Filed under: Multimedia, Software
EyeTV software update supports iPhone, iPod Touch
Elgato's EyeTV software lets users watch, record and schedule TV on their Macs, as well as transfer recordings to the iPod. I've got an EyeTV Hybrid connected to my G4 iMac and it works wonderfully, despite the older processor and modest video card (64 MB DDR RAM). Our own Mike Rose wrote a thorough review in March which you can read here.Today, Elgato announced EyeTV software version 2.5 (available Sept. 25th), which has some cool features. The most exciting is Wi Fi access to your recordings with an iPhone or iPod Touch. Both can connect to a web server running within EyeTV 2.5 (via Safari), browse the EyeTV archive and playlists and play shows with a touch. Very cool. Other changes include:
- One-click export of files for the iPhone and iPod touch.
- The EyeTV window can be set to float above all other windows (Yay!)
- Improved H.264 HDTV playback (This requires at least an Intel Core 2 Duo processor)
- Time-shift recording for analog tuners
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Dave McKean said 2:40PM on 9-24-2007
Actually, they have posted the update already! Not a bad upgrade!
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Trent Pekkala said 2:47PM on 9-24-2007
So can you only watch recorded shows from iPhone/iPod? Or can you watch live TV as well?
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Jon said 2:51PM on 9-24-2007
Does anyone know if the over the air HDTV usb sticks require an external antenna?
If I could find and HDTV tuner like elgatos, but with hardware encoding and iPhone support I'd be all over that. Any ideas?
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mike said 3:09PM on 9-24-2007
JON, all usb stick tunners need an external antenna(that i have seen).. the my tv hd i got that comes with eye tv had it included in the box... i get all my local in HD with it.
also the update is already up can be found here:
http://www.elgato.com/index.php?file=support_updates_eyetv2
next time do some research dave, dont just copy from some other website for the hits.
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Jason Golden said 3:21PM on 9-24-2007
Looks like a nice update. I tried EyeTV for a while, and my only disappointment was no "Season Pass" functionality. As far as I can tell, this still is an issue. Can anyone confirm?
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Jason said 3:23PM on 9-24-2007
Speaking of doing more research, found this in the EyeTV Hybrid article comments. Just wanted to know if this was any easier, or if it's still the same. When someone gets a chance to try, thanks!
"13. re: No season pass...in the schedule edit, you can change the repeat to weekly, but that's not available from the fullscreen schedule.
and unlike tivo, the schedule's date/time/channel oriented, not show-title oriented, so if the show changes, you'll have to update manually."
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tim said 3:24PM on 9-24-2007
"Time-shift recording for analog tuners"
YES!!! its about time. now if they could just get a season pass...or if someone WROTE a season pass for it, even if they used the backdoor to someones EPG i would use it!
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Max said 3:25PM on 9-24-2007
This is a great update. The WiFi sharing is a really nice feature that I'm looking forward to using once I get my iPod touch. I hope they develop it further to include live TV support (unless Slingbox has too many patents on that) and support for adding your own videos to the shared list.
Imagine if it shared your whole (non-DRM) iTunes video library-- rather than maintaining a list of WiFi-shared recordings and also having the option to send it to iTunes, it just sends everything to iTunes and shares them all (along with any other videos you add to iTunes). You choose the ones you want on your iPod at all times, and the rest you can access any time you're near a WiFi hotspot.
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Jon said 3:27PM on 9-24-2007
Thanks for the help Mike! I guess I was asking too much! Maybe some day they'll get the antenna integrated....
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Max said 3:31PM on 9-24-2007
@Jason:
It works fine, I've done that before. You just schedule something to record and then in the Programs window you double click on the schedule and say Repeat Weekly. Shows don't get moved around too often, so really the only thing to remember is if a show goes on mid-season hiatus, you have to disable it or it'll start recording whatever reruns they stick in that timeslot.
TiVo has tons of patents on all of their little ease of use and convenience features, so it's hard for companies like ElGato to implement them as well as TiVo.
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Harbinger said 4:30PM on 9-24-2007
Hope it improves dual-tuner setups like mine.
Making a Channel List work across an analog and hd tuner is a total pain (ie. won't work without Sofa Control or similar software).
Otherwise, it's stellar software that has had some excellent updates and great hardware integration.
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James said 7:40PM on 9-24-2007
Max: Don't give ElGato an excuse. Windows MCE has season pass functionality.
It's the only reason why I don't use EyeTV, its nice to be able to go to the guide and tap the record button twice to get the whole season of any show.
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Mike said 11:50AM on 9-25-2007
The "wifi access" feature seems to work great when you're on the local network, but over the internet, even with an 8mb down/2mb up cable connection, the video freezes frequently. Anyone else observe this?
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Carlos said 1:14PM on 9-25-2007
Mike - i'm surprised it even works over the internet - try compressing the original 'WiFi Access' video file down further - that should help.
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Ricky Clay said 1:26PM on 9-25-2007
Just installed on my Mini with EyeTV Hybrid. Freezes up on launch. Every time. Haven't had time to do anything but repair permissions. No help. Anyone else?
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Mike Evangelist said 6:54PM on 9-25-2007
>but over the internet, even with an 8mb down/2mb up cable connection, the video freezes frequently.
Mike, the data-rate of the files for streaming is about 1100kbps. Stuttering is not surprising over a 2mbps pipe, since there's probably other things on your network reducing the effective speed and increasing latency.
Carlos, as long has you configure your router to forward the port (2170), it's possible for it to work. But it takes more bandwidth than most people have.
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Paul said 5:03PM on 9-26-2007
Just installed on a Rev A iMac G5 (which for some reason has always been the red-headed stepchild of the eyeTV family), and found that it wiped out all the signal strength. Not Useful. I reverted to 2.4, which works fine.
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JMo said 4:50AM on 10-01-2007
Lost reception on one channel and returns "No Signal" when I change channel on my MBP2.33. Have to quit and re-launch to change channels successfully. Reverting to 2.4.
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Jeff said 1:04AM on 10-04-2007
Harbinger: "Making a Channel List work across an analog and hd tuner is a total pain (ie. won't work without Sofa Control or similar software)."
Please elaborate. I have analog cable and I want to use EyeTV with that an over-the-air digital, but the hybrid tuner only has one RF input.
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