EyeTV for Digital Terrestrial TV (DTT)

[robbieduncan]

many thanks for the link, can't do any harm to try. What's the general default picture on a freeview box (prior to tuning) or does it vary depending on brand?

Thanks for the advice.

I only have experience of a couple of boxes but they have both defaulted to a kind of welcome screen. You normally have to then press a button on the remote and it will scan for channels, then save them to some local flash RAM. If you've been playing around with the box it may have already done this depending on whether it auto-starts the scan or waits for user input. If it's already scanned for channels it should default to one of them (normally the last channel you watched, BBC1 if you haven't selected any channel).

 

[welshbird]

I think my DDT is ALMOST great

I got mine a few weeks ago, and connected it to my 12" powerbook via a co-ax cable that comes off the back of the Sky digibox.

It will find the freeview channels, but what I'd really like is for it to see the channels that come throught the SKy box. I've got a sky-link or some such thing that lets me watch Sky in another room, as long as I don;t want a different channel than from downstairs.

Has anyone tried? I kind want it to find an AV input I guess. I'd also like to be able to play VHS through it and record to my hard drive.

Any one got any thoughts?

Thanks,

 

[robbieduncan]

EyeTV for DTT cannot do that. It can only receive and decode DVB-T signals. Your Sky box sounds like it is outputing a standard analogue signal which the DTT box cannot understand. The same is true of your VHS. It is not DVB-T.

You need an EyeTv 200 to do what you want.

 

[ATG]

Has anyone seen the Miglia TVMini? (http://www.miglia.com/products/video/tvmini/index.html)

It's about the size of two iPod shuffles.

 

[devman]

Has anyone seen the Miglia TVMini? (http://www.miglia.com/products/video/tvmini/index.html)

It's about the size of two iPod shuffles.

yeah the Terratec Cinergi T2 is very similar (but not quite as small by the look of it). Elgato now sell it also so you get EyeTv software for it.

 

[wdaly]

I only have experience of a couple of boxes but they have both defaulted to a kind of welcome screen. You normally have to then press a button on the remote and it will scan for channels, then save them to some local flash RAM. If you've been playing around with the box it may have already done this depending on whether it auto-starts the scan or waits for user input. If it's already scanned for channels it should default to one of them (normally the last channel you watched, BBC1 if you haven't selected any channel).

well, I got a Scart to phono lead at Maplin today and have hooked it all up – and all is in order. Cheers for your help!

 

[paddy2042]

record from VCR

I have been using an eye tv usb and been able to connect it through the vcr which then allows me to record both TV and VCR programmes to my HD. I then send to Toast 6 but it spends ages reencoding them to burn to DVD.
Will eyetv dtt be able to do these two operations and export the recordings so that they don't have to be re-encoded for DVD?
I have a feeling I will not be able to transfer material frm VCR to my cmputer wiht the eye dtt.

Would love some advice before buying

Paddy

 

[robbieduncan]

I have been using an eye tv usb and been able to connect it through the vcr which then allows me to record both TV and VCR programmes to my HD. I then send to Toast 6 but it spends ages reencoding them to burn to DVD.
Will eyetv dtt be able to do these two operations and export the recordings so that they don't have to be re-encoded for DVD?
I have a feeling I will not be able to transfer material frm VCR to my cmputer wiht the eye dtt.

Would love some advice before buying

Paddy

EyeTV for DTT can only deal with DVB-T signals. So it can't record or import standard terrestrial analogue signals, VCR inputs, SKY or anything else! EyeTV for DTT can export the signals it receives to Toast but I would not be surprised if it takes ages to do that. It certainly takes ages to export to MPEG-4.

 

[welshbird]

EyeTV for DTT can only deal with DVB-T signals. So it can't record or import standard terrestrial analogue signals, VCR inputs, SKY or anything else! EyeTV for DTT can export the signals it receives to Toast but I would not be surprised if it takes ages to do that. It certainly takes ages to export to MPEG-4.

Boo to that then! I guess I should read the product information before I buy! None the less, this is a great product, and it was excellent value too.

Has any one found a way of burning to VCD or SVCD without using Toast? I don't have Toast, and although I can convert to MPEg-4 or MPEG-2 easily enough, using another burning package (Dragon Burn in my case) doesn't let me play on my DVD player. I do know it will play VCD's and SVCD's though....

Thanks in advance if anyone has any ideas.

 

[nw43]

Boo to that then! I guess I should read the product information before I buy! None the less, this is a great product, and it was excellent value too.

Has any one found a way of burning to VCD or SVCD without using Toast? I don't have Toast, and although I can convert to MPEg-4 or MPEG-2 easily enough, using another burning package (Dragon Burn in my case) doesn't let me play on my DVD player. I do know it will play VCD's and SVCD's though....

Thanks in advance if anyone has any ideas.

I was definitely able to do this before as I have burnt some shows I've recorded onto CD and watched them on a normal DVD player. I may be mistaken but I'm sure there was an option just to burn to vcd from within the program but this seems to be gone with the latest version of the software (using 1.8.3 which is a vast improvement in terms of stability on the old version). If there wasn't that option I'm not sure how I did it but it was definitely possible as I have the CD to prove it!

 

[gafferbee]

Anyone solved the sleep problem yet? I've had my computer set up never to sleep for ages now, but sometimes it would be nice to put the mac down for a bit without the dtt forgetting how to get a signal when it wakes up.

v annoying when you set programmes to record and they don't work, and hardly helping to save the world either.

also, does anyone know if there's a way of using the terratec remote to send my imac to sleep?

 

[nw43]

Anyone solved the sleep problem yet? I've had my computer set up never to sleep for ages now, but sometimes it would be nice to put the mac down for a bit without the dtt forgetting how to get a signal when it wakes up.

What version of the EyeTV software do you have? I found there to be far fewer problems after upgrading to the latest version (1.8.3)

 

[gafferbee]

What version of the EyeTV software do you have? I found there to be far fewer problems after upgrading to the latest version (1.8.3)

I'm on the same version - and my iMac is the same as yours, less a gig of RAM. But if I put the iMac to sleep for anything more than about an hour the unit gets no signal when it wakes the computer up - leading to missed recordings, general frustration, high electricity bills and global environmental meltdown.

 

[donelson]

I got one yesterday at the MacExpo in London. Hooked it up, and the little antenna does not work very well. I don't get ITV1 and a bunch of other channels. Signal strength 65%, quality 100%.

But the worst is, when I try to change channels, it often gets stuck, giving the info for the new channel, but continuing to show the old channel. Over and over and over.

THEN, when I try to Quit, it hangs and cannot be Forced to Quit. Even using Activity Monitor cannot quit the damn thing. You have to restart the machine.

What a piece of Poo.

I have 1.8.3 software, OSX 10.4.2, dual G4 1.25Ghz, 1 GB of RAM.

Any ideas?

 

[Atlasland]

Has anyone seen the Miglia TVMini? (http://www.miglia.com/products/video/tvmini/index.html)

It's about the size of two iPod shuffles.

I have one of these babys, and its is sweet. I keep the device under my table so as not to spoil the beauty of my iMac G5, and the infrared is good enough that i can operate the remote at the most acute of angles.

I must admit that I'm not a huge fan of the eyetv software. I don't like the tvtv webpage, and sometimes the pvr recordings don't work. However the editing software is beautiful.

All in all this tiny device effectively is a 20" widescreen tv, with freeview box, and sky+ pvr all for £100. Thats a good deal.

 

[stevep]

I got one yesterday at the MacExpo in London. Hooked it up, and the little antenna does not work very well. I don't get ITV1 and a bunch of other channels. Signal strength 65%, quality 100%.

But the worst is, when I try to change channels, it often gets stuck, giving the info for the new channel, but continuing to show the old channel. Over and over and over.

THEN, when I try to Quit, it hangs and cannot be Forced to Quit. Even using Activity Monitor cannot quit the damn thing. You have to restart the machine.

What a piece of Poo.

I have 1.8.3 software, OSX 10.4.2, dual G4 1.25Ghz, 1 GB of RAM.

Any ideas?

Probably your aerial. Where are you, or more to the point, what sort of signal is available in your area? Check the http://www.freeview.co.uk/ site if you haven't already. The fact that you can't get all the channels indicates that your signal strength is weak and you aren't getting the full duplex transmission. If you get a proper aerial you might improve things - you may even be able to get away without climbing on the roof, just stick it in the loft.

 

[donelson]

Probably your aerial. Where are you....

I am in Morden, Surrey, just south of Wimbledon. Crystal Palace is East-northeast of here and is the closest xmitter. Line of sight is good and antenna is on first floor next to window with direct line of sight (almost) to C Palace.

Of course, the little antenna that comes with the DTT has one main function: Fit into the Box. Otherwise, it is a joke. I've just watched my signal signal go from 65% - 70% all day, suddenly down to 35% or so.

Yech. I guess I'll have to splice into the roof antenna, which I don't really want to do.

Anyone buy a small directional antenna and have it work any better?

 

[raincoat]

I bought Eye Tv for DTT a couple of weeks back. Initially had some trouble getting a signal with the antenna but found that if i attached the magnetic base to my metal desk facing sideways and do an exhaustive search, i get all of the channels.

As for recordings, all is well untill I delete those that i have seen, the disk space is not recovered untill the next time i reboot and filevault recovers it. Considering that i rarely shut down my powerbook, this can present some issues.

Does anyone know how to recover that space without shutting down?

Otherwise a bargainous experience.

Oh yeah, on the whole TV licence thing.....If the accomodation that you rent (as a student) is rented as a whole house and not by single rooms, then you only need one licence between you all, so share the love!

New series of West Wing rocks - worth the £100 to get it on freeview and "more 4" is now featured on tvtv...Finally!

 

[donelson]

exhaustive search, i get all of the channels

I tried this, and got all the channels, but none of the "captured" channels actually worked, so I have no improvement overall. My signals strength is now at 78%, pretty consistently.

Has anyone tried a directional antenna inside?

 

[stevep]

I tried this, and got all the channels, but none of the "captured" channels actually worked, so I have no improvement overall. My signals strength is now at 78%, pretty consistently.

Has anyone tried a directional antenna inside?

Try this: http://www.wrightsaerials.tv/digitalterrtvrecep.htm
It explains how you can be close to a transmitter and still have problems, and there's also some useful basic aerial info, and a lot of stuff that is beyond me!

 

[Dreamkatcha]

I bought one of these yesterday. Everything was going very well until I tried to watch my first recording, only to find that the EyeTV software had shredded it.

I recorded a 3.3gb program to my primary partition, though when I noticed that this didn't leave me much disk space to play with I changed the storage drive to my much more spacious secondary partition from within the EyeTV preferences menu.

To begin with I tried playing back the file using VLC. I wasn't able to fast forward so I decided to go back to the EyeTV player instead. When I loaded the app the recording was no longer available - not surprising since the new storage location was empty. Anyway I tried closing down the app, moving the recording to the new location and re-opening it. Once again no recordings were available. When I re-visited the folder where I'd moved the recording to it had vanished. Thanks very much EyeTV. You're a real pal!

I'm trying to recover it using an app called FileSalvage, but I don't hold out much hope, especially since the trial version will only identify recoverable files without actually undeleting them. Hmmf!

 

[donelson]

Try this: http://www.wrightsaerials.tv/digitalterrtvrecep.htm
It explains how you can be close to a transmitter and still have problems, and there's also some useful basic aerial info, and a lot of stuff that is beyond me!

Whoah! Information overload!

I got a £5 UHF antenna today, and hooked it up and got around 80% +/- signal level. I then got on a ladder and split my roof antenna, and fed it to the EyeTV box. Only 75% +/- ; worse than the UHF thingy.

 

[TMA]

I've just moved house and found that my EyeTV didn't want to pick up the Channel 4/ITV/E4 transmitter.

I bought an £8 TV Signal Booster from Argos and now it works great. I didn't think something so cheap and cheerful would work, but it does infact work great!

 

[Cordless]

Struggling here in NW London!

Set up new EyeTV for DTT today. Supplied aerial waste of time. Tried indoor aerial with separate amplifier and got some channels but no ITV. Ran long extension through two rooms to external aerial and pulled in all channels OK. Only trouble is cable everywhere so can't use that method. Will look for more powerful amplified indoor aerial tomorrow. Any recommendations for aerial at Argos for example. Not holding out much hope. Pity 'cos it could be very good.

 

[donelson]

Set up new EyeTV for DTT today. Supplied aerial waste of time. Tried indoor aerial with separate amplifier and got some channels but no ITV. Ran long extension through two rooms to external aerial and pulled in all channels OK. Only trouble is cable everywhere so can't use that method. Will look for more powerful amplified indoor aerial tomorrow. Any recommendations for aerial at Argos for example. Not holding out much hope. Pity 'cos it could be very good.

Be sure to find out which transmitter supplies your DTT signals, and then "aim" the antenna in that direction.

I got a £5 antenna from Maplin, and it worked just fine, sitting about 4 ft away from my Mac and aimed out the window in the direction of Crystal Palace.

Type your postcode into this:
http://www.dtg.org.uk/retailer/coverage_retailer.pl

to find your local transmitter, then use streetmaps.co.uk to figure the angle you need to aim the antenna. Once that's done, fiddle around a bit while using EyeTV > Device Settings > Signal -- and watching the signal strength.