Recording to PC from a SA 8300HD via Firewire - Page 3

This thread seems to have gone quiet so I'm guessing there's no solution to the issues discussed here, but in the off chance let me just say I have the same issues as mention by samian here.

Is there anybody who's been able to figure out firewire recording on an SA 8300HD running Passport?

I have the same problem-- if I use the DVHS program, it crashes almost instantly. Instead, I tried VLC to record. It lets you open a recording device (video/audio) and stream it to disk if you want. This works pretty well, but every few seconds (or perhaps every certain number of bytes) the image distorts (gets MPEG errors) and the sound drops out.

I know there are two different chipset "types" out there for PCs and Firewire.. I used to have an older Sony camera which would only work with a Texas Instruments firewire card (my Creative on-board firewire would glitch up.) So, maybe this is the same case? Unfortunately, I do not have a seperate card to test on, only the one built into my laptop.

There has to be a solution for this. It's killing me to be so close and not able to fix it.

I hear you, I've been checking this thread (and all the others) hoping something will come up, but so far haven't heard of anything. AVS Forum seems to be the definitive source for this sort of info. I agree its seems like there should be some solution. I can see the SA 8300HD in my device manager all I need is to be able to record the data off it. Oh well

I've been able to get video off my 8300HD with my new macbok and use Apple's Firewire SDK. Just comes up with lots of video and sound artifacts. Any ideas on how to fix that?

Successful recording (albeit only a partial success):

Just thought I'd throw my 2 cents in here. I've only been working on this for the last couple of nights, but I have been able to successfully play and record from the 8300HD through VLC. I used the stream to file setting in the Capture Device tab. For HD content MPEG TS is a bit choppy with occasional artifacts. MPEG PS appeared to record well. I have only recorded several 5-10 second pieces of live material though. I have not experimented with streaming my DVR recordings yet. Playing them through VLC has worked occasionally, but I haven't figured out how to get them to play every time.

The important note: I have only been successful at recording if I setup VLC to capture the stream, THEN turn on the STB. The channel I have set as my "Power On Channel" will record. I have not been able to change channels or to start a recording while a channel is already playing.

Also, I've only been able to record about 2 secs worth of video using CapDVHS, before it crashes. I haven't been playing with that as much though.

Delusion
is that not the same defect one gets when using a DVHS recorder?
Gene

Sorry, I really don't know. (I assume you're talking about CapDVHS crashing) . I have since been able to record a bit more without it ever crashing. I haven't tried to see how long it will go though... just been experimenting.

Any updates? I still have a video I need to get off of my sa 8300HD

I never got CapDVHS to work for more than about 5 secs. My VLC work became a big disappointment. It was VERY hit-or-miss. It had major trouble with successfully sync'ing. Also, I figured out that something that loaded with VLC messed up my Nero Showtime DVD player, causing it to crash. I uninstalled VLC and Nero worked fine after that. I haven't been back to work with it since. ugh.

Thanks delusion!
When capturing via firewire from my SA4200HD using CapDVHS all the 720P content recorded fine without problems. Any time I tried to record 1080i content with CapDVHS it would crash within a few seconds.
I took your suggestion and tried VLC to capture. VLC does not crash, and I can now record 1080i via firewire to my computer! I also noticed occasional glitches in the transport stream, mostly on ESPN-HD and TNT-HD which make recording pretty much unwatchable. Luckily, the major networks are good and UHD is almost perfect which means I can now record BSG and Firefly in HD on Sunday nights.

Can't thank you enough for mentioning VLC to capture the ts data!


PS... The original "Back To The Future" is on UHD Sunday 9PM Eastern in glorious hi-def.
Hello McFly....don't be a butt-head... get your recorders ready!

Hey all, new to this topic, I lurk in the Mitsu hdtv area, lol

I have a SA8300HD, and decided to give this a little whirl and see what happens..

I have a laptop with XP Pro on it, and I downloaded that firestb.zip file, followed the instructions for extraction (since I'm not in WMC2k5) which worked fine, watch the drivers get installed etc..

Took laptop to stb, turned off stb, plugged firewire into both, turned on stb and low and behold... nothing happened. No ding 'found new hardware', nothing. Turned stb on and off a few times, nothing. (my tv uses the HDMI cable, so I should mention I had that unplugged that as well, in fear that it wouldn't know where to send the signal even if the tv was off).

With the HDMI cable back in, turned on tv (which works fine still, lol) and looked in the setup for ANY mention of firewire. I see nothing. There's no firewire output option (only the hdmi/dvi, upscale1, and upscale2, and auto I think??). Should there be some mention of firewire somewhere, or does it just happen automatically? What am I missing here? I mean, I expected some issues with getting the firewire to play through the PC, much less be able to record my saved shows (just hdtv tv, like nbc/cbs/fox/abc, not premium channels), but I didn't expect to have it just plain not do ANYTHING, lol Firewire port works, I use it all the time on a Sony DVCam..

Help?

After recording a particular program on the 8300, can you transfer that recorded program to a PC ?

That's pretty much what people are trying to figure out how to do with the SA8300.... looks like firewire transfer is not working as it would on other devices

So since this isn't working on the 8300HD, if I bought a 3250HD I could record on that and transfer it to my PC via firewire from the 3250HD?

How would that work with both receivers (could I have them both hooked up at the same time?), and would I have to let my cable company know about it or would it just be a plug and play type thing? With the incompetency of the local cable company I doubt they'd be even able to fathom someone owning another receiver.

In the US (it's different in Canada) the cable companies OWN all of the STBs (either 8300HD or 3250HD). The boxes have a unique ID and that ID needs to be in the cable system database.

There is no reason that you can't rent more than one STB from the cable company. If they both are in the same room, there is an issue with the Remote Control sending commands to both STBs at the same time. An effective work-around is to only have one powered up at a time.

But the 3250HD does not record does it?

IIRC, you could record on the PC, but the transfer would be "live" from the STB to the PC...

v/r,
C-F

I'm new to all this, but I tried the CAPdvhs and it explodes the moment I hit record.
I then tried VLC and although it won't record live TV, it does record anything I play back from my 8300HD's archived stuff.

Only problem is the recordings are extremely choppy and unwatchable. Just momentary glimpses of what looks like pretty good video here and there. And I can only playback a few moments worth before it explodes and reboots my computer.

The 8300HD is a real dissapointement. I can't archive to my 5U DVHS and I can't archive to my computer. And even if I use an external HD via USB to archive onto (haven't tried yet), I'm reading that I could only use the 8300HD to play any of that back. So thats another useless option considering the 8300HD is a lease and I don't get to keep it.

OK, it'ss still dead horse here... I dunno what you guys did with VLC but it doesn't record anything for me...

I now have the SA8300HD and use VLC to stream capture to my PC as CapDVHS always crashes within a few seconds of starting to capture.
Here's the post that got me using VLC for capture:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post8146474

My Method: I first record the program on the SA8300HD, then play it back- as it's playing back- I capture it to my HTPC (WinXP Pro w/SP2a) with VLC. I then edit out commercials/credits/etc... with VideoRedo- save it as a .ts file then run it through MPEG2repair (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=442446). Then I open the "fixed" .ts file with VideoRedo and simply save it as a Mpeg2 file. It's a few extra steps, but the files, even with a minor glitch here and there- play back really well on my HTPC. I recorded "Firefly" on Friday night and actually had no glitches after authoring, I recorded "BSG- The Story So Far" which had a few minor glitches (two within the first 60 seconds and probably two throughout the remainder of the program) after authoring. So, I'm pretty happy with the results now and renting the SA8300HD is only an extra $10/month from Cablevision.

I am trying to download from my hardrive from motorola 6416 cable box to a XP Media Center. I am using CAPDVHS program, I am getting the program to run, but when tring to record, I get a error, cannot record standard grizzsly,

what am i doing wrong, do I need a different program?

Thanks, I'll give it another try.

Thanks for some good news, finally. I'm still unclear about the limitations (if still any) on what material can be captured. I understand that you are capturing material that has already been recorded on the 8300HD. From what I've gathered from this thread that this is basically the only successful way to accomplish this via firewire (1394).

I suppose my actual question is; Will VLC capture any, including HD and/or this 5C (I'm not sure if that's exactly right) coded or encrypted HD content or is that what VideoRedo is used for?

Thanks to replayrob (for the VLC tip) and DoubleDAZ (for help getting my firewire ports activated, SARA 1.88.22.1) I have some limited PC recording capability from my 8300HD. I have tried various things and found that:

- I can reliably record items recorded on the 8300HD. No live feed. That's really all I wanted anyway.
- CapDVHS does not work with the 8300HD.
- I use VLC to record - it works, but only the latest version - v8.6a.
- Using the Media Information function in VLC I found that any recording with a bit rate over ~15,000kbps gives me dropouts/hiccups over firewire, but the feeds are still recordable. Those same original recordings are flawless displayed though component from the 8300HD. I am using a couple of active firewire extension cables to get a 40 foot connection. Don't know if this is the cause, but I might eventually test that possibility by moving the computer closer to eliminate the extension cables.

This is awesome news. Thank you for sharing your experience. Are you able to capture ANYTHING you've previous recorded on the ? For example, something from DiscoveryHD?

I can't record the 5C enrypted channels including DiscoveryHD. I can record the local HD and basic SD channels.

Ouch. So that's why it never worked for me - I wanted to dump my Rome episodes from the box...

Awwh, man what a bummer. I have some shows on there I'd like to show to some friends and family sometime but keep worrying about a crash. These are shows that aren't available on the market either (HD-DVD or Blu-ray) AFAIK.

Cant get anything off of mine not even with VLC. How do I find the if the channel/show is encrypted or not?

Also could I get step but step instructions with VLC on how to capture or view?

Thanks.

Thank you Vidguy for that nugget of information. I've tried using VLC to record from the 8300 live and off the hard drive for many months with no success. I didn't think of trying the latest build (0.8.6a) until you mentioned it (was using 0.8.6). Now it appears to work. I was able to capture about 20 minutes off the hard drive and playback looks perfect. Also, a big thumbs up to VideoLan for the 'fix'.

You need to look at the 8300HD diagnostics screen, page 31 "1394 Information". Read the SA 8300 HD Tips & Tricks -- SARA thread for instructions. You can change the channels while watching the diagnostic screen to check various channels. There is a delayed reaction, so wait a few seconds after changing channels. If "free" or "undefined" is shown, you should be able to record that channel.

To use VLC:
- Open VLC
- Choose "File" > "Open Capture Device"
- In the DirectShow tab to the right of "Video device name" click "Refresh List," then choose "Scientific-Atlanta AV/C Tuner Device" from the drop down.
- If you want to capture the stream, click "Stream/Save", go into "settings" and select "Play locally" and "File" and enter a filename ending with .ts. Use the "Browse" button to specify a loacation. Click "OK"
- Click "OK"