How-To: MacOS X Firewire HDTV recording - Page 5

Well so was I, but I wonder is Steve Jobs aware that no matter what Apple does, it matters not one iota if you happened to have bought a HDTV and a STB that do not provide a Firewire connection, prior to his decision to support AV/C protocols. I do have a choice with regard to switching to another HDTV set, ( though I doubt whether I would opt for a Mitsubishi solely on account of the Firewire ,) but I'm afraid my satellite TV provider, Bell ExpressVU, an affiliate of Dish when it comes to STBs, etc. leaves me with no choice in the matter. If the 921's two Dishwire (LOL) connections are not 5C., then again I'm powerless to do anything about it.

I banked on the G5 to become my HTPC, but I obviously gambled and lost. "For the want of a nail !"

I finally got Virtual D-VHS on my PowerBook G4 record from my 6200 somewhat reliably. Previously attempts always ended up in 0 data and eventually hard crashing VDVHS and the firewire bus. Requiring me to hard re-boot my machine.

Interestingly enough, contrary to everybody's recommendation, I have found that running AVCBrowser was the cause of the crashing. If I know the channel, Virtual D-VHS works great without AVCBrowser running, but if AVCBrowser is running I get a hard crash. Either immediately or after recording about 20 seconds of footage.

Also as a side note, I've found that there is no problem recording to a network device. In my case I'm recording to my G5 in another room via 100Mb ethernet. Just some FYI's for everyone.

I assume that nobody figured out how to change channels on the 6200 via firewire. I saw some code going back and forth between several of you, but I don't recall hearing whether any of those hex codes worked. Did they?

Also, while I love the cool integration of these Applescripts and iCal, this has motivated me to finally conquer Apple's Cocoa. I'm looking forward to creating an even more advanced TiVo-like software for the Mac.


Jeremy

And if they are not? I have an over-the-air STB without 5C and I can record to VirtualDVHS via Firewire. And even if they are, the programmers will set the level of protection. VirtualDVHS should be able to record all content marked "copy freely" which includes broadcast and basic cable channels. Premium channels may be marked as restrictive as "copy once." We can copy today what the programmers are letting us copy with VirtualDVHS. Otherwise, I doubt that Firewire would have been enabled.

What is the firmware on your 6200? 7.07 or 7.10?

No.


Good luck and I hope all goes well.

Couple of questions: As mentioned previously I'll be picking up my SA 3250HD Firewire enabled STB tomorrow and I've got a 6-pin to 6-pin Firewire cable running from my G5 to where my new STB will live. I've downloaded VirtualDVHS and am reading all the doc's, etc.

One thing I don't understand - since I don't have Firewire on my TV I need to buy a D-VHS to make this setup work? That's like $500-$700. Why would I want to record from my Mac if I could record directly to the D-VHS? I was hoping for a less expensive solution, but for that kind of change I may wait for Comcast to release their forthcoming HD DVR.

What are the advantages of doing this from a Mac? I suppose I could play back my HD content on my G5 with VLC, correct? That would be free

What video card do you have in your G5? You should be able to send the video out using the VGA output. You will probably need a "VGA to Component" transcoder like these at Digital Connection . You can use VLC to playback on your HDTV once you get the transcoder.

I'v e got the Radeon 9600 Pro Powermac G5 Edition
http://www.ati.com/products/radeon9600

I just read about the KD-VTCA3 transcoder. This ROCKS. $149 sounds better eh?

Look at this post and this thread . Perhaps, a JVC 30K might be needed in the chain to record to hard drive from the SA3250 on certain systems.

Edited to add: The issues cited in the links could be isolated issues.

Excellent thread - since I'm moving from the 3100 to the 3250. Guess we'll find out soon enough if anything else is needed in the chain to record to a hard drive - on my G5 at least. If it works I'll be all over that VGA to Component (Y-Pb-Pr) Converter.

You just may need the DVI to component adapter, but I don't know how supported it is on the mac versions.

Well, since I couldn't find an Apple Cinema Display without dead or stuck pixels I stayed with my Viewsonic P225fb 22" CRT - so I'm already using the DVI to VGA adapter. Don't guess that would matter too much if I used it with the VGA to Component adapter. I didn't see a DVI to Component on that site...

RCliff - I planned on trying it first before buying the adapter. Thanks for the heads up though

You should be okay with a Dual G5/2.0 and it is good advice to test with VLC for dropped frames especially with G4 and older systems. An MIT MDR-200 (Firewire) is a good outboard decoder for HDTVs with component or RGB connections for older Macs. It does cost about $399, however.

Has anyone thought to use a stand-alone TiVo with this kind of set-up? I believe the Moto 6200 outputs on all jacks at the same time (maybe the Sammy does too?), so the TiVo could record the SDTV picture as a back up AND make sure the box is on the right channel, and the Mac could do the HD recording. I think I may have suggested this before but I forget if it was this thread. I use a DirecTivo now for my D* stuff and it rocks, but I do not want to pay $999 for the HD Tivo. If I could find a cheap series one stand-alone Tivo on Ebay maybe I will look into this. That is, once Adelphia adds more than HBO plus the OTA stuff I already get with the myHD card and my antenna.

Cool. Since I'm on Panther 10.3.3 do I need the Firewire 18b SDK?

That SDK has all the necessary programs such as VirtualDVHS and AVC Browser. It also has DVHSCap to export and import .m2t files between two DVHS devices. Yes, you do need it.

Run, succesfully with a Samsung SIR-T165:
PowerMac G4 Dual 1.25GHz, 512MB-1.5GB (FW connected to both T165 and 30k DVHS)

My 3250 is still a bit wonky, so I want to wait for it to stabalize a bit before I try this. For example, I get copy protection errors, and this causes the D-VHS to downconvert to 480i on record. More importantly... Star Wars airs Saturday -- waiting to record it since June '03 -- and I don't want to chance missing it!! After Saturday, I'll give it a shot.

On another note, I want to give a bit more detail on my experience here.

Record

I can simultaneously record to D-VHS and the Powerbook now! My connection diagram:

3250 --> rear FW D-VHS -- front FW D-VHS --> Powerbook

On the D-VHS, select the Input Channel corresponding to the 3250. You do this ussing the Channel +/- on the D-VHS front panel, and selecting "I-N" where "N" refers to a node. I select "I-3" on to get my 3250. If you have the D-VHS component outs run to your TV, you will see the 3250's output converted by the D-VHS and pass through to the TV.

After tuning to the channel you want to record, you can use the front transport to instigate recording on the D-VHS. On the Powerbook, select Channel 63, and press record. You should see data flowing.

Playback

Unfortunately, with the above connection setup, I cannot play back from the Powerbook. The solution is obvious, though inconvenient. Simply run the Powerbook into the rear FW port of the D-VHS. You have to re-select the Input Channel on the D-VHS, probably I-2 or I-3. After that just use Virtual D-VHS for playback, and you're set.

Oh, and you can record from the PB to the D-VHS with this setup... Just press record!

Hope this helps anyone in a similar boat to myself.... especially if you're on Time Warner San Diego, and have a 711 series Mitsubishi.

(All info here points to the Mitsubishi rejecting the MPEG stream from the 3250... raw or recorded. Don't know who to blame, but since the JVC can handle the 3250's stream, I am pointing fingers at Mitsubishi right now.)

-Pie

[Deleted due to repeat info]

-Pie

No rush. I remember when I was playing with the 6200 and the MDR-200 and having to disconnect and reconnect. When I did not follow the right process with the 6200 to reconnect, I couldn't record off the 6200 and I was in serious panic mode. Of course, I am past that now after having learned through trial and error how to reconnect reliably.

Again, no rush.

Something non-invasive would be to launch AVC Browser and get the exact name of the device (3250) from the first column of the device list and then quit AVC Browser without affecting the connection.

For $299 you can get a Roku HD1000 for playback. This is the solution I am currently using.

iBook G3 800Mhz 128Mb
iBook G3 800Mhz 640Mb

Can you play back the stream on your PB using VLC player?

iMac G4/800 512MB

Record: Excellent *****

Playback: Using VLC 0.7.1
SD: Very Good ****
HD: Fair ** (dropped frames)


Legend:

Excellent *****
Very Good ****
Good ***
Fair **
Poor *

Can you elaborate on how you archive to dvd ? Are you writing the stream as data to the dvd or 480p video ?

Eating Pie,

Another item on the already long request list. I bet you are using the second Firewire connection on the back of the JVC for the connection to the Mits. I wonder whether this rear panel Firewire connection would also enable you to record the stream to the Mac like the front panel Firewire does.

Please test this after your timeshifting event. Thanks again.

Are you compressing it or is the stream less then 4.9 gigs ? I thought about archiving 1 shows this way but haven't done it yet. How do I edit the stream if it is too big ? Is it easy to trim the beginning and ending ?