On Sat, 2008-01-26 at 14:07 +0000, Barry Samuels wrote:
My idea would be to assemble another computer using some spare parts that I have together with some parts that I would have to re-aquire. I say 're-aquire' because I would have had all the necessary parts if I hadn't given away a lot of them (CPUs, hard drives, RAM) to a local computer recycling charity a few months ago. Why is it that one does not have a use for these parts until they've gone?
I'm assuming that if I assemble the said computer with the TV adapter in it (putting it near a TV aerial socket) and can connect wirelessly to my desktop then I could access the TV adapter from my desktop using something like MythTV. Would such a thing be possible?
You should be able to access the content over a network using myth TV but I am not sure of the specifics of setting that bit up.
This would assume that I could connect the two boxes using nothing more than a wireless adapter in each i.e. no router. My desktop has an on- board wireless adapter and I have two spare PCI adapters one of which I could use in the new box. Is it possible to get two wireless adapters to communicate in this way? Would that be fast enough to cope with the data from the TV adapter?
Yeh you need hardware with drivers capable of ad-hoc mode (although this carries a performance penalty) or Master mode (not everything supports this but you would only need one (either) end to do it) or go for something that works with the hostap drivers (like the prism chipset) as they have their own "master" mode that emulates an Access Point...again you only need one end to do that and the other end can then be set up as if it was talking to a real access point...only ad-hoc mode requires specific support from both ends. I don't know the bandwidth requirements of running Myth with a remote client, you may have to consider ethernet over mains (homeplug) to get the bandwidth you need
I wouldn't normally want to use a screen or keyboard after the machine has been setup - would that cause problems when booting?
No. you may need to look in the machines Bios and tell it not to halt on keyboard errors, nearly every BIOS has an option for that somewhere.