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WinTroll · May 26, 2003, 05:00 PM

www.eyetv.com
www.eskapelabs.com

Anyone have any experience with these under OSX?

I want to be able to save TV episodes for later viewing without having to use any "native" viewer from manufacturer.

I would like to save in QuickTime format or MPG.

Can anyone shed some light on these two?

Thanks in advance!

Weezer · May 26, 2003, 07:50 PM

There's no comparison, get an EyeTV. Also, the website is www.elgato.com. It hardware encodes into mpeg-1, which you can view in any player, and you can also edit/export to quicktime.

Diggory Laycock · May 27, 2003, 05:33 AM

There have been several discussions of these two in the past - do a search - basically the EyeTV has good Software - the MyTV has very poor software.

yoyoman · May 27, 2003, 11:55 AM

Originally posted by Diggory Laycock:
There have been several discussions of these two in the past - do a search - basically the EyeTV has good Software - the MyTV has very poor software.

What about the firewire one. I forgot the name but better resolution and can support more than mpeg1.

GORDYmac · May 27, 2003, 12:50 PM

You're joking, right?

Weezer · May 27, 2003, 05:18 PM

Originally posted by yoyoman:
What about the firewire one. I forgot the name but better resolution and can support more than mpeg1.

Formac Studio DV/TV

http://www.synchrotech.com/product-1...verter_01.html

Terrible software, however I believe there is a program on version tracker that's supposed to be much better. It still will not give you the PVR functionality of the EyeTV, and your captured files will be DV, and thus much much larger. The Studio DV is mainly used for analog to DV video conversion, with TV as an afterthought.

Diggory Laycock · May 27, 2003, 06:54 PM

Originally posted by yoyoman:
What about the firewire one. I forgot the name but better resolution and can support more than mpeg1.

Yeah - the formac studio - I have one - very expensive - but higher quality (DV) - this means you can stream the DV back out to the TV - apart from the lack of surround you can't tell the difference between live TV and recordings.

The supplied software is terrible - but you can use Vidi - which is far superior (it even can use the FM tuner (which Formac's own software can't))

The only downside to vidi is that it doesn't have AppleScript support (yet) - so I can't control my recorder over the net (like I can with the formac software.)

DV is huge - about 3MB per second.

yoyoman · May 27, 2003, 07:10 PM

Originally posted by Diggory Laycock:
Yeah - the formac studio - I have one - very expensive - but higher quality (DV) - this means you can stream the DV back out to the TV - apart from the lack of surround you can't tell the difference between live TV and recordings.The supplied software is terrible - but you can use Vidi - which is far superior (it even can use the FM tuner (which Formac's own software can't)) The only downside to vidi is that it doesn't have AppleScript support (yet) - so I can't control my recorder over the net (like I can with the formac software.) DV is huge - about 3MB per second.

You think there will be one with firewire 800. Formc is better than the eye tv and my tv for sure. What do you mean surrond. Just get surrond sound for your computer. I hope they come out with a firewire 800 one that would be slick. How big of resolution can you get. Like 4x6 11x8 something comared to my/I tv.

Kenneth · May 27, 2003, 09:10 PM

I used to have the Studio DV/TV from Formac... pretty good for watching TV on my G4. FW800 on this thing would be a nice upgrade.

MaxPower2k3 · May 27, 2003, 09:34 PM

why does everyone think Firewire 800 would make everything better? If it's already fast enough to record at DV quality, how would FW800 make it any better?

yoyoman · May 28, 2003, 12:41 AM

Originally posted by MaxPower2k3:
why does everyone think Firewire 800 would make everything better? If it's already fast enough to record at DV quality, how would FW800 make it any better?

Higher resolution. Like at full screen. mpeg4. smaller pins with fw800 compared to fw400. Also less conjection. Smoother trasnfering.

Diggory Laycock · May 28, 2003, 05:15 AM

It does not need FW 800.

it uses DV which is a standard - giving it more bandwith won't improve the standard.

Your TV wouldn' be able to display any higher quality anyway.

DV is good enough for TV broadcast.

It would be nice however if Formac updated it to support a Surround Codec and Hardware MPEG-4 codec - then you could store recodings as MPEG-4 and they'd take up less space.

alas - Somehow I don't see them doing this though.

Diggory Laycock · May 28, 2003, 05:48 AM

here's a screenshot of vidi -

http://www.monkeyfood.com/thestuff/f...ots/VidiBB.jpg

yoyoman · May 28, 2003, 10:05 AM

Originally posted by Diggory Laycock:
here's a screenshot of vidi -

http://www.monkeyfood.com/thestuff/f...ots/VidiBB.jpg

Support for HDTV and all the new formts. Can you have full screen and matain full quality while watching and recoarding.

Diggory Laycock · May 28, 2003, 01:06 PM

Originally posted by yoyoman:
Support for HDTV and all the new formts.

Not sure what that first sentence means - but i'll guess.

Yes Vidi supports 16:9 aspect ratio.

HDTV no - I don't know anything about it (is it a US only thing?) - The tuner is just for normal NTSC - or PAL (depending on which country you live in)

Originally posted by yoyoman:
Can you have full screen and matain full quality while watching and recoarding.

yes it does full screen - recording doesn't seem to affect video quality displayed on the mac.

However - n.b. - watching TV through a PC is not the same as watching a tv - your computer will not be as good quality as a tv.

I think the reason for this is the fact that computers still don't have the horsepower to decode then display a frame of DV (digital video) at perfect quality 25 times a second.

The DV file itself is still very good quality though - so if you stream it back out through the formac (or burn it to DVD) it will appear fine on your TV.

tooki · Jun 17, 2003, 05:05 PM

Even HDTV doesn't require FW800.

As for "congestion," it's not a concern, because DV video uses something called "isochronous transfer" where, of the 50MB/sec available, DV's 3.6MB/sec are reserved and guaranteed for the DV transfer -- until the transfer is over, those 3.6MB/sec are off-limits to any other transfer.

tooki