PS3 - digital record, Play TV (NZ) ???????

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Valks

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#62289 3-Jun-2010 09:53

I have just brought a Sony 250G HDD DVD recorded, Im new to New Zealand and didnt even bother to ask if it records in digital, apparently NO HDD DVD recorders do here! What is this? Seems so backwards imo.
..anyway was wondering if I got the PTV attachment for my PS3 from Australia, would that pick up out digital channels here in NZ?

Theres got to be something we can do surely..? Is there anyway I can get my Sony DVD recorder to pick up digital instead of crappy analog? Please help and many thanks!

xpd

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#337680 3-Jun-2010 10:03

Your post is a little confusing... but...

If you purchased an analogue unit, thats not NZ's fault :)

From what i know (read here mainly) the Au PlayTV units run fine but dont use the EPG (? Someone clarify ?) until its officially released here.

Im picking up a PS3 in the next few weeks and will be looking at getting a PlayTv unit shortly afterwards.

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Valks

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#337683 3-Jun-2010 10:14

Thanks for the reply. Sorry wasnt meant to say its NZ's fault' was annoyed at NZ having this red tape rangle with freeview. Apprently NZ has been waiting for this PTV thingy for over a year.

So best bet is order one from Oz? Thanks.

xpd

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#337690 3-Jun-2010 10:33

Officially the PlayTV is supposed to be out here this year.....but personally I think they got the 0's in the wrong order when they said 2010... think they meant 2100 ;)

But yes, getting the unit from Oz seems to be the way to go unless you find someone with one here already willing to sell up.

You can order a new one here - http://www.firstgames.co.nz/shop/playstation_3/play-tv-playstation3tv-tuner

Id say they pick them up from Oz....

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chiefie

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#337692 3-Jun-2010 10:47

Well.. there's a few rumour that Sony is working on PlayTV2.

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Jaxson

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#337694 3-Jun-2010 10:53

Yes PlayTV will work here.
It is fully functional except that there is very little EPG data broadcast here, so your EPG will be close to useless. PlayTV also has some limitations so it would pay to be aware of this in advance, single tuner for recording purposes etc, can't really export a file over 4Gb etc.

There is a DVD/HDD recorder that records in NZ so that's not quite right. Panasonic does a DVD and a Bluray version. Same deal on EPG data though with that one.

Only official boxes here in NZ have full EPG units on the DVB-T / UHF service.

You can't convert your old technology analogue DVD HDD unit to record Digital Terrestrial. It's old technology, even if you just brought the unit new.

There are multiple units available for both terrestrial and satellite that record. Some are official, some not. Pros and cos to both.

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#337700 3-Jun-2010 11:04

Jaxson: Yes PlayTV will work here.
It is fully functional except that there is very little EPG data broadcast here, so your EPG will be close to useless. PlayTV also has some limitations so it would pay to be aware of this in advance, single tuner for recording purposes etc, can't really export a file over 4Gb etc.

Does the EPG work for timer recording ? Thatd be the main thing for myself...dont care about the rest, long as I can set a show to record and wander off :)

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bazzer

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#337803 3-Jun-2010 13:43

It does, the time slots are allocated, just the program info is not populated. I will add that you may get frustrated with PlayTV in the longterm. I was reasonably happy with it, but a few issues (single tuner, issues with large HDDs) caused me to switch to MyFreeview PVR. Couldn't be happier now.

I may revisit PlayTV in the future if there are updates or I might try it on a Windows 7 box, but otherwise I'll stick with my PVR.

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Jaxson

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#337849 3-Jun-2010 14:46

PlayTV's EPG shows timeslots for future shows, but no name labels. You can use this to schedule a time and channel via the EPG, if you know the time and channel you want to record. Hope that makes sense.

However, this only works on the TVNZ channels in some parts of the contry. I think this is due to TVNZ's regional streams approach which I believe is on DVB-T (different adds in different parts of the country). Auckland or so gets all the channel start and stop segments, but here in Palmyston I only got a few and then it said no data. The rest, Prime, C4 etc did show all the future program sections with start and stop but no label.

You can schedule a start and stop manually like an old school VCR too.

I too had thought of getting it again, it's about $150 last time I checked, so a cheap upgrade. However now I have a TV with freeview built in I don't need the 1 tuner that just shows TV. This would be great for someone wanting to add freeview to their existing system but gets less and less appealing if you have it already.

It is cheap though, but it may be worth the extra to get a proper twin tuner pvr? It's your personal choice on that front.

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#337993 3-Jun-2010 19:09

chiefie: Well.. there's a few rumour that Sony is working on PlayTV2.

http://www.myce.com/news/sony-preparing-new-playtv-dvr-for-ps3-30321/

Regards,

Old3eyes

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#337997 3-Jun-2010 19:21

DVD recorders are now worthless because digital broadcasts around the world are moving to H.264/MPEG4. DVD is MPEG2.

There is a single DVD recorder here on the market from Panasonic, this has to transcode the video to MPEG2 which means you can't record in HD. There is a Blu Ray version available that allows recording in HD.

HDD based recorders are now the norm, in part because discs are pretty much worthless now due to their limited storage capacity and high cost of Blu Ray discs.