DVR

DVR’s

by

I am sitting at home (fighting a cold) today. What to do? Watch TV of course. I am cleaning out my Tivo of things I want to watch. After that I decided to play around with my Eye TV USB. it is a DVR for my Mac. It is a great little device, that I don’t use as often as I would like. It act’s just like a Tivo. It records the files right to my Powerbook’s hard drive, which is cool. It can export to MPEG-1 so I can burn a VCD. that is also cool. I would like to burn as a DVD using MPEG-2 files, but I don’t want to upgrade to the newer version (EyeTV-200) that will do that. EyeTV also does not require me to pay a monthly subscription fee. Why then don’t I use it all the time? It has one fatal flaw.

I have a digital cable box (2 actually). In order for me to get digital cable channels I need to plug the EyeTV into the Digital Cable box. When the EyeTV wants to record something it cannot change the Cable box’s channel. That means if I want to record something on the EyeTV I need to change the channel on the cable box for it. What good is that unless I am at the TV? Now if they made some sort of IR channel changer that Tivo has to resolve this problem then I would not need my Tivo. With the majority of the US population with cable or satellite, why not have this option? This is a great product, that I can’t use that much because of this limitation. I have no way around it for now. I am warming up to the DVR on a computer idea. I would rather do this on my Mac, then finding a PC solution. I don’t even know if the PC TV cards can change cable box channels? My old ATI All in Wonder Pro had the same issue.

For now I will stick with my Tivo. I love it, and have not found anything that works better. That said I keep going back to replayTV’s website to check out their warez every few months.

It Just Works

by

Whoever said that is correct. Mac’s just work. To make a long story short, I have an Eye TV that I have plugged into my iMac. I am moving, so I unplugged it. I packed my TV, DVD, VCR, Tivo and all other gear away. I still wanted to watch tv. I went to elgato’s website and downloaded the latest software for Eye TV and dropped it in the applications folder of my Powerbook and plugged in the EyeTV. I was watching TV in 3 minutes.

I never had that kind of luck with my ATI all in wonder capture card on my PC. The idea of setting the Eye TV up on my laptop is now when my cable company shows up at my new place I don’t need my tv to be unpacked. I just need the Eye TV and my powerbook and I can verify that cable works. Both items are small so they can go in my laptop bag.

I am very happy I didn’t have to spend hours figuring out how to get the dam thing to work. I don’t even want to watch tv now that I know I can when I want for the next few days.

Tivo withdrawal is another story, and another post…

Getting Rid Of The Tivo???

by

I have actually been having thoughts about getting rid of the Tivo. I know you must think I am crazy. I love that thing. It is like a pet or something, but yes it is true I have had thoughts about getting rid of it. Why you ask? I have been looking into ReplayTV. I have heard good things about it. Not sure if they will stay around even after they have been bought up. See ongoing legal saga regarding ReplayTV.

I am hearing that it is just plain better than Tivo.

Comedy

by

Friday night Glenn our CEO took us all out to dinner. I had the surf and turf. It was a small but great fillet, and a lobster tail. Both were really good.

Then we saw John Steward in concert. He was awesome. I was almost in tears with laughter. It was 90 minutes of funny. I am going to start Tivo’ing the daily show again. He is just good.

Crime Drama’s

by

I saw the first episode of the new season of the Soprano’s. it was OK, not fantastic and not bad. I watch that show on and off. I saw most of last season but missed most of the 2 seasons before that. I loved the first season though. I have the soprano’s back in my season pass list in Tivo.

Another crime drama, or shall I say really bad ass bad guy as the star drama is the Shield. That was on again last night. I Tivo’ed that, and will watch it tonight or this weekend. I have actually watched the first two seasons of that show and it has been pretty good so far. I will season pass the 3rd season and see if it is any good.

Lets face it nothing else is on TV right now. All major network shows that I like anyway are in rerun’s for march and part of april. So I am trolling cable TV for good things to watch. Granted I am watching allot less TV these days but I am always looking for something good to watch…

Busy, Busy, Busy

by

Yesterday was very busy. it was one of those days that you don’t remember where I spent most of my time, but I looked up at it was 3:30PM already.

Today and tomorrow will probibly be just as busy. Stuff is going on I cannot really discuss just yet, but the work will keep Keith and I busy for a while.

Jayson went to Dave’s again last night. His mom was cooking dinner. I declined to go. I was tired and had things to do around the house. I got some stuff done, but ended up watching some stuff I had on Tivo. I have not had a chance to watch much TV since last week, so I have allot of stuff on the tivo I have to see or take the chance that it will be overwritten soon.

Tonight Jay and I may goto Angilo & Maxie’s. it is a really good steakhouse right by my office. I need to talk with him later about it to see if he is still up for it.

What’s On TV

by

I used to watch TV all the time. It was my way of relaxing when I got home from work. Tivo has changed my life, or my TV watching life. It records the crap I want. I don’t channel surf anymore. I also find myself watching less TV. I even fast forward allot of what I Tivo, or just decide to delete it after I capture it. It is rare to find good television, especially during the summer.

My new favorite thing on TV currently is Mi-5, on A&E of all places. I mentioned it before in another post. It is a well done BBC show that A&E picked up. Their are only 16 of them over 2 seasons. I just saw the entire season 1 over the past week or two. A&E had a marathon monday and I captured all the ones I had not seen. I like spy novels and shows, but this is just good. This is my spy fix since The Agency was canceled. I just ordered Mi-5 Season 1 on DVD. Gotta love that amazon.co.uk. You can find tons of stuff you can’t get in the US.

On the down side in 9 more weeks the second season will be over and I will have to wait till june 2004 or later to get more installments of Mi-5 (or spooks as it is called in the UK). I guess I will have to wait till September or October and see what crap US television puts on the air. Of course who will be watching TV when the Simpson’s Season 3 comes out on DVD!!!