Recording HD Signals

It must have been late at night that I put my address on line instead of
asking a question. Well, it even happens to old dogs like me!

My question: what are various options for recording HD signals in HD or SD
format? One possibility would be to use an HD to analog converter and then
using a regular VCR.

Cass

On 14 Apr 2007 13:27:11 GMT, (Cass Lewart)
wrote:

It must have been late at night that I put my address on line instead of
asking a question. Well, it even happens to old dogs like me!

My question: what are various options for recording HD signals in HD or SD
format? One possibility would be to use an HD to analog converter and then
using a regular VCR.

Cass

If you can receive local OTA HD signals, there are several options.
One, a computer with an ATSC card, if you're OK with technical things.
For the less technically inclined, a Tivo... I think it's series 3
that will record OTA. In my case, OTA reception is marginal, so I
subscribe to DirecTV. I have their recorders for HD, the HR10-250 that
receives and records some HD channels via satellite, and those
channels that I can receive OTA, and their HR20 which records locals
broadcast via satellite.
Charlie Hoffpauir
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

"Cass Lewart" wrote in message
...
It must have been late at night that I put my address on line instead of
asking a question. Well, it even happens to old dogs like me!

My question: what are various options for recording HD signals in HD or SD
format? One possibility would be to use an HD to analog converter and then
using a regular VCR.

Cass

==========================
Most HD receivers (including sat and cable) have ability to output 480i.
That is all that is needed to record to standard VCR or DVD-R.
You need buy nothing more.

"Cass Lewart" wrote in message
...
It must have been late at night that I put my address on line instead of
asking a question. Well, it even happens to old dogs like me!

My question: what are various options for recording HD signals in HD or SD
format? One possibility would be to use an HD to analog converter and then
using a regular VCR.

Cass

You might have a look at the Myhd PC card, it records over-the-air signals
very nicely.

http://www.digitalconnection.com/Pro...deo/mdp130.asp

On Sat, 14 Apr 2007 08:17:59 -0700, Richard C. wrote:

On Sat 14 Apr 2007 08:17:59 -0700, Richard C. wrote:
"Cass Lewart" wrote in message
...
It must have been late at night that I put my address on line instead
of asking a question. Well, it even happens to old dogs like me!

My question: what are various options for recording HD signals in HD or
SD format? One possibility would be to use an HD to analog converter
and then using a regular VCR.

Cass

==========================
Most HD receivers (including sat and cable) have ability to output 480i.
That is all that is needed to record to standard VCR or DVD-R. You need
buy nothing more.

Also, some cable/satellite boxes as well as TV models have
firewire (ieee1394) ports. Might need activation by the company
at the head-end. Hook it up to a firewire-equipped computer (PC,
Linux, Mac), run a freeware or shareware app with the features you
need, several can automatically change channels according to
schedules.

The firewire data ends up as an exact copy of the digital stream,
so you won't lose quality or extra audio / subtitle tracks etc.
that the head-end is sending.

Just for recording, a computer does not need a fast CPU, just gobs
of disk space, esp. if the stream is HD. If your TV has firewire,
you can play back the recording through those ports w/o loss of
quality, here you still do not need a fast CPU as the TV is doing
the actual playing. You only need fast CPU for watching the
recording on the computer itself.

Macintosh computers are super-easy to use in this regard. Apple
has published open source code for working firewire stream
recorders & players (they invented firewire, after all ).
Other people have taken that code and came out with enhanced apps,
such as iRecord http://www.ammesset.com/software/irecord/.

For Macs and OTA there are the devices made by Elgato
http://www.elgato.com/ and Miglia http://www.miglia.com/.
Elgato also makes software that can handle many other third-party
devices that are normally PC-only.

The only thing all of these can't support is when the "broadcast
flag" says "copy once" or "copy never". The firewire stream
becomes scrambled if the device or recording app can't honour the
DTCP/5C handshaking. This is a topic I have warned and written to
a few trusted radio talk shows; I hope to soon go public with my
warnings for a wider audience (such as this newsgroup) well before
the FCC analogue cut-off date I hope.

Thanks...

On Sat, 14 Apr 2007 13:27:11 +0000, Cass Lewart wrote:

My question: what are various options for recording HD signals in HD or SD
format?

There are lots of ways depending on the HD signal source. OTA ATSC can be
recorded direct to a PC (with tuner(s)), HD-VCR, and comsumer grade PVR's.
behind an ATSC receiver, you can record the HD signal as an SD signal on
any VCR/dvr that excepts 480i input. Cable and sat gets a lot more
complicated depending on many things when it comes to HD, but most (if not
all cable/sat boxes will ouput 480i so you can use any recorder to record
HD in SD format. For HD with cable or sat I'd recommend using their
equipment as it's the cheapest route. there are cablecard ready recorders
for cable but they are expensive. And it gets a lot more complicated as
for clear qam, firewire, etc. You need to ask about a specify application
for a definative answer.

--
Want the ultimate in free OTA SD/HDTV Recorder? http://mythtv.org
http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html Usenet alt.video.ptv.mythtv
My server http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php
HD Tivo S3 compared http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/mythtivo.htm

One option no one seemed to mention are JVC's DVHS recorders. They
record HD to DVHS tape. One advantage of this is you can save up a
nice collection. I've got over 200 movies laying arround. Not quite
sure how you can do that with any of the Hard Drive based solutions.
You do need a fire wire connection, but from your post I already
gathered you have one.

Last I checked (about a month ago) you can find the recorders online
at many vendors, price was averaging in the mid 4 hundreds.

Though they would like you to buy special D-VHS tapes any Svhs
tape can be converted buy drilling a hole on the bottom on the
opposite side as the one already there to tell your recorder it's a S
tape..

One trick to be aware of, due to paranoia on behalf of the movie
industry they had to design the recorders such that you can't set the
timer to record the firewire input. But a quick fix for that is to buy
a VCR programmer remote. Picked one up at radio shack for 10 bucks,
just leave your vcr set to firewire input & the programmer will turn
it on & off when you wish.

Also someone pointed out 2 programs to me awhile back that allow
you to capture your hd via firewire to your computer (and out put back
to a DVHS recorder if you wish) . A program called CapDVHS does the
capture, another called HDTVtoMPEG2 allows you to edit it & archive to
other media. I've downloaded both, but haven't tried them yet, next
time i see something on a comercial channel i really want to save i
may be able to tell you more.



On 14 Apr 2007 13:27:11 GMT, (Cass Lewart)
wrote:

It must have been late at night that I put my address on line instead of
asking a question. Well, it even happens to old dogs like me!

My question: what are various options for recording HD signals in HD or SD
format? One possibility would be to use an HD to analog converter and then
using a regular VCR.

Cass

On Apr 15, 6:26 am, NightWing wrote:
One option no one seemed to mention are JVC's DVHS recorders. They
record HD to DVHS tape. One advantage of this is you can save up a
nice collection. I've got over 200 movies laying arround. Not quite
sure how you can do that with any of the Hard Drive based solutions.
You do need a fire wire connection, but from your post I already
gathered you have one.


For me the problem with tape is the tape and all its limits. To
archive with my hard drive systems you dump to DVD. I use MythTV and
ReplayTV. I get the data from the replay via ethernet connection.
But there's very little I find worth archiving that isn't at the
library on DVD.

Last I checked (about a month ago) you can find the recorders online
at many vendors, price was averaging in the mid 4 hundreds.

Though they would like you to buy special D-VHS tapes any Svhs
tape can be converted buy drilling a hole on the bottom on the
opposite side as the one already there to tell your recorder it's a S
tape..

One trick to be aware of, due to paranoia on behalf of the movie
industry they had to design the recorders such that you can't set the
timer to record the firewire input. But a quick fix for that is to buy
a VCR programmer remote. Picked one up at radio shack for 10 bucks,
just leave your vcr set to firewire input & the programmer will turn
it on & off when you wish.


Now THAT is interesting. Does you deck recognize or respond to the
"copy once" or "copy never" flags?

Also someone pointed out 2 programs to me awhile back that allow
you to capture your hd via firewire to your computer (and out put back
to a DVHS recorder if you wish) . A program called CapDVHS does the
capture, another called HDTVtoMPEG2 allows you to edit it & archive to
other media. I've downloaded both, but haven't tried them yet, next
time i see something on a comercial channel i really want to save i
may be able to tell you more.


I know someone who records HD cable shows onto a sony HD disk
recorder, then dumps to d-vhs to keep the disk from filling up. Works
for him.

One trick to be aware of, due to paranoia on behalf of the movie
industry they had to design the recorders such that you can't set the
timer to record the firewire input. But a quick fix for that is to buy
a VCR programmer remote. Picked one up at radio shack for 10 bucks,
just leave your vcr set to firewire input & the programmer will turn
it on & off when you wish.


Now THAT is interesting. Does you deck recognize or respond to the
"copy once" or "copy never" flags?

So far I've not seen any sign of it.