Do you have Eye TV?

[Jen5678]

Do you like it? Are you having any problems?

[robbieduncan]

Got a 410 connected to a Mac Mini. Seems to work really well. Does exactly what it's meant to do. Only thing that is missing a DVB text renderer so no teletext or red-button fun!

[Gerg]

I have an EyeTV 200 connected to my Mac mini, and their EyeHome attached to the TV (the EyeHome allows me to view any content on my Mac through the TV-recorded EyeTV shows, iPhoto albums, iTunes music, etc,).

Other than a brief hiccup in the EyeHome connection out of the box, I've had no problems. Well, that's not 100% true. My current problem is that I'm fast running out of disc space for all the stuff I've recorded. I want to leave it on a hard drive so I can easily axccess it through the EyeHome. If it weren't for that, I'd just burn it all off to a video CD or DVD.

I'm very happy with it!

[tpatricks]

I've had both the earlier EyeTV USB version and the Firewire model. Both have performed great. The real trick is the software, which seems to improve regularly. The earlier USB version had limited quality, but the Firewire version is full TV resolution. Nice.

Get a big hard drive. Size does matter.
-

[daveL]

My wife has a model 200 on her iMac G5; works great.

[noel4r]

How about EvolutionTV?

http://www.miglia.com/products/video/evolutiontv/

I think Gizmodo or Engadget said it was better than EyeTV because it support Divx and mp4 and its cheaper. Does anybody have one?

[risc]

Originally Posted by Jen5678

Do you like it? Are you having any problems?

I've got the EyeTV 400 the only thing I don't like about it, is the mpeg2 streams seem to be huge in the latest bunch of updates - like over a GB for a half hour show, where they were a lot smaller when I first got it.

I've also got the EyeHome which is an amazing piece of hardware _EXCEPT_ for the lack of AC3 output from divx/xvid video to analog - which was working when I first got it, but as the updates came more functionality got added and AC3 was forced to only work through the digital output, which is nice and all except I don't have a digital-in on my amp. I asked El Gato about this and based on their response I don't expect to see AC3 over analog support in the future, they told me I need a TOS to RCA convertor I've never seen these anywhere, if any of you guys know what they are can you chuck me a product name, or link?

[iGary]

Can you hook cable directly into one of these things?

(I'm A/V handicapped, for real.)

[Grimace]

Yep, you can hook in cable, just not satellite. I have the EyeTV 500 and LOVE it! I record "24" in HD for free every week!

[dirk-a-lurk]

Originally Posted by carletonmusic

Yep, you can hook in cable, just not satellite. I have the EyeTV 500 and LOVE it! I record "24" in HD for free every week!

I recently purchased an EyeTv 500, and it works very well with my 1.33 Powerbook 17". I can view, record, and burn to DVD with hardly any chop in the picture (Elgato's website says that a Dual G5 is necessary for max resolution HD viewing and recording, but my 1.33 G4 powerbook does quite well...of course it does use over 90% CPU power during these operations).

That being said, it is limited in the amount of content it can receive. Restricted to OTA signals (Over the Air via antenna) and Clear QAM (unencrypted digital cable) via my Comcast digital Cable basically totals up to all of the major network's signals (NBC, ABC, etc.), ESPN-HD, DISC-HD, INHD, and INHD2).

Basically, if you’re looking for a device to record HD broadcast signals this is your product. If you want to be able to record channels like Comedy Central and other basic cable offerings, you should look into the EyeTv 200 or the EyeTv Wonder USB 2.0.

Personally, I'm flirting with the idea of buying an EyeTv 200 to supplement this shortfall, but I'm unsure if you can use both devices at once (have an email into Elgato right now). Good for Elgato...bad for my wallet.

Does anyone have experience with running two of these devices at once? I realize my Powerbook only has one Firewire 400 input, but was thinking of getting a mini-hub, or just trying to piggyback off the EyeTv 500 firewire input.

[Gareth56]

I wonder if anyone can help?

I have bought a Miglia TV Eye from Apple and despite having a brand new digital aerial on the roof and being told by the engineer who installed it that the signal is excelelnt I cannot get any of the ITV channels or channel 5 nor BBC 4 or SKY News and a few other of the Freeview channels. In my lounge I have a Freeview box which can get ALL available channels via the same aerial. There are two lines coming from the aerial (the engineer said it was OK to have 2 separete lines because the signal is strong enough to cope) one goes to the Freeview box in the lounge, the other to the computer room. I can actually see the local transmitter from my house. Looking at the Elegato support page and their FAQ, it does suggest that if you cannot receive any ITV channels it could be due to the signal being too strong so insert an attenuator in te line, I tried this and I still just the same number of channels and no improvement.

Any suggestions would be welcome before I send it back to Apple for a refund.

Thanks
Gareth.

[dcv]

Originally Posted by Gareth56

I wonder if anyone can help?

I have bought a Miglia TV Eye from Apple and despite having a brand new digital aerial on the roof and being told by the engineer who installed it that the signal is excelelnt I cannot get any of the ITV channels or channel 5 nor BBC 4 or SKY News and a few other of the Freeview channels. In my lounge I have a Freeview box which can get ALL available channels via the same aerial. There are two lines coming from the aerial (the engineer said it was OK to have 2 separete lines because the signal is strong enough to cope) one goes to the Freeview box in the lounge, the other to the computer room. I can actually see the local transmitter from my house. Looking at the Elegato support page and their FAQ, it does suggest that if you cannot receive any ITV channels it could be due to the signal being too strong so insert an attenuator in te line, I tried this and I still just the same number of channels and no improvement.

Have you tested the aerial socket in the computer room using the Freeview box from the lounge? Or have you tried connecting the Miglia TV to the aerial socket in the lounge? Might be worth double-checking as the problem could lie in the cable connection to the rooftop aerial and not the Miglia unit. Is there a little portable antenna supplied with the Miglia one (as you get with the Elgato EyeTV) - do you get any channels at all with that?

[Gareth56]

Originally Posted by dietcokevanilla

Have you tested the aerial socket in the computer room using the Freeview box from the lounge? Or have you tried connecting the Miglia TV to the aerial socket in the lounge? Might be worth double-checking as the problem could lie in the cable connection to the rooftop aerial and not the Miglia unit. Is there a little portable antenna supplied with the Miglia one (as you get with the Elgato EyeTV) - do you get any channels at all with that?

Yes, I've connected the Miglia to the aerial that goes into the Freeview box and can still only get 23 of the >69 channels that I can get on my Freeview box. The portable (stick) antena that came with the unit can only pick up 6 channels despite been able to see the transmitter away up on the hills approx 20km from my house.

[Temujin]

Could anyone of you EyeTv owners tell me the quality vs. hard drive space stats? 1 hour of video max quality = ? gb

[risc]

Originally Posted by Temujin

Could anyone of you EyeTv owners tell me the quality vs. hard drive space stats? 1 hour of video max quality = ? gb

It depends on the model and what you are recording. On my 400 standard definition digital is a little over 2 GB an hour (this is an average and can change based on the quality of the broadcast), HD would be heaps more.

[caj58uk]

Originally Posted by Gareth56

I wonder if anyone can help?

I have bought a Miglia TV Eye from Apple and despite having a brand new digital aerial on the roof and being told by the engineer who installed it that the signal is excelelnt I cannot get any of the ITV channels or channel 5 nor BBC 4 or SKY News and a few other of the Freeview channels. In my lounge I have a Freeview box which can get ALL available channels via the same aerial. There are two lines coming from the aerial (the engineer said it was OK to have 2 separete lines because the signal is strong enough to cope) one goes to the Freeview box in the lounge, the other to the computer room. I can actually see the local transmitter from my house. Looking at the Elegato support page and their FAQ, it does suggest that if you cannot receive any ITV channels it could be due to the signal being too strong so insert an attenuator in te line, I tried this and I still just the same number of channels and no improvement.

I am in the same position as Gareth. I'm using a roof aerial providing a 100% strength signal, and also purchased an attenuator as recommended in the FAQ on the Elegato support page. The following FAQ from the Digital Spy website appears to provide an explanation - but no new satisfactory solution.

**Try this: Run the Set Up Assistant and re-tune with the attenuator, and then re-tune again without the attenuator. I'm now receiving ITV1 and other channels in the group for the first time as I write this!**

Good luck.

Tony

"If you have this problem then the channels normally affected are either Five, QVC, Bid-Up and TVTravelShop or ITV1, ITV2, ITV News and C4. (If you have difficulties receiving any other channels please see 'How do I know if I can get DTT and do I need to upgrade my existing aerial?')

"Both of these sets of channels fit into a single multiplex. A multiplex is a set of channels that only use up one frequency -- on analogue (normal) television you can only have one channel, whereas you can have 4 or 6 in the same space on digital.

"Both of these multiplexes use a different way of transmitting the signal compared to the other channels on Freeview. These channels use the QAM64 mode instead of QAM16.

"The trouble with sending a large amount of bits in one go (as is the case with QAM64) is that noise from power switches, cars or even just the distance between the aerial and transmitter can confuse the receiving box. If the box is confused into thinking that it is receiving something it isn’t, it classes it as an error. If there are lots of errors then the picture will break up, or, in extreme circumstances, not be picked up by the DTT box at all.

"QAM64 falls into precisely this problem. It has a greater bandwidth (6 channels instead of 4) but is more susceptible to noise. So, if you are not close enough to the transmitter, these channels will look worse than the others.

"QAM16 has less ‘points’ than QAM64, so noise isn’t as much of a problem -- there is far more tolerance for errors but there is less bandwidth (space) so you get less channels."

[caj58uk]

Originally Posted by Gareth56

I wonder if anyone can help?

I have bought a Miglia TV Eye from Apple and despite having a brand new digital aerial on the roof and being told by the engineer who installed it that the signal is excelelnt I cannot get any of the ITV channels or channel 5 nor BBC 4 or SKY News and a few other of the Freeview channels. In my lounge I have a Freeview box which can get ALL available channels via the same aerial. There are two lines coming from the aerial (the engineer said it was OK to have 2 separete lines because the signal is strong enough to cope) one goes to the Freeview box in the lounge, the other to the computer room. I can actually see the local transmitter from my house. Looking at the Elegato support page and their FAQ, it does suggest that if you cannot receive any ITV channels it could be due to the signal being too strong so insert an attenuator in the line, I tried this and I still just the same number of channels and no improvement.

Make sure that the attenuator is connected directly to the Miglia, and then connect the co-axial cable to the attenuator...

[qool]

I just bought Miglia's TVmini for my MB, and it's great! It uses EyeTV engine.
It's a USB dongle, and a small aerial on a suction cup. I've used numerous Digital STBs for my regular TV, and they were all crap. They were connected to the big roof aerial, and never had a perfect reception.
This little pen-sized aerial gets every digital channel offered, and records straight onto my HDD. I can export it out to my video ipod, PSP, etc.

[MacAficionado]

I imagine one can get an external HD and store the media in there instead of the boot volume. Am I wrong in this assumption?

[thumb]

Originally Posted by MacAficionado

I imagine one can get an external HD and store the media in there instead of the boot volume. Am I wrong in this assumption?

not just can, pretty much ought/have to.

[puckhead193]

i'm thinking of getting an eye tv 250 for my future iMac. How will this work at school. I'm pretty sure my school direct tv. But all the channels are messed up with direct tv and the package they have. How will this work? like 247 TBS isn't 247 its like 40 something...

[bbrosemer]

Originally Posted by puckhead193

i'm thinking of getting an eye tv 250 for my future iMac. How will this work at school. I'm pretty sure my school direct tv. But all the channels are messed up with direct tv and the package they have. How will this work? like 247 TBS isn't 247 its like 40 something...

My school had the same problem with my pvr luckily I found a channel guide that was similar to what I had just keep searching and you never know the channel guide could turn up in some unexpected place.

[risc]

Originally Posted by Jen5678

Do you like it? Are you having any problems?

I have a 400 it works exactly as expected, teletext etc work correctly. Great picture quality, can't fault it really.

[2yet]

I have a G4 Dual 1ghz Powermac and I installed Miglia TV MAX tuner and it works okay when there is signal. Every time I turn my Miglia on, it keeps saying no signal on the screen. I would have to open a recorded show and then open a new “live” tv screen and it will work, 80% of the time. I know my cable signal is good because I don’t have a bad signal problem when I plugged it directly to the TV. The second problem that I have is that the remote that came with this tuner card doesn’t really work smoothly like it should. Half of the buttons doesn’t do anything, including a few number buttons, like 0. Sometimes it work and sometimes it doesn’t and I aim my remote control directly at the TV tuner box. I even made sure to install fresh batteries. Does anyone have this problem or do I have a bad tuner? Please help?-2yet

[andysc]

got the eyetv 250, but it seems very laggy when changing channels.