Converting Cable DVDR to Hard Drive

[Baja Bum]

So, I've got an ATI TV tuner card, Wonder VE, that I run my Time Warner cable box through to watch Cable TV - have the card set on channel 3 so it passively runs the cable input giving me 1000+ channels, using the cable remote, instead of 140 that the card's software is limited to reading.

 

Since my cable box is also a Digital video recorder, like Tivo, I can record shows... bla, blah, blah.

 

Q: How can I convert the saved programs, like 24, Sapranos, etc. onto my PC's hard drive? My cable box is only 30GB vs. 250GB free on my Hard Drives, so I could store a lot more for future viewing.

 

Thanks,

 

BB

[wardog]

Duplicated HERE

[General Septem]

If there's USB or anything, try that.

[Baja Bum]

Tried the USB, but no luck.

 

After reading the forums for my Cable box (Scientific Atlanta 8300HD) it turns out that the USB ports are not activated and the SATA port is only for adding an external drive for storage.

 

They recommended getting a TV tuner Card with software that lets you download and record to your PC. So, I just bought the Hauppage HVR1600 - directron.com $85.00 - and will be testing it out this week.

 

BB

[General Septem]

You'll have to be careful with this if it's a cable box, but you can also open the box and remove the hard drive. Then you can install it in your PC and copy the files.

 

Connecting the video output to a TV tuner and recording in real time is a pain in the butt. You basically have to sit in front of the TV the whole time.

[red930]

The local cable provider has all their premium and HD channels on a cable box but there are almost 70 SD channels available without the box so it isn't much of a drop down in channel selection for SD material.

 

I have a mediapc with an old and almost busted ATI AIW 9600XT card in it. I record standard definition programs on it exclusively.

 

I use the Cablebox HD-DVR to record the HD programs. This means I have the full capacity of the HD box drive for the HD program material.

 

One nice thing about having the programs recorded on the mediapc is that I can move files off the drive to offline storage to build compilations of entire seasons with little effort. Once the season has concluded I can go back and watch the shows as I please.

 

This actually came in very handy after hurricane Katrina. With electricity but no cable for 28 days, we watched entire seasons of Lost, Star Trek Enterprise, Mythbusters and a few others. Right now I have entire seasons of about 10 programs stored to watch later.