Gadgetory

cable companies are way behind I want to be able to take what I record on my TV and transfer it to my computer well until they fix that there is a solution it's called an HD PVR and today I'll show you how to record live TV directly on to your computer but before we continue you should know that CBS Interactive does not condone or encourage illegal duplication or distribution of copyrighted content okay with that out of the way we can get started here's what you'll need you'll need an HD PVR I got this from ho posh on amazon.com for about two hundred dollars you'll also need your source for me that's my cable box but it can also be your TV or even a gaming console lastly you'll need a computer now let's get everything linked up so first I'll connect the HD PVR to my cable box I'm using component cables because right now you can't use HDMI component is the best quality you'll get that will give me 720p video which looks really good on a computer and on mobile devices so once I have it hooked up to my HD PVR I'll hook everything up to my cable box okay this isn't rocket science we'll just match up all the colors that's all set now the last thing I need to do is connect my computer to the HD PVR it uses USB 2.0 because right now 3.0 isn't available ok everything is linked up and it really is that easy now we should be able to see what's on my TV on my computer screen so I'll launch the software that came with the HD PVR it's called Total Media Xtreme as soon as I launch it there it is I can see what's on my TV right here before we start recording we have to change a few settings so I'll go into format settings and here's what's important you want to take a look at the max bitrate this will determine the video quality and the file size so the lower the bitrate the worse the video quality and the higher the bit rate the better for me I'm going to choose seven megabytes per second that will give me pretty decent video and a smaller file size so that's all set I'll hit OK lastly I'll choose the format of the video I'm doing mp4 so that I can put on my Android phone and in my Google Cloud Drive but if you're burning it to a DVD or a blu-ray you're going to want to choose TS we're all set and we're ready to capture so I'll hit play on my cable box and the video and the audio come rolling through here I'll hit capture and my video is recording I'll let this run for a couple minutes and then I'll show you what it looks like when it's done alright I think that's enough video I'm going to hit stop I'm going to pause my DVR and right now the file is saving and I set it to save in my video folder so let me show you what that looks like alright my videos let me open up for you and there it is playing on my computer and you'll see just how good this quality is even at seven megabytes per second and you saw how easy that was now if I was recording an entire movie it would be a much larger file size and it would of course take longer because you're recording in real time now that I have this on my computer I'm going to transfer it onto my phone I'll show you what that looks like so pause the video just plug my android phone it's the computer and of course what's easy about this is that it's just drag-and-drop if you have an iPhone it might take some converting again if you recorded a movie it's going to take much longer to transfer onto your mobile device but that's the price you pay right so for this example you notice that I'm using a PC if you use the HD PVR with the Mac you're going to purchase a $30 program but what comes with the HD PVR that software is free for PC alright the video is transferred let's see what it looks like should show up in my video app there it is this video that was on my TV is on my phone and it worked just like that now as you witnessed that was super easy and once you have all the components set up in your media cabinet it'll take no time to record live TV onto your computer now if you do make a habit out of doing this you will want to buy an external hard drive okay if you have any questions along the way or want to know more about the HD PVR tweet me at sharing back or send your questions to always on at cnet.com