Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Hello Everyone -

I am new on this forum as of today, so thanks in advance for reading this "plea for help" !

I have Virgin Media cable (with TV, Internet and 'Phone), with Tivo box included. I have hours and hours of unwatched programmes recorded on the Tivo box - but early next year, I am emigrating and thus terminating my Virgin subscription. I would dearly like to take some of the recorded programmes with me, as they will remind me of the UK and where I am going doesn't have very good TV...

I have done quite a lot of inconclusive research on how it might be possible to copy or transfer some of the recorded programs from the Tivo box to another storage device. Two things seem agreed upon by everyone: that content can only be recorded in real time (i.e. if there is a 2 hour movie, it will take 2 hours to transfer) and that it can only be done via a SCART lead, meaning it will be analogue. After that, I am in the dark. Someone said that it is possible to do it straight to an iMac into iMovie, with a Scart/USB converter. To this end, I bought today something called Vidbox by Honestech, with all the necessary leads.

My questions are: does anyone on this forum know the definitive answer as to what is/is not possible ? Does the Vidbox solution work (I would like to know as once I open the packaging, I can't return it for a refund if it doesn't work). It would be great to be able to put the content on my iMac, as then I don't have to end up buying a DVD recorder and buy/use piles of DVDs, also because with the content on the iMac I can stream it back to my TV via an Apple TV box.

Apologies for the long email and thanks for reading this far. Grateful for your advice.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

when they say "real time" it means you have to watch the recording on the TiVo and basically record it on the other device.

It's the only way, if you are really determined i would look at a HDMI DVD Recorder or someting similar to get a better picture.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

The picture will be SD only from Tivo, so SD is what you'll get, no matter how you connect the DVD recorder to the TV. And most TV's will do a better job of upscaling than a DVD recorder. I doubt that you can actually buy an HDMI-less DVD recorder these days anyway.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

So are you saying that the only way to record programmes off a Tivo box is by copying them straight to DVD (I had always been told SCART cable only) ? Copying to a hard drive only device like a HDD recorder doesn't work ? What about copying them straight into an iMac, into iMovie ? I spoke to a technical wizard in a department store who swore that the clever way was to buy a piece of kit which links the back of the Tivo box to the iMac and that iMovie would be able to accept and convert the files. It has an impact on what I buy, as I will have to get extra kit to do all this.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

You can copy content to any device you like - as long as they can connect to TiVo using the standard SCART connection.

Although it might be possible to connect a recording device to TiVo using HDMI, you would likely come across copy protection which stops you copying the HD signal.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Aha....now I feel I'm getting somewhere. So the Vidbox product I bought with connecting cables could actually copy content to my iMac, which I can then use with iMovie, in turn broadcasting back to my TV via the Apple TV box. Thank you.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Yes, Vidbox would work but you'd need a SCART to S-Video lead / adapter as well as the Vidbox hardware and software.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Superb, thank you - exactly what I bought yesterday

---------- Post added at 09:57 ---------- Previous post was at 09:56 ----------

Although slightly worried by some of the customer reviews of Vidbox not working........

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

These units can be a pain to set up, but usually work Ok.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Thanks for all these very helpful answers. One last question: do you think it would still work as above if the other end of the lead from the Vidbox (the USB end) were plugged into a portable hard drive, rather than my iMac ? Hope this isn't a dumb question.....

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

No - I'd expect the Vidbox requires software to work properly. You'd have to do the copy to your iMac first and then back off to the portable drive.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Very good - thank you

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Yes, the Mac/Vidbox would have to do the heavy lifting of converting the analogue SCART output back to a digital file.

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

It works. The only slight niggle is that the picture quality is not great - a bit like going back to 1970s TV. I wonder if there is a way to fix/improve that ?

Re: Tivo box recordings transfer
 

Not easily. To improve the quality you'd have to capture the RGB SCART signal, rather than having it converted to S-Video

However doing a search I can't see any solution that would work with a iMac. Most RBG SCART to computer hardware seems to be aimed at PCs