Low Cost FireWire TV input device?

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  • Reply 101 of 135
    limtclimtc Posts: 82member
    Programmer, I am answering your question on "Holy crap, this is exactly what I was talking about". I didn't follow up on this thread. If you like to know more about EyeHome, maybe I can help.
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  • Reply 102 of 135
    limtclimtc Posts: 82member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Programmer

    Holy crap, this is exactly what I was talking about above. I can't wait to read some reviews of it -- if it works as-claimed I'm order 3, plus the DVR box for my Mac.



    Somebody out there is reading my mind...




    Programmer, if you don't mind not including DVR, you will have more choice from coming CES (some of them will be Mac compatible). One of this you can check out is from http://www.neuston.com/en/mc500.asp
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  • Reply 103 of 135
    eugeneeugene Posts: 8,254member
    'Golden convergence' continues to rear its ugly-ass head...



    Okay...WTF?? REALLY!



    "Hi, I need a color print cartridge for my TV..."



    This is why we just accept what every tech company decides is forward progress.
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  • Reply 104 of 135
    whisperwhisper Posts: 735member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Eugene

    'Golden convergence' continues to rear its ugly-ass head...



    Okay...WTF?? REALLY!



    "Hi, I need a color print cartridge for my TV..."



    This is why we just accept what every tech company decides is forward progress.




    lol, wow. That's scary
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  • Reply 105 of 135
    eugeneeugene Posts: 8,254member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Whisper

    lol, wow. That's scary



    Even worse, they went that far and decided not to put a DVD±RW drive in there. So you can't even watch or record DVDs with the optical drive on that thing. Huh???
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  • Reply 106 of 135
    aphelionaphelion Posts: 736member
    Well, MacWorld has come and gone without any mention of the hoped for convergence device. Of course, the now obvious focus on music for MacWorld didn't leave any room for the soon to be announced next generation iMac either so I still have hope that Apple is working on something for later this year.



    Of course over at the CES show in Las Vegas Bill Gates was front and center with "seamless computing" for it's Media Center PC and "extenders" to the TV as well as portable media players (formerly known as "media2go"). All are to be available for this year's Christmas buying season.



    Bill also announced the availability of the SPOT watch which was the product he promised at the last CES show for the 2003 Christmas buying season. I predict that this particular bit of Microsoft innovation will be quietly killed long before next Christmas.



    It would seem that Microsoft is making a play to dominate this "convergence" thing which, without a notable competitor (not Linux), they may succeed in. Of course their "Golden Convergence" will be kludged together hardware all tied up with poorly written software and laced with Microsoft's draconian DRM.



    I believe Apple can offer more for less here if, as Eugene said, they choose to compete for the millions of consumers who will want their PCs to have these capabilities.



    The Boston Globe had this to say about Apple's future plans:

    Quote:

    ... But analysts expect Apple to stay ahead of its competitors. The company's likely next steps are a home-media server for recording TV shows and sharing digital files between the television and computer, then a portable video player like the iPod.



    "Apple is slowly reinventing itself," Kay said.



    Roger Kay is the director of client computing for International Data Corp., a research firm in Framingham.
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  • Reply 107 of 135
    homhom Posts: 1,098member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Aphelion

    Well, MacWorld has come and gone without any mention of the hoped for convergence device. Of course, the now obvious focus on music for MacWorld didn't leave any room for the soon to be announced next generation iMac either so I still have hope that Apple is working on something for later this year.



    Of course over at the CES show in Las Vegas Bill Gates was front and center with "seamless computing" for it's Media Center PC and "extenders" to the TV as well as portable media players (formerly known as "media2go"). All are to be available for this year's Christmas buying season.



    Bill also announced the availability of the SPOT watch which was the product he promised at the last CES show for the 2003 Christmas buying season. I predict that this particular bit of Microsoft innovation will be quietly killed long before next Christmas.



    It would seem that Microsoft is making a play to dominate this "convergence" thing which, without a notable competitor (not Linux), they may succeed in. Of course their "Golden Convergence" will be kludged together hardware all tied up with poorly written software and laced with Microsoft's draconian DRM.



    I believe Apple can offer more for less here if, as Eugene said, they choose to compete for the millions of consumers who will want their PCs to have these capabilities.



    The Boston Globe had this to say about Apple's future plans:



    Roger Kay is the director of client computing for International Data Corp., a research firm in Framingham.




    Whenever MS "innovates" in a market that has no major competitors, you can bank on the fact that it is going to be a flop. Can anyone say "wireless monitor"? I knew you could.
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  • Reply 108 of 135
    Quote:

    Originally posted by HOM :

    Whenever MS "innovates" in a market that has no major competitors, you can bank on the fact that it is going to be a flop...



    Right, with nobody to show them how, they remain clueless as to how to design and implement functionality into their products. Microsoft's main goal is to get their WMP and attendant DRM into mainstream products so as to become the de-facto controller (and toll collector) of whatever is used to implement the "convergence".



    They are frantic to define emerging markets and become the de-facto non-standard standard. The question the product planners at Apple Computer has to come to grips with is: "is it in Apple's best interests to let Microsoft do this?"



    I believe that the pressure from the product engineers and Board of Directors at Apple will force Steve Jobs to hold his nose and at least put his toe in the pool.
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  • Reply 109 of 135
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Programmer

    Holy crap, this is exactly what I was talking about above. I can't wait to read some reviews of it -- if it works as-claimed I'm order 3, plus the DVR box for my Mac.



    Somebody out there is reading my mind...




    somebody is *almost* reading my mind, it plays mpeg-1, mpeg-2, mpeg-4 and divx, but does NOT play Quicktime movie files of other formats... bah!
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  • Reply 110 of 135
    eugeneeugene Posts: 8,254member
    I can't wait to buy my Epson HDTV/Printer/Video-Conferencing device so I can hook it up to my integrated HP Scanner/Printer/Fax/Rotisserie, which in turn is hooked up to my wireless video/audio server/stereo/DVD player, which is also hooked up to my Media Center PC, etc...
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  • Reply 111 of 135
    there are some historical precedents being discussed in the iBox thread



    Apple STB (Set Top Box) circa 1995
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  • Reply 112 of 135
    limtclimtc Posts: 82member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Conner

    somebody is *almost* reading my mind, it plays mpeg-1, mpeg-2, mpeg-4 and divx, but does NOT play Quicktime movie files of other formats... bah!



    It does play QuickTime, but it depends on what is the codec used in the movie. QuickTime, like AVI, is just a container. If it contains MPEG1 or MPEG4 video stream inside, it will play.
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  • Reply 113 of 135
    connerconner Posts: 22member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by limtc

    It does play QuickTime, but it depends on what is the codec used in the movie. QuickTime, like AVI, is just a container. If it contains MPEG1 or MPEG4 video stream inside, it will play.



    that is why I said 'but does NOT play Quicktime movie files of other formats'
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  • Reply 114 of 135
    programmerprogrammer Posts: 3,503member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Conner

    that is why I said 'but does NOT play Quicktime movie files of other formats'



    To play any codec it would have to be an Apple machine so that it could run Apple's QuickTime implementation. In that case you'll pay more for it. As it is the device plays all the formats that really matter, and you can always transcode other material if you really must watch it on your TV instead of your Mac. Is there a particular codec you want supported? If it is widely enough used they might be able to support it.
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  • Reply 115 of 135
    limtclimtc Posts: 82member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Programmer

    To play any codec it would have to be an Apple machine so that it could run Apple's QuickTime implementation. In that case you'll pay more for it. As it is the device plays all the formats that really matter, and you can always transcode other material if you really must watch it on your TV instead of your Mac. Is there a particular codec you want supported? If it is widely enough used they might be able to support it.



    Programmer, you are right. The decoding is actually done in the media player itself. EyeHome software running on Mac is just a web server sending streams over to the media player. The media player is playing a lot of standard stuffs, like MPEG1/2/4, AAC/MP2/MP3. It supports both AVI and QuickTime container. I converts all my QuickTime movies to 3ivx format, and it works fine.
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  • Reply 116 of 135
    Quote:

    Originally posted by musicaltone :

    Eugene, why cant the iBox sit on the network too? It would make sense for such a device to be a dedicated TV device, another resource on the network. Like the internet itself, home networks will be based on the idea that there isn't 1 hub, but a number of connected devices. Now, Apple could ignore this segment of the market if it wishes too, as you have said there are other players. But what if Apple did produce something - another iDevice to further support the platform and iTMS in particular.



    HP's decision to go with the iPod and the iTMS is sending shock waves through the Industry and pumping both HP and Apples stock up by over 5% as we discuss whether it's a good idea for Apple to develop another iGadget or iBox set-top thingy.



    How does the HP/Apple announcement relate to this discussion? Well I found an interesting quote from HP at CNN/Money concerning their future plans for an "entertainment hub":



    Quote:

    HP also announced plans to start selling this fall what it calls an "entertainment hub" that will include a single, central storage device, as well as a distribution and access point for all music, photo, video and movie collections in the home.



    Might this be a device, that, like the iPod and the Xserver RAID, can be used by any operating system? If Apple were to build a device that acted as an "entertainment hub" to be sold to anyone with a TV, wouldn't they want it to be a stand alone device that was platform agnostic? Think of the jump in sales for both the iPod and the iTMS when they fully opened it to Windows users.



    To bad the xBox name is already taken.
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  • Reply 117 of 135
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Programmer

    To play any codec it would have to be an Apple machine so that it could run Apple's QuickTime implementation. In that case you'll pay more for it. As it is the device plays all the formats that really matter, and you can always transcode other material if you really must watch it on your TV instead of your Mac. Is there a particular codec you want supported? If it is widely enough used they might be able to support it.



    I think I know what you mean, but a Windows PC can play 'any' codec with QT installed, similarly a 'media player' could have some form of QT installed (yes, I realize the hurdles here - I am not saying it would be trivial), and have it upgradeable thru firmware when new versions of QuickTime come out. So I don't think it would *have* to be an Apple machine, but it would most certainly help.



    Yes, I realize that 'any' is a stretch, some codecs (uncompressed, DV, high quality motion jpeg) have far too high of a bitrate to be realistic, and other codecs (Sorenson 3) are highly cpu intensive where you'd need a beefy processor in the 'media player' to decode full screen movies - but it would be nice to see it have QuickTime installed and support QuickTime formats where it makes sense.



    Over time I've captured to DV thru media converters a lot of video, then compressed that down to Sorenson 2 or more recently Sorenson 3 - 1000+ of hours of stuff. Could I reencode that to mpeg-1 or mpeg-2 or mpeg-4? Yes, but it would be highly time consuming and would be at a loss of quality and/or gain in file size. Could I recapture and recompress the stuff - most of it, but some of it was captured live, so that would not be an option for some of it, and it would again take a great deal of time.



    I should have been more specific in my first post - the EyeHome product is *close* to what I want - I *understand* why it doesn't support 'all' QuickTime formats, but the product I want *would* support all/most of them...



    ah well, still waiting for 'my' media player (:
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  • Reply 118 of 135
    programmerprogrammer Posts: 3,503member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Conner

    I think I know what you mean, but a Windows PC can play 'any' codec with QT installed, similarly a 'media player' could have some form of QT installed (yes, I realize the hurdles here - I am not saying it would be trivial), and have it upgradeable thru firmware when new versions of QuickTime come out. So I don't think it would *have* to be an Apple machine, but it would most certainly help.



    Yes, I realize that 'any' is a stretch, some codecs (uncompressed, DV, high quality motion jpeg) have far too high of a bitrate to be realistic, and other codecs (Sorenson 3) are highly cpu intensive where you'd need a beefy processor in the 'media player' to decode full screen movies - but it would be nice to see it have QuickTime installed and support QuickTime formats where it makes sense.



    Over time I've captured to DV thru media converters a lot of video, then compressed that down to Sorenson 2 or more recently Sorenson 3 - 1000+ of hours of stuff. Could I reencode that to mpeg-1 or mpeg-2 or mpeg-4? Yes, but it would be highly time consuming and would be at a loss of quality and/or gain in file size. Could I recapture and recompress the stuff - most of it, but some of it was captured live, so that would not be an option for some of it, and it would again take a great deal of time.



    I should have been more specific in my first post - the EyeHome product is *close* to what I want - I *understand* why it doesn't support 'all' QuickTime formats, but the product I want *would* support all/most of them...



    ah well, still waiting for 'my' media player (:




    If Sorenson is specifically what you want then ask them to support it. If they decide there is enough content out there to warrant it, they just might do it.



    Anything is possible, but most of it drives the cost up. The whole attraction of this device to me is that it costs a mere US$250. Beefing it up to run Apple's QuickTime release would complicate things enormously, make it crash a lot ('cuz you'd probably be running Windows), and involve licensing fees for one or more software vendors. No thanks.



    Perhaps what you ought to do is buy a FireWire-based MPEG-2 encoder and have your Mac play your movies TO and FROM that device in order to transcode them.
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  • Reply 119 of 135
    programmerprogrammer Posts: 3,503member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by limtc

    Programmer, you are right. The decoding is actually done in the media player itself. EyeHome software running on Mac is just a web server sending streams over to the media player. The media player is playing a lot of standard stuffs, like MPEG1/2/4, AAC/MP2/MP3. It supports both AVI and QuickTime container. I converts all my QuickTime movies to 3ivx format, and it works fine.



    So you actually have one of these little gems? I'd PM you, but you've got that turned off. So tell us what you think, how well it works, what the warranty is, etc. Do you have an EyeTV as well, if so how well do these things work together? Can the EyeHome control the EyeTV?
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  • Reply 120 of 135
    programmerprogrammer Posts: 3,503member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Aphelion

    Might this be a device, that, like the iPod and the Xserver RAID, can be used by any operating system? If Apple were to build a device that acted as an "entertainment hub" to be sold to anyone with a TV, wouldn't they want it to be a stand alone device that was platform agnostic? Think of the jump in sales for both the iPod and the iTMS when they fully opened it to Windows users.







    The computer is the "hub". What is needed are good/cheap devices along the lines of Streamium and EyeHome/EyeTV which connect the hub to media inputs and outputs.
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