[MW Forums]

The EyeTV Hybrid has many benefits and few drawbacks. It’s a clear winner—especially if you want to take TV viewing on the road. If you have a slower, single-processor Mac, however, the EyeTV 250 may be a better bet. more

[sigma8]

I'm curious what your experience is about being able to record the highest quality MPEG2 video. I have a 1.66 ghz Mac Mini (the dual-core one), and it is not able to record the highest quality without dropping frames. It is probably 95% effective, but having a short stutter once every 20 seconds or so is very noticeable and jarring. I don't use it, and am forced down to the the middle quality which has the weird resolution (something like 352x480).
Also, I've had the software barf on me a few times. If you run out of disk space, it doesn't warn you, it just starts acting wonky and refusing to record stuff (or in one case, refusing to stop believing it's recording something, because it couldn't close out the file). I've also had it get stuck where it was low on space once, and after I cleared up space, it didn't seem to realize the space was cleared up and I missed a few scheduled programs.
That said, these events are rare. And for me they tended to happen when I was low on space. I have a 250gig drive I more or less dedicated to recording stuff, and yes I have run out :-o
Also, not having a separate antenna input for the HD is actually a fairly big drawback, as you cannot schedule for recording a HD program, and then a cable program. If you want to do that, you will have to attend your machine, and you will have to manually unscrew the coax for the cable or antenna, in order to plug the other one in. Since I have cable, I find I NEVER use the HD portion, which is a shame because it looks so gorgeous. It's such a pain to switch them, and if I ever do so, I might forget about a scheduled recording, and find myself missing a program. So even when there's something I want to see on NBC or some other channel that I get in HD, I do not watch it in HD.
I still think it's one of the slickest products. And it at least let me taste the HD a bit. Unfortunately, I think the only way to be able to effectively record both standard cable and HD broadcasts will be either a new product (with such a simple feature as a separate antenna input), or a second device.

[jamiebd]

"ATSC differs from traditional over-the-air broadcasts in that there is no static in the picture. If you have enough signal to receive a picture, it will be crystal clear. If you dont have enough signal, you will see and hear nothing."
I think this is a bit of an overstatement. I've had plenty of cases, specifically with the CBS station in Chicago, where you'll get a signal and it will break up, almost looking like macro blocking. So you will see and hear audio and video, but it will be breaking up.
I've found HDTV, or more precisely, ATSC to need a much better antenna then the standard "OTA" analog transmission. Using the same antenna, I can receive a perfectly good signal, I'll have trouble receiving ATSC signal. I've also found that the ATSC signals are more prone to interference caused by weather and other environmental conditions.
So I can't imagine hailing your laptop to the beach to watch television, and hailing your antenna and tripod along with you.

[webraider]

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I'm curious what your experience is about being able to record the highest quality MPEG2 video. I have a 1.66 ghz Mac Mini (the dual-core one), and it is not able to record the highest quality without dropping frames. It is probably 95% effective, but having a short stutter once every 20 seconds or so is very noticeable and jarring. I don't use it, and am forced down to the the middle quality which has the weird resolution (something like 352x480).

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This is why I don't recommend buying ANY ty capture device w/o hardware encoding built into it. Although I'm using the Standard TV Box from Plextor with the EyeTV software, it works flawlessly. I've had no problems to date and it records full screen Mpeg. It's more $ but Elgato sells a wonderful HD TV box with built in Mpeg2/4 Hardware encoing. All your processor has to do is project it and write it to your hard disk. If you rely only on softare then it has to project it, encode it and write it to your hard disk.
Also... what's not said is that you don't have to use only Toast to burn the files to DVD. I use CAPTY DVD and I prefer it as It lets me customize my menu's more. Just expore the RAW Mpeg 2 file (takes from 1-2 minutes depending on the length of the show recorded) and drag the file to CAPTY DVD. The only difference is that Toast is slightly quicker because it will import EyeTV files without the export. This only saves about a minute or two. You are then limited to TOASTS Menus and you can't customize them.

[CAG]

So if I hook this up to an Xbox 360, will I actually be able to get HDTV quality?
Thanks

[Seattle_Dan]

75 percent or more of the viewing public watches TV from a cable box or
Sat TV box. The outputs from those devices are component and HDMI (if HDTV) or s-video
for SD. This device will not work for those people, including me.
What I can't understand is why they did not provide video inputs, not just RF.
The problem we Mac users have right now is, you can't hook up video to your
iMac for instance, and use the computer monitor for TV viewing, unless you have a
DV converter for SD video, or an even more expensive HD converter.
Both of these would plug into the firewire input, then you fire up an editing
application to can see the firewire input. There still is no consumer
product for simply taking your component or HDMI output of your cable box
and plugging it into a box with firewire output, to plug into your Mac.
Or is there?
Dan

[Grapho]

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Also, I've had the software barf on me a few times. If you run out of disk space, it doesn't warn you, it just starts acting wonky and refusing to record stuff (or in one case, refusing to stop believing it's recording something, because it couldn't close out the file). I've also had it get stuck where it was low on space once, and after I cleared up space, it didn't seem to realize the space was cleared up and I missed a few scheduled programs.

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This is not unique to this software. I have a client that has lost twice all his e-mails trying to rebuild his database using MS Entourage, ending up loosing everything because of lack of disk space. He was never warned. He is not very computer savvy to say the least, and did not know about swap files and the like. But at least MS should have had Entourage check the availability of disk space instead of running his entire e-mail database, losing years of e-mail. Also he should have kept a backup, but that a deferent story.

[Modesto]

Hi Dan,
As far as I know this device comes with an adapter to input composite and S-Video.
As for your second comment, if you have a Motorola DCT-6200 HD cable box, you can run a firewire cable from that cable box to your Mac and record what the box is displaying. It will record HD and SD programming. This is the solution I am using and it did not cost me a penny since I have been renting the box from Time Warner (Comcast) and I already had the firewire cable. You will need the Apple Firewire SDK 18 (to record) and VCL Player (to playback).
Go here for how to do this:
http://macteens.com/...s/fullstory/how[/u]tomakeyourownhometheatremac_htmac/
It really works!!!

[JakeT]

The firewire on the Motorola works great, except that some channels are scrambled or something.
I've also heard of something called "Clear QAM". I'm not sure who all has it or how compatible, etc.
Everything should have firewire. That's the compressed signal from the broadcaster and firewire was designed for connecting multiple video devices. You could have your whole house wired together and have several control centers, a couple of terabytes somewhere for recording shows, etc.
It would also be nice if they added a coax output for connecting from one room to another that had the digital signal remodulated on channel 3.

[Seattle_Dan]

If this device comes with an adapter for composite or s-video,
those two inputs can only be SD, so that's not a solution.
I use DirecTIVO and it does not have firewire out.
But thanks for the info about the Comcast cable boxes.
I have buddies who use them. I'm not sure if they have
Motorola boxes or not but I'll check.
As far as displaying or recording, I have FCP on my systems
so that's not a problem as far as manually doing it.
But a solution, all in one, that looks at the program you
selected to record, that opens the app, uses a IR eye to
change the cable or Sat box to the channel you want, starts and stops the
recording, that's what we need for the Mac.
Right now there are many little separate
apps trying to work together and this is trouble for the average user,
in my opinion.
Dan

[goldenbear]

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... Unfortunately, I think the only way to be able to effectively record both standard cable and HD broadcasts will be either a new product (with such a simple feature as a separate antenna input), or a second device.

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Just curious...
Is there a reason why you couldn't simply use a coax splitter/combiner to hook up both an antenna (for HD) and analog cable?

[hillstones]

My TiVo Series 3 HD Media Recorder is the best. Got rid of the buggy Motorola cable box that seemed to always freeze up, and got annoyed with the banner ads on the program guide when Time Warner took over Comcast. Now I am back to TiVo's excellent interface and software. Have no need to watch TV on the Mac...that seemed so 90's when the Mac TV arrived and the TV feature transitioned to the Performas. I had a ixMicro TV Tuner card in my old Beige G3, until the company went under and Mac OS 9 broke the TV Tuner software rendering the card useless.

[irieblue]

I bought the Eye TV hybrid to go hand in hand with a 24' iMac. I specifically put up an outdoor UHF Antenna to pick up the over the Air HD broadcasts (basically a 3x3 Square style Antenna). Lacking in every single review I have read so far, is the absolutely magnificient quality of the HD signals. I get all of the major networks in HD (40 Channels here in Northern CA, although not all in HD), and it is absolutely drop dead gorgeous.
I sometimes have a small window open while I am surfing/recording a show and the 24" Core 2 Duo 2.1 Ghz iMac does not miss a beat. A 1 Hour HD show on NBC takes up 7 GB. The Eye TV software is well thought out, and works rather nicely with the Apple remote, although you can easily change the channel while you meant to scan backwards .
Because the UHF signal is somewhat directional, I can't imagine how a little whip antenna indoors will pick up any HD signal.
If you don't already have a HD TV, but have an suitably powered Mac, this is your best bet to experiencing HD TV.

[gudin]

What I want to be able to do is hook an HD Cable box to an iMac 24" and use the iMac as the HDTV, DVR etc.
According to everything I have seen and heard from Elgato, this is not possible.
This seems obvious to me, as you can apparently do it with standard signals, just not HD. When that happens, I'll buy a 24 " iMac and one of these devices.