I let the people of the Internet pull in the shows from OTA, or what ever source, edit out the commercials, encode them into H.264, and pack them into MKV files. I just fill up my HDs with the shows (and eventually buy them on BD when available).
I find most every show I want to see, but I've not looked for anything from those three example channels you gave.
I’ve found that Chris’ way is the most efficient and cost effective because it allows you to try before you buy.
I made an HTPC with the intent of eventually ripping everything CD and DVD but found the process is just to labourious for the convenience and wow factor it gives. Most things BD and SACD I enjoy are things that I spend time with so the convenience of switching them quickly is pointless for me. The stuff I do find convenient to have quickly switch able are audio files I want to listen to casually where the most important feature to me becomes the media manager I use. It’s also convenient to quickly switch between music videos but for everything else the time I would have wasted ripping would never have been recouped in watching.
As far as H.264 MKV they look and sound fine but I’ve never A/B compared the audio to something playing in my BDP83. I have compared PQ and as long as the PC video signal is HDMI I think it looks almost as good as a regular BD. Just a guess but I imagine the audio isn’t as good since the sound card is usually the weakest link in most HTPCs.
However, I still use the HTPC more than all the rest of my equipment combined since I capture tens of thousands of songs from streaming radio each year and use it to watch various online content from the likes of Hulu, Netflix and others.
The biggest advantage isn’t the HTPC itself but rather the NAS I store stuff on. Having over 6TB of storage space is cool though it runs out very quickly.
The other advantage is being able to access it remotely over the internet is great when on long trips overseas since most of my music and over 4 TB of compressed video is a few mouse clicks away almost anywhere in the world. Now if I can just figure out how to login to is from my new phone I’ll have it made.
Also an HTPC can double as a good gaming machine.
