It says on the box the files are stored in mpeg format - well, technically it is a KIND of mpeg format - but at the start I wasn't able to do the simple process of writing a DVD with a picture. However I discovered some free software called Mpeg Streamclip, and this program is a fantastic asset to anyone with a PVR or indeed a video camera. The video camera uses a transport stream with a file extension ".TOD"; the PVR uses one with ".TP0" (that's a zero on the end), and Mpeg Streamclip can read them all and save out as mpeg. It's also a rudimentary mpeg editor (great for chopping out commercials) and all free. Once I had this software my DVD burning career burgeoned forever!
Digital TV transmissions ARE the way to go - they use less than a quarter of the bandwidth of analogue, and the quality is absolutely superb. No wonder analogue TV is going to be knocked on the head in a few years time: digital is better for sure.
Except when there's a problem. Drat! The hard drive on the PVR has been very obtuse last week, locking up the system (yep, PVRs crash just like computers), and refusing to playback a show when recording another (as it is fully supposed to do). It's also been issuing some very strange clicking noises.
Today, the hard drive has completely stopped working at all, and despite the tuner working, so we can get live television on it, the hard drive is just not being recognised as a device. So reliant are we on this machine that there must be at least 40 hours of unwatched TV programmes on the hard drive.
I wonder what is going to happen, and whether we are going to ever get to see our unwatched programmes at all? I'll keep you posted.
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