Tivo anyone?

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This is kinda off topic. Kinda not.

Does anyone know how the performance of Tivo compares to VCD? I know Tivo uses MPEG2. What encoder do they use? What resolutions and settings does it support? Is there a good web page to check out for these types of questions?

Thanks in advance,

-- Michael S. Gilmore (mgilmore@san.rr.com), April 13, 2000

Answers

Tivo records only at one resolution. Don't know the encoder or settings. You buy the box, sit in on your TV, and tell it what to record. It can't output to another recording device, except VCRs, and it can't burn DVDs or CDs.

-- The Lone Ranger (rutger_s@hotmail.com), April 14, 2000.

The reason I ask, is that I was wondering what the quality is. I've been looking for a realtime MPEG1 Encoder and they're all expensive. The Tivo is basicly a MPEG2 encoder/decoder with a 14 or 30 gig hard drive. I can't imagine that the quality at it's lowest settings could be much better than what I make on VCD. But I'm interested to check and see what the quality really is. Just wanted some opinions on the Tivo's quality. What encoding artifacts have people observed on Tivo?

-- Michael S. Gilmore (mgilmore@san.rr.com), April 14, 2000.

there's an article over at maximumpc.com with some more info. Apparently it's linux based and uses an IDE hard drive. The author tried unsuccessfully to upgrade the hard drive, but I would be curious to see about sucking data out of the thing. We know it only outputs to VHS, but what's to stop someone from converting the HD to an external so you can plug it into a computer and burn stuff that way? Has anyone tried pulling the drive out & accessing the filing system? Supposedly, future versions will get their subscription updates over ethernet. If I could plug the thing into my home lan & grab mpeg2 video out of it it would be way more interesting.

-- Sean (sean@magnuminvestments.com), April 14, 2000.

I own one of those PTV machines. In my case it's a Replay TV box and not the TIVO. Similar technology. Here's the scoop. I'm pretty sure the other poster is incorrect about the "single" quality. If TIVO is like the Replay it has multiple options for quality. With my replay I have three. The lowest setting is about as good as an SVHS tape. (of course the final quality will be somewhat dependant on your source) In my case I have a very clean cable tv source. The middle quality is VERY good. And the high quality as about as good as a commercial DVD. If you are interested, the bit rates are 2, 4 and 6 Mb/s I often record in the lowest quality and it is fine for casual viewing. There is a "save to tape" option where you can output the video for permanent storage to a VCR tape. In my case when I have that special flick I want to burn to VCD I'll have my Replay save it in highest quality and then play it back to my PC capture card.

These "boxes" are not simply digital recorders. The firmware is quite interesting. My unit hooks up to a regular telephone line and every night (wee hours of the morning) it calls a local number and updates the next two weeks of programing. There are many ways to have it "watch" for favorite things. During this nightly "adjustment" it will also check for new firmware and programming and download and install that.

I almost "never" watch live TV any longer, and haven't used my VCR since getting the Replay. For example, let's say there's a hour block of sitcoms I normally watch. I just set it to record them. Then while Frasier is being recorded I can use my TV tuner to watch another program on another channel. While this is not anything fancy, where it "does" get fancy is after that first program ends, (even if Frasier is still recording) I can switch to Frasier. AND start viewing it from the BEGINNING while the Replay unit is also continuing to record. When I come to a commerical I hit the quick skip a few times and in less than a second, I've jumped past the commericials. Because I'm watching about 1/2 hour behind "real time" I can keep "skipping" commericials and all along it's recording in real time while I'm "catching up". After a 1 hour of commercial free viewing I usually catch up to real time. By then I've managed to watch 90 minutes of sitcoms in 60 minutes !! (without any commericial) Of course it's also real handy for "live" viewing when someone calls on the phone. Just hit "pause" and come back later to continue where you left off. Only this time you gain the advantage of being able to "skip" the recorded commercials.

Opps, I'm sorry ... I'm off on a tangent here But I really love this technology. In fact I'm getting a new one with more storage. It's big thing is "time shift" viewing. In the highest quality the video really is outstanding. Many people are trying to "duplicate" this technology with the newer real time Mpeg capture boards and software in the PC environment. I have both capabilities and while the real time PC capture is nice it can't come even close in functionality to the TIVO/Replay boxes.

-- Rich (richa@home.com), April 14, 2000.


About 2 months ago on ZDTV ScreenSavers show, they discussed a new capture card that was going to be released by ATI. I don't remember the name of it. Anyway, ATI claimed that it was going to turn your PC into a digital VCR and would rival TiVo/Replay. ATI even had a webpage for it and had the specs. All of a sudden the webpage disappeared and ATI is claiming that it will not be released. Not sure what the deal is, but I suspect they finally realized that the card alone won't do it all without a very fast hard drive to go with it. It would be nice if it happens though.

-- EG Marshall (4me@shoolmail.com), April 15, 2000.


Is TiVO/Replay TV able to edit? Can you do titling, wipes, fades, and other editing type effects?

When I first heard of these types of machines, they said that those capabilities would be supported.

-- MrVCD (mrvcd@juno.com), April 17, 2000.


http://www.9thtee.com/insidetivo.htm

you can find part numbers of (Phillips) tivo. the mpeg encoder is a sony one (www.sel.sony.com/semi/cxd1922qwp.html). Since TiVo is linux ppc based connecting a IDE/CD-RW device would be possible. And then recording VCD/SVCDS would be possible too.

-- Abderrahim ABOUELOUAFA (aabouelou@yahoo.fr), February 09, 2001.


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