Registered: Jun 2002
Location: Dublin, CA
Posts: 0

Change Quality of Recording for Sony SAT T60

I have a Sony SAT T60 TiVo unit. Is there anyway to change the quality of the recordings? What is the default quality, basic or medium? If I add more disk space, can I change the quality as well? Thanks!

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Jason

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Registered: Mar 2002
Location: Prince Georges County, MD
Posts: 14

Nope.

The SA TiVO's have a Analog-Digital encoder that takes the analog video signal input and encodes it into digital format for storage on the hard disk. The chip encodes in MPEG format, with varying bitrates for the different kinds of quality levels (basic ... best).

Unlike the SA TiVOs, the DTiVO has a digital input (the satellite). Hence, no encoding is needed. The data stream from the satellite is encoded directly onto the disk.

I've noticed that my 35hr DirecTiVO can store significantly more programs than my 30hr SA TiVO. I believe that it is because the DirecTV folks have a much higher quality encoder on their end that is able to produce high quality MPEG at lower bitrates. Alternatively, each station that feeds DirecTV digitally has a high quality encoder...

It's amazing the difference a high quality encoder can make. I once watched a VCD containing a movie encoded at very low bitrate, but professionally done by Sony (I think) - it was unbelievable...

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--
"The human mind is great at inventing complexity."
SAT-T60 v3.1: 68hr + turbonet
SAT-T60 v3.1: 109hr + turbonet
Philips SA: v3.0: 30hr + turbonet
DSR704 v3.2: 35hr

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Registered: Jun 2002
Location: Dublin, CA
Posts: 0

I think I understand your reply. Since I have a DirecTV/TiVo integrated unit, is the information encoded directly to the hard drive digitally or is it still converted from analog to digital? I just wish there was a way to change the quality of the recording assuming I have plenty of disk space.

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Jason

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Registered: Jul 2002
Location: Cambridgeshire, UK
Posts: 9266

The feed from the satellite contains an MPEG-2 video stream. DTiVoes just pipe this directly onto the hard drive, hence no control over quality - whatever DirecTV sends is what ends up on the drive.

On the plus side using an SA with a 'digital' feed means the digital signal from the cable or satellite is converted to analogue by the decoder and then back to digital by the TiVo's MPEG-2 encoder for saving to the hard drive.

By eliminating this step, DTiVoes may give a better picture. DTiVoes can also record two streams simultaneously - SA's only have one encoder so can't do this.

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Please do not PM me asking for TiVo backups. I don't have any.

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Registered: Mar 2002
Location:
Posts: 1

Quick answer. The directivo's are recording at the highest quality at all times.

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