H.264 will only become interesting (to me) once there are hardware devices that can replay it (aka "Full Featured DVB cards"). I am not interested in software players that might not even run on my 450 MHz VDR.
Until then, normal MPEG2/DVB-S does just fine for me.
I can understand Klaus has only a limited amount of time available and therefore can only focus on what he thinks are important for his system, but the problem with this is that there is more than 1 user of VDR out there. H264 is a video standard and as such it should have support within VDR. More and more channels will start using it (not necessarily HD channels either, H264 increases the bandwidth of the satellite platform) and there is already plenty of fine content out there. E.g. the Premiere HD channels, Sky UK HD channels and the bouquet of HD channels on Thor (Canal Digital). The Polish HD channels are already improving and there will be HD channels as part of Digitalb in December. It has now gone behind demonstration loops and if you check out Kingofsat's website you will see there is now an abundance of channels from different providers.
If Klaus is too busy or unconcerned to implement this standard in VDR, why aren't key patches by trustworthy sources such as Reinhard included? If Klaus does not start taking onboard assistance from key developers to assist then VDR will always be behind the curve. With something as important as H264 and DVB-S2 support, this needs to be included in the developer version as soon as possible (H264 NOW and DVB-S2 when the multiproto stuff is finished) otherwise it will be a real problem to patch and update the source and plugins to keep in line with new developer versions. Klaus may argue that he would like to keep control of stability of VDR etc, however isn't this why we have "developer" versions? Personally, I have still be using vdr-1.4.7, but I also have vdr-1.5.10 setup alongside it for looking at the dev version and applying patches etc (usually when the wife is out).
Reinhard has released some much needed patches that AFAIK have still not been implemented within VDR developer: -
* H264 (this can slot in very easily with negligible impact to MPEG2 users) * Sync Early * NTSC recording time * Radio recording time fix (this has been a problem with VDR for as long as I have used it)
Essentially, what I believe is that if Klaus is unwilling to implement changes within VDR due to time constraints he should do what most other open source projects do and enlist help and set-up a CVS/SVN/HG. Klaus can then spend a little bit of time reviewing the code and ensuring it is OK, but I'm sure from people like Reinhard et al this will not take a lot of time.
I must admit that unless this happens soon then I might be another long term user and supporter of VDR that moves over to MythTV purely because it seems to be better supported by developers. I have recently been playing with xine and a nvidia card (for both VDR and MythTV) and there is now very little difference between the output of xine and Technotrend FF card due to the improvements in de-interlacing. This was one of my first reasons for using VDR - output via a graphics card looked terrible!
Please implement these changes to VDR to ensure that those who would like to see HD within VDR can remain with their favourite choice of open source PVR software.
I hope this helps,
Morfsta