Reddit reviews Viewtv AT-163 ATSC Digital TV Converter Box and Media Player w/ Recording PVR Function / HDMI Out / Coaxial Out / Composite Out / USB Input

Wow first time I had the urge to login in awhile lol.

I am interested in doing this as well! I am curious if this would work:
http://www.amazon.com/Viewtv-Converter-Recording-Function-Composite/dp/B00GGVPKKC/ref=sr_1_sc_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1396015977&sr=8-1-spell&keywords=compositie+recorder

A review says you need to supply your own USB drive but that's not a big deal. But I don't know if it would work with recording a gamecube.

You would, unless your monitor also has one for some reason. This one looks like it would work, but I haven't bought one of these in a long time.

Yup. Cheaper than I remember, too. <$40 for this:

ViewTV AT-163 ATSC Digital TV Converter Box and Media Player

It has some quirks (made in China so menus and remote functions aren't translated well) but it works perfectly and you can take everything to go on a USB drive to watch on a laptop or any other TV.

You just need a tuner dude, this would probably be fine.

Check out the standalone DVR's like the Mediasonic, this , or this, or this

That DRV+ is expensive, but there are others for $30 like the Viewtv 163 https://www.amazon.com/Viewtv-Converter-Recording-Function-Composite/dp/B00GGVPKKC
None of them seem to say what the quality of the recording is. If you get a good HD signal, it can be higher bitrate than cable.

Some possibilities with some examples:

• Many portable DVD players support sd cards. This one hooks up to a tv.
  
  
• Digital Converter boxes like this one play your own files from a hard drive or flash drive. Not sure what type of remote.
  
  
• Possibly an older non smart tv with an USB port like this might work. (This seems to be fairly low energy use.)
  
  
• a mini stick pc or raspberry pi
  
  
  
  
  
  

I mean one of these: http://www.amazon.com/Viewtv-Converter-Recording-Function-Composite/dp/B00GGVPKKC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1426128943&sr=8-1&keywords=hd+receiver

This probably only has an RF antenna input. First step is to convert the HDMI out of your laptop or Firestick to composite video/audio. This gadget should do the trick and it has a zoom button, which I've found is useful when streaming old TV programs from my Firestick to my vintage TVs.

The second step is to convert that composite video to an RF frequency that your TV can tune in. The cheaper ones use channel 3 and 4, but I've had good luck with agile modulators like this one. This will let you modulate your composite A/V signal onto any channel you like.

If you wanted to get super fancy, you could get several of those "agile" RF modulators, set them to different channels, and combine the RF outputs using a regular RF splitter, then connect you're laptop, Firestick, and maybe a couple off-air ATSC demodulators tuned to classic channels.

Since this is a portable set, you might not want an RF cable pinning you down, so you could look into getting an ultra low power RF transmitter and tune it to whatever channel you want. You'll still need the HDMI to Analog composite converter I linked to above, but you wouldn't need the RF modulator. The transmitter I linked to should get you coverage within you're house and maybe your yard, depending on the transmitter's antenna and placement within your house.

Well. Let’s see here. I first purchased this antenna and this mast holder once I made the decision this year to cut the cord. Reading this sub, I quickly realized that I could use this mast amplifier to obtain about 10 more channels and this distribution amplifier to run the signals into 7 rooms of my house.

I configured and tested my setup in the middle of the summer thunderstorm season so I installed this UPS to prevent the brownouts that were occurring all too often during this time. I still had two television sets that were analog/CRT, so I purchased this set top converter which gave me the added bonus of Broadcast DVR when I purchased this flash drive to plug into them.
I then purchased two Roku3 units to supplement my broadcast programming. I also discovered that even when using a dual band router , I was only able to obtain a reliable 18 Mbit wireless stream in my far bedrooms from my Laundry Room equipment location. While this was sufficient for managing two simultaneous streams of HD for now, I was concerned that we would need to have 3 or 4 simultaneous streams or need to upgrade for UltraHD in the next year or so. I then purchased some Cat5e cable and ran 3 separate cables to each of 7 rooms and centralized all the lines into this switch which acted as my Ethernet distribution network.

I had an idle desktop PC with an AMD FX-8350 processor which I upgraded with gigabit LAN, 8GB DDR3 RAM, and five 3TB Disk Drives. I installed Plex Media Server based on recommendations from this sub and I have been torrenting like a madman to fill a little more than half this disk space in the past 4 months. I connected the media server to my Ethernet switch via a Gigabit link and have had no issues with lag even while transcoding on the fly. I plan to purchase some more streaming devices which will probably be Roku3 or Chromecast units depending upon the price and suitability.

My next step is to look at high quality music streaming and how I might integrate some vintage (1980s) audio equipment into this setup.

Just found these on Amazon, no idea if they would do what you want, just something to look at:

http://www.amazon.com/Mediasonic-HW-150PVR-HomeWorx-Converter-Recording/dp/B00I2ZBD1U

http://www.amazon.com/Viewtv-Converter-Recording-Function-Composite/dp/B00GGVPKKC

The Mediasonic HW-150PVR HomeWorx box supposedly has a firmware update available (upon request?) that enables it to record unencrypted cable TV.

The Viewtv At-163 box has this note: "While this device DOES have full QAM/Cable capability, it is NOT currently officially supported due to incompatibility issues with some cable providers."

Either one is cheap enough that it might be pretty low-risk for you to just try it out, even if your signal becomes encrypted in the not-too-distant future.

For question 1, something like a Digital TV Converter Box maybe?

Don't fret. You can always buy something like this