Most people who read here or are involved with the HTPC community in any way know most of the options out there.  For those looking to get started you may have heard of Windows Media Center and maybe SageTV, two of the bigger players in the market.  What you may not know is that there are a ton of options out there.
Luckily, if you are looking for a free alternative solution to some of the bigger softwares out there, the Telematics Freedom Foundation’s “Freedom Box Project,” has put together …

If DVR-MS Toolbox, the little app that can do anything to video wasn’t enough, Andy VanTil decided that SageTV users should be given cable card as well.  With that in mind, he’s created his SageMCTuner application that basically uses Windows Media Center to do the actual recording!
Though the process seems complicated, it is apparently working and Andy has put it out for testing.  You can find the app here.  Note that this is an experimental release so use with caution.  I have no doubt Andy will be refining the tool …

For those SageTV users who don’t want to run beta software, your wait is finally over.  Version 6.6.1 has been released from beta and is free for owners of previous version 6 software.  Brent has posted that there were at least 20 updates during the beta run some of which include:
 

BDMV folder (BluRay) support on the HD200 for playback of the main movie with support for audio track selection, subtitles and chapters
System Message functionality for simplified system monitoring
Placeshifter automatic logins
Overhauled channel setup & channel scanning for digital …

Brent Evans over at GeekTonic has the skinny on a new way to run an HTPC from SageTV.  It seems the company understands that setting up the hardware, software and drivers for an HTPC isn’t always easy and they want to make it easier.
During his interview with CTO of SageTV, Jeff Kardatzke, Brent learned that the company is working on a “SageTV Linux Media Server” that would run off of a USB key.  This would basically allow you to use a PC as a headless media server by booting …

I’m not a SageTV user myself, but I always enjoy learning and if there’s one place I’ve found that you can learn about SageTV it’s over at GeekTonic.  Brent Evans knows his stuff and he also knows others who do as well.
Today Brent published a guest post from Dave detailing how you can use your SageTV HD-200 extender to watch live and recorded TV while you’re away from home.  I have a friend who currently does this to watch his home programming while in the mountains of NC on …

SageTV, one of the more popular pieces of HTPC software on the market, is great about updates.  The company seems to pump them out continuously not just for the software but this time for their HD100 and HD200 extenders as well.
Brent Evans from GeekTonic has the details on the latest updates posted.  If you’re a SageTV user you’re going to want to know what the latest versions are going to give you.  Here’s just a sample:
For SageTV software:

Fixed bug with some ATSC/QAM recordings being recognized as MPEG1 instead …

Brent Evans, the…um, sage of SageTV has posted over at Geektonic that SageTV has released a beta update.  A few features include:
Improved UI performance
Network streaming improvement for media player mode
Optimized performance for high bitrate mkv files
Added support for zlib compressed subtitles in MKV files
Various subtitle support fixes
 
There’s a lot more included and the full details can be found over at Geektonic!  I may not be a Sage user myself, but I love seeing a company push updates like this.  I does tend to make me …

Brent Evans of Geektonic has posted that there are updates for three HTPC software solutions.  Updates are always good and Brent has the lowdown on all of them.