[WelMac] FreeView and TubeStick

[David Empson]

At 1:28 PM +1200 5/06/2007, John Crook wrote:
>Hi
>
>I'm just wondering if anyone has tried the "TubeStick" from Equinux:
>
><http://enl.equinux.de/r/ef13fd5e68cfea0d02c828b5c34f608dJK8Y7E7ZP1XC/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5lcXVpbnV4LmNvbS9nb3RvL210MTQyL25sXzA3MDYwMS9sYXRlc3RmZWF0dXJlcw%3D%3D>http://enl.equinux.de/r/ef13fd5e68cfea0d02c828b5c34f608dJK8Y7E7ZP1XC/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5lcXVpbnV4LmNvbS9nb3RvL210MTQyL25sXzA3MDYwMS9sYXRlc3RmZWF0dXJlcw%3D%3D
>
>TubeStick is a small plug-in USB device that can receive digital 
>broadcast TV signals that comply with the DVB-T technical standard. 
>It allows you to view and save DVB broadcast television programs on 
>your Mac.
>
>And it just so happens that DVB-T is the standard being used by the 
>new FreeView service in New Zealand.

Not exactly. My understanding is that DVB-T (Digital Video Broadcast 
- Terrestrial) is what they will be using next year, supplementing 
and eventually replacing the current analog TV broadcasts from 
locations like Mt Kaukau.

The initial Freeview service available right now comes from a 
satellite, and it uses DVB-S.

DVB-S and DVB-T require different decoders. For example, I'm aware 
that El Gato's EyeTV comes in different versions according to which 
DVB standard you need to use.

The satellite service will continue once terrestrial is available, as 
it has nationwide coverage, whereas terrestrial will be similar 
coverage to the current analog TV broadcasts.

If I had a spare computer with sufficient CPU grunt and disk space, 
I'd definitely like to assemble a computer-based digital TV reception 
and recording system, so I can finally get rid of my analog VCRs.

I'm not impressed with the current oferrings in the DVD/HD recorder 
lines - they charge too much, especially for incremental improvements 
like a bigger hard disk (which I know costs very little more) and 
they will be obsoleted somewhat by digital TV.

In a year or two, high capacity Flash storage will start to get 
affordable, so a future digital HD/DVD recorder will not need a noisy 
mechanical hard drive (it can be replaced with flash memory). The 
same will go for some computers (especially laptops), and devices 
like the iPod.

Samsung already sell a 32 GB "flash hard drive". It won't be long 
before they start to eat up the low capacity end of the hard drive 
market.
-- 
David Empson
dempson at actrix.gen.nz
Snail mail: P.O. Box 27-103, Wellington, New Zealand