Recording HDTV

I have myself a kickass Sony Trinitron CRT HDTV. Puts out a killer image, noticeably superior to any LCD or Plasma I've seen. But...it only has the older NTSC analog tuner. For me to see current DTV broadcasts, I'd need to add some type of external ATSC tuner to the mix. I'm currently using one of those DTV downcoverters the Feds sponsored. Gives me a real nice image, but it is only SD. I want an HD image on my HDTV. I also want to record the occasional program when I'm not home.
Here's the catch. I want to do those things without a monthly fee. I don't mind a one time hardware purchase, but I want the cash layout to end there.
I can add the ATSC tuner with hardware from the cable or satellite companies, or from TiVo. And they will all record the HD signal for me to watch later. But all of them come with a monthly fee. I can hook up a stand alone ATSC tuner and an antennae for free HDTV reception, but how do I record that signal?

Hi Jim,
The TIVO box is, of course, a one-time purchase. It should see all the channels you get from the stand-alone tuner box, without signing up for a monthly fee, and can be used to record any channel at a given time. Just like on tape, except you can set a time and channel ahead of time, I believe. The TIVO monthly fee service only adds the search and other menu capabilities, looking for favorite programs and setting up a recurring record function.

Similar Messages

Record HDTV from cable box

I have an EyeTV 250 which I have used for years to record (using the EyeTV software) the analog signal my cable system (TWC) provided. The cable company recently switched to all-digital, but provided digital-to-analog converters to anyone who didn't have a set-top box. I ran the analog signal from the DTA into my EyeTV, and all worked as before. Now I want to record HDTV. The DTA has an HDMI output as well as the analog output. What do I need to complete the task? Elgato no longer sells this type of equipment in the US, and frankly, i'm not even sure what (if any?) equipment I need.

See this link:
http://macteens.com/index.php/features/fullstory/howto_make_your_own_home_theatre_machtmac/
I haven't tried it, but have always wanted to.

Watch and record HDTV to imac

Ok, so i have a few questions that are quite extensive.
First I want to watch HDTV on my imac and want to know what ways I can do that?
I have directv and wanted to know if I could watch directvHD on my imac record it and then edit that footage maybe send to imovie or FCE4 and then make a DVD of different recordings using Toast 9, (I already have toast and FCE 4).
What do I need to do that?
Or my other option would be to get an EyeTV product the hybrid or the 250 or whichever one I need to watch hDTV record it and do the same with export it and editing it.
What do I need to do that besides the eyeTV product?
My questions are getting convoluted in my head, but basically I want to watch HDTV on my imac, record HDTV, edit my recordings, merge recordings to make a movie, and burn it to DVD using Toast 9 which can record HD to regular DVd.
Let me know, any help is greatly appreciated.

Providing the programs are Mac compatible then there isn't a problem. Although your purchased versions may be for Win and thus there in lies the problem.
In addition with it being Mac you cannot watch Blu-Ray which means you won't be able to watch HD Hollywood blockbusters. However I am uncertain as to whether you simply meant HDTV footage you created. You still need more explanation but I hope that throws some light onto things?
Bootcamp allows you to use programs designed for Windows and the setup for this is pretty minimal and encouraged by Apple.
Message was edited by: ToonBoomAnimation

Recorded HDTV and ATV question.

Hi
I am going through the PVR purchase research and am interested in recording free to air digital tv to then stream to the tv via ATV.
If I were to use an EyeTv type receiver to record to the computer, does it need to be converted to another format before the ATV can use it?
Also, the digital receivers claim to need either dual G5 or intel processors to access 720p (the format of my tv) or 1080i/p. Is this only for watching the broadcast live or will I be able to record this quality and watch the HD content later using my single 1.8GHz 2 GB ram G5?
Are there any tuners for that matter that my set up can use and utilise the 720p format?
Thanks in advance

ATV requires MP4 format. When user records from a set top box the file is .m2t
Example, what I do:
Record a "copt freely" movie to the Comcast set top box. Once done I play it back and use AVCBrowser (taken from Apple SKD and free) to capture that movie. It is in .m2t format. Then I'd use either Handbrake, VisualHub or MPEGStreamClip to convert for ipod or ATV in MP4 format.
I never used Eyetv because I did all the above for zero cost except for time.

Retrieve recording from fios

I guess this topic was discussed before and it was all over the internet. here is the issue. I just got new plan and sign up with fios tv with dvr. I am new to this and actually first use dvr. I recorded some shows on tv and want to take it out put on my hard drive. I looked through the dvr menu and found no option to do that, then contacted tech support. they told me there is no way to do that due to copyright. The recordings stay in the machine forvever even if I cancel my service I have to return the dvr machine recordings still in it.
I found discussions on internet about people trying to download the recording with real time recording with tv tuner. I have an old vcr with dvd recording. I tried to record it from dvr put found quality is not good, plackback was crappy, not clear. Maybe the connection was not properly setup.
anbody know how the connect settings to improve recording quality?
I also found discussion that people try to record from dvr playback with tv tuner. what are the good ones that can recording HDTV quality? is it possible to record with HDMI ?

HDTV -- HD DVD

I record HDTV programs over the air on to my Mac using EyeTV. I can easily demux these MPEG-2 transport streams (1080i and 720p), bring them into DVD Studio Pro, and author an HD-DVD which I burn to DVD-9 media (red laser dual layer).
However, sometimes I would like to downscale 1080i programs to 720p. The only way I have found to do this that DVD Studio Pro finds acceptable is to transcode the 1080i MPEG-2 to the Apple Intermediate Codec at 1280x720, and import the result into DVD Studio Pro and allow its encoder to convert back to MPEG-2 when I do a build. So, I have a solution. But, it's very time/resource intensive. Can anyone offer a better solution?

Hey Guys,
The thing I've found is that if your source TS file is 29.97 fps then I can demux it with MPEG Streamclip and the mpeg file imports just fine.
If the TS is 23.976 fps, then the demuxed file isn't supported.
I will be at the NAB show tomorrow thru Thursday, and I will be asking a bunch of questions when I get there.
Also, I can get the Dolby Digital audio to import, but when I burn a disc and play it back in my Toshiba HD-A1 HD DVD player, the audio is silent.
Anyway, I will update this when I get back.
Thanks for helping, and verifying what I have discovered.
Casey

Capturing/Editing HDTV in imovie

Hi,
I have learned all about recording HDTV onto my Comcast DVR box and putting that on my powerbook via firewire. Everything works pretty well. I want to edit out commercials from an HD program and still retain as much picture quality as possible. I normally would use AVCvideocap/MPEG Streamclip to convert the .m2t file to .DV and import it into imovie for editing. Is this the best way for maintaining picture quality?
Thanks!
12" PB G4

You can do simple editing right inside Streamclip. Select IN and OUT points and remove ads. Then save or export.

Windows Media Center on my HP TouchSmart PC won't switch channels on my attached Cable Box.

Have a Motorola DCX3501-M DVR (cable box) connected to my HP TouchSmart PC (Win 7 64-bit) in order to view and record HDTV channels. Problem is I can't get Windows Media Center to communicate with the cable box properly, e.g., when I select a channel to view in WMC (using the PC's remote control) it does not tell the cable box to switch to that channel. I have the IR cable connected from the rear of the PC and affixed to the front panel of the cable box. How can I get the cable box to work properly with this PC?

Hello Curly2U:
Did you connect the IR cables correctly ?http://www.motorola.com/staticfiles/Video-Solutions/Products/Video-CPE/All-Digital-Set-Tops/DCX3501-... Now I look up your cable box. Take the IR cable that is connected from p.c. IR out port and plug the other end directly into EXT IR IN port. Next to IEEE 1384 and Power Cord ports. I really do not see how a p.c. remote can control any thing but the computer because these remotes do not have a option to add codes to them like a universal remote does. They also do not have special butons to allow you to contol other devices such as tv's or stereos and cable boxes like a universal remote does. I checked our Help and Support and did not see anything about mentioning controlling other devices.
You might want to by pass the cable box altogether and directly plug the cable antenna wire directly into the computer and see if it can tune in cable channels. You might not need the cable box after all. There are two antenna ports on your computer try switching the cable antenna arround. I found out one antenna port olnly picked up one channel and when I switched the cable cable arround I was able to pick up all the channels.

DAW - advice for setting up my new DAW?

Hi,
I intend to get my own DAW/general purpose computer in the next few months and was hoping to run my plan by y'all for advice. I intend to use it half for music recording, and also as a normal computer.
I plan to have a high end graphics card (dual dvi) for games etc, will run a 23" widescreen lcd (pref apple on pc) or bigger maybe upgrading to dual monitors later. I am running a HD tv card which needs some good headroom when recording. I only play far cry and need for speed when it comes to games etc so won't have a million games installed.
I have a about 50 gig of music mp3's and wmas and general stuff, so need lots of storage space. I have about 10gig of AA session files and that will grow so im thinking 30-40 gig min.
For recording/mixing, i have usually 10 trax minimum with lots of real time, sometimes locked fx, i do a lot of processing/wave editing and can have up to 10minute tracks up to 24 etc so i need some juice to power it all. running xp pro sp2.
Can someone explain raid vs ide, im told i can raid 2 similiar drives, but how much better is it, and are there draw backs? can i raid 2 x 15000rpm drives together(2 x 20 or 2 x 40 gig) as my dedicated AA session files space or is that just overkill, i plan to have maybe 2 x 250 gig 7200 or 10 000 drives raided as a dedicated digital vcr for HD tv recording, a small system drive 20-40gig just for installed stuff, another 80-250 gig for normal storage. Any ideas for best way to configure this stuff? minimum im thinking is sep small sys drive, sep AA drive/raided or not, sep bigass drive for TV recording, and sep general storage drive so thats minimum 4 or more.
Wireless keyboard (ultra flat touch keys like on bank atm's sort super silent DO THESE EXIST YET IF SO PLEASE TELL ME WHERE AND WHAT CALLED?)
and wireless optical mouse with extra side buttons and fully functional
Can y'all fill me in on scsi, im told the 14k rpm drives need a scsi
controller or osmething? tell me about this stuff please
Also, 64bit cpus? what the hell does that mean
I'm thinking the fastest intel cpu wht is it 3 gig these days with cache, or does anyone know how much dual cpu will cost (and what needs to go with it) motherboard with 800fsb and 8x agp that can take like 1-2 gig of ram (what sort is fastest?), 8 x agp graphics card that is very high end for 1080i output for high definition tv, and games.
Obviously dvd+rw/cd+rw drive.
Need advise on DAW case, ultra sound and heat proof as i might sleep in the same room and im sick of noisy computers, and i might need a big load of space with all the hdd's depending on what i get, will have a usb2. pci card no doubt and tv card etc
Wondering bout the new audigy 2 zn platinum pro thing Is this any good compared to the normal audigy 2? it says with firewire i can have 7 stereo inputs, is that really true at once, do i need extra external hardware like a mixer to do that, and does AA support that at all?
I have a decent pair of phones i will use for a while until i get studio monitors so don't worry about them for now, thats later.
I hope to spend only about 3-6 grand Australian pref no more, so any suggestions of other things to add or not to bother with etc, revisions?

Billy Corgan wrote:
> I intend to get my own DAW/general purpose computer
> in the next few months and was hoping to run my plan
> by y'all for advice.
Don't clutter a daw with too much GP stuff, office software
installations and antivirus software should generally not be installed
on a daw, and a gp computer can generally not be without either.
Generally, mind you, generally is generally a lot less general with the
more capable hardware, but a lean daw is a happy daw. Fortunately a
p2-300 with 192 megs of ram and a modern harddisk is still a lot of GP
officing computer, and such machines are not costly on the second hand
market.
> I intend to use it half for music recording, and also as
> a normal computer.
There may be valid reasons for doing that, if so then you could be well
off having multiple OS installations on it, one for GP use and one for
Audio use and making it a multibooter. It however my experience that a
multibooter always ends up being booted in the wrong OS ..... O;-)
> I plan to have a high end graphics card (dual dvi) for games etc,
A dual head card is strongly recommended. Matrox has nice cards that do
not need to have a fan on them and that do not require the utmost
hardware speed. You do not WANT to have the ultra fastest graphics card
on a daw because you need to avoid that the graphics cards bus bandwidth
requirements obstruct other, more vital chores. Less fast cards that do
not require a fan allows for a more quiet system.
> will run a 23" widescreen lcd (pref apple on pc) or bigger
> maybe upgrading to dual monitors later.
It may be that you can get dual smaller lcd's for the same budget as one
23", and it may be of more use, everybody is on some kind of a budget,
and you also need to have money over for audio hardware. Good mics and
good mic pre's do more for the quality of your sound than a larger
screen.
> I am running a HD tv card which needs some good headroom when
> recording.
Hmmm ...... select the recording options wisely, you come across as
chasing specs rather than as being aware of just what specs you actually
need.
> I only play far cry and need for speed when it comes to games etc
> so won't have a million games installed.
One never knows what the future holds, but it should be possible to
avoid having too many games installed at any one time.
> I have a about 50 gig of music mp3's and wmas and general stuff,
> so need lots of storage space. I have about 10gig of AA session
> files and that will grow so im thinking 30-40 gig min.
It is too costly pr. gigabyte to buy anything smaller than 120 GB, and
the 120 GB drives of today are all comfortably fast. You should at least
have two physical drives for Audition so as to be able to avoid
simultaneous reads and writes on the same drive, three physical drives
are imo preferable.
> For recording/mixing, i have usually 10 trax minimum with lots
> of real time, sometimes locked fx, i do a lot of processing/wave
> editing and can have up to 10minute tracks up to 24 etc so i need
> some juice to power it all. running xp pro sp2.
I think that your setup is one that would benefit of having three
physical drives to prevent having temp files on the drive that contains
the "static" audio files.
> can someone explain raid vs ide, im told i can raid
> 2 similiar drives, but how much better is it,
Depends, it is not faster than a single drive where it is fastest, but
raid 0 (simple stripe set) is less likely to show performance reduction
due to file fragmentation. A stripe set still counts as "one physical
drive", and if you want to have only two drives in it you are better off
not having them striped.
> and are there draw backs?
You can not remove just one harddisk and move it to another machine. If
one harddisk fails, then all is lost, at least if you run a simple
stripe set. The probability math is tolerable with only two disks in a
stripe set, but it takes less of an error to loose all. All things
considered you need to have a problem to solve by striping prior to
doing it, and distributing multitrack files over several physcial drives
is also a way to increase playback performance if there is a problem to
solve.
> can i raid 2 x 15000 rpm drives together(2 x 20 or 2 x 40 gig)
> as my dedicated AA session files space or is that just overkill,
That would be a silly set up, three 5400 or 7200 rpm 120 GB drives is a
possibly less costly way to get same or better performance, assuming
wise deployment. You will always end up having some copying of files
from one physical drive to another, and consequently it is very wise to
have identical drives so that the faster need not wait for the slower.
> I plan to have maybe 2 x 250 gig 7200 or 10 000 drives raided
> as a dedicated digital vcr for HD tv recording,
I wouldn't raid them, but tv recording is a very fast way of making
large drives appear small and I don't really know what the bandwidth
requirement is for recordign hdtv.
> a small system drive 20-40gig just for installed stuff,
No, you will be wasting a valuable drive bay on a drive that will be a
bottleneck, three drives is a good idea, but preferably identical or at
least similar. Put that old drive in a USB 2.0 box and use it for
project backup instead.
> another 80-250 gig for normal storage.
Yes, you may need storage space when you want to do TV recording, so 750
GB unformatted is not unreasonable.
> Any ideas for best way to configure this stuff? minimum I'm
> thinking is sep small sys drive, sep AA drive/raided or not,
> sep bigass drive for TV recording, and sep general storage
> drive so thats minimum 4 or more.
Three 200 GB drives will probably be the optimally cost efficient setup.
> wireless keyboard (ultra flat touch keys like on bank atm's
> sort super silent DO THESE EXIST YET IF SO PLEASE TELL ME
> WHERE AND WHAT CALLED?)
A wireless keyboard is called too slow and too sloppy ...
> and wireless optical mouse with extra side buttons
But a wireless mouse can be an ergonomic advantage, agreed.
> can y'all fill me in on scsi,
Too costly.
> im told the 14k rpm drives need a scsi
> controller or osmething?
Yes, and thus it gets to be about a very different and very costly mobo.
You do not want a disk controller on the PCI bus on a DAW.
> also, 64bit cpus? what the hell does that mean
Currently nothing of relevance considering the current software. What it
means is that the memory allocation space can be 64 terabytes rather
than 4 GB, and that is rapidly getting to be of importance for database
servers and terminal servers.
> im thinking the fastest intel cpu wht is it 3 gig these
> days with cache, or does anyone know how much dual cpu
> will cost (and what needs to go with it)
It is unknown to me whether Audition actually will benefit from multiple
CPU's, generally the required CPU versions (XEON) and mobo's are too
costly to make sense.
> motherboard with 800fsb
Asus P5P800 is modestly priced. I think your specs are extreme and that
your quests are of the "it would be nice to be able to" type. Life is
not about using as much money on chasing specs as possible, but rather
about getting good results. To do that, you also need to have resources
to get some reasonable audio equipment. Leave all the video concerns out
of it, I have understood them to be about leasure, and live with
recording the number of pixels that is possible with a good DAW.
I suggest this also because it may be problematic to try to make a
multitrack audio recording simultanously on the machine that records the
video in case "both combined" is the productivity quest. Just one reason
for not thinking that hdtv is very important on the machine is that it
is not very likely that you actually record hdtv with a camera.
> wondering bout the new audigy 2 zn platinum pro thing
In the audio context that is relevant here something Midiman is "more
like it" - example product, not the only possible choice. See also
http://www.pcavtech.com, Arny Krügers very interesting web site and a
good place to start learning more about sound cards. A budget card that
it appears will meet your demands is the Midiman 1010LT or similar model
from other manufacturer.
Kind regards
Peter Larsen
* My site is at: http://www.muyiovatki.dk *

Mac Mini DVR?

Looking to get rid of my Cox Cable DVR box and possibly replacing it with a Mac Mini.
I don't necessarily want to get the brand new Mac Mini but was wondering what the bare minimum Mac Mini I would need to purchase in order to record HDTV with EyeTV? Would I need an Intel Core Solo, Duo or Core 2 Duo?

That's the problem now-a-days you can't just run down and buy a crt TV it is going to be a flat panel with either 720 or 1080i. Try viewing anything that is not HD on a 50" plasma. It looks horrible. I had a HDD/DVD recorder that worked great for recording regular tv, but I can no longer do that cause when I port the regular 480 recorded data over to the Plasma it is awful and painful to watch.
So almost all the cable channels that are HD are encrypted and need the Cable top box to decrypt the data, So I've been told.
So to my real question I want to record the HD cable channels so I can view regular recorded TV on my plasma. Can I do this with the Mac mini with the Elgato? Does anyone know what hardware I would need besides the mini to capture the data?
Am I even making any since, this is not my specialty. Ok, so I have no specialty but I am really weak here.

I want to switch

Hello, I have been a Windows user for all of my life, and I really want to switch to Mac OS X. I think the software and hardware is eye candy and so easy to use. Yesterday I was on a friends iMac G5 and it was faster than my Sony which costed me $1800! So I can only imagine the speed of the new Intel Macs.
I really want to switch, but I don't know where to start. I don't know how to sell my computer for the best profit and such. I am afraid that I will lose money by selling my computer, although it is an extremely nice Windows PC.
I would like to wait for Leopard to come out installed on the iMac's but I would like to sell my computer soon so it doesn't get anymore outdated.
Can anyone help? Thanks!
Oh, by the way how would I be able to watch and record HDTV on an iMac?
Sony VAIO VGC-RA840G Windows XP My computer will be 1 year old the 16th of Augest. I take extremely good care of my computer.

Prices aren't reflecting reality until an item actually sells. Pay no attention to bidding prior to that. Unless you're a bidder you must ignore all open auctions, and re-search your item using the "completed listings" limiter.
edit-
You have the ability to see about three weeks of past results. Throw out the seemingly abnormally high and low results and the remaining price range is usually a pretty fair estimate of value, although that doesn't mean you'll like the number. Once you learn that info and set your goal, it becomes more a matter of "marketing."
Message was edited by: myhighway

HD disconnects on opening imac

External HD (LaCie) disconnects everytime I put the iMac to sleep and/or restrat ?

If you don't want to use BluRays the only legal way to get HD movies onto your I can think of is recording HDTV.
But I'm not aware of TV stations using 1080p - only some channels using 1080i

Eye TV 250 Plus and Mac OSX Leopard

Does this device work well with Leopard? Also, has anyone used this device to capture VHS to MPEG-2? Does it do so without dropped frames?
I understand this device can buffer Live TV to RAM. Is ok to do with Leopard and does it make that RAM available again after closing the app.? Thanks.

Canopus will convert the analog source to DV format which is natively editable by iMovie.
EyeTV 250 and EyeTV Hybrid will convert the analog source to MPEG2. To edit in iMovie you need to further convert the MPEG2 files using MPEG Streamclip (free) and the Apple QuickTIme MPEG2 Playback Component ($20). You can convert them to AIC or DV for best editing results. I deinterlace in this step, as well. If you don't plan to edit, you can sent the MPEG2 files directly to TOAST from the EyeTV software. You can also convert the MPEG2 files to h.264 format using the EyeTV software for use on AppleTV, iPhone, iPod, iTunes, etc.
Personally, I use the EyeTV Hybrid, which is all you need if you have an Intel Mac. If you have a Power PC Mac, get an EyeTV that offloads the processing such as the 250. I have to go through an extra step before editing, but I am getting excellent results, and I also get to watch and record HDTV on my Mac.
These days, I should also mention that the EyeTV solution connects via USB, while the Canopus connects via Firewire. Some recent MacBooks do not have a Firewire port, but if you have an older Macbook, or any iMac, Mac Pro, MacBook Pro, Mac Mini, they should all have firewire.

Motherboard Recomendations

My "server" is suffering badly. I belive I had a power surge that made the system all wacky. Anyways, I replaced it with the closest (physically, not specs) board I had. So I went from a Athlon XP 3000+ to a Pentium 3 667Mhz. It's not doing the trick as well. (Read...can't keep up with the 1.5TB software RAID5 while recording HDTV).
I'm looking for motherboard recomendations. I'm not opposed to either Intel or AMD (although I'm a sucker for the underdog) and need something reliable more than 'fast'.
And yes...it runs Arch. And only Arch. Ever. (Long live Arch!)

It depends what you are looking for, are you after something cheap or something with all the whistles and bell's.
I have always found Gigabyte boards to be sturdy and reliable. As this is for a server I would go for something with a built in graphics chip (nvidia) and fast DDR2 capability, hardware SATA raid would be a bonus. Here in the UK you can pick up a Gigabyte S775 nForce 630I MATX board for under £45, I have built a couple of machines using this board for friends (unfortunately they insist on Vista!) and I haven't been disappointed. Have a look at Gigabyte's website and pick a board you like then google it for a good price!

What's the difference between El Gato Eye Tv 250 Plus and Canopus ADVC110

Is there any difference between these two devices? Both enable me to transfer videos/ Both enable me to hook up a television signal. So - is there any other significant difference?
Thanks.

Canopus will convert the analog source to DV format which is natively editable by iMovie.
EyeTV 250 and EyeTV Hybrid will convert the analog source to MPEG2. To edit in iMovie you need to further convert the MPEG2 files using MPEG Streamclip (free) and the Apple QuickTIme MPEG2 Playback Component ($20). You can convert them to AIC or DV for best editing results. I deinterlace in this step, as well. If you don't plan to edit, you can sent the MPEG2 files directly to TOAST from the EyeTV software. You can also convert the MPEG2 files to h.264 format using the EyeTV software for use on AppleTV, iPhone, iPod, iTunes, etc.
Personally, I use the EyeTV Hybrid, which is all you need if you have an Intel Mac. If you have a Power PC Mac, get an EyeTV that offloads the processing such as the 250. I have to go through an extra step before editing, but I am getting excellent results, and I also get to watch and record HDTV on my Mac.
These days, I should also mention that the EyeTV solution connects via USB, while the Canopus connects via Firewire. Some recent MacBooks do not have a Firewire port, but if you have an older Macbook, or any iMac, Mac Pro, MacBook Pro, Mac Mini, they should all have firewire.

Recording HDTV

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for