PAUSE LIVE TV (PLTV) & AUTOSTART RECORDING (PLAY/SAVE/DUMP BUFFER)
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Old Pause Live TV (PLTV) - 3575/3576/2080
New Pause Live TV (PLTV) - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
Play & Rewind Buffer - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
Save Buffer - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
Dump Buffer - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
Turn Buffering Off - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
Old Pause Live TV (PLTV) - 3575/3576/2080
The 3575/3576 has a PAUSE LIVE TV (PLTV) and the Mag 2080 has a Time Shift (TS) button, that starts making a
temporary recording of a live show you're watching so you can come back, while it's still recording, and start playing from the point you paused it.
You have two options for activating PLTV, depending on whether you want Live TV to continue playing or pause on screen while you're away/busy:
1. Press PLTV/TS button ONCE -- Live TV CONTINUES on screen while being recorded in the background. Press PLAY to continue watching from the point you pressed the button.
2. Press PLTV/TS button TWICE -- Live TV PAUSES on screen while being recorded in the background. Press PLAY to continue watching from the point you pressed the button. (Instructions for going to Live TV or stopping PLTV are displayed on screen, if needed at that point... not!)
While playing the temp. recording with the INFO/DISPLAY screen up, an on-screen display, lower left, shows the play status (> for playing, ll for paused) plus PLTV time vs Live TV time counters in upper right. INFO/DISPLAY screens do not get recorded during PLTV... in fact, if you have the 1st screen up on a digital channel, that menu goes away immediately on pressing the PLTV button.
Recording will stop when/if the disc runs out of space, the total time exceeds 12 hours (not 6 as in one national review), or 2-minutes before a timer recording is scheduled to start.
If you plan to be away for awhile or not sure, instead of Pause Live TV or Time Shift, you can press REC several times, in 30-minute increments, until you've set the remaining time for the show you're watching. Using the REC button gives you two options:
1. If you're still there while it's recording, you can start Chase Playing immediately from where you pressed REC... just press PLAY... without worrying about time limits and the temporary nature of the Pause Live TV function.
2. If you
can't make it back in time and the remaining show completes recording per the time you set, the portion you missed will have been recorded to the HDD so you can play it back whenever you do have time.
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New Pause Live TV (PLTV) - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
- The drive you left the unit on when you shut down is the drive it'll start up on. You must be on the HDD drive to bring up the AR menu and verify buffer start.
- Don't press the DISPLAY button while on a digital channel since the 1st screen with the signal-strength indicator will get recorded in the buffer. To see DISPLAY-type menus use one of the normal AR-activating buttons (PAUSE, REW, etc.), then press DISPLAY for the normal menu(s) or RETURN to exit the menus.
- If you notice that your 2160A or 513 doesn't always start AR immediately on power-up, and you regularly use AR and rely on it, make sure you're on the HDD drive and on live TV, then press PAUSE after ~10-sec or so to check the AR status. If the AR menu does not appear, AR has not started so change channels to activate the buffer. If AR has started and the AR menu is on screen, press STOP to go back to live TV, then get rid of the menu with the RETURN button. There is a FW update for the 2160A and early-513 to correct this problem and install other refinements described here. The original 2160 and 515 don't have this problem and don't need a FW update.
The Mag 2160/2160A/513/515/53x doesn't have the simple Pause Live TV like the 357x or Time Shift like the 2080. It has Autostart Recording (AR) instead... greatest thing since sliced bread!
Every time you turn on a Mag, it
automatically encodes the channel(s) you tune and stores that video in a temporary buffer on the HDD of up to 6 hours. It does this in the background and in
2-hr-SP rec mode, which can't be changed.
If you change channels, the Mag keeps buffering whatever channels you tune and keeps replacing the oldest portion so the buffer is always the LAST 6 hours.
Certain actions will dump the accumulated buffer, but resume AR afterwards. One of those actions is
setting the Mag on Source L3 (DV input)... that not only dumps the buffer but also keeps buffering off while on L3.
To Pause Live TV, Press PAUSE
This brings up an AR menu (shown below) with some icons, time counters in upper left corner (your "GPS guide"), and a progress bar at the bottom. In the far-left-bottom corner, you'll see the Pause symbol to indicate you're Paused in the buffer at that point.
The AR menu is only a visual aide, it's NOT REQD for playing or saving the buffer (unless you need the time counters)... you can get rid of the menu at ANY TIME by pressing the RETURN button, and bring it back up with the DISPLAY button.
To Resume Watching, Press PLAY
Press PLAY to enter Chase Play mode and see what you missed, even if you were away too long and the paused frame reverts to live TV (1-hour +). (See next section for more details on playing the buffer.)
Alternate between PLAY and STOP
You can alternate between PLAY and STOP while catching up... PLAY to playback the buffer and STOP to go to Live TV, if desired. STOP leaves playback in the Resume condition.
Switch to Different Channel
IF you've Paused Live TV and are catching up in Play mode, and you know the show has ended, but you suddenly want to record or watch something else
on a diff. channel, Save the remainder of the buffered show to HDD by pressing REC then STOP 2X. You're done and can find the saved buffer remnant as a HDD title. If the show hasn't ended, there's no way to preserve the entire remainder of the show you paused and change channels for the other show.
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Play & Rewind Buffer - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
- The drive you left the unit on when you shut down is the drive it'll start up on. You must be on the HDD drive to bring up the AR menu and verify buffer start.
- Don't press the DISPLAY button while on a digital channel since the 1st screen with the signal-strength indicator will get recorded in the buffer. To see DISPLAY-type menus use one of the normal AR-activating buttons (PAUSE, REW, etc.), then press DISPLAY for the normal menu(s) or RETURN to exit the menus.
At any time while watching live TV thru a Mag, you can go back and watch things you've tuned in the past 6 hours, if desired. To start your trip back in time, press ONE of these buttons:
PAUSE - pauses the live TV pic and continues background recording live TV. This is a good place for beginners to get "oriented" before starting backward moves for Playback or Save to HDD. Press PLAY to get out of the PAUSE mode, then any of the other Play-mode buttons to play the buffer or record it, as described below. PAUSE backs up ~1 sec from what you see on screen when pressing the button, but that's 30 frames so just be aware of that.
PREV (chapter) - immediately goes back thru the buffer in increments of 5-min. If you press multiple times quickly, you can go back FAST (watch the clock), but you won't be able to see the content. NEXT works same way forward.
REW - immediately begins rewinding the buffer.
REPLAY - immediately moves back the amount of time you set as your default replay move.
Once the AR menu is up/active, a play-mode symbol will appear in the lower-left corner to indicate you're in the buffer, and you can now use the PLAY/REW/PREV/REPLAY and PAUSE buttons and watch the buffer normally. Press STOP to leave playback in RESUME mode and go to Live TV (with "Live" replacing play-mode symbol). Press PLAY to Resume playback.
The AR menu is only a visual aide, it's NOT REQD for playing or saving the buffer (unless you need the time counters)... you can get rid of the menu at ANY TIME by pressing the RETURN button, and bring it back up with the DISPLAY button.
To go to the
very beginning of the buffer at 0:00:00, you can press PREV (chapter) multiple times fast until arriving there, or use the Display menu to enter a
specific time in the top time counter, as follows:
- Press PAUSE.
- If Display menu is not up, press DISPLAY button.
- Press OK on the auto-highlighted "?" icon under the top counters.
- Arrow right and change HH:MM:SS numbers to 0:00:00 with up/dn arrows or direct-entry (or set to any other time you want to go back to).
- Press OK.
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Save Buffer - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
- The drive you left the unit on when you shut down is the drive it'll start up on. You must be on the HDD drive to bring up the AR menu and verify buffer start.
- Don't press the DISPLAY button while on a digital channel since the 1st screen with the signal-strength indicator will get recorded in the buffer. To see DISPLAY-type menus use one of the normal AR-activating buttons (PAUSE, REW, etc.), then press DISPLAY for the normal menu(s) or RETURN to exit the menus.
- Once you save any portion of a buffer to the HDD, that entire buffer is wiped out and it starts fresh from that point on!
If you want to
save one or more buffered shows to the Mag HDD as a normal title, here are the "normal" steps. Other steps for "Odd Situations and Procedures" follow this procedure.
- Make sure at least the start of the 1st show you want to save to HDD is in the buffer.
Using the STOP button gets a little "tricky" once you get to Step 4 and press REC, so this procedure is much simpler if ALL the titles you want to save are already in the buffer (i.e., have ended).
- Press PAUSE to bring up the AR menu.
Once you're in the buffer with the AR menu, you can get rid of the menu now, or at ANY TIME, by pressing the RETURN button, and bring it back up with the DISPLAY button. The AR menu is only a visual aide, it's NOT REQD for playing or saving the buffer (unless you need the time counters).
- Press PREV / REPLAY / REW / REPLAY or enter buffer time directly to move to the approx. starting point of the show... you can trim later.
You can move back FAST by pressing the PREV button multiple times quickly or by entering a specific time (even 0:00:00) in the time counter (press OK on 1st ? icon, enter digits directly or use arrow up.dn keys, press OK).
You can use the Play-mode buttons to get to a "perfect" start point, if desired, but getting the exact start point is not critical here since you'll have a chance to do a Front-Cut on the title once on the HDD... AND you WILL have to do an End-Cut anyway. Besides, you can't press REC in next step while on PAUSE.
DON'T PRESS STOP or you'll go to Live TV and lose your exact place in the buffer (the Resume point). Use PAUSE instead. If you do press STOP, you can get back into the buffer with the PREV/NEXT/REW/REPLAY button, but you'll get back in at some time fwd of where you left it (the diff. between the time you pressed STOP and the time the backwards move takes you to). Your only hope to get back to the exact spot is to remember the time you left the buffer and go there.
- In PLAY mode (not PAUSE), press REC to mark the approx. starting point of your show(s)... you can trim later.
You can't press REC while on PAUSE, so press PLAY, then press REC while playing... or try slo-mo with PAUSE > FF/REW or frame-advance with PAUSE > NEXT/PREV. After pressing REC, you can press STOP 1X ONLY without an intervening PLAY command, but don't press STOP 2X in a row yet. It's OK to alternate between STOP and PLAY as many times as you want.
Just remember that if you press STOP 2X in a row prematurely or accidentally, before all your show(s) are in the buffer, that will wipe the entire buffer, which is not recoverable.
- If all your show(s) have ended and are in the buffer, press STOP 2X in a row. The entire buffer, from your marked starting point to its current end, will be saved to the HDD... you don't need to find or mark an end point. If you pressed STOP once in Step 4 WITHOUT an intervening PLAY command, ONE press here will save the buffer.
Once pressed, you should see a short "Writing to disc" message and progress bar to confirm the Save. The buffer from your start point to the current point of live TV has now been saved to the HDD, ready for Front- and End-Cut in Edit.
If all your shows have not ended and you marked the start point with REC, be careful now with the STOP button...TWO presses in a row at any time will save only the portion already in the buffer, which may not be what you want, i.e., one or more shows still to come. If all your shows have not been buffered yet, you're stuck with chase play where you can alternate between PLAY and STOP w/o triggering the SAVE function... just don't press STOP 2X in a row.
- Do Front- and End-Cuts as needed on the new, saved HDD title(s).
Odd Situations and Procedures
- Entire Show Has Not Ended Yet
If the desired end-of-show has NOT been buffered yet, and you can't or don't want to watch live until end, you've got a problem. You must leave it on that channel to buffer the rest of the show, but you could go into the buffer as described above and mark the beginning of the show by pressing REC, but you'll still have to wait for the end of the show before pressing STOP 2X in a row. Your only option now is to Chase Play the show while it's in REC mode and buffers the remainder of the show. While chase playing, you canalternate between STOP and PLAY w/o triggering the SAVE function... just don't press STOP 2X in a row until you really want to SAVE the buffer from your REC point to its end.
- Switching from Chase Play to the Other Tuner
IF you've Paused Live TV and are watching a buffered show in Chase Play mode, and you know the show has ended, but you suddenly want to record or watch something else on the other tuner, which will wipe the buffer, Save the remainder of the show you're watching to HDD by pressing REC then STOP 2X. Watch for "Writing to disc" message to confirm the Save to HDD. You're done and can find the remainder as a HDD title so you can finish watching that show. If the show has NOT ended, no way to preserve the remainder of the entire show since that buffer will be deleted once you switch to the other tuner.
Remember: if you're just watching LIVE TV on a DIGITAL channel and you press the DISPLAY button once at any time, the DTV menu appears first and THAT gets recorded in the AutoRec buffer, so if that happens, press RETURN quickly to get rid of it. Only way to prevent that is to never press DISPLAY while watching a digital channel if there's any chance you'll want to save that part of the buffer to the HDD. The menu you see when pressing one of the AR-activating buttons does NOT start with the same recordable DTV menu.
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Dump the Buffer - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
IMPORTANT: If you want to retain an accumulated Mag buffer, DO
NOT do any of the actions listed below!
AR will dump the buffer when:
- Machine is powered off.
- Recording or dubbing.
- Opening the Edit menu or editing titles.
- Opening the Disc Edit or HDD Menus.
- Deleting titles (DVD only).
- Switching between tuners (analog/digital).
- Switching Source to L1, L2 or L3. (Switching and remaining on Source L3 (DV) also stops background recording and is a working fix for the 2160A Finalize/Format/Erase bug... FW Update is the permanent fix, as described here.)
- Using the following menus:
- General Setting > Display > V-Chip > Downloadable Rating
- General Setting > Channel > Auto Channel Preset
- General Setting > Channel > Manual Channel Preset.
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Turn Buffering OFF - 2160/2160A/513/515/53x
There's no "switch" or menu option to turn the Mag's AR off completely. Those actions listed above will dump the buffer but then restart buffering. Only one setting can turn the Mag AR off while the machine remains in that set condition: switch Source to L3 (DV) input and leave it there.
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