Elgato's Deal

[NiroNavro]

I understand that there are a lot of threads based on the Elgato EyeTV products. I started this one so that it was tailored to my individual budget.

Elgato currently has a deal that allows you to purchase the EyeTV Hybrid and the Turbo.264 for about $200. That's about $50 off of the two. Their current price for the EyeTV 250 Plus is also $200.

My question is: Should I go for the deal or go for the 250 Plus?

I ask this because many people have said that the 250 Plus is better because it doesn't take away from your CPU. But I'd prefer not to spend another $100 on top of the 250 Plus just to get the turbo. I'm kind of trying to conserve money.

Any suggestions?

 

[digitalnicotine]

What do you plan to use them for? Read this about the Turbo264 from their website:

Turbo.264 is a powerful hardware encoding device that quickly converts any video to the advanced H.264 (MPEG-4) format without using your Mac’s resources. Work, watch TV and surf the web while you encode video with no reduction in processing speed. Turbo.264 supports many third-party Mac video applications as well as EyeTV.

It seems to me that your best option is to take advantage of this current deal, and get the EyeTV Hybrid and the Turbo.264? But knowing your intended usage would help in being certain.

 

[NiroNavro]

Intended usage:
Connecting video game consoles to iMac.
Watching TV on iMac
Recording TV on iMac
Converting videos for iPod Touch
Watching TV via wifi on iPod Touch

That's basically it.

 

[gehrbox]

What do you plan to use them for? Read this about the Turbo264 from their website:

Turbo.264 is a powerful hardware encoding device that quickly converts any video to the advanced H.264 (MPEG-4) format without using your Mac’s resources. Work, watch TV and surf the web while you encode video with no reduction in processing speed. Turbo.264 supports many third-party Mac video applications as well as EyeTV.

It seems to me that your best option is to take advantage of this current deal, and get the EyeTV Hybrid and the Turbo.264? But knowing your intended usage would help in being certain.

When a movie is recorded to HDD from EyetV (either Hybrid or 250+) it is encoded to MPeg2. After the movie has finished recording and is stored on your HDD the EyetTV software can be set to take the MPeg2 file and encode it as MP4, then add it to iTunes. The Turbo.264 only doe the MP4 encoding. If you have the Hybrid it does not have the hardware to do the initial encoding to MPeg2 during the record phase, so your CPU has to do the work. With the EyetV 250+ this MPeg2 encoding is done by the 250+ and does not load up your CPU.

I have this exact setup (EyeTV 250+ Turbo.264) and on a 1.83Ghz Mac Mini I never noticed any significant CPU usage while recording or encoding to MP4.

 

[digitalnicotine]

Thanks for responding with your usage intentions. I think the EyeTV Hybrid and the Turbo.264 will work perfectly for you. Good luck!

 

[mkrishnan]

There are some threads, though, about the H.264 conversion quality that you might want to check out...

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/357693/

I think is one of them (but there was a thread where the conversion using this tool was compared to either Quicktime or Handbrake, and I'm having trouble finding it). It seemed like, depending on your standards, you might or might not be happy with the quality of the H.264 conversions, although the speed was definitely great.

 

[gehrbox]

There are some threads, though, about the H.264 conversion quality that you might want to check out...

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/357693/

I think is one of them (but there was a thread where the conversion using this tool was compared to either Quicktime or Handbrake, and I'm having trouble finding it). It seemed like, depending on your standards, you might or might not be happy with the quality of the H.264 conversions, although the speed was definitely great.

All my recordings look great from TV recording. The problem with handbrake is that it uses the computers CPU, the Turbo.264 does not.

 

[Sesshi]

Would it be faster than throwing a 3.2 Octo at it? Transcode times aren't unacceptable but I'd like it to be faster...

 

[NiroNavro]

I'm gonna be honest, I don't really understand some of the terms you guys are using. I just want to know if the hybrid and turbo will be enough for me or if I should get the 250 plus.

 

[gehrbox]

I'm gonna be honest, I don't really understand some of the terms you guys are using. I just want to know if the hybrid and turbo will be enough for me or if I should get the 250 plus.

If you want minimal impact while using your computer at the same time it is recording buy the 250+ and the Turbo.264. The Hybrid cost less, but it consumes a lot of CPU power from your computer while it is recording.