Recording HDTV to DVD

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Can I record an HDTV program to an DVD Recorder?

What specific types of hardware do I need?

I currently have a motorola HDTV-DVR and would like buy a DVD-RW and record
shows to it as well.

Is this possbile?

 

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Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

Iron wrote:

> X-No-Archive:yes
>
> Can I record an HDTV program to an DVD Recorder?
>
> What specific types of hardware do I need?
>
> I currently have a motorola HDTV-DVR and would like buy a DVD-RW and record
> shows to it as well.
>
> Is this possbile?

The simple answer is no. A standard DVD can only record NTSC 480i
signals. You may be able to hook up the S-Video or composite output of
the HD-DVR to the DVD recorder, but you will only record a downconverted
to SD signal (and likely not very good picture quality for SD). A PC
setup is able to put HD on a DVD, but not in standard format.

That is why we have two upcoming HD disk formats for yet another
format war: HD-DVD and Blu-Ray BD. But these will be expensive for the
first several years. Look for HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray threads or news articles.

Alan F

 

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Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

"Iron" <X-No-Archive:yes@usenet.ca> wrote (in part):

>Can I record an HDTV program to an DVD Recorder?

If you mean a stand-alone DVD recorder, then no. None that I'm aware
of will accept an HDTV signal or play it back if you could record it.
That's coming, but not yet. The only stand-alone HD recorders I know
of are D-VHS, and those without digital tuners require a firewire
connection to a compatible tuner.

However, if you can save the HD programs to a computer hard drive
(typically as ATSC transport streams) then you can save them to DVD as
ordinary data files and play them on the computer. A drawback is that
a single-layer DVD can only hold about 40-50 minutes of HD, depending
on compression, null stripping, etc.
>
>What specific types of hardware do I need?

A computer with a DVD burner, an HDTV capture card, some connection to
an HDTV display. And as much hard drive capacity as you can afford.
VLC, a free program from www.videolan.org, can play them. However, my
recommended solution is a MyHD MDP-130 PCI card, at least a 1 GHz PC
running Windows XP (98 SE will do, but imposes some restrictions such
as a 4 GB maximum file size and no firewire support). Comes with
component output and you can add DVI for more money. HD output is
independent of the computer's video output, although you can see a
low-res overlay there if you wish. Burn the saved transport streams
to DVD and play them from there if you wish. On the computer, of
course; these are nothing a standard DVD player would recognize. I've
done that and it works, but more and more I'm finding that buying hard
drives on sale and removeable trays for them is more practical than
DVDs, even though it's still more expensive.
>
>I currently have a motorola HDTV-DVR and would like buy a DVD-RW and record
>shows to it as well.
>
>Is this possbile?

Not unless the Motorola has firewire output to go to a D-VHS and you
can rig up a computer to look like a D-VHS to it.

Del Mibbler

 

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Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

On Tue, 23 Aug 2005 16:18:28 GMT Del Mibbler <mibbler@nycap.rr.com> wrote:

| However, if you can save the HD programs to a computer hard drive
| (typically as ATSC transport streams) then you can save them to DVD as

Do you know of ant external (e.g. STB style) tuners that can provide
the ATSC transport stream for a computer (such as via Firewire, USB
or fast ethernet)?

Alternatively, a capture card would be workable, if (and only if) it
can be used with Linux (source code drivers) and provides the ATSC
stream (the 19.39 mbps bit stream).

Of course, the next question is how to take that captured and stored
ATSC stream and send it back out so a TV display or STB thinks it is
getting genuine ATSC like OTA. Maybe an RF modulator? What I want to
do is not burning DVDs, but just be able to playback delayed progamming
while managing it with my own software.

If I can get the ATSC bit stream as is, I'm sure I can figure out how
to extract the specific channel to cut down on storage requirement, and
reconstruct the ATSC during playback (insert dummy content for the other
virtual channels). I'm just looking for a demodulator that will take
the signal from RF all the way through trellis decoding to get the raw
bit stream (before demultiplexing), and a corresponding modulator that
will take that already multiplexed bit stream and do all the steps from
trellis encoding to RF up conversion and VSB filtering to a single real
channel (agile would be nice, but single frequency would be usable).

--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Phil Howard KA9WGN | http/linuxhomepage.com/ http/ham.org/ |
| (first name) at ipal.net | http/phil.ipal.org/ http/ka9wgn.ham.org/ |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

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Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

On 24 Aug 2005 14:30:21 GMT, phil-news-nospam@ipal.net wrote:

>
> Do you know of ant external (e.g. STB style) tuners that can provide
> the ATSC transport stream for a computer (such as via Firewire, USB
> or fast ethernet)?

AFAIK: they don't exist.

>
> Alternatively, a capture card would be workable, if (and only if) it
> can be used with Linux (source code drivers) and provides the ATSC
> stream (the 19.39 mbps bit stream).
>

ATI makes the HDTV Wonder that tunes OTA and saves it to disk. I don't
think you get a pure ATSC stream, but it is close.

> Of course, the next question is how to take that captured and stored
> ATSC stream and send it back out so a TV display or STB thinks it is
> getting genuine ATSC like OTA. Maybe an RF modulator?

It does not exist. It is not as simple as you would think. It not only
would have to do the RF part it would have to compress on the fly. Someday
we will have this.

> What I want to
> do is not burning DVDs, but just be able to playback delayed progamming
> while managing it with my own software.

You can play it back over component video, VGA or some other analog method
from your PC. There are digital options as well.

Brad H

 

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Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

On Wed, 24 Aug 2005 14:30:21 +0000, phil-news-nospa wrote:


> Alternatively, a capture card would be workable, if (and only if) it can
> be used with Linux (source code drivers) and provides the ATSC stream
> (the 19.39 mbps bit stream).
>
http/www.pchdtv.com/

I have the HD-3000, and have been capturing OTA HDTV (and SDTV) since last
year. It came with its own drivers, but is now supported by the DVB
drivers in recent kernels. Other cards are supported by the DVB drivers,
as well, but I have no personal experience with them.

Some software captures the TS, some extracts the PS, some lets you choose.
I'm happily using MythTV. Recent additions include using FireWire to
control and grab from a cable STB. I haven't tried that; my cable
company's offerings are expensive, don't carry all of the broadcasted
streams, and drop the bitrate in order to cram more streams in a given
channel. If I wanted premium channels, it might be worth it. Three PBS
stations, each with multiple streams, pump out more than I have time to
watch.

Playback is via nVidia 6200 DVI output to an HDMI input. Once you've seen
the flexibility that a real computer adds to a home theater, the cable and
satellite boxes look like toys. STBs are designed to a low price point,
suitable for use with a $300 TV. A high-end TV deserves a high-end user
interface, which the wimpy microcontrollers used in STBs can't do well.
Yeah, you can get decent video, but it's like trying to steer a Lexus with
a tiller.

If you don't like to tinker, though, use a standard STB. I'm willing to
put effort into making things work the way I want, not the way that serves
someone else's business model.

 

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Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

In article <4b6hz1axpvbd$.1b7u61xcrewt5$.dlg@40tude.net>,
Brad Houser <bradDOThouser@intel.com> wrote:

| On 24 Aug 2005 14:30:21 GMT, phil-news-nospam@ipal.net wrote:
|
| >
| > Do you know of ant external (e.g. STB style) tuners that can provide
| > the ATSC transport stream for a computer (such as via Firewire, USB
| > or fast ethernet)?
|
| AFAIK: they don't exist.

The ElGato EyeTV 500 is an external tuner which decodes 8VSB or clear
QAM, and outputs the transport stream via FireWire. However, it's
associated software is Mac-only.

-- Tim Olson