Can the Marvel be used like TiVo or ReplayTV?

[mmace]

Since the UK doesn't currently have the TiVo or ReplayTV (hard disk video recorders) can the Marvel act in the same way? surely this is easily done through software? (recording a program while watching the recording - e.g. set it to record a film, come home half way through, start watching from the start while still recording the end)

The TiVo and ReplayTV use standard PC Hard drives, and the processing power cannot be better than a PC's as the price is about £400, so it must be software related.

[Dayspring]

Hi there,

Well, I think the problem is more related to the input/output hardware. With the Marvel, I think the same hardware is basically used to capture to MJPEG as well as playback from it. I don't think you can use playback and record at the same time with the hardware. I could be wrong about though.

On the other hand, you can use the basic videotools to set up recording, but I think you'll have to wait until it's done to view the opening part of the film. You can set up times and dates in there though.

I do doubt the processing power of the TiVo or ReplayTV is any better than a lower end computer, and the Hard Drive speeds are probably lower as well, but it must have hardware that can playback at the same time it's recording.

And now that I think about it, there's one other big problem with the Marvel for this sort of use. I don't believe that Windows would support you writing to the file and reading from it at the same time. It would probably tell you that the file is in use and cannot be opened.

Hope this helps,
Matt

[DavidHM]

The Matrox can't, but ATI has announced that future versions of their software will give their products TiVo and ReplayTV features. Not sure what the hardware requirements and quality will be like. I would think recording a video stream and playing it back at the same time would cause a lot of harddrive thrashing.

[DavidHM]

Hmm... Looking at the press release again, it's doesn't sound like current ATI products will have these features. Check out:
http://www.ati.com/na/pages/corporat...2000/4292.html