Does anyone use DVDs?

[so.cal.fan]

They now sell these for our So. Cal. races......5 days on a CD, works out to about $4 a day, I believe.
I have a few friends that are using them. One man bought a multiple DVD player, and gets the best digital quality replays you can get.
Do any of you guys use them?

[cj]

You could easily do the same yourself for much cheaper...I'm a miser that way.

[so.cal.fan]

Okay, how do we do our own?
I just got a new computer and it has a Nero Burning ROM on it, whatever that is?????LOL
My friend has a DVD set up where his player holds 300 CDs, so you don't have to keep changing them. They are instant.....no rewinding......he showed me the set up and it was very, very impressive.
There are many good uses for such replays, just wondered if anyone takes advantage of them?

[chrisg]

These socal dvd's, do they come with all the "angles"; the different replays? Or are you getting the one-time actual race footage?

[JustRalph]

where do you get these ? So Cal give us the dirt.......

[Speed Figure]

www.racedvd.com Is a place where you can get this stuff. It's $120 for oaktree/ $140 for belmont park.

[Whirlaway]

You can get high quality replays for Oak Tree (http://www.oaktreeracing.com/live/replays.php) and Del Mar free at their websites. Takes about 45 seconds to download a race over cable modem.

Other tracks are pretty much in the dark ages when it comes to internet replays. Some give you free acces to their replays at racereplays.com, but those streaming replays are useless for the trip handicapper.

Obviously you can tape the replays from TVG or Fox and you could use something like TV Wonder (http://www.ati.com/products/tvwonderve/index.html) to tape directly to your computer or transfer from videotape.

I've promised myself that I'm gonna get that set up Real Soon Now, since I love having the races on my hard disk for easy access -- way better than searching through video tapes for the race you want.

[Dave Schwartz]

SCF,

If you are serious about this, do yourself a favor and put up a "video server." We have one... actually, it is a "music server," (but the next step is to add video as soon as we have $$ for a REAL home theatre). Currently contains about 800 albums and is linked to our home stereos. Very cool. Very inexpensive.

If you are interested in how to do it, just email me privately and I'll tell you all about it.


Dave

[JustRalph]

Originally posted by Whirlaway
Obviously you can tape the replays from TVG or Fox and you could use something like TV Wonder (http://www.ati.com/products/tvwonderve/index.html) to tape directly to your computer or transfer from videotape. I've promised myself that I'm gonna get that set up Real Soon Now, since I love having the races on my hard disk for easy access -- way better than searching through video tapes for the race you want.

I have had it for about a year or more. It works well with an ATI all-in-wonder card. I used my Dishnetwork Digital Recorder (similar to a Tivo) more though. The nice part was I could review whatever I was taping on the dig. Recorder and then bring it down to disk instead having my hard drive recording all the time. It was all wired in series. I am going to get that system installed again, soon....... I agree it is much cheaper than what was quoted above...........

[so.cal.fan]

I think Speed Figure's link is the one I was thinking of.
The people I know who use them, use them on a large screen TV, with a DVD player that will hold hundreds of races, so it makes it really easy to watch what you want without all that re-winding.

[Pace Cap'n]

If you were to have the time and inclination, I would like to know how to get data from a DishNetwork PVC to my PC, with the idea in mind to burn it to DVD.

I queried DishNetwork and they said "No way", which seemed odd to me, as it would be from one hard drive to another.

I would need to add a DVD burner to my PC, but the ones I've looked at require at least Win 98SE, and mine is currently Win98.
Should I just upgrade to XP? Other than that, W98 seems to suit my current needs.

[Tom]

Originally posted by so.cal.fan
Okay, how do we do our own?
I just got a new computer and it has a Nero Burning ROM on it, whatever that is?????LOL


I tried out my new CD burner this week.
Boy, the fire department was mad-told me never to use it again!:rolleyes:

[so.cal.fan]

Yeah, that's what I was afraid of, Tom
Just the name of my software.......Nero Burning.........sounds pretty scary!
I'm afraid to use it....LOL

[Rick]

socal,

Yeah, I've heard that everywhere in Southern California is a smoking area lately.

[PaceAdvantage]

I've got the Hauppauge WinTV-PVR 250.....works well....

I also bought their recently released WinTV MVP, which allows you to play any recorded material directly from your PC harddrive to your TV via your home network. Anything I record with the WinTV PVR, I can play on the TV without having to burn it to DVD...

[so.cal.fan]

Is it digital quality, PA?

[JustRalph]

Originally posted by Pace Cap'n
If you were to have the time and inclination, I would like to know how to get data from a DishNetwork PVC to my PC, with the idea in mind to burn it to DVD.

Pace.... go here and look at this product.

http://216.239.53.104/search?q=cache:LdTEBfZ6CnQJ:www.hwextreme.com/reviews/videocards/ati_9700pro/+ALL-IN-WONDER%C2%AE+9700+PRO&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

I found a similar card on ebay....for less

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2763916748&category=40158

You install that product in your computer. It is a kick ass video card. You run the video from the back of your Dish PVR to the card and Voila! you have the video saved to your hard drive. You can watch it on the fly etc. or save it to disk. The card also comes with a digital connector (the square plug in the picture, they leave out the connector cable with the plugs on it) for Firewire (dig video camera connectors) , RCA jacks, s-video, and more....(just about anything you want to pump into it) and output connectors that you can run back to your television or any other product. It basically is put inline between your Dish Pvr and your computer and then you can output it back to your tv. Burn the files to CD or convert them to DVD for use in a player. I personally don't burn them to DVD because I only watch them on computer. Therefore I don't need a "DVD Burner" just a regular $35 CD Burner is all I use. DVD Burning is in my future. Just havent' gotten around to that yet. Although I will probably still watch them on the computer. I have seen them burned to DVD. I sent a CD of the video to a friend and he burned it in DVD format very easily. The link above actually mentions that you can do that. If the price of the card is a little steep, look around for an older model (they are out there if you look) I have the 8500 model. It works the same, but as usual there are improvements to be had with the newer stuff.

[PaceAdvantage]

so.cal.fan,

The quality is as good as you want it to be, although it is not an HDTV compatible (meaning, it will not record an HDTV signal).

Of course, the higher quality recordings (for instance DVD standard quality) will mean increased disk usage. For my recordings, a half hour takes up a little over 1 GIG (you read that right...1 gig). LOL When I edit out commercials, I can get it down to about 700-800megs....

Here's the link to my card:

http://www.hauppauge.com

The benefits of the hauppauge card as opposed to the card JustRalph mentioned is that the hauppauge card is a hardware based video processor, while the ATI card makes your CPU do all the processing work....when I record TV, it takes up very, very little CPU resources....

==PA

[Pace Cap'n]

Ralph and PA....

Thanks very much for your informative responses. Will definitely be looking into this. I knew there had to be some way to interface between TV and PC. More good information is available on this board than anywhere I've found. Maybe I should tell DishNetwork how to do it.........nahhh.

It does seem I would need to upgrade the OS from W98. All else looks like a go.

Thanks again for your time.

Best regards,
Steve

[BillW]

Originally posted by Pace Cap'n
Ralph and PA....


Thanks very much for your informative responses. Will definitely be looking into this. I knew there had to be some way to interface between TV and PC. More good information is available on this board than anywhere I've found. Maybe I should tell DishNetwork how to do it.........nahhh.

It does seem I would need to upgrade the OS from W98. All else looks like a go.

Thanks again for your time.

Best regards,
Steve

If they told you how to record their programming they could possibly get sued because of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DCMA).

Bill