[ Added multimedia@ as that is a more appropriate list than hackers ]
> I just moved into a very cramped apartment
> we are using a broadcast signal only [current US {NYC} standards]
You'll need to know if you have any NTSC (analog) stations you
care about or if everything is ATSC (digital). Hopefully your
building has a good antenna system.
Next, select your tuner(s). You have a choice of tuners that connect
via Ethernet (HDHomeRun, pros: small external box, doesn't need a slot,
works with any OS, better diagnostic info than others. cons: I've seen
a *lot* of postings with people saying that various other tuners get better
reception, digital only no NTSC analog), Firewire (if they are still
available?), USB, PCIe cards (needs a slot), PCI cards (needs a slot).
Some cards also do FM radio.
> 2. What ports to install
Depends on what tuner(s) you select.
Cards based on cx88 need multimedia/cx88 and multimedia/libtuner
http://corona.homeunix.net/cx88wiki
has a list of supported cards.
Some cards are supported by bktr(4).
Make sure the tuner you select is supported by FreeBSD.
Recording ATSC takes very little CPU. Recording NTSC takes either
a lot of CPU or hardware compression. Decoding either takes a lot of CPU
(or hardware decoding which AFAIK FreeBSD doesn't have). You can use
at(1) for automated recordings. A full ATSC channel is 19.3 Mbps.
Some tuners allow filtering by PID, which saves disk space.
For playback you can use mplayer or any of several similar programs.
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