Magnavox 537, 535, 533, 515, 513, 2160A, 2160, 2080 & Philips 3576, 3575 - Page 325

DigaDo & Wajo,

Thanks for your advice on the "Front Cut" & the "quick & dirty naming". I will get into that shortly.

Wajo,

Your ideas on the external dock -and -play HDD's are interesting & make a lot of sense. I have gone to your postings on how to do that a few times now. And each time I do that, I get intimidated. There is just so much I don't know about that subject - and I don't recognize the jargon used in the descriptions. And the thought of taking the unit apart & making modifications makes me nervous. I am sure it is much easier than it sounds at first glance, and once I got into it, it would be pretty straight forward. But currently I am suffering from 'Techno - shock' on this one.

I just purchased a DVD player [$36.50 refurb] that plays DIVX format, so that I can play the AVI files I have been downloading. It also has a USB port & the ability to rip files from a CD to the USB drive. It does a great job of playing AVI & other files on both the DVD's & USB stick drive. I have not hooked up an external HDD drive to it, but I am trying to figure out if this would be a viable option to the one you outlined above. The drag & drop option on the USB is really nice.

Let me make sure I understand what you said above. You can connect mutiple HDD's to the 2160 -- all at the same time - and you can be recording to one of them, while at the same time playing a title from another? What would be the rough cost of doing this with say 2 1Tb ext HDD's?

Jer

That hour long show to which you refer, has, as its underlying message, faith, hope and charity, but it also addresses American history from the founding era down to the early twentieth century progressive era and on to the socialist/marxist/revolutionary movements pushing for the "fundamental transformation of America."

That show is shown twice each weekday. The show's host often suggests that viewers DVR or record the shows for sharing with others. I record both weekday afternoon and evening showings to a Magnavox 2160 hard drive at LP. Then I usually audition and edit the afternoon shows first. The evening shows are recorded as back-ups to the afternoon shows (in the event that there are interruptions for breaking news, staged news conference pre-emptions or there are editing complications).

The initial editing consists of front and end cuts, mid-cuts of commercials and intro/outro graphic sequences before and after commercials/promos. The goal is to bring the edited shows in under 40 minutes as an average show length so that a complete week of LP shows will fit a single high-speed dubbed DVD. Sometimes the editorial content for a single show exceeds 40 minutes, sometimes even approaching 42 minutes. In those instances I re-edit that show and/or other shows to trim out a few seconds here and there, always taking care not to make any cuts to editorial content, in order to tighten-up the overall running time for the week's shows.

This last week had several "long shows" requiring numerous editing adjustments. I managed to botch-up the edit for the Friday afternoon show when I cut about 35 seconds of editorial content, so I turned to the Friday evening show in order to produce the final edited version of that show with all the editorial content intact. Then, after setting up the high-speed dub I found the overall content was a little too large for high-speed dubbing. I went back to the Monday show, editing out approximately 56 seconds, a promo for the show host's new book. (I retained the Thursday show's book promo with the Ronald Reagan content.) Then the high-speed dub was set up again, this time with a total of 4401 MB, and then the master DVD disc was successfully high-speed dubbed.

The two photos depict the five show thumbnails, their final timings and the empty title timing. (The photos were snapped before the master DVD was finalized.)

CopyPal duplicates of the master DVD have already been sent out (free) to shut-ins and several more will be circulated (free) tomorrow afternoon to OTA folks that do not otherwise have access to this show.

OK, I'm getting corn-fused. I posted earlier about the large number of channels I was able to get with just the bare Comcast cable coax without their box screwed into a standard (older CRT type) Sony TV in the guest bedroom.

I switched cables around today, ie: Comcast coax into my 2160A then up to the HD box. I scanned in the analog/digital channels into the 2160 and got the same number of channels but the PQ is very noisy/grainy!! If I switch over to the cable box's version of the same channel viewed through the S-Video from the box into the L1 input of the 2160 it's instantly clearer. As if the 2160's tuner is weak. I recorded a few minutes at HQ to double check and it was the same; noisy & grainy.

Any thoughts??

HDMI cable out from 2160 into the TV if I'm understanding your question properly.

OK, tried that and the poor PQ stayed with the 2160. I guess the analog signal from the cable is amplified or conditioned somehow by the cable box? If I switch the 2160 to DTV, the digital channels' PQ is good.

Switched to component cables between the 2160 & TV but PQ's the same. Looks like the cable feed is just too weak without a box.

Also, maybe the noise just doesn't show up on the old SD TV in the other room? PQ looks OK on it but of course there's no comparison between it and the 50" G-Series Panasonic plasma the 2160's hooked up to.

It was already on Progressive scan. One other thing I noticed is that the audio level is considerably lower as well.

OK, a big fat DUHH on me! I just looked at the Sony in the other room and upon further review, the PQ is noisy on it as well; just not as dramatic.

I'll bet either my cable signal in general is weak or that's just the way things are with Comcast here. No pay fo' de box, no purty pitchers to watch.

My wife rented Leap Year and watched it last night. About half the movie looked really bad like the 2160 was deinterlacing the wrong lines. My wife and daughter said it looked fine to them and didn't want me to investigate any further but I was curious if anybody else has seen similar behavior from their player?

I'm OTA - Not cable, but I always felt the ANALOG tuners in my DVDR3575 and DVDR3576 (which I presume are the same as the ones in the Magnavox 2160s) were of rather low quality. Since you say your seeing the same channels that you viewed with "a standard (older CRT type) Sony TV ", I presume you are currently using the Cable Version of that ANALOG tuner.

I found the ANALOG tuners comparable (at best) to the one in my cheap old VCRs. When I looked at the image from the S-Video outs of the DVDRs, it was noticeably inferior to the image using the TVs ANALOG tuner to process the same OTA channel. That was not an issue for me, since I bought these units to record DIGITAL OTA channels, and they work fine for them. Right now, there are no English language ANALOG OTA stations left that I can receive at my location.

Put a 500GB WD Caviar Blue PATA drive in my pawn shop find, the Philips DVDR3575 thanks to this forum. Works great.

Was going to rig up a separate external power source, if needed, but saw the power specs on the old 160 versus the 500, and they were super close to being the same, so I didn't bother with that.

Hey, I'm still wanting to open up my TiVo unit and try to use the HDD as I stated in post #8402 back in February. My problem is does anyone here know what type of screwdriver do I need to remove the screws holding the cover on?
Thanks!
Ghpr13

Jer01

What was the make and model number of the DVD player you bought which will rip from DVD to USB.

Hi Frontenac,

OOOOPS - I got that one wrong! It has the ability to rip a CD to the USB device. Sorry - I am disappointed too. I read the info wrong -- wishful thinking I guess. You get your choice of 128 or 192kbs rip rate. Ripping process is 2.6 x the normal speed.

I just received the unit on Friday and am still learning.

If you are still interested, it is a Samsung DVD1080P9.

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/produ...ct_id=11080823

In you want more info, at the above link - 5 lines below the $68 price, click on the 'Demo & 360 view' link.

Here are the Refurbs at Amazon. I bot mine from Retail Killer [$36.50] and am very satified with the transaction.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listi...on=refurbished


Jer

I have a similar model the Onyx Sw2300XS from Walmart, $38.00 in Canada. Wish I did have one that would rip DVD to USB.

High everybody,

Yesterday, in one of my posts, I said I was trying to figure out how to use the Samsung DVP 1080P9 with an external USB as an alternative to HDD farm with the 2160. Well, last night in bed at 5:00AM, I came up with this proposal which I will throw out here for your perusal/comments.

As I see it, the 2160 is great for time shifting, when you record a title and a short time later watch it and delete the title. But if your are like me and want to start collecting movies & TV series for long term storage, the HDD can fill up quite fast & the process for title naming & finding titles can be a little cumbersome. Reading the posts on this board, many of you have faced the same problem, since there is a lot of talk/action re upgrading to a 500Gb drive, and using multiple 2160's. Some of the latter may be just to have the capability of recording more than one program at one time, but some of it is because the previous unit is full & I don't want to delete titles syndrome. Those of you who are really serious about large collections have gone to HDD farms.

In that regard, I started looking into downloading the compressed files for TV programs that can be found on the web. These are MPEG4 format files - termed Divx, Xvid, AVI, etc. These take up much less space on the HDD, and generally give a good quality picture. One problem with these is that they cannot be played on many DVD players. So I researched DVD players that have Divx capability, and narrowed it down to players that also have a USB port, so I could connect some storage to it. I came up with the Samsung DVD 1080P9.

This unit has mostly good reviews at both Walmart & Amazon. It is also upconverting. But the biggest features for me are the ability to play compressed AVI/DivX files [ pretty much the standard for dl TV video files] and the USB port. I have tried the USB feature [USB flash stick] with Video DL AVI viles and it works great. I am researching what external USB HDD to buy [need FAT 16/32 ?????].

Just think, You could put 2,857 1 hr AVI files on a 1 TB HDD - or about 1,400 movies - your entire mp3 music collection. Or, if that is not big enough, try 2TB - or 3 TB!.

Let's compare that to how many 1 hr files you can store on a 160Gig HHD using the 2160. At SP you can record 60 1 hr programs -- at EP you can record 120 1hr programs before the HDD is full. If you upgrade your 2160 to 500 Gig, those numbers expand to 188 1 hr programs @ SP & 375 at EP. It would take 15 500 Gig Hdd's with the 2160 set up to give you the same storage capacity at SP as you would have with one 1 Tb Hdd using dl AVI files & the 1080P9. That number would drop down to 7.5 500 Gig HDD's if you recorded at EP. I hope some of you Techno-Geeks out there will double check my math!


With the 1080P9 you can set up different folders on the ext HDD to store:e. g. , MOVIES, TV PROGRAMS, MUSIC, PICTURES, HOME VIDEOS, ETC. The unit makes it easy [using the arrow buttons] to scroll thru & to open the proper folder and see all the titles you have in that folder [titles which you already chose when you first saved the file]. It is easy to scroll down till you find the one you want & hit enter to play. This is very user freindly in that regard. For someone who is considering a large collection of TV programs/movies, the use of downloaded AVI files & a DVD player with a USB port might be a good choice to connect to your TV along side of your 2160(s) for time shifting. You could be watching your video collection on the 1080P9, while your 2160 is recording your favorite programs for time shifting. And if you needed more than one ext USB HDD to store your colllection, it would be a breeze to switch the USB connections.

The AVI files have another big advantage. Some of us like to make DVD's from our collection of movies & TV series. With the 2160 at SP quality, you can fit 2.0 hrs on one DVD - at EP quality 4.0 hours. With the AVI files on the 1080P9 , you can fit 13 hours on one DVD -- or 13 one hr episodes -- 26 half our episodes.

Open Issues:

1--If we already have a big collection of titles in our 2160 system, I am not sure what it would take to convert them over to AVI files to be incorporated into the 1080P9 system.

2--Picture Quality of the 1080P9 system vs the 2160 system. But AVI files are generally regarded as good quality.

3-- Which HDD to choose for the 1080P9 system and what problems the FAT16/32 requirement would pose.

4-- How well the the 1080P9 system will work with a large external USB HDD vs the USB flash stick. I read the reviews and a few people used this option - all but one was positive. But little detail.

5--How to prevent loss of your entire collection if the HDD goes bad. I have read a few reviews & there are some horror stories out there in this regard [even a WD drive]. Of course, we have the same risk with our 2160's.

Jer

WOW !!!
Where to start????

Ok Jer...here I go with a lot of if's and a few questions:

It would help to know the following re: your setup--
Computer:
a. make/model
b. operating system version
c. HDD size (and make/model if known)
d. broadband (type) and download/upload speeds
e. router/modem make/models
HDTV
make/model
Budget
What is your budget limit for this project?
_________________________

Your Questions...My Suggestions:

1--A lot of time & effort. (need your setup details to answer.)

2--If your happy with AVI quality......I'm happy too.

3--To start, if I remember correctly, you mentioned a while back you download a lot of TV programs from the internet. Assuming you have a computer with a broadband internet connection running through a router/modem and your HDTV has either VGA+Audio inputs or an ethernet input, then an Ethernet HDD setup may be one solution. (Your setup details are needed before we can give specific recommendations.)

4--The Samsung User's Manual for the 1080P9 isn't very clear about use of large USB storage devices (Flash or HDD). You need to research this more deeply on the net or call Samsung Support (1-800-SAMSUNG) and ask questions.

5--To really protect your "library", you'll probably need some sort of offsite storage solution. The most practical would appear to be some sort of "cloud" storage, using a paid service like Carbonite, or a free limited service like Hotmail's Skydrive with it's 25GB of free storage. Of course you could burn a few hundred (or would it be thousands) of DVD's and put them in your bank safety-deposit box. Either way, they need to be out of your home, in case of fire, flood or other catastrophic event. (It could cost thousands of dollars to recover data from a "dead" HDD.)

Hopefully others will add their recommendations and suggestions. You've certainly picked a big chore yourself. Good luck.

Hi Waldwolf,

Thanks for the info. Here is the info you requested.

Computer: HP Pavillion A650 E; Windows XP Home ed; HDD 160Gb, 7200 rpm; DSL low level; Dsl Modem - Seimens SpeedStream 4100; no router or wireless connections at the current time.

SDTV: Sharp 27sc26b q - no HD TV; No eithernet connection.

Budget - Very low

And yes, I have been dl lots of AVI files. I used to think the 160 Gb HDD was plenty large enough. With my recent downloading of video files over the last 2-3 weeks, I have almost filled it up. I will have to buy a new ext HDD very soon - and transfer all those video files to the new HDD.

If you would, I would be grateful if you explain that FAT 32 requirement for the HDD and what that would mean to me. I don't understand that at all. Some of the reviews have said that we would have to reformat the HDD to FAT 32????????

Jer

Appears to me that the new machine is identical to the 2160 with two separate on-screen displays for digital and analog. Our cable company had a big advertising campaign whose theme was "Beware the Evil Digital Transition, but if you're on cable you'll be OK because nothing will change." so they might keep us on analog for a while. I can only hope...

Regarding UPS: I've had my DVDRs on a medium-sized APS Back-UPS unit for four or five years. It looks like this:



I bought it at a big box store when they were changing models and got a very good price. It does a self-test once per day and so far the battery has held up. We don't get many power outages, but my DVDR goes unattended most of the time so a momentary power outage could screw up several programmed recordings. We had an unusually long 6+ hour outage a few weeks ago and the UPS kept all the clocks on time.

Most modern electronic devices convert the AC to regulated DC for use of all the internal components so the shape of the wave isn't as important as it used to be. The clocks in our DVDRs have their own internal timebase so they don't rely on the power being exactly 60 cycles (a pity, since the line frequency is carefully regulated to keep synchronous-motor clocks on time!)

Replacement batteries are readily available from the manufacturer or, if you want a cheaper price, from various internet suppliers. The chemistry is simply lead-acid so the cost isn't nearly as dear as laptop batteries. In fact, if you don't get too carried away you can increase the runtime of your UPS by using outboard batteries with more capacity.

As Funai says explicitly in the manual, The HDD is considered to be only for temporary storage only. If you want to keep it, move it to DVD!

Thank you for the warm welcome! So far, the 513H seems to be pretty much identical to the 2160 with the only difference being the clock default (which I need to double-check carefully when installing the second unit!) and the fact that the firmware allows finalizing with recordings scheduled. The case is identical except for the labels on the back.

It looks like Funai decided not to fiddle with it too much which is fine by me because I'd just as soon have the old bugs fixed without introducing new and more exciting bugs.