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Thinking about WDTV, questions (w/EyeTV)

Heb1228

Heb1228

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Feb 3, 2004
2,217
1
Virginia Beach, VA
I'm considering the best way to be able to watch my EyeTV recordings on our TV. I wanted to hear from some of you who have an WDTV and see if this setup would work for me.

My EyeTV is upstairs connected to my MacBook Pro and I capture to an external hard drive. My idea is to share the external drive over the network and use a wireless N USB adapter for the WDTV downstairs connected to the TV. Here are some of my questions...

  • Will I be able to share effectively and stream over the wireless connection, assuming we have decent signal strength?
  • Will the WDTV read the EyeTV format (either container or actual media file) without exporting or re-encoding? If I remove commercials first, will it still play the files properly?
  • Will I be able to jump ahead in the recording to skip commercials? How well does this work?
  • Can I begin recording, then start watching on the WDTV before the recording is finished? Or do I have to wait for the recording to finish?
We got rid of cable and are just using over the air programming. We don't miss the extra channels but do miss the DVR. I'm hoping this setup will basically get us back to having a DVR for our over the air channels. Thanks for any help you guys can be.
 
Last edited:
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rjderama

macrumors newbie
Feb 7, 2011
8
0
EyeTV and WDTV

Heb1228,

Hi. As you may know, EyeTV is able to export to MP4 format for iPads/ATV, so you're WDTV should be able to play it so long as your host computer has exported into a folder that the WDTV can access. And since this recording can be set to be done at the same time of the initial recording, there is no need to wait for the export. However, you will have to wait until the show is over, which makes your last 2 questions moot. However, installing ETVcomskip will eliminate the commercials in the exports, so it'snot all bad.

I'd suggest an ATV2. I'm assuming you've got an iPhone, iPod Touch, or an iPad. Since these devices are all AirPlay compatible, you could record with EyeTV, watch the feed on your iOS mobile device, and then, conceivably, stream it to your ATV2 via AirPlay. You'd need a really good WiFi signal everywhere and, preferably, the iPad, since it's 802.11n.

Or, just keep the MBP hooked up to the TV, use it as your HTPC, and then stream to mobile devices as you wish. Wow, I guess the possibilities are endless. But I would keep the technologies "in house". Apple products "play best" with other Apple products :)

My wife and I got rid of cable too, and it's a great feeling. Check out our blog at www.tvonthecheap.com Maybe it'll help you out :)

Good luck!
 
Last edited:
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kokako

macrumors regular
Feb 23, 2011
179
3
WDTV also plays the raw eyetv recordings so no need to encode.
I share a portable drive between my mbp and my wdtv on my network, I also have an appletv and atv2.
 
Heb1228

Heb1228

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Feb 3, 2004
2,217
1
Virginia Beach, VA
Thanks for the replies so far. I've thought about an ATV but am more impressed with the WDTV's ability to play most anything you throw at it.

Probably the most pressing question I'd like to know is if I can watch the EyeTV file on the WDTV while the file is still being written. I know that I can through EyeTV (basically start recording and then start watching a few minutes later with no problem). I realize the question and my situation are rather specific so I may not get a concrete answer here.

I may go ahead and get one to try it out and plan on returning it if it doesn't live up to what I'd like it to do.
 
R

rjderama

macrumors newbie
Feb 7, 2011
8
0
Keep us posted!

I just tried to do a similar type of scenario: Recording with EyeTV and then using my iPad to view the recording*via StreamToMe/ServeToMe. The streaming software was able to read the mpg file while it was recording and playback on the iPad was clean and did not skip. So long as I gave EyeTV a headstart to record the show, it worked well.

So in theory, your WDTV experiment may be a success.
 
K

kokako

macrumors regular
Feb 23, 2011
179
3
You can't watch the eyetv file while it's still being written in a WDTV unfortunately I've tried.

Yeah the WDTV is fantastic and pretty impressive I got the WDTV Live and I'd recommend paying a little extra for it, keeps you up to daye with Leo Laporte and his great TWIT network.

WDTV plays everything I've ever thrown at it even 1:1 blu-ray rips in the MKV format (lossless backups) ie 40gb movie files.

I can also plug in windows and mac formatted memory sticks and drives and no problems there, same can't be said of my samsung tv that only plays windows drives.

I love my AppleTVs too (both versions), although the new one has very limited TV content.

WDTV a no brainer.
 
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