Introduction

Introduction:

I wrote this guide as I installed MediaPortal from scratch on my new HTPC so the guide will mimic how I installed/configured my HTPC.

For starters, there are a few things we need to have before we can proceed, I'll quickly run over the software requirements and hardware requirements.

Software Requirements:

• Windows XP with SP2, Windows XP MCE 2005 with RU2 or Windows Vista recommended
• Windows Hotfixes up to date
  
• Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 with SP1
• Microsoft .NET Framework 2
• DirectX 9.0c
• Windows Media Player 10
• WindowsXP SP2 Hotfix for DVB
• WindowsXP SP2 Hotfix for 1394  (If using FireWire devices)
• H.264 Decoder (e.g. Cyberlink PowerDVD 7+, CoreAVC, ffdshow)
• Large NTFS Hard drive space - recordings are around ~1GB per 30min show (FAT32 has a 4GB limit)

The H.264 decoder is important as this is what Freeview|HD is transmitted as. One downside to using H.264 is that it requires a lot of processing power to decode. If you are using a graphics card that has H.264 decoding onboard (more on this below) you must use a H.264 decoder that supports hardware decoding. At this stage I have only come across PowerDVD7/8 (Ultra editions) and ArcSoft's TotalMedia, CoreAVC currently does not support hardware decoding but is  "coming soon" in their Professional release. If you aren't using a graphics card with onboard decoding then I would suggest using CoreAVC 1.6.5+ as this is the best software H.264 out there. More discussioin on H.264 decoders can be found here on Geekzone.

Hardware Requirements:

The hardware configuration in my HTPC is currently:

• AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+
  

• 2x 1GB DDR2-800 PC2-6400 (Dual Channel)
  

• ASUS M2A-VM Motherboard
  

• Geforce 9600 GT 512MB (PureVideHD onboard decoding)
  

• Hauppauge NOVA-T-500 dual DVB-T tuner
  

• 1x Seagate 80GB, 320GB & 750GB
  

• Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit) with Service Pack 1

Important things to know about hardware:

Graphics card - Some graphics cards have onboard H.264 decoding (Nvidia PureVideHD and ATI AVIVO), these cards are GREAT to use for Freeview|HD as it will take a lot of strain off your CPU. I would highly recommend one of these. You can find a discussion of these video cards here on Geekzone.

Digital Tuner Card - You will need a compatible DVB-T tuner card, I would recommend you look at a dual tuner model (such as Hauppauge Nova-T-500 or Hauppauge HVR-2200) so you are able to record multiple channels at once, they are fairly cheap but can be hot in demand.

Hard drive space - You need a decent sized hard drive which should not be formatted as FAT32, this is because FAT32 does not support filesizes of 4GB. When you're recording HDTV the space adds up fairly quickly. A 30 minute show can take up ~1GB so a 2 hour move will easily push 4GB.

Hardware Configuration:

Basically MediaPortal can run in to types of configuration, StandAlone and Client/Server. Both of these are fairly easy to setup.

Client/Server is good if you would like multiple HTPC's around your house to be able to watch Freeview as you can configure a server to handle tuning channels/recording shows/program guides.