Tivo to DVD How do I convert sound track?

[MerlinMacuser]

Hello friends.

I am trying to import material recorded on Tivo to my G5 using a Pyro DV capture device and iMovie. There are a couple of problems with this method including a wicked ground loop hum. I bought an inline GL filter form RS which works ok but I have previously transfered material for which the originals are gone from Tivo's drive.

I want to use the Hum Elimination filter in Final Cut Express but each time I launch the filter, FCE wants to re-render the audio track. Finally determined that this is due to the sampling frequency difference between iMovie and FCE. So each time I want to play the audio track to confirm that the filter worked, FCE wants to up convert and render again.

Is there an application I can use to either import the material from Tivo at an appropriate frequency or is there something I can use to scrub the hum before burning the dvd besides FCE?

The other weird problem is a slow vertical roll wave in the video portion. In order to transfer from Tivo to the G5 I have to play the movie as if I'm recording to a VCR. When I actually do this to a vcr the roll is less evident but still present. I use a S-Video inline amplifier to boost the signal between the Tivo and the G5 which are about 40 feet distant from each other. Could this booster be the cause of the roll? Any thoughts?

Thanks!

[markusb]

I don't know if I am helping you here or not, but here goes, the video and audio are probably both non-standard (is it a series 1 or 2 TiVo?)

You can try:

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/14022

to get the raw .ty files to quicktime and them author it from there, but I basically use VirtualPC (tytool or tystudio/tmpgenc & tmpgenc dvd author) to do this, because it just seems to produce better reults.

Don't get me wrong here, I would prefer to do this ALL n my 17" powerbook, but I have tried lots of ways to do it without success.

I did ask Serbian if he could add a TiVo > DVD functio into his other product (MPEG2Works) and he said he would look into it, but it is probably a lower priority than other stuff, you could contact him for further info on the progress I guess.

[pfile]

yeah i think the video problems are due to the extremely long s-video cord. you are probably getting reflections off the far end of the cable.

for my part i had been using a Formac Studio DV to pull video off the tivo. this device works with iMovie. i had audio problems with iMovie3, but installing the formac driver took care of that. so i would edit in iMovie3 then use DVD studio pro's toolchain to make DVDs. but of course the extraction happens in real time and that's just too slow.

you really should be able to set everything up such that there's no hum. perhaps you need to move the tivo closer to the computer... then if your device works with iMovie3, you can do the same thing i was doing.

a couple of weeks ago i got my act together and set up the tivo to do video extraction. this is not for the faint of heart, and there's no good mac-only solution right now, but it is very convenient. now i can pull the shows off of the tivo as .mpg files and burn them to dvd. the downside here is that the DVDs created from these .mpgs are not legal DVDs and some DVD players will not play them. mine does though, so i am happy.
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[MerlinMacuser]

Thanks...it is a series 2 unit. You've given me an idea though...

Virtual PC won't work on the G5 due to an architecture issue. Supposedly MS is working on a solution but it won't be ready until the NEXT itteration of VPC.

Update: I moved Tivo to my office and set it up so it is within 3 feet of the capture device and a monitor. I did not connect the cable or phone lines to it since I only want to download stored material....wow! No hum and no apparent video distortion at all. The only downside is that the material needs to be captured by iMovie (or Final Cut, or Toast) in real time. Also, the sound track is not DD 5.1...however my receiver can synth it, sort of.

I just made an archive disk of Miss Spears' latest concert which includes the advance adverts as a lead-in then 2 of her music videos as encores after the concert. Wow! nudge nudge

This beats the VCR alternative by a considerable amount. I just read that Tivo is offering a price break for second room installations...maybe I can connect them via Home Media Option then I won't have to physically move it around.

[marc1]

I did ask Serbian if he could add a TiVo > DVD functio into his other product (MPEG2Works) and he said he would look into it, but it is probably a lower priority than other stuff, you could contact him for further info on the progress I guess.

Would love to hear about any upddates here. I have some Tivo files that I am trying to burn on to DVDs. It has been very difficult!

[jaytbird]

I had the same issues with my DVR about a year ago. Here's what I ended up doing:
My setup: Ultimate TV unit (M$ version of Tivo), TiBook, Sony DCR-TRV 720 video camera.

1. S-Video from the UTV unit to the Camcorder. Now, there are two ways to capture. One, record the signal directly onto the camcorder media. Mine is unique in that it records digitally onto Hi-8 cassettes. It utilizes and an onboard analog>digital transcoder. After recording to your media, then capture from the camera with iMovie.
The second option is to do this real-time, utilizing the camcorder as a pass through transcoder, and then capturing with iMovie, but you must have any extremely large hard drive.
2. Either way, once the video is in the iMovie format, I use ffmpegX to compress to .mp2 and .m2v (elementary streams). Don't forget you'll need to rename the extension from.mov to .dv, as ffmpegX doesn't reconginze the .mov extension. After compression, I then use ffmpegX to author as a DVD.
3. Once this is done, you can then burn with Toast, and Voila! A DVD of excellent quality from your DVR unit can now be played on all stand-alones. One item that sucks is that the DD 5.1 and DTS do not transfer, so all you get to Pro-Logic sound, but my Reciever does a pretty good job of simulating the experience. I would not use this method to archive a movie with awesome special effects that is commercially available, but it works for most other shows. BTW, I burned the Battlestar Galactica mini-series that was on Sci-Fi last December. I edited the commercials out, and was extremely pleased with the end product.
Anyways, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it!