After trying multiple times to get MythTV working with Ubuntu 8.04 I kept running into problems.  It seemed that the majority of the problems centered around getting the latest ivtv drivers to compile correctly on the system: I just was not able to get it to work.

I am a very stubborn person, so trust me when I say I tried lots of different ways to compile the driver.  For whatever reason, it just would not work right for me.  I even tried Mythbuntu, which was gave me even more problems with database passwords and such.  That being said, I started to look for alternatives.  The hardcore geek in me turned to Slackware Linux, the stubborn guy said “lets give Ubuntu one more shot”, the adventurous spirit insisted that Gentoo Linux looked like fun, and finally the practical guy said that MythDora seemed like it would just work.

I have had a Slackware install before; it is an awesome distribution with a very cool name & logos.  When I installed it last it seemed all the configuration stuff was done command line style and they kind of just set you loose on the system - I ultimately wasn’t in the mood for this much work.  I couldn’t bring myself to try Ubuntu again - it was obvious it was just becoming a time sink for me.  It seemed that every new way of installing my PVR-150 would just end at a new type of error.  I have only heard good things about Gentoo Linux, including Myclawz compiling it completely from source to get a server working.  Again though, I wasn’t in the mood for that much work.  I know I could have just installed it the easy way, but what is the point of installing Gentoo if you don’t compile for source?  So, if you have been keeping track, you would know that left me with MythDora 5.0.

I had tried MythDora when I believe they were on release 3.0 (maybe).  It installed, but was giving me lots of issues - not something I wanted out of the “easy way”.  It was time to give 5.0 a shot.

I downloaded the DVD ISO and burned it to a disk.  It was at this point that I remembered that the old system I was dealing with only had a CD drive - I had to wait another 20 minutes to download both CD ISOs.  On the first attempted install everything was going smoothly - they even had an option to install the ivtv drivers during the install process…I was impressed and encouraged.  About 50% way through copying the files over my system restarted - I don’t know why exactly, but looking back on it, it was probably because something shorted out (I had the board resting on a book with wires all over the place).  I restarted the install and everything went smoothly.  I didn’t have to enter passwords for the database or anything too special - just a root password.

At the end of the install it had a button to configure MythTV - I just had to tell it I had cable and sign up for a SchedulesDirect account (20/year) so I could get the listings.  After configuring everything it automatically asked me to run mythfilldatabase, which puts all the channel listings in the database.  Once the computer finished doing this, I was off and running.  MythTV worked perfectly with my old PIII 933 on 384 MB of RAM.  The real trick was having a hardware encoder for the TV stream: PVR-150.

I must say I was really impressed with MythDora this time around and would recommend it to anyone.  All I have left to do is to buy a remote and also a video card with a TV out.

Like always, if you have any questions about exactly how I did this just leave a comment.

UPDATE:  I installed the Intel drivers from 6/08 (I had to update them through device manager) and they did not make any change to the game play.

My girlfriend recently moved closer to me and consequently I have been spending a lot of time at her place.  This is great and all, but she does not have a gaming machine.

She does have  a Toshiba Portege M400 Tablet PC.  It sports an Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 950, which is not the best.  She did upgrade the RAM to 3 GB and had been playing WoW on it with no problems - I figured EQ2 was worth a shot.

After transferring EQ2 from an external hard drive I started it up.  The loading screen looked amazing - there was hope.  As soon as I got into the game things were choppy.  I immediately went to the graphic settings and turned everything down (as low as they would go)- it helped a little.

I also went in and turned the wide screen letter box all the way up to max.  This also helped, but by no means was the game playable (or recognizable for that matter).  I didn’t bother to see how many FPS I was getting - I know it was horrible.

Considering her computer has a Core 2 Duo and 3 GB RAM I am force to believe it was the Intel graphics card that killed any hope of getting this to work.  It used shared memory and was able to go up to 128 MB in XP.  After some research I noticed that in Vista it could go up to 256 MB.

She was planning on formatting her computer anyway and just happen to have a copy of Vista Ultimate laying around.  After a little bit of trouble loading the correct raid drivers for her computer, the install went smoothly.  We updated all the drivers and I immediately loaded up EQ2 - the extra memory did not help much.

At best, one would be able to run around and do some harvesting, but I would never trust this computer for play in a group.

EQ2 is a much more demanding game (graphics wise) than WoW is and that was crystal clear after this.

There is still hope though - she just got a MacBook…I will keep you posted.