Newbie Needs help on picking which Linux distro to use for DVR

[Emmanuelg]

Hi! My names emmanuel and I am interested in using Linux.

I own a store and for the past 6 years I've been using a windows based DVR system. Lately the hardware has been failing and I wanted to copy and paste the entire windows install + drivers & software onto a new pc. But alas it did not work out. The software only works with intel based chipset and the DVR drivers + software is locked down to that one pc only that it was originally installed on. Changing the motherboard sends the computer into an endless bsod reboot cycle.

The company that sold me the system, secomusa backed out of the US market and no longer does any support outside of Australia. I was recently quoted 5k for a new security system to suit my needs. But I was left wondering what non-windows options do I have? The DVR cards still work and all I'd need to do was buy a new pc.

I am not very technically expereinced. I built myself a few pc's and I know how to fix a PC. I've used linux in school for a while but I cannot remember which distro, but I admit I did like it enough to consider using it as my full time desktop OS. But the complexity of it all scared me away.

Can anyone please help me?

[Rubberman]

What make/model are the DVR cards you have? I presume they are cards that plug into the computer bus (PCI)? Anyway, current Linux systems (Ubuntu/Debian, Red Hat/Fedora, et al) support a LOT of hardware out-of-the-box, and video streaming/recording is not a big problem. We'll try to help you find about drivers for these devices if you can give us more information. FWIW, you can run a live CD/DVD of a current Linux distribution with the DVR card(s) plugged in, and then run from the command line: lspci - which will list the hardware plugged into the computer bus.

[MASONTX]

You might start your search with LinHES, mythbuntu, and mythdora, available on distrowatch.com.