How in the hell do you record games in this decade ???

[SharkHawk]

@Shark: Flash was a great technology that helped spur the web into what it is today, but it's dead and should be killed off accordingly, nowadays. I don't know the story behind an Adobe employee trying to kill you, that's jacked up, but I do know Adobe products were used across the board for Cameron's Avatar, so if it's good enough for a movie that looks like that one does visually, I would say it certainly meets any reasonable professional standard one can make a claim for.

Also, your comment about what works within your budget made me laugh; I'm sure you understand why. Apple's only product that one could call reasonably priced is the base Macbook Air. Apple has always charged ridiculous premiums for their computers, and NOBODY has an argument that they are a money-saver.

In any case, like Apple all you want, just don't try to sell them as a company more ethical than Microsoft, or whatever.

I never said they were ethical. I said they had contracts with school districts. That's just a fact. I can't get around it. I can't force my kids to goof around with an android tablet and root the thing when I have a cart of brand new iPads sitting in my classroom with specific apps I'm supposed to use for instruction.

Apple stuff has always been cheap for me... but again, I have a distinct advantage over a typical end user. I get it on lease (employer pays the lease) at the end of the lease Apple buys it back for X amount of dollars which applies to next lease (3 year cycles typically, but moving toward 5 now) or I can take it and pay $1 more than the lease return amount. We never shell out more than about $400 per computer. I'd say that's cheap for its life span and kid friendliness. And yes.... they are KID friendly, and I realize that computer wizards and internet superstars like to laugh about that, but let's be honest... the majority of the buying public likes things that are easy. I like Tivo, but I can't hear enough about what a POS the thing is and how stupid it is, and how I can do the same thing with the following 8 machines and a guy showing me as his system is crashing and he's got devices strung all over the room. Honestly, I can afford the $400 upfront for a lifetime Tivo and let them figure out the engineering of a setup. It's nifty. I reward them for their hard work so I don't have to do it. Could I? Certainly. I just don't want to. I'm lazy. It's the American way.

And yes.... somebody who is quite high up at Adobe did try to kill me. He pulled a gun on me in a classroom and was interrupted. It's awesome. He's rich enough that he got off totally free when the one witness (my supervisor/principal) turned tail and switched her story and claimed she didn't see a confrontation, and then she attempted to transfer me away at this guy's request because he was going to pull his "support" of the school and Adobe's annual PTA gift as well. Class acts all the way. CLASS. CLASS. CLASS. I'm glad it's good enough for James Cameron, but if Adobe was on fire I wouldn't piss the place out.

 

[Marvin49]

[youtube][/youtube]

I have a DVR and then dump things to a DVD recorder I got at Walmart. I just got a new one last week for $75. It works great! I dump shows I want to rewatch onto DVD all the time (or movies I've watched that I don't want to buy, but don't mind having a lower quality copy of). It only lets me dump it with the old yellow, red, white cables, but everything looks good enough to me. I don't see any degradation over what my DVR is putting out.

Only prob with that is that those cables you are talking about are component cables. Those will only do 480p (IE, no HD) DVD won't record in HD either. Its a good solution, but I was looking to keep the games in full 1080p. A bit more challenging.

Actually what he's talking about are composite cables, component cables are the 5 color cables and they do support 1080p...jeez niner fans sometimes

oops. Correct. Had my cable names backwards. No worries. Just tryin ta help and explain how I capture all my games in HD.

 

[Marvin49]

Hope you don't mind advice from Niner fan on this one...

I have all 49er games in HD since 2010.

I got a box at Frys that connects to the composite out on my cable box (or DVR) and then I run from the box to the TV. Can't remember Name but I can find it if interested. I want to say its from a company called Hippogauge or something like that and its called a PVR.

Anyway, the box also has USB outs that I plug into my laptop. It comes with software (Total Media Extreme) that will allow you to capture the video in full 1080p.

Its a beautiful thing. Each game tho is about 13-15 GB in size tho so I store the games on a 2 TB External USB Hard drive.

Pretty cool tho...I can plug the drive into my new Sharp 70" tv and I can watch any game from last three years. It looks so good it looks like I'm watching it live.

Hope this helps.

I got the Hauppage last year and it works great.

There ya go...thats the one.

Its fantastic. One of the best buys I've ever made and it wasn't even expensive.

 

[BlueTalons]

What BlueTalons said, but there's also an alternative to that particular device. I use the Ceton InfiniTV 4, which is a model behind what's currently available: http://cetoncorp.com/ Plus, Ceton is headquartered right here in Kirkland, WA; so if you like supporting local business, then get one of those. I love my InfiniTV 4. It's just annoying that the restricted Windows Media Center format can't be edited in most video editors natively.

Check out VideoReDo...they have a 30 day trial and you will wonder how you did without it! If you don't want to spend $100, then VideoReDo Plus ($50) WILL work...but you have to convert the .WTV files to .DVR-MS files (do a Google search on it.)

 

[RolandDeschain]

I've played with it, Blue; it's convenient for the basics, but it lacks a ton of features compared to Premiere Pro. The only problem is, I can't work natively with .WTV files in Premiere Pro; but I also don't want to re-encode to a different format just to work with it in Premiere Pro, because you lose quality every time you re-encode something.

I may just use Microsoft Expressions Encoder, but that's strangely limited in some ways, too...Blah.

 

[mikeak]

And yes.... they are KID friendly, and I realize that computer wizards and internet superstars like to laugh about that, but let's be honest... the majority of the buying public likes things that are easy. I like Tivo, but I can't hear enough about what a POS the thing is and how stupid it is, and how I can do the same thing with the following 8 machines and a guy showing me as his system is crashing and he's got devices strung all over the room. Honestly, I can afford the $400 upfront for a lifetime Tivo and let them figure out the engineering of a setup. It's nifty. I reward them for their hard work so I don't have to do it. Could I? Certainly. I just don't want to. I'm lazy. It's the American way.
.

This is why I have several apple products. Is it optimizing - nope, is it the most bang for the buck in regards to performance - nope. Is it so freaking simple that I don't have to spend my time which is more precious than money (to me) learning something I simply don't feel like learning - YES. Is this why I went back to cable for one week then wonder WTF I was doing and called Directv and got them back in my house - YES.

Simplicity is king and it is not just about being lazy it is about where to spend time which is the most limited asset for many

 

[drdiags]

I have the same setup as Blue Talons, even the VideoReDo. I wanted to go with the Ceton extender but MS messed them up with their Windows 8 version of Media Center. So the Ceton only supports Windows 7 Media Center. I wanted to toss the Xbox as my extender to the HDHomerun Prime.

The Premiere Pro sounds interesting, since VideoReDo can require a little more hands on to correctly remove all the commercials from your WTV files. Maybe it isn't compatible with what I have but nothing wrong with reading up on it.

Since the OP sounds like he wants to do this on a VCR and not a DVR, I am not sure I have an answer for him that doesn't involve some type of computer/set top box.

 

[RolandDeschain]

So the Ceton only supports Windows 7 Media Center.

Hmmm? Works fine for me on Windows 8. I know they were still waiting for some certification from MS or something shortly before the official Windows 8 release, but that was all worked out.

 

[drdiags]

Not the tv card. They were doing an extender as well for about $170.00. Came out last xmas.

 

[BlueTalons]

I've played with it, Blue; it's convenient for the basics, but it lacks a ton of features compared to Premiere Pro. The only problem is, I can't work natively with .WTV files in Premiere Pro; but I also don't want to re-encode to a different format just to work with it in Premiere Pro, because you lose quality every time you re-encode something.

I may just use Microsoft Expressions Encoder, but that's strangely limited in some ways, too...Blah.

At nearly $400 for the Premiere Pro...no thanks. I like to keep the native format anyway and with VideoReDo I can edit out commercials and just re-mux it with no encoding.

For the OP...it boils down to what features you want and how much you want to spend and how you want to set things up. To record from the Comcast DVR to a DVD Recorder means you have to play the game at real time to capture the recording. Then you have commercials which take up space and the need for additional DVDs - more PITA. Then to copy the disc, you still need to use a computer...

Also, you lose the HD quality - BIG negative to me. If you have <40" TV like Shark, you may not notice much difference (though I DO notice it A LOT...) With the computer recordings, you take the raw recording in a file and you can do just about whatever you want with it in full HD. (SIDE NOTE...MUST use NTFS not FAT32 which limits 4GB file sizes.)

The only REAL negative with the HD (aside from HUGE files) is KIRO's Comcast CBS feed which is HIGHLY compressed CRAP...somewhat "hidden" by smaller TV's/analog conversions. So glad we only have to bare 2 games a year on that station...

 

[RolandDeschain]

Not the tv card. They were doing an extender as well for about $170.00. Came out last xmas.

Oh, wow; I didn't know Windows 8 didn't support non-MS extenders. That's some serious BS. Microsoft, you really annoy me sometimes. I wonder if there's a crack for this somewhere?

I like to keep the native format anyway and with VideoReDo I can edit out commercials and just re-mux it with no encoding.

Re-muxing doesn't remove the Windows Media Center DRM from the recordings though, does it? This doesn't seem to matter much for Seahawks games because they're over public airwaves and the DRM's more or less turned off for them, but there are severe restrictions put on recordings from some cable channels, etc.

 

[hawks4thewin]

My uncompressed HD recording ( well the best comcast HD can deliver)
Silicon dust hd Prime.
windows 8 pc with Media center
Blu ray burner (60 bucks)
M-card From comcast (FREE)
I burn one seahawks game PER Blu-ray disk about 22 gigs a game.

if i'm making spot videos of the games or reducing them down to watch on less elaboarte systems i will use CYBERLINK POWER DIRECTOR and
Cut the commercials and then compress to mpeg 2 or 4.

Uncompessed Seahawks HD games are going to run you in the 20-25 gig range PER GAME. fyi.

 

[Jazzhawk]

I'm not even going to get Roland started on video editors... but ok... yeah I am. I use a Diamond VC500 for my MAC (Made by APPLE COMPUTERS! hahaha) and use the built in APPLE SOFTWARE stuff, and it works just niftily. (be gentle...)

It's just not fair that I get antagonized like this, then I get yelled at for responding in kind.

(Adobe Premiere Pro.)

It's insanely fair. :th2thumbs:

 

[Jazzhawk]

SO, what's the best way to get my DVR copies off the Comcast box and into permanent storage?

 

[BlueTalons]

SO, what's the best way to get my DVR copies off the Comcast box and into permanent storage?

I USED to use a Firewire cable connected to the back of the Comcast DVR, fed into a PC with Firewire, used a special D-VHS driver and an app to record real time playback. This is how I got the games during our SB run in '05 in HD. Here is the link on the subject...though it is old and not sure if it works anymore... AND you pretty much had to be a techie to get it to work right! Back in the Windows XP days.

Best to not use the Comcast DVR in the first place...

 

[drdiags]

SO, what's the best way to get my DVR copies off the Comcast box and into permanent storage?

The technique Blue Talons mentioned was how I wanted to do it, but my PCs all had Windows XP upgraded or never installed. The driver mentioned in the article was for Windows XP-compliant PCs so when I tried hooking up my Firewire to the Comcast DVR, my version of Windows wouldn't work with it and then I turned it in. Had the Beastquake game, Rams Sunday night game and the Bears playoff loss.

If you get this to work on a non-Windows XP system, please share.

 

[drdiags]

SO, what's the best way to get my DVR copies off the Comcast box and into permanent storage?

The technique Blue Talons mentioned was how I wanted to do it, but my PCs all had Windows XP upgraded or never installed. The driver mentioned in the article was for Windows XP-compliant PCs so when I tried hooking up my Firewire to the Comcast DVR, my version of Windows wouldn't work with it and then I turned it in. Had the Beastquake game, Rams Sunday night game and the Bears playoff loss.

If you get this to work on a non-Windows XP system, please share.

 

[BlueTalons]

I like to keep the native format anyway and with VideoReDo I can edit out commercials and just re-mux it with no encoding.

Re-muxing doesn't remove the Windows Media Center DRM from the recordings though, does it? This doesn't seem to matter much for Seahawks games because they're over public airwaves and the DRM's more or less turned off for them, but there are severe restrictions put on recordings from some cable channels, etc.

I was able to record and do whatever I wanted with NFL Network content (as of last year anyway...I don't have NFL Network this year for budget reasons.) I have some NFL Replay games.

 

[Marvin49]

SO, what's the best way to get my DVR copies off the Comcast box and into permanent storage?

Thats what I do tho its a DirecTV DVR. Get a PVR and capture the games to a computer via a USB cable.

Its fairly simple. The only bad thing is that you actually have to capture it. You can't just access the file and move it. IE...it takes some time.

http://www.hauppauge.com/site/products/data_hdpvr.html

Games are saved in .m2ts format and 13-15 GB ea.

 

[BlueTalons]

A good (and recent) article: How To DVR to Computer: Record or Transfer Shows and Movies From a DVR to a Computer. Good technical info on different options you have.