Technology reviews

An archive of The Medium is Not Enough’s reviews of TV technology

Technology reviews

Bastard the PVR continues to live up to his name

31 March 2009 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

The hardware may have changed, but Bastard, my PVR, continues to be a bastard.

And it all looked so different a couple of weeks, when I discovered he could now record two things at once. Cracking! No more worrying about scheduling conflicts, no more worrying that the end of episode one is going to get recorded on the beginning of episode two if there’s an over-run.

Marvellous.

Except I updated him to version 3.1.1 of his EyeTV software, which worked fine in most regards, except with exports. Suddenly, little Bastard didn’t like to export programs with their soundtracks intact. I didn’t realise this until about a week later, by which time I’d deleted the originals.

Curses.

So I downgraded back to 3.1, using Elgato’s preferred method. Except I didn’t restart my computer since they didn’t ask me to. Now Bastard won’t start recording unless EyeTV is already running. The problem went away after a restart, but not before it had failed to record one programme: American Outlaws, starring Ali Larter.

Bastard.

UK TV

Review: Sky+HD

24 February 2009 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Well, finally, after all that fun with the Sky+ competition last year, I have Sky+HD. As you may recall, I was this close to getting it when at the last moment, I found out you need two feeds from the satellite dish to be able to record a programme while watching another, so we never got it. Fortunately, at our new flat, there are two wall feeds from the communal satellite dish (even if one, for some strange reason that even the Sky engineers couldn’t fathom, is on the other side of the room from the other feed).

As it happens, I made a slight cost saving from delaying, since the cost installation and the box has gone down from £75 (reduced from £150) to £49. Bargain.

So, after a few days, what am I reckoning, apart from it’s all worth it just to see Ali Larter in high def on Heroes?

Continue reading “Review: Sky+HD”

UK TV

Review: Sky+HD

24 February 2009 Rob Buckley 8 Comments

Well, finally, after all that fun with the Sky+ competition last year, I have Sky+HD. As you may recall, I was this close to getting it when at the last moment, I found out you need two feeds from the satellite dish to be able to record a programme while watching another, so we never got it. Fortunately, at our new flat, there are two wall feeds from the communal satellite dish (even if one, for some strange reason that even the Sky engineers couldn’t fathom, is on the other side of the room from the other feed).

As it happens, I made a slight cost saving from delaying, since the cost installation and the box has gone down from £75 (reduced from £150) to £49. Bargain.

So, after a few days, what am I reckoning, apart from it’s all worth it just to see Ali Larter in high def on Heroes?

Continue reading “Review: Sky+HD”

Technology reviews

Review: Elgato EyeTV Diversity

23 February 2009 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

EyeTV Diversity

As you may know, I have a PVR for my Mac called Bastard. It was originally called Bastard because of its occasional refusal to record programmes for no adequately explored reason. After a few software updates, it got better and started to behave, even if it still warranted the name Bastard for refusing to export anything over an hour long to my AppleTV without giving an error (allegedly the fault lies with my Turbo H.264, made by the same company. They’re the ones doing the alleging. Twats).

Anyway, I’ve moved flat and my Mac is no longer sitting comfortably near a TV socket. So I had two options: either stick a great big trailing cable around the room to where there is a TV socket or invest in an EyeTV Diversity, which employs two mini antennae and some fancy signal processing skills to supposedly produce great pictures and reception even indoors.

I bought the Diversity. Suffice it to say, the trailing cable’s now arriving this week some time.

Continue reading “Review: Elgato EyeTV Diversity”

News

iTunes UK: pricing on movies for sale and to rent

4 June 2008 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Ooh look. The UK iTunes store has just got round to releasing movies that you can either buy or rent then play on your computer, iPod, iPhone or Apple TV. Pricing is £3.49 to rent a new release, £2.49 for an old release; to buy a new release costs £10.99, while an old release costs £6.99. All prices include VAT.

File size for a 2h20 movie is about 1.6GB so best not to try this if you have capped broadband. Not sure if you can watch something while it’s still being downloaded in iTunes, but if you have an Apple TV – which is starting to become even more attractive by the minute, particularly since at least some of the movies (eg Into The Wild) will be in high def on it if you pay £1 extra – you should be able to start watching within a couple of minutes of purchase. 

As far as I can work out, you’ve 48 hours to watch a rented movie once you’ve started playing it – and 30 days to start playing it in – and you can watch it as many times as you like in that 48 hours. But if you don’t make it through to the end of the movie in that time, you’ll still have the option of carrying on to the end of the movie – or deleting it.

That concludes the commercial break.

Not sure how keen I am on the pricing – cheaper to buy the DVD almost. And there’s not a lot of great stuff in there yet, unless you count the older movies like Batman Begins and The Matrix. But indie stuff like The Darjeeling Limited is due any moment now, and as we learnt from the Music Store, what’s in there when it opens is always a lot, lot less than a few months down the line.