Excellent Hacks to the ReplayTV 4000

Hit the link below to find links to assorted hacks done to the extremely cool ReplayTV 4000 PVR. Thanks to jptsetme for submitting links to hacks like hard drive upgrades, software to download mpegs, edit the guide, and systems under development to automate create of VCDs and DVDs from Replay's. It's exciting seeing so much headway being made so fast, and evidence that this is one heck of a machine. "The Replay hackers at AVS forum have done an amazing job on the new ReplayTV 4000's. You can now do some very cool things with this new PVR.

You can increase recording space (by either replacing the existing drive, or adding an additional one.) This has, of course, been done with Tivos and older Replays in the past. Not only has this hack been adapted for the Replay4000 model (including custom sized photo partitions and preserving existing shows), but Replay has also recently released new software that removes the previous 137G per drive limitation, so you can now turn any ReplayTV4000 into a 320G model with a couple of 160G drives and a PC (Linux, Win2k, XP, or with a Linux boot disk on an x86 box with a good enough BIOS to recognize the drive size.)
http://rtvpatch.sourceforge.net/

But, you might decide you don't need to open the box at all, since you can now offload your shows to your PC and then serve them back to the ReplayTV4000 with your PC masquerading as another ReplayTV4000 on your local network, giving you nearly limitless storage capacity. [Note: this does not use the internet sharing feature, which is so slow over typical broadband as to be practically unusable. This is streaming the show in realtime from your PC back to your Replay4000, using the same mechanism two Replays use to stream shows back and forth over your local network.]

ReplayPC (C/C++, Windows, Linux, Mac. A simple text mode utility for extracting mpg files from ReplayTV4000 PVRs via TCP/IP)
http://replaypc.sourceforge.net/

Replayer (Pure Java. Java GUI utility allows you to extract mpg files from your ReplayTV 4000 to your PC)
http://www.forbesfield.com/replayer.html

Replay Server (built on PHP for Apache. Allows you to serve downloaded shows to a ReplayTV (on your LAN only) from your PC as if your PC was a ReplayTV)
http://206.124.140.12/rtv/

SwapDV (J++, windoze only. Allows you to download shows from your ReplayTV 4000, serve downloaded shows as if your box was a ReplayTV 4000, and edit the "guide" provided by your PC. i.e. capabilities of both Replayer and Replay Server, but only for Windows.)
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&a mp;threadid=116035

A number of users are also working on burning shows to VCD, SVCD, XSVCD and DVD, with moderate success.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&a mp;threadid=115338
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&a mp;threadid=106437

Lastly, there has also been a hack developed to remove macrovision from the old Panasonic Showstoppers (effectively transforming them into ReplayTV3xxx machines.)
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&a mp;threadid=118170."

Comments

Phone Home

[loydcc]

Is there a hack to keep it from ratting out my preferences to replay Brittney Spears commercials. That would be a truly useful hack. Until then I think I'll stick with my 1/2 inch tape VCR. Upgrading the storage capacity is easy with it's modular cartridge accaptance port. And programming what I want to watch costs me nothing.

Re:Phone Home

[deepvoid]

Why would you want to do that? Replay TV could be a better neilson box than the peice of trash they use now. This would give the advertising companies an incentive to show even MORE of Brittney (though you might need an MRI to do that by now ;>) Wouldn't it be nice to have a button on the remote which could give a thumbs up or down to the commercial as well, skipping any recording of it if you disliked it, as well as sending the approriate signal to the polyester person (PP) who thought it up?

Re:Phone Home

[loydcc]

Replay TV could be a better neilson box than the peice of trash they use now.

Who buys the PVR's? Geeks and early adopters ie the people with money or desire to get the coolest gadgets. But then the average household is left out of ratings system. So instead of Americas Funniest Home Videos taking the ratings Cowboy Bebop takes the ratings. (I know they don't run opposite each other it's just an example of the two different kinds of viewers.) Eithor way the outcome is skewed.

When the average viewer can afford a PVR or has no choice but get one cause the video cassette makers went the way of the Vinyl Recordplayer, then maybe Replay TV or Tivo could be a better Neilson Box.

Until then TV is pretty much going to suck 90% no matter what they put on it. The scam is that the ratings system today only pleases those who volunteer to be watched. And those sheep enjoy 'Touched by an Angel'

Re:The Replay units are nice, but...

[Zaknafein500]

Neither unit forces you to pay for service (with the Tivo, just load 2.5xtreme and turn on "SubTest"). However, the Replay units are sold at a significant markup and the Tivo units are sold below cost. I'm no market analysist, but three guesses which one is better for consumers?

This is innaccurate. In fact, if you follow the instructions above, you are stealing TiVo service. TiVo requires a subscription, either 9.95/monthly or 249/product lifetime. The sole purpose of 2.5xtreme (this has been debated, but no one is going to change my mine) is to facilitate the theft of TiVo service and of DirecTV.

Re:Why use a PVR? - look at SnapStream PVS

[dodald]

I have found this program ShowShifter to work 10x better then SnapStream. With showshifter you can pause live TV, and pick up where you left off (No rewind though). And (A plus over SnapStream) you can watch as you record. It (like SnapStream) offers timed recordings, however can not currently download tv listings. The "trial" version ShowShifter is also less naggy, and more functional then the trial version of snapstream. Check it out. (Also only Windows).

Re:What's your point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Bullshit. There are many reasons why somebody might not want their Tivo phoning home every night. How about privacy (yes, the Tivo logs every fucking button you push on the remote). How about the fact that some of us don't have a land line phone because wireless is a better deal.

Re:The Replay units are nice, but...

[Monte]

The Tivo gets its guide data off the air; the Replay needs to connect to a central server to get it. What happens when Replay goes bankrupt?

Let's see, you're advocating that people by a Tivo (which makes profit from the subscription, not the sale of the box) and then install a hack that lets them use it w/o subbing? I don't think it's Replay that's going to go bankrupt.

The Tivo has a 30 second commercial skip feature too

That's not "commercial skip", that's instant 30-second fast-forward. The 4000 skips commercials without the user having to press anything - and for me it works bang-on 19 out of 20 times.

And you forgot to mention those neat extract-and-stream hacks (getting back to the original subject). If you want to extract video from a Tivo you have to pull the hard drive and mount it on a Linux machine.