Help w/Sony Giga Pocket TVR -- Hacks?

[eferrr]

I just bought a Sony Vaio PCV-RX590G with Giga Pocket PVR/Capture setup. Last night, when attempting to capture a VHS tape onto my hard drive (to edit and put on a VCD for my own personal use, natch), the GigaPocket recorder abruptly stopped recording, giving me the error message "Content can't be recorded - copy protected. Analog copy guard error." Anyone out there familiar with the Vaio GigaPocket setup? Is there a hack to disable the copy protection? Or, if not, is there a reliable Macrovision defeater out there? I ran to Best Buy today and purchased a Sima Video CopyMaster, but it didn't do anything -- still got the same error, and Giga refused to record.

BTW - the Giga recorder works great -- I've captured tons of other (non-copy protected) stuff, so I know that's not the problem.

Help?

Thanks in advance!

[jackhyde]

I don't have an answer for you but I'm interested in buying the Sony RX590G. Can you give me your opinion of the product and the bundled software? Is the mpeg files created with the hardware encoder as good or better than what you can create with the software encoders mentioned on this site? Is it capable of mpeg 1 and 2 capture? How do you like the performance of the personal tv video recorder, are you able to view a tv guide online or do you have to do it on your own? I'm wondering how this compares to a TiVo.
Are you able to produce non standard mpeg files like for SVCD or XVCD? Are you happy with the DVD recorder?
Sorry about all the questions but this is a hefty purchase.
Thank you for your views.

[jackhyde]

I just thought of another question. What brand is the mpeg card and the DVD recorder or are these Sony proprietory hardware products?

[eferrr]

Hey Jack -- I don't have answers to all of your questions, but I'll help where I can.

I think the 590G is a superior product in practically every way and I couldn't be happier with it. I know there are a lot of folks out there that are down on the Vaios and Sony, but I have been a Vaio convert for serveral years now -- this is my second (my previous model being the PCV-R556DS), and the third Vaio I've brought home (my wife also has an older Vaio slimtop model. Sony truly designs tight systems, as I've never had a major problem with any of my them.

The bundled software that comes with the 590G is the usual mixed bag -- if you're like me, when you get a new system, at least 50% of the bundled software either doesn't get used or gets deleted. Adobe Premiere 6 LE is probably the most powerful app that comes included, and believe me, it's worth it. I was a bit hesitant to use it at first (having previously gotten used to the interface on a much-more user friendly, yet much less-powerful, less reliable video editing app), but it was fairly intuitive once I started fiddling around with it. Probably my only complaint is that, for the first time in recent memory, this Vaio comes bundled with Wordperfect 9, as opposed to MSWord. Still a very good program, but I'm just very used to Word (tip: for around $89 or $99 you can buy the latest version of MSWorks which comes with an upgrade to the latest version of Word 2002 -- having Wordperfect 9 on your HD qualifies you for the competetive upgrade).

I can't really say if the mpeg files are good, better or worse than those created by other software encoders, but I can tell you that they are of a high quality. When you capture video (I use two sources -- cable TV signal and VHS), GigaPocket saves the files in a proprietary format. But you have the option to export these files to any of three different formats -- MPEG1, MPEG2 or AVI. I export to AVI so that I can edit the files in Premiere. Then I save the finished files in Premiere in AVI, and then I use TMPGEnc to convert the edited AVIs to MPEG1 -- so that I can burn them onto Video CDs.

The recorder works very well, and the program guide is awesome -- you simply log in to the website (http://www.sony.com/vaiotv/), scroll through the channels (the lineups of which are tailored to your local cable provider's lineup), and when you see something you'd like to record, you just click on the "Record this show" icon. This sets the timer for your GigaPocket. You can also adjust the timer, set it manually, whatever. As a matter of fact, the only negative thing I can say about the GigaPocket is that you can't pause, rewind, etc. a program when you're watching it live (like you can with Tivo and ReplayTV ). All in all, a small price to pay when you get right down to it.

With regard to the DVD recorder, I can't really comment just yet -- I haven't tried to burn a DVD yet (although I've already burned countless CDs and VCDs -- and not a coaster in the bunch. This may be due to the fact that I use Roxio's Easy CD Creator Platinum (bought it seperately) -- I'm not sure about whatever burning software that came bundled with the 590G, as I've never had need to use it.

And, to answer your last question, I believe the mpeg capture card is a Sony proprietary deal, as it appears in the device manager as "Sony MPEG2 Encoder Board (WDM)." The DVD-R/RW drive is a Pioneer DVD-RW DVR-103.

To sum up, in case you haven't read between the lines here -- I think this is a top-notch machine and would recommend it to anyone!

Feel free to write if you have any other questions (ed@edferrara.com). And lemme know if you end up buying one -- it would be nice to know of at least *one* other person out there who owns one!

Later!

[M&M]

Have anyone used the DVD-RW burnner on the Sony Vaio 590G or 490TV to burn a VCD (CD-R) with Nero?

I always got the power calibration error. Would someone please give me some clue?

Thanks.

[drr]

Hello,

I got a 490TV back in May. There was precious little information available on the machine, so I took it on faith that Sony would deliver a great package. Eferrr is right, Premier is the best app, but I'm a long way from producing anything useful (my job, wife and daughter keep eating all my 'spare' time).

I'd be most interested in your (Eferrr's) processing of GigaPocket recordings using TEMPGEnc or the other tools. Any tips or help would be most appreciated. I keep making things that crash the encoder or player, have A/V sync problems, or are too big for VCD.

I'll not tell anyone not to buy a Vaio, but right now I'm feeling a little frustrated with it.

drr

[M&M]

I have been playing with the system a bit more over the weekend. I found the problem that I had (power calibration error) was CD-R media related. I got that problem when I used the "Digial Media" Disc. It didn't happen if I used the TDK disc. Then, when I did some more experiment, I found the problem could be caused by the media's transperancy. As soon as I put a CD label on the Digial Media disc, the problem went away.

I tried to convert those Giga Pocket capture files into mpeg1 files than burn them on a VCD. I found the quailty was not so good. At least, it was unacceptable to me. I am going to try convert the Giga pocket files to mpeg2, then convert to mpeg1 using VBR to see if it will help.

drr, I hear you. I found that once you have kids, time becomes very expensive.

Regards,
MM