Best (cheapest) Extender Option for Viewing TV & DVR

[QingGuy]

I'm new to HTPC, just did my first build and it's working great. Now I'm going to add a tuner and two extenders (wireless) to replace the three boxes I'm currently renting from Comcast. I need two extenders whos' primary function will be to watch live TV and some recorded cable content on the HTPC HD. I'm not as worried about watching MKVs etc. on these two extenders. What's the best low cost option for this type of use? I'd hate to buy Xbox 360s just to watch TV on these two machines. Do any of the media boxes like WD HD Live or Roku work?

Thanks in advance for any advice you can provide.

[lithium630]

I'm new to HTPC, just did my first build and it's working great. Now I'm going to add a tuner and two extenders (wireless) to replace the three boxes I'm currently renting from Comcast. I need two extenders whos' primary function will be to watch live TV and some recorded cable content on the HTPC HD. I'm not as worried about watching MKVs etc. on these two extenders. What's the best low cost option for this type of use? I'd hate to buy Xbox 360s just to watch TV on these two machines. Do any of the media boxes like WD HD Live or Roku work?

Thanks in advance for any advice you can provide.

You are not going to have a good experience with wireless. Even wireless N is just not consistent enough for an extender. If you are unable to run cable I would suggest using something like high quality powerline adapters. It's still not as good as wired but far better than wireless. As to you question, the Xbox is the only extender sold. You can find some older extenders from Linksys and others on Ebay. They are not nearly as smooth but get the job done. A newer Xbox is really the best way to go. If you are not in a rush then it may be worth waiting for the Ceton extender. Not much info on it yet but I'm looking forward to it.

[QingGuy]

Not in a big hurry, I can get rid of one $16 mo. HD/DVR with the Ceton card and wait for the Ceton extender.

[adam1991]

Wait, which do you want: the best, or the cheapest?

They are mutually exclusive.

If you go on price only, and add in making them wireless, you will come away convinced that extenders absolutely do not work.

The only extender you can buy new today is XBox. It also happens to be the best and most robust. And while it will do wireless, streaming TV that way will be a wasted effort in the end.

Yes, XBox is $200. So? It also plays DVDs...

You're currently renting crap boxes from Comcast. You will stop those rental fees, you will no longer have to deal with low disc space and a crappy user interface, and it will cost you $X to own the equipment to achieve that. Just do the math on the crossover point where equipment ownership starts paying off and rental starts costing more, and in the meantime sit and enjoy the far superior experience that 7MC brings to the table.

I've had a home built 7MC DVR plus two XBoxen for a year now. I spent $400 on the Ceton card and $400 for two XBoxen, and was already $800 into it before I even built the computer or added the cableCARD. Seemed painful at the time, but now I don't even remember it. The overall experience is exactly what you're looking for--and how often do you get exactly what you want?

Also, I took the effort to run network cables everywhere. No regrets there, either.

[QingGuy]

Adam1991, very useful information and I understand what you're saying best vs. cheapest. My wireless need is temporary as we're moving into a new house this summer which will be wired so I'll only be using wireless for a few months. Is streaming live TV different than streaming 720p movies? Reason I ask is my wireless network seems to have no problem streaming 720p, 1080p now that's a different story.

I'm not thrilled about the foot print of an X-Box but if that's the best option, then it's the best option. I figure I can get a couple of XBoxes for $150 ea., I picked-up my Ceton InfiniTV card today for $199 so total I'll be in around $500. I'll be saving about $42 a mo. on my Comcast bill so I figure I'll be at break even my 12th month and have a pretty cool setup to boot.

[adam1991]

The new XBox aren't very big, and they're quiet. And, you can easily re-sell them if you want to switch them out for an Echo later.

[newfiend]

I have both a Xbox Slim and a DMA-2100 extender. Xbox is the best option at this time. The new Ceton Echo looks amazing and I can't wait till it's available for order. I think in the end it will be the best option once they come out. But as of now the Xbox is it. There is no use spending money on old extender prodcut that is end of life and no longer supported. The Xbox is still supported as far as extenders go and the end user experience is MUCH better!
My DMA-2100 is slow and quirky, it works but it's just not as polished as the Xbox, plus there are other options available on the Xbox that the old extenders do not have. Netflix, and Zune if your into that kind of thing. I have both so its a nice rounded package that does it all. Just wish it had a Blu-Ray drive.. but that isn't a deal killer.
newfiend~

[barnabas1969]

First and foremost, as others have mentioned... DON'T GO WIRELESS. Secondly, if you only care about watching recorded TV on the extenders... and you live in the USA... the XBox isn't necessary (the main advantage of the XBox as an extender is H.264 support). The Linksys and HP extenders work fine for this purpose... with the following limitations:

**The Linksys extenders take longer to boot than the HP.
**The HP gets an HDCP error when you are watching copy-protected content from a CableCARD tuner, whenever you try to FFWD or RWD. But... this only happens when connected via HDMI... the Component output does not give you this error.
**The HP magically turns itself ON every day or two. Not a big deal, but it does happen. This will wake your HTPC if you are using my WOL script (see below)... but this can be remedied if you use a smart power strip.
**Neither the HP nor the Linksys will wake your HTPC when you turn them on (the XBox has built-in WOL capabilities)... unless you have a compatible router and you install DD-WRT and my WOL script.

Some people will tell you that the XBox is faster at navigating the menus in Media Center... but I don't completely believe that... the extender experience is mainly dependent on your HTPC's processor cores and RAM. However, the XBox will allow you to play H.264 content (MKV?). If you don't have a large library of MKV files, the XBox may not be necessary for you.

[slowbiscuit]

Adam1991, very useful information and I understand what you're saying best vs. cheapest. My wireless need is temporary as we're moving into a new house this summer which will be wired so I'll only be using wireless for a few months. Is streaming live TV different than streaming 720p movies? Reason I ask is my wireless network seems to have no problem streaming 720p, 1080p now that's a different story.

I'm not thrilled about the foot print of an X-Box but if that's the best option, then it's the best option. I figure I can get a couple of XBoxes for $150 ea., I picked-up my Ceton InfiniTV card today for $199 so total I'll be in around $500. I'll be saving about $42 a mo. on my Comcast bill so I figure I'll be at break even my 12th month and have a pretty cool setup to boot.

Your wireless need is going to be very temporary once you try it out and see 'network issues' on your screen all the time when streaming HD. You might be one of the lucky few where wireless works great on an extender, but don't count on it. Get MoCA or powerline adapters instead, and MoCA is cheaper and more reliable from what I've seen.

[bobbob]

just to add balance. i am a wireless xbox user and i have never seen one glitch in my HD content yet. i've done nothing special apart from buy good equipment

[lithium630]

Some people will tell you that the XBox is faster at navigating the menus in Media Center... but I don't completely believe that... the extender experience is mainly dependent on your HTPC's processor cores and RAM. However, the XBox will allow you to play H.264 content (MKV?). If you don't have a large library of MKV files, the XBox may not be necessary for you.

I don't think many people who have both extenders would agree with you. I have 3 Xbox's and two Linksys DMA2200's. The Xbox menus are flawless, just like the HTPC. The Linksys boxes are very jerky and slow. (I had to retype this three times. My cheaky sarcasm doesn't come out well in writing)

[newfiend]

Some people will tell you that the XBox is faster at navigating the menus in Media Center... but I don't completely believe that... the extender experience is mainly dependent on your HTPC's processor cores and RAM. However, the XBox will allow you to play H.264 content (MKV?). If you don't have a large library of MKV files, the XBox may not be necessary for you.

I don't think many people who have both extenders would agree with you. I have 3 Xbox's and two Linksys DMA2200's. The Xbox menus are flawless, just like the HTPC. The Linksys boxes are very jerky and slow. (I had to retype this three times. My cheaky sarcasm doesn't come out well in writing)

Agreed, the menu animations have to be turned off for things to "smooth out" on the DMA-2100 I have. The XBOX is just like MC with animations enabled... Plus the added ability to play .MKV on it was worth it to me. I am really curious to see how good the echos are!! (hint, hint ceton guys!)
newfiend~

[barnabas1969]

I don't think I ever changed any settings for animations my my extenders. Admittedly, my only DMA is connected to an SD-TV that is in my 5 year old step daughter's room... so I don't use it much. But the HP extenders work fine. No animations, but I don't miss that. I don't care... I just want my recorded TV and live TV to play seamlessly in the bedrooms... and it does. No noise and no heat from an XBox. Oh... and no Red Rings of Death!

[adam1991]

When was the last time you looked at an XBox?

Very little noise and heat from the new ones.

[newfiend]

When was the last time you looked at an XBox?

Very little noise and heat from the new ones.

True, the slim model is much quieter and less prone to RROD syndrome .. I think my HTPC makes more noise than my XboX..

[barnabas1969]

Yes, I've heard that... both about noise/heat and also about RROD. However, the slim model hasn't been around long enough to prove that it won't RROD... every model of the XBox prior to the latest one has RROD issues (even though M$ claims that it has been fixed with each subsequent version) and does the XBox slim use less than 20 watts like the Linksys and HP extenders? Watts = heat.

[carljanderson]

The wireless networking dieties appear to like me. I have had very few issues with my wireless on my x280n. The biggest one is when I look at the guide, the live TV stutters. I appear to also have some small glitches in streaming some 1080p movies, however it hasn't been often I have done that in the bedroom.

I do have my x280n on the 5Ghz band, and connecting to a WNDR3700 with stock firmware. I have disabled 2.4 Ghz on the WNDR3700. The x280n is the only device on my 5Ghz network.

All of my 2.4 traffic is on a WNDR4000 with DD-WRT (18204).

[slowbiscuit]

Well, that's just it - under perfect conditions (clear channel, no interference, great signal, no other devices in your house hogging it at times), wireless can be made to work. But it's not guaranteed, where a wired solution pretty much just works if you get decent stuff. That's all.

Also the main reason why Ceton won't have an N-adapter built into the new DVR and extender, but use MoCA instead. They don't want to take the support calls for flaky wireless setups.

[jasmithvr6]

New to the forum, but long-time SageTV user. Although my setup could have used some refreshing, it worked flawlessly with a dedicated SageTV Server in the basement and an STP-HD200 extender upstairs. With SageTV being hijacked by Google, I'm forced to look at my next HTPC setup and I'm ready to upgrade to a Ceton quad tuner.

My concern is primarily the extender situation. I'm not too excited about having 3 or 4 Xbox's to simply serve as extenders and would prefer a smaller, fanless, silent solution. I'm considering the Linksys DMA 2100/2200 as alternatives, although something tells me 2-3 year old technology that is no longer supported might not be the best option. The Echo seems to be ultimate answer, but ETA is unknown. I'm surprised that with such a well tauted W7 capablity as WMC that there are so few extender options available. Should I look to pick up a some used Xbox's for extenders? If so, what should I be looking for exactly? Is one make/model better than another when considering used hardware?

Also, I read somewhere that in order to utilize full streaming/functionality of an Xbox extender, an Xbox Gold annual subscription is needed. Any truth to that?

Thanks!

[newfiend]

New to the forum, but long-time SageTV user. Although my setup could have used some refreshing, it worked flawlessly with a dedicated SageTV Server in the basement and an STP-HD200 extender upstairs. With SageTV being hijacked by Google, I'm forced to look at my next HTPC setup and I'm ready to upgrade to a Ceton quad tuner.

My concern is primarily the extender situation. I'm not too excited about having 3 or 4 Xbox's to simply serve as extenders and would prefer a smaller, fanless, silent solution. I'm considering the Linksys DMA 2100/2200 as alternatives, although something tells me 2-3 year old technology that is no longer supported might not be the best option. The Echo seems to be ultimate answer, but ETA is unknown. I'm surprised that with such a well tauted W7 capablity as WMC that there are so few extender options available. Should I look to pick up a some used Xbox's for extenders? If so, what should I be looking for exactly? Is one make/model better than another when considering used hardware?

Also, I read somewhere that in order to utilize full streaming/functionality of an Xbox extender, an Xbox Gold annual subscription is needed. Any truth to that?

Thanks!

Welcome to the forum...
I have two Ceton Tuners (one PCIe, one USB) They have worked really well for me so far. I have had the USB unit a short time and the PCIe since the first batch of cards hit the U.S. It's been a very good tuner.
I have both The Xbox and a DMA-2100. The DMA's work. They are quiet and fanless units. However I much prefer the Slim Xbox (newer version) to the DMA's.
It is a bit on the noisy side as it has a fan but after it's on the the TV volume is up at normal levels you really don't hear it. It is MUCH quieter than the older Xbox as well. If you can get your hands on the Xbox Slim (newer black version) That's going to be your best bet in the short term.
If your looking for a smaller quiet extender the Ceton Echo is going to be the best option.. but like you said.. ETA is ??? I want one of these also and will order one (maybe two) once they are available. The thing looks very impressive.
As far as Extender functionality goes you do not have to have a Xbox Live Gold account for this to work. If you want to use Netflix, Hulu Plus, or the Xfinity Apps etc.. you will need a gold account for this. But for regular extender streaming functions you do not.
HTH,
newfiend~