind of commercial auto-detect in MCE, nor any real auto-transcode or even manual transcode capabilities. It seems to want to put everything in a closed, non-portable format and I can't find anywhere to change that.

    MCE also seems kind of limited in it's DVD capabilities. Not only can it not import any DVDs to its own library, but it won't even play DVDs I've bought in other countries. That's unfortunate.

    There doen't seem to be any feature in MCE like MythWeb, where a user can search listings, schedule, and administer recordings remotely with a web interface.

    As far as CableCard(TM) goes, it's been 'right around the corner' for years now. I've never seen one, and I doubt I will soon. And if you think Microsoft will let you record and keep Premium HD Content (TM) in any meaningful way, . . . well, you just keep believing that.

  • clievers, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5You definitely should. I have it set up on a gentoo box right now. I'd like to change this as I find it hard to use (especially with the installation of gentoo). Anyways, I was thinking about trying Ubuntu or something, but this project seems neat.
  • Stonekeeper, on 10/12/2007, -4/+8a vmware appliance would be nice! :)
  • jurbania, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6I've been eyeballing MythTV for a while now. I can never find the time or courage to try it out though.
  • jforsyth, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Have made several Myth boxes now all using Fedora. As previously mentioned Jarod Wilson provides a fantastic guide, but really what takes all the pain out of the install is yum. Yes "Yellow Dog Upgrade Manager"! Really like to thank the Yellow Dog distro for yum - it makes all the difference when installing packages with complex dependencies.

    "yum install ivtv" - oooh I just about installed capture card
    "yum install myth-suite" - oooh I just installed mythtv
    '
    OK so this is a bit of a simplification (not much though) - all the details are in Jarod's guide. Truly Mythtv is a "convergence" of media. Checkout Tom's Hardware for some interesting discussions on this convergence thing
  • Venky80, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Can anyone tell me when a list of compatible hardware which i should buy if i am eyeballing myth TV. Also if I make use of compatible hardware would it be as easy as installing a deb or a RPM?
    I have see many articles on myth tv but I almost always never see a 1-2-3 step to myth tv installation.
  • rubicante, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Installing MythTV is not trivial, under KnoppMyth or MythDora. I use KnoppMyth, and my install was relatively painless, however still took me the better part of a day. Of course, this doesn't even include all the research that went into the components I purchased. All-in-all I'm happy with KnoppMyth but an alternative (competition) is great.
  • diecastbeatdown, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3i am a 2+ year gentoo user. mythtv takes some setup but the installation can be quite easy.

    http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_Setup_MythTV
  • krinthekuz, on 09/16/2008, -0/+2here's my write-up for mythtv+edgy+hauppauge pvr-150.
    http://www.djlosch.com/post_retrieve.php?pid=70

    however, the most solid guide out right now is hyams, but that's for breezy
    http://hyams.webhop.net/mythtv/myth_ubuntu.html

    the nice thing about it being ubuntu and not based on knoppix or fedora is that you still have the awesomeness that is ubuntu.
  • dcmjzero, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3last i checked they didn't- i have the same problem. ati has so far refused to release information on how to use their hardware. but hopefully that will change with amd's buyout of ati.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4Sure wish there was linux support for my Rage theater 550 card. I have to switch to my windows disk if I want to watch Jon Stewart and Colbert.
  • nofxjunkee, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2first comment spam... but you only get the first page. *****.

    http://duggmirror.com//linux_unix/Install_MythTV_0_20_the_easy_way_MythDora_3_0_Walk_through_Screencast/plain.html
  • rubicante, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2PVR Hardware Database: http://pvrhw.goldfish.org
    Then check the MythTV Wiki: http://www.mythtv.org

    Also, check recent customer product reviews. I went for a Hauppauge PVR-500 and got a bad card, then I noticed all the recent reviews saying the cards were bad. Bah! I had zero problems with KnoppMyth, just Hauppauge. KnoppMyth Wiki is great, too, if you go that route.
  • davidhunt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2https://help.ubuntu.com/community/MythTV

    Pretty good Ubuntu guide from the Community site. Haven't used it myself, but I'm thinking of setting up a MythTV box soon.
  • Protonz, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5I say this every MythTV thread, check out Media Portal. It's an open-source alternative that won't take you a week to install and configure.
    http://www.team-mediaportal.com/

    Note: It runs on windows.
  • pencilneck, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I have tried several times to get MythTV to work with little luck. Linux, while fine and dandy, isn't user friendly when it comes to tweaking some things.

    I'll give this one a whirl... even with a failure at getting MythTV going, I might learn some new things along the way.
  • felderado, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4mythtv isn't difficult at all if you use Gentoo. These guides that use other distros are a PITA. I just look at them and laugh.....
  • bloodguard, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4Linux based PVRs are a dead end if you want most HD content due to the fact CableLabs is going to squash any effort to create drivers for Linux (excluding proprietary boxes like Tivo).

    Until we can get together and put pressure on Feds to mandate the opening up of the CableCard spec we're going to be stuck with Standard Def Programming or OTA HD.

    No Dish, DirectTV or cable HD. No High Def MythTV.
  • seldon21, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2KnoppMyth only way to go. Light, easy to use, very straight forward distro. Been using it for over 2 years with little to no issues. Built front-end PC and XBox with no issues and great extender. No MS tax.
  • rubicante, on 10/12/2007, -4/+5Or you could watch movies you download on from bittorrent without burning them. Or watch more efficient TV.
  • mirek, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2How does MythTV compare to BeyondTV for Windows? or MCE?

  • jfinke, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This is what I used back in January.

    http://hyams.webhop.net/mythtv/myth_ubuntu.html

    However, it is a bit outdated down. You can't follow it word for word if you use Dapper for instance.

    I believe Ubuntu comes with .20 compiled now.

  • BartSwordfish, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Fantastic article! Thanks to whoever originally dugg this article. If you're thinking about trying to setup a MythTV box this article is a must read. I've had limited success setting my MythTV box. This article,however, has encouraged me to try it again. I noticed a few things I struggled with in previous attempts covered in greater detail here. Thanks.
  • flibby, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1http://www.parker1.co.uk/mythtv_ubuntu.php

    I followed this and the previous suggestion and it worked ok. i'm not finished yet and am looking for trouble shooting guides now. (video slow and choppy).
  • AstroZombie138, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Does anyone have a link to a good guide to install MythTV on Ubuntu? I tried the install a while back and couldn't get it to work so I gave up. I would like to revisit it, but if I can keep from changing distros then I'd be happier.

    Is there a reason someone can't package this up like the other apps?
  • JohnnyZito, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The hundred and tenth will double that percentage at least! :)
  • dillybat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1problem with vmware appliance is that it is to under powered to encode and decode video
  • jurbania, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1ATI recently released a new Catalyst driver (v6.2) that supposedly has support for Fedora and Debian(?). But I've yet to try it out on either Linux distro. Then, I don't know if either distro supports MythTV either. But its worth a shot if you have the time.
  • krinthekuz, on 09/16/2008, -1/+2@spisska
    i dunno if i'd say that MCE ripped the mythtv UI. they're hardly novel. and the MythCenter UI seems actually ripped off from MCE.

    either way, myth is awesomely better than MCE.
    after 3 days, MCE will delete anything (read: everything) that the studios or telcos deem "premium"
    http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/11/readme.aspx#1608319

    and anyone worrying about HD capture cards is a moron. there are already a few on the market with linux support. and if you think they'll use a cable box to get around it, that's still beaten by irblaster.

    @dkoon: windows has nothing that compares to mythtv.
  • LMN8R, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2My friend has MythTV and I have BeyondTV. Both have similar features and tons of user-created plugins, skins, and other content for free. I prefer BeyondTV because I don't need a separate Linux box to run it and can instead use my PC like a normal PC 100% of the time with BTV running as a service in the background.

    Heck, I can even play a game while recording two shows at the same time, with only a minimal performance hit.

    And yes, BTV fully supports HDTV tuners as well. You can mix and match any combination of any number of tuners.

    If you have an extra computer sitting around that you can install Linux on, great, otherwise, BeyondTV is will worth the price tag. I'd rather pay around $70 for an application and retain full use out of my PC than require a Linux partition to dual boot into and switch to it whenever I want to record something.
  • portwojc, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Well no luck for me with the site all toasty. I did download it earlier but out of the box it detects my TV as an unknown monitor and doesn't display squat once it boots up...
  • knutert, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Excellent reply, spisska. This is exactly the reason why people should support free software.
  • rubicante, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Well you just said it: DirectTV. At least there IS an option where market pressure can applied.

    Anyhow, I can view all my digital cable channels through my KnoppMyth box (through my Comcast box), how is that different than accessing HD?
  • jonocorp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I've barely gotten knoppmyth to work with my multiple tuner cards (1x pvr250 and 1x pvr500). For the longest time I couldn't get the 500 tuner to recognize the second internal tuner.

    For me, Knoppmyth is just to play around and watch a few things. I would get more serious about it if it wasn't such a pain to upgrade. If Knoppmyth or MythDora supports online updates, I'd be in it in a second.

    I would like to see a BeyondTV clone, a Gentoo single disc MythTV installer, or a Ubuntu single disc installer.
  • spisska, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2@djlosch

    I only meant to imply that MCE copied Myth's UI because Myth was around well before MCE. It's true that there's only a certain number of ways that the information can be displayed, but there's no getting around the fact that Myth came first.

    Everything else you say is pretty spot on. Folks using MCE that think they'll get an easier time with HD (or any other) content are in for a rude awakening.
  • almighty, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1I have been planning and testing a home entertainment pc for quite some time now. As good as MythTV and its off shoots are, there is still a lot of ground to cover before it catches up with MCE. I am NOT a MS fan in the slightest bit, but with that said the media center included for free in Vista is pretty nice. No dependency hell, no hardware support issues, a user interface in a candy coated shell.

    This release seems to have a good amount of potential so I will be trying it. My only question would be did they ever solve the problem with the latest version of MYSQL not agreeing with MythTV? I know there was a work around for the previous version but it would be nice not to go through that again.
  • immrlizard, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0There is also gvpvr for those of you wanting to stick to windows.

    I set up my mythbox using knoppixmyth and haven't had any problems that I wasn't expecting. The only problem I am having is switching the stations and only because I haven't added the script to allow that. The setup I did was from mysettopbox.tv and there is an auto setup where it does it all for you with little input at all. The catch is that if you are using sata drives you need to do the standard install. Their documentation is good and the forum is really helpful too. I doubt if you will run into a problem they haven't faced before
  • thorbergdt, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2Ive wanted to use this or try it for awhile... but i don't believe they work with ATI All-In-Wonder cards. Or do they?
  • jarodl, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I had a similar experience. I had GB-PVR installed on WinXP, and it worked very well, but I heard so much about how awesome MythTV is so I decided to try it out. After days of trying to get Ubuntu working well with my NVidia GEForce FX 5200 s-video output, then trying to get MythTV installed, I gave up with no success. I thought, "Why am I even trying this when GB-PVR does 99% of what I want it to do, and it is extremely easy to set up?"
  • awp0, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1@spisska

    You know, I like Linux. I use it at home for various things and I'm exposed to it regularly at work as I run a QA department for an enterprise software product that supports RH and SUSE.

    I'm sure you won't care about what I'm about to say, because I'll say it anyway. People like you do a disservice to the Linux and OSS community. You ramble on strongly about how it's superior in every way and how everything Windows is just an inferior copy. You turn people off with this attitude. You turn people off to open source software altogether. And the worst part is: Often you're dead wrong.

    Does MCE have commercial auto detect? Sure, take a look at DVRMS Toolbox.

    Does MCE have the equivalent of "MythWeb"? Sure, see DBarrett's WebGuide, or Orb, or Microsoft's own Remote Record. And there are others.

    MythArchive? Sure, there are several plugins that help you compress and archive recordings and whatnot.

    These are plugins to MCE (and there are 100's of them), and MCE has a similar architecture to MythTV in this respect as it uses plugins/components to assemble the whole package.

    And can I "record and keep" CableCARD recordings in a "meaningful way"? Depends on what you mean. I can record and keep them, that's for sure. And that's a lot better than MythTV. Show me an HBO high definition recording in Myth.

    And one more thing: prove to me that MCE copied Myth's UI (or anything Myth related for that matter). Issac Richards started Myth development in 2002. MCE was actually released in 2002. Myth's default little "bubble" main screen looks absolutely nothing like MCE's. Where is the copying again? Are you sure you're not mistaking Myth for XBMC, which looks a lot like MCE (and was a direct copy of MCE)?

    And I don't think I'm being biased by claiming that anyone who's seen MCE2005 or especially MCE Vista would agree that MCE is well ahead of Myth in UI design.

  • orangekid13, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Uh, I've spent hours configuring Ubuntu, installing everything, and getting it to have a resolution that didn't make my 19" widescreen a waste of $200... No way in hell am I gonna let anything format

    i just want to run it as a program, this is a completely pointless post for most people
    how'd it get so many diggs?
  • jsreid, on 10/12/2007, -5/+4http://www.duggmirror.com
  • awp0, on 10/12/2007, -8/+6@spisska

    Sorry bub. If you want to talk about "misleading" then you should look at your own statements about MythTV "running laps" around MCE.

    In fact, MCE has a much far superior UI, doesn't require a Linux expert to maintain it, and perhaps most importantly with Vista it contains a feature which we'll never see in MythTV: CableCARD support. And for those unaware, this means MCE will have HD Premium content and Myth never will.

    By the way, yes I know that MythTV is skinnable, but every single skin that I've ever seen for Myth screams of the 1980's. I ran it for a couple of weeks and decided it was too ugly for my living room.
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