Hello,
My 3 year old son was on TV thanks to the "Sprout" network today-they picked him for one of their little cartoon segments! I wanted to know if there was a way to pull the recording from my Comcast High Definition Digital DVR box (with HDMI wire and digital outputs) directly to my computer or video camera? The sprout channel was not in high definition (if that makes a difference).My camera is an older mini-dv model-Sony DCR-TRV17. I know I can copy to dvd then bring it into imovie, but is there a way to connect the video camera (or my mac mini) directly to the DVR box?

Thanks,
Natalie

The only way that I know of would be:

1) if your MiniDV camera can do video in via RCA or S-Video go to step 2. If not, then the answer is NO.

2) Connect your Comcast DVR to your camcorder via RCA audio and S-Video




3) Set the Camcorder for DV-In (passthrough)

4) At this point you can play the show and record it to a Mini-DV tape OR you can go one step further and connect the Firewire cable to your Mac and transfer the show right into say iMovie.

The Sony TRV-17 does have S-video and RCA in (this is the camera I use to save things off of TV), so you should be able to follow Terry's instructions. If you still have the manual, I'm pretty sure there's a digram and instructions in there, too.

Hang onto that camera! Consumer cameras today no longer come with this feature for the most part. I can't recall a consumer-grade camera that's come out in the past few years that does.

Thank you both-I will give it a try!

Natalie

Out of curiosity-I see that there is a firewire spot on the back of the DVR box-is it possible to connect with a firewire cable directly to the camera?

Nataie

Although the DVR itself has Firewire, USB, eSATA and all kinds of cool connections, NONE of these ports are enabled by Comcast because that would be just too useful for their customers.

quote:

Originally posted by artphanto:
Out of curiosity-I see that there is a firewire spot on the back of the DVR box-is it possible to connect with a firewire cable directly to the camera?

Nataie

Then that would be too easy-
Thanks Terry

I was able to connect it via RCA cables.

For anyone interested-I posted it on youtube

YouTube

Great job and cute!

What I'm actually stunned by (well not really) is that with Comcast DVR's you still can't:

• Schedule recordings remotely over the internet
  
• Transfer shows from one DVR to another one
  
• Network them together to share stuff
  
• Add external storage via USB, Firewire or eSata
  

All of this is and more is available on TiVo HD.
Seeing that Comcast also provides internet service, you would think that at least remote scheduling would be a no brainer!

What a treasure for you! It's wonderful that, in this day and age, that we are able to capture it and share like this,thanks to the wonders of technology and our Macs, of course.

quote:

Originally posted by Terry White:
Although the DVR itself has Firewire, USB, eSATA and all kinds of cool connections, NONE of these ports are enabled by Comcast because that would be just too useful for their customers.

That's hilarious, Terry... Well, it would be if it wasn't so true!

Andrew

quote:

Originally posted by Donna:
What a treasure for you! It's wonderful that, in this day and age, that we are able to capture it and share like this,thanks to the wonders of technology and our Macs, of course.

Thanks Donna and Terry! Yes with the wonders of the mac technology-I was able to share this with my relatives all over the world almost instantly!

A great technological time we are living in!