Exporting from DVR
Posted 10/02/09 at 12:15:07 PM by The Maximum PC Staff
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What would be the best way (time efficient) to capture video from my DirecTV DVR to my PC? I don’t want to capture Hollywood movies—I can buy those. My interest is in capturing the near 100 hours of Brazilian Carnival on my DVR, then editing it down to a “best of” DVD or two. My PC has plenty of USB ports and free PCI-E and PCI expansion slots available.
—Jeff Absher
Jeff, if your machine were a TiVo, exporting video would be fairly easy using the on-board USB, but the DirecTV DVR is trickier since any USB ports it has are disabled and there’s no way to enable them. Since you have a free PCI-E slot, we think your best bet (though it will be a time sink) is to get a PCI TV tuner and output your DVR to its input ports. Some higher-end videocards from ATI and Nvidia also include Video In Video Out, so (with the addition of video-capture software and/or specialized drivers) you can record directly from that port. Either way, you’re looking at bad news on two fronts: First, your output signal will be analog and the quality may suffer; second, you’ll have to do it in real time. But hey, it’ll do the job.
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Ditrectv2PC
Submitted by sniper62 on Mon, 10/05/2009 - 9:51am
http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/global/contentPageNR.jsp?assetId=P4920044
take a look at that, with that program u can connect your DVR to your network and can have access it from all the computers connected to that network. you wont loose quality, but you will have to figure out a way to record whats playing. you could just use a screen recording program to capture it then edit it.
Better yet
Submitted by alanmc76 on Sun, 10/04/2009 - 7:51am
Better yet, get an ATSC compatible TV Tuner card and use Media Center inside Win 7. Media Center has all of the functionality of a digital receiver and all of the functionality of a DVR, plus with a high end sound card you have native 7.1 stereo.
Get all the existing programming off the current DVR and never look back. I haven't.
________________________________________
-- "What am I, MacGyver? Fix it with what?"--
Submitted by shnoogie on Fri, 10/02/2009 - 4:12pm
Hack to Tivo (Google it)
Use Tivo Desktop 2.0 (not newer) to transfer your recordings to the PC over Ethernet.
Submitted by ready4war on Fri, 10/02/2009 - 1:58pm
dish network allows u to put Recordings on a HDD but u have to pay like 40 bucks a months
Acctually it's just a one
Submitted by yogurt80 on Fri, 10/02/2009 - 6:46pm
Acctually it's just a one time $40 fee to enable the USB jack, and then you can hook any extenal drive to it and record for free.
Submitted by robotsneedhugs2 on Fri, 10/02/2009 - 1:00pm
What's the point of USB ports on the DVR if they can't be enabled? Why even put them on there?
Submitted by MeTo on Sat, 10/03/2009 - 6:02am
So they can charge you $40 bucks to turn it on.
Submitted by mesiah on Fri, 10/02/2009 - 8:18pm
The designers of most new cable and satellite DVRs realize the many potential uses for a USB port on their hardware, so they add it. However, the cable and satellite companies are afraid users will somehow use the usb ports to hack their box and get free service, so they force the manufacturer to disable it. Its cheaper to just turn it off in the software than have to redesign the box down the road if usb is needed.
Submitted by billcipp on Fri, 10/02/2009 - 12:45pm
I believe theat Direct TV has video out, actually composite video out which you can input into the Hauppauge HD PVR High Definition Personal Video Recorder. It also allows recording in HD Format with virtually no loss of picture. It allows pass-through so no need for splitters. See the link:
http://www.hauppauge.com/site/products/data_hdpvr.html
and read reviews:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815116030
Make sure you read all the reviews as the majority swear by this product.
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