HDTV storage needs

[Dan Ritter]

On Thu, Oct 02, 2008 at 08:47:54AM -0400, Doug wrote:
> Hello:
> 
> I am getting FiOS today, which makes me think maybe I should do
> something with MythTV.  Looking at a storage product on line, it looks
> like 1 terabyte gets records 667 hours SDTV or 167 hours of HDTV/MPEG4
> (accurate?).  What I am wondering is how _few_ hours on the hard disk
> start to feel limiting?  If one watches a few shows a week plus one
> football game, is 20/50/100 hours enough?  I would particularly like
> to hear from those who watch via MythTV.  I really like the idea of
> skipping commercials.

Well, that depends on how you store it.

If you transcode to 720x480 XviD, you can get great results
at about 1GB/hour. If you keep lots of 1080i MPEG2 around,
you'll discover that ends up being 4GB/hour.

As to how much feels limiting -- I have a family that likes to
keep some shows around forever, mostly kids' programs. So I
think about 2 TB of disk space is about right, with three
tuners.

-dsr-

-- 
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