TiVoToGo for Mac Announced

An anonymous reader writes "After much anticipation, some backpedaling, a bite of hope, and a delayed release date, TiVoToGo Mac Edition is here. While there have been some unofficial hacks, those solutions have not been ideal for everyone. With support for transferring shows and burning to DVD/iPod, TiVoToGo is bundled as a part of Roxio's Toast Titanium software that will be announced tomorrow at Macworld."

Comments

Too bad, almost sounded useful

[Anonymous Coward]

Bundled as part of Toast? Well, so much for that idea then. A CD burning application that costs $100 and breaks with every security and system update that apple puts out? No thank you, I'll stick with the "unofficial hacks" (which work just fine).

Re:Too bad, almost sounded useful

[slughead]

Bundled as part of Toast? Well, so much for that idea then. A CD burning application that costs $100 and breaks with every security and system update that apple puts out? No thank you, I'll stick with the "unofficial hacks" (which work just fine).

I don't understand, I haven't updated toast 7.0 since it came out and haven't upgraded to 7.1--or whatever it's at now (I'm doing 10.4.8 on a Mac Pro now).

Toast has always been the 'end-all' of burning software since I started using it nearly a decade ago.

These days it can take in raw video, including mpeg2, and burn a DVD with no other software. It'll auto-compress video (and video_ts) to fit DVDs.

Combined with ElGato's software, burning TV shows from Miglia or EyeTV devices can be done without recompression. I used to do this three or 4 times a week, putting 2 hours on each disc.

It even started doing dual layer way before Apple even offered the option.

I've never had compatibility issues, even though I rarely upgrade. In fact, I've never had a single issue with Toast, and I use it for all sorts of crazy stuff.

Re:Too bad, almost sounded useful

[lakeland]

I used to use toast too, but have stopped since the number of things it can do best has shrunk to virtually zero.

As a serious backup program it doesn't work. It doesn't handle backing up open files and I don't even think it has an option to span disks.
Backing up the odd file from your home directory is far easier in the Finder than launching a seperate program.
Music and Photo backups are meaningless now with the builtin apps doing them better.
That leaves movie backup. It does a passable job there, but so do dozens of other apps. Last time I used something called ffmpegX, not as pretty as Toast but did a better job. Besides, how often do you need to backup movies for a DVD player? I can burn DIVX or MOV straight to disk for playing in my 'DVD' player and if I was doing anything serious I would be using iMovie rather than a direct burn.

A few years ago Toast was essential. Now I can go months without using it and wouldn't bother installing it on a new machine despite a site licence.

Of course it it...

[moracity]

I just spent all weekend getting two-way video working between my new iMac and Tivo.

Unfortunately... There's DRM

[8127972]

According to Engadget.com:

"Take heed, the software does indeed embed a non-visible watermark of your Media Access key into converted video -- same as the PC kiddo."

Click below for the full details:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/08/roxio-deliverst ivotogo-for-mac-yes-roxio/

Re:Unfortunately... There's DRM

[Ed Avis]

I don't think that is particularly evil. Unless it's removing some of your digital rights, I don't think you can justify calling it DRM. There is enough real DRM out there without muddying the water. As far as I can tell, you can still exercise your rights to fair dealing, time-shifting and so on even if there is an invisible watermark in the video.

Re:Unfortunately... There's DRM

[pyite]

I agree. However, watermarks can be pretty useless. Most are vulnerable to collusion. Assume for the moment that iTunes downloads didn't have copy protection DRM, just watermarks. Now how about five of us get together and download the same file on iTunes. Then, we get together and "average our files." Often times this will destroy the watermark but leave the original media intact. There is definitely research to create collusion resistant fingerprinting (see Anti-Collusion Fingerprinting for Multimedia by W. Trappe, M. Wu, Z. Wang, and K. J. R. Liu, for instance). In the end though, just like regular DRM, it's a losing battle and there are always ways around it.

I saw this coming.

[kyouteki]

This timing, of course, is not coincidental. The open-source hack tivodecode has made .tivo file decoding possible on non-Windows platforms. Tons of people are using tools like the TivoDecode Manager to replace the functionality not available from TiVo officially...until now.

Dissappointing

[Hawthorne01]

Clearly, this is an attempt by Roxio to stay relevant on the Mac. But there's no word yet of iTunes integration for full-size videos. Therefore, I have doubts (which hopefully will be settled tomorrow) about how this will work with 'iTV".

Likely to work with a Series 1?

[mccalli]

The UK only ever got Series 1 hardware - is this likely to work with a series 1 device?

Incidentally, for some more of those infamous hacks might I recommend TivoTool for the Mac and my own cross-platform TivoPodcast for handling podcasts of digital radio.

Cheers,
Ian

Not available without Toast?

[masonbrown]

It looks like there's no transfer-to-Mac capabilities without purchasing Toast:

"Roxio is the exclusive official provider of TiVoToGo(TM) for the Mac--and Toast 8 Titanium is the way to get it and enjoy your favorite shows on the Mac, on DVD, and on-the-go."

http://www.tivo.com/mactivotogo/

Re:Not available without Toast?

[TobyRush]

Why, I ought to just yank my TiVo out and toss it in the... *sob* Oh, who am I kidding? They have me right where they want me!

You have GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. Mac users wait, and then wait, and then wait some more, and then finally TiVo announces it... for $100? The thing which has been a free download for Windows users for... ever? I'm miffed, but also genuinely curious why they would so obviously spit in the face of their customers like this. Is the Mac port somehow dependent on Toast's technology? Do they figure that Mac users must all be rich and spendy, and thus won't care about forking over $100? Are they just desperate for cash?

We're supposed to hear more about the "iTV" and Leopard tomorrow. Maybe there will be a TiVo-related announcement made there that will make me feel a little less affronted, but after waiting this long for TiVo to show even a little Mac love, I'm not holding my breath...

Not Exactly

[shirizaki]

More like meta data. DRM would hinder actual play of video files on players, btu it will encode it for iPod and PSP use, so calling it DRM isn't correct.


If anything, this is the proper way I'd like to see content distributed with protection.

"We'll give you free reign, but we're marking it."

Re:Not Exactly

[Niten]

No, it's not DRM. It's a watermark. It does not and cannot prevent you from doing anything at all with the video; all it does is provide the content owners with a means of identifying copyright violators, should the video show up in a torrent somewhere.

I agree with shirizaki - this is the proper way for media to be distributed online. This watermark will never be an issue for you until after you've already, publicly violated someone else's copyright.

So what.

[Laith]

At home I'm mostly a Mac guy. By bundling the new software only with a pay product when the Windows version is free is just insulting and bad business.

I just want to be able to copy some of our programs to a computer to watch. So I can watch my Sci-Fi when my wife or daughter are watching one of their programs, or so my daughter can watch one of her shows when the TV is otherwise busy.

We have no dvd burner in the computer and no desire to save these shows after viewing. Just want to have another screen to view them on.

And...

[sootman]

...still no love for DirecTiVos. And, I guess, never. From http://www.tivo.com/4.9.4.1-1.asp
"The TiVoToGo feature is not currently available on Series3. This feature will not be available [emphasis mine] on the DIRECTV DVR with TiVo or the original TiVo boxes (TiVo Series1)."

All I want to do is download shows. I've got two hackable TiVos (and even a supported USB/network adapter) but I've never been able to get it to work, and with two jobs, a newborn, and no "spare" PCs anymore, it's difficult for me to try--my last attempt was over a year ago. Are there any reputable services/people that can hack my TiVo for me? I'm not trying to get around TiVo's fees, I just want to have it make shows available for download, and maybe a web-based frontend for recording/deleting shows and the ability to make its daily call over the network would be nice, too. Any suggestions?

$100 vs free

[diamondsw]

And note that while Windows users get it for free, Mac users only get it as part of a $100 application; one that you hardly need with all of the built-in CD and DVD burning services.

Re:$100 vs free

[Anonymous Coward]

Not exactly. Yes, the software is free on the PC, but won't actually play video without you having already acquired an MPEG-2 codec for the machine, can't burn to DVD without you acquiring DVD burning software from a third party, and won't convert to some of the formats this supports without an additional fee (~$30) to cover the costs of the codec licensing for those formats.

Since the Mac OS X software as packaged has a vastly different things feature set than the Windows version, as packaged, it's not an apples-to-apples pricing comparison,

Roxio Discount

[frenchs]

I'm pretty sure I'm in line with everyone else in that I don't really want to buy a $100 dollar piece of burning software just so I can download and view my tv shows on my mac.

But for those that are into that. If you go to Roxio's site to an invalid URL (Like this one), you can get a 10% off coupon for their online store.

Re:Placeshifting

[LMacG]

Maybe you could stop geeking out and find other ways to distract her in bed? (Insert appropriate smiley thing here).

It's still TiVo - I won't go there

[TheWoozle]

Unless TiVo change their policies about gathering information on what I watch, forcing downloads of advertising and other content that I don't want, etc., I don't want a TiVo.

I think I'll wait and see what Jobs & Co. have cooked up in the new "iTV" device. Anybody heard anything from the Macworld keynote yet?

Re:It's still TiVo - I won't go there

[Have Blue]

The keynote is tomorrow at 9AM PST.

Re:DRM

[mark0]

Install the TiVo Desktop and DirectShow Dump.

Re:back PEDALING, not peddling

[slughead]

back PEDALING, not peddling.

Nonsense. They meant that they went back in time to sell Tivos to people in the past.

"Back Peddling"

Generations / DRM isn't about copying

[bill_mcgonigle]

Then, we get together and "average our files." Often times this will destroy the watermark but leave the original media intact.

Yes, but to do so you incur a generation loss.

I'm with you though, watermarks are a great alternative to DRM from a user's perspective and from the purported-need perspective. Then you realize that DRM isn't about controlling how many copies of a work you can make, but controlling where and when you can play your media and suddenly the watermark isn't effective DRM anymore.

Re:In other news...another badly ported, late app.

[repetty]

>> Tell me again why the Mac is a better platform is the apps lag by years?

The main virtue of the Mac platform is that it pisses guys like you off.