VDR is the name of the digital linux video recorder project of Klaus Schmidinger

Thanks to the overwhelming support of the open source community, the scope and functionality of this program has been emerged to something more. VDR is used to record digital radio and television broadcasted via satellite, cable network or terrestrial antenna in an outstanding reproduction quality. Many of you will recognize a “Digital Video Recorder” as an expensive piece of hardware. And yes this may be true for something you can buy in the shops down the road. But, VDR is not like this. All Software needed is free of any charge, just the required hardware will cost investment.

Addendum: Actually the digital broadcast signal will be distributed in some bigger german cities also via terretrial transmitters, that can be used by using a DVB-t card in the VDR. In this case the DVB-t card will be connected to the conventional antenna. Please refer to this URL to get more detail where in germany those pilote installations are currently running, and further information and technical details : www.digitv.de

General information around DVB-t can be found here (also suitable for VDR-Fans not living in germany...): www.linuxstb.org/dvb-t/index.shtml

If you are having an old PC anywhere, and considering the purchase of a DVB-add-on card (Digital Video Broadcast) for around 200 – 300 Euros, you will be able to get the benefit of a multi-functional Digital Video Recorder for a “more than reasonable” price.  But the old PC is not a pre-requisite. You may also use any Home PC that you are currently using to install VDR.

What do I get ?

Right away VDR can easily replace any actual Digital Video Recorder in its functionality and maybe do a little more for you. To list all the actual functions would surely explode this short intro, so please note the brief list below that is permanently expanded by new exciting features:

- Time shift recording using only one single DVB card (if using an actual software driver)

- Simultaneous recording of several TV channels (if these channels are broadcasted on the same broadcast frequency layer)

- Easy cut-out and removal of advertising spots from the recording using the remote control

- Playback of any Avi; Mpeg; DVD; VCD; SVCD using the high-quality TV output of the DVB card

- Automatic conversion of the recorded video files into DIVx; MPEG, VCD; SVCD controlled by OSD (on screen display)

- DVD navigation menu

- Video streaming of the TV signal over the LAN (if installed)

- Playback of images (Yes, you can use VDR to view your digital photographs!)

- Videotext Support (up til now this feature is somehow tricky)

- Playback of any audio CD including MP3 files with full CDDB support

- MP3 Navigation using OSD

- Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) emulator using the high-quality TV output of the DVB card  (Yes, it’s a game station too!!!)

- Easy programming of the VDR over Internet or LAN using VDRADMIN

- Support for additional LCD Display (indicating channels, timer, and recording information)

- Easy implementation of user commands to be executed and controlled by OSD

The main producer of the related cards is “Technotrend“. The links below show some companies that all source this card as a brand labelled version from Technotrend. We will not bother you with the tech specs of the card(s), as this is not that important for the project. You can easily find the related data sheets on the internet. But to share some experiences will be more useful to you in making decisions. In general we have to distinguish the DVB cards according to their connection to the “antenna”. DVB-s is the solution to attach the PC to a satellite dish, DVB-c will connect the computer to a cable network, and finally DVB-t uses a terrestrial antenna to receive the broadcast signals. Below we will concentrate our attention on the satellite version and for this the DVB-s will be the product explained. As the both others will not differ from the functionality, but might have some limitations in receiving all possible channels, due to the channel pre-selection made by the cable company for instance.

The DVB-s card is currently available on the market in three versions, indicated by revision numbers (1.3, 2.1 and Nexus). Personally I cannot state any major difference in picture quality either in record or playback mode.

Abb: This is the DVB Nexus

Beside all other features (see above), it is also possible to record and view so-called pay-TV and pay per view channels. For this you should have a valid subscription represented by the related chip card (smartcard), a so-called Common Interface extension board (CI) that will be attached to the DVB card, and of course a so-called CAM (Conditional Access Module). The smartcard will be inserted into the CAM, and the subscribed channels will be switched on to view. The additional cost of the CI board are around 70 – 100 Euros, depending on the supplier. Don´t get worried this is exactly the same as with a standard set-top box, where you also would need the CAM and the smartcard to get access to the pay-TV channels. The only extra is the CI card, that serves as an interface to the CAM.

Abb: This is the Common Interface to be attached to the DVB

The best choice for the CAM would be an „Irdeto AllCam 4.6“ or „4.7 SE“, because those will be supported by Linux very well. For further information which CAM would require which driver release, please refer to this site: www.linuxdvb.tv/documentation/cim.html. Regarding the ALPHACRYPT 1.0 CAM up till now it is not clear if it is completely supported or not. According to some user postings found on different other BBS, it cannot be recommended yet.

The main advantages compared to a product from the store can be found in the detail features. Although that the industry shows more and more such solutions, most of them are somehow restricted, esp. regarding their scalability and modularity.

For instance: What could you do if the hard disk of such a device is full?

If there should be any possibility for a hard disk upgrade, the price to do so is often several times higher compared to a standard PC hard disk that you can easily add to you PC. And that is one of the advantages of the VDR concept: The use of mainstream technology, that ensures a maximum of scalability, upgradability and reasonable prices to adapt the systems to the real needs and to possible changes in the future.

Furthermore the data export of the recorded MPEG2 data streams of such devices, sometimes is not accessible. Maybe that the file system used is something proprietary or just by the fact that there is no interface. When using VDR on a PC, you can easily add a standard network card, and you have total access and control from outside.

Recently I have integrated an ISDN card to my VDR-PC, and this gives me also the opportunity to use the computer as an ISDN Internet Gateway Router, fully supported by the very good implemented Firewall given by SUSE´s Linux distribution. Only your imagination is the limit to what you can use the VDR-PC beside its main functions.

Something to mention also: Because of the fact that this system is build on a Linux OS, there should be absolutely no BLUESCREENS :-).

Optional LCD Display ?

Thanks to LCDproc and Martin Hammerschmid´s program extensions, it is possible to submit main operation data of the VDR to an external display. You can obtain such devices in a broad variety of sizes (Rule of Thumb:  The bigger the display the more expensive they are). Small displays showing 2 x 40 or 4 x 40 characters are reasonable priced.

Abb: LCD Display 20 x 4

If you consider to realize a VDR-PC, you will be very soon confronted with the question how your project would/should look alike. As usual there are more than one solutions depending mainly on your personal taste. Either a standard PC case, a design case or something you build your own. Everything is possible.

If you like something more design oriented, you may want to look here: www.heimkino.at. A complete design case can be purchased suitable to fit into your HIFI-Rack. Unfortunately not that cheap!

Abb: HTPC Dign

My personal hint: Why not using the case of an old HIFI-amplifier, receiver or so? You should easily get such things pretty cheap at every internet auction. Please refer to My VDR Box. There are plenty of alternatives and ideas available. Some economic solutions can also be found here: www.pc-gehaeuse.com

Which type of  hard disk should I choose for my VDR-PC? You can find a list of hard disks running very silent here: www.silentmaxx.de , but I cannot guarantee that the list is on the absolute actual status.

* according to manufacturer’s measurements taken in Idle-Mode.

"Noise reduction" is always the second best solution against audible operation of the PC, rather than “noise prevention”. Especially with hard disks major differences can be identified. Unfortunately there is a context between operating noise, spindle speed (RPM) and data access speed. But anyway, hard disks generating more than 40 dB(A) are only suitable for network servers and not for a VDR-PC.

LOLA uses a 30 Gig Quantum Fireball LCT15 (UATA 100; 4400 RPM).
Look here: www.home.pages.at/fdm-ware/index.htm ( noise dissipation: idle mode 23,0 dbA / 0,4 Sone ; full operation 29,9 dbA / 0,8 Sone ). You can also find some further details on this harddisk in the german CT magazine: (www.heise.de/ct)

Mainboard ?

Basically a lot of mainboards will run under Linux, but not every board features "Automatic Power Up Control" or "Resume by Alarm". Those features are required to run „nvram-wakeup“, a tool expressively written for the use with VDR. This programme enables the automatic boot-up of the PC to start the recording. You should also make sure that the power supply of your PC is able to deliver at least 0.75 amps on the standby-voltage.
The mainboards currently supported by nvram-wakeup can be found within the program itself: www.sourceforge.net/projects/nvram-wakeup, or in the list here: www.cvs.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/nvram-wakeup/nvram-wakeup/nvram-wakeup-mb.h

Remote Control ?

If someone wants to spend more money for the remote control than for the entire VDR-PC including a TV-set, you can throw out your money here: www.remotecentral.com Considerable prices and some real bargains can be found here: www.universalfernbedienungen.de.
Before ordering a remote, please check at www.lirc.org that the model you intend to buy is really supported by the software! Personally I have purchased a MOTI remote controller for 10€ .

For users that are not intending to build the VDR-Box theirself, the “Media Portal” is currently available at EBAY for auction (alternatively also available here: www.members.fortunecity.de/vdrbox. Here you can also download actual BIOS Updates and the necessary parameters to run nvram-wakeup)

Main Features:

- powerful multimedia terminal (Celeron 433MHz; 64MB RAM)
- Infrared Remote Keyboard
- noise reduced processor cooling
- Instant-On / Stand-by
- built-in Siemens DVB-S (Rev1.3) mit CI Erweiterung (ready to run on satellite dish)
- 3 x PCI Slots available
- Toshiba DVD drive
- Set-Top Box Mainboard (incl. VGA, Sound onboard) von AVT or QDI Legend (special version)
- Harddisk suitable for hard disk recording

Priced at approx. 300 Euro, which is considerably cheap, especially if you consider that a single DVB-s card without CI is in the same price range. And here is how the thing looks alike:

Abb: Media Portal

An Alternative could be the SetTopBox called ACTIVY from Fujitsu-Siemens. In the meantime there are several patches and plugins available to ensure a proper operation of VDR on this hardware. The price of a used device depends on how old it is and on the condition. Usually those devices are priced around 300 Euros. (Stickerprice brand-new around 1000 Euros incl. DVD drive and DVB-s card). Further information around the ACTIVY can be found here: www.activy300.1xu.de Especially a mini-linux distribution can be downloaded that runs also on other machines.

Abb: SetTopBox ACTIVY