Tuner Sharing and Live TV

Channels DVR Server
#1

The way I understand Tuner Sharing works is as follows:
• If enabled: Client connects through ChannelsDVR Server
• If disabled: Client connects directly to HRHomeRun

Does that mean if Tuner sharing is not enabled and someone uses a client to watch live TV, there is a chance of tuner conflict with a scheduled recording?

Assuming that is true, a couple of questions:

  1. How much of a load (CPU, Bandwidth, etc.) does Tuner Sharing place on the server?
  2. What happens is one client has Tuner Sharing enabled and a different client does not, and both are trying to watch Live TV?
  3. With multiple HRHomeRuns, is it possible to have one dedicated to recordings (highest priority) and another HRHomeRun dedicated to clients for Live TV viewing?
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#2

To keep it simple if you have limited amount of tuners then tuner sharing is a must. Can you imagine if you have only 1 Quattro ... any connected client will get it's own tuner whether watching the same channel or not.

From what I understand is that sharing tuners the only thing the server does is distribute the tuners.

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#3

Yes.

As long as your clients use "Original" for their streaming setting, it's negligible. There is a slight network usage increase because of the additional hop, but if there are 2+ users of the stream—live or recording—it's actually a net reduction in bandwidth.

Then two tuners are used. One client gets its stream using the DVR as the delegate, and the other client connects directly to the tuner.

Not really; at least not with tuner sharing. Channels will follow its priority order for sources when tuning a channel. You can maintain a separate order in the clients than the server, so the DVR has one physical device as its top priority, and the clients have a different device as their priority for live viewing. But once all tuners in a device have been exhausted, the next device in the list will be used.

In short, for the best experience enable tuner sharing. (To mitigate the impact that may create, try to ensure that your tuners and the computer hosting your DVR are all on the same switch; that way your clients won't experience much difference because of the added hop in getting their live stream.)

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#4

Is there a way to "hide" a HDHomeRun device from a client?

#5

Yes. In the client, go to Settings > Manage Sources > DeviceID > Enabled and switch it to Off.

Similarly, in the DVR web UI if you remove the guide data from an HDHR tuner, the DVR will not use that device for any recordings.

This will essentially create a set of tuners for recording, and a different set for viewing. The disadvantage of this is that a recording and a live viewing session will use 2 separate tuners, rather than the single when tuner sharing is used. Also, if 2 clients wish to view that same channel, that will use 2 separate tuners on your "live" device, as the HDHomeRun does not really do multicast.

#6

But if I do that, the person using it to watch live TV will not have guide data.