![]() ![]() ![]() This competes with a program from TV Harmony called AutoPilot, which does much of what Desktop Plus offers, only for free – and better. To that end, TiVo has released a $25 TiVo Desktop upgrade called TiVo Desktop Plus – it’s actually just a serial number to unlock a conversion utility already built into TiVo Desktop. You’ll need a few “not in the box” items to do this: a wired or wireless USB network adapter ($20-50), an Ethernet cable or wireless networking hardware, and conversion software. Consequently, it’s not enough to record a video on your TiVo and just connect an iPod to one of its USB ports: you need to transfer the video from TiVo to a Windows XP or 2000 PC using a free program called TiVo Desktop, then use the PC to convert it into an iPod-ready format. TiVo’s boxes have only two problems: their processors are fairly slow, and based on the older MPEG-2 format, rather than iPod-compatible MPEG-4. Using a highly intuitive program guide with an integrated smart search engine, they record your chosen videos onto a hard drive and display them on a home TV. ![]() The latest to come on board is TiVo, maker of what we feel to be the best standalone digital video recorders we’ve seen – these boxes are a few steps above a Neuros Recorder with EyeTV 2 software inside. A time-consuming, but user involvement-free conversion process is required after the original recording has finished. By comparison, Elgato Systems’ $200-and-up Eye TV 2 solutions (iLounge rating: B) do a very impressive job of recording TV shows and include a great program guide that makes the process easy, but requires that you leave a Mac computer on during recording, and doesn’t save videos directly into iPod-compatible formats. But in execution, the Recorder 2’s old VCR-like interface and recording limitations are far below what today’s consumers expect, and recordings are on the grainy side. In concept, Neuros has the best solution with the $150 MPEG-4 Recorder 2 (iLounge rating: C), a standalone hardware box that records TV shows that can be played back on TVs, iPods, and other MPEG-4 devices such as computers. Several companies have tackled this challenge from different angles, none as well as we would have liked. We catalogued all of the current alternatives in our most recent Free iPod Book, but as we’ve noted, an ideal solution for TV viewers would be to have a single smart device that records videos in a format that can instantly be watched on TVs or transferred to iPods. The Neuros MPEG-4 Recorder 2 Plus provides a straightforward way to get video content onto your portable device without the need for a PC.Since Apple introduced the fifth-generation iPod (“with video”) last year, millions of prospective video watchers have been faced with a serious question: “how can I get videos to actually play on one of those?” There are two major obstacles: finding content (such as TV shows, music videos, and movies), and converting it into one of the iPod’s only two video formats (MPEG-4 and H.264). The recorder lacks S-Video connectivity and an IR blaster for cable/satellite box control. All video recording is done in real time, which will frustrate anyone used to ripping DVDs or downloading video files. Records TV shows-or any video source-to CompactFlash, SD, MMC, Memory Stick flash media relatively easy to set up connects to any cable/satellite box, DVR, VCR, or DVD player recorded MPEG-4 files play back on a wide variety of mobile handheld devices, including the PSP, many PDAs, mobile phones, portable media players, and-after a PC file transfer-the video iPod doesn't recognize Macrovision copy-protection flags, so recording VHS and DVD movies isn't a problem can also be used to view JPEG images and to listen to MP3 audio stored on your cards. ![]() — - 32068978 Neuros MPEG-4 Recorder 2 Plus 6463 Video Players and Recorders Digital Media Receivers ![]()
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