video capture for beginners

ok, I am new to video capture. My Brother-in-law was on the news and I want to take the news story from my Tivo Premier 4 DVR and import it to my MBP5,3.
I believe that there is a composite out (RWY) on the back of the Tivo and also with HDMI out to tv.
Can I presume that the HDMI is digital and the composite is analog?
I would like to use the firewire input to the MBP?
What program do I use to capture it and write the file to the HD? I have about 400Gb on the drive. Does handbrake do this or should I use imovie or some other program? I understand from reading other posts that this must be recorded on the fly.
I also have a sony DVMCDA box to convert analog to digital either way if this helps. Can I unplug the HDMI cable from the tv and use a HDMI to firewire cable? Thanks in advance.

MBP5,3 8gb ram, 500gb drive mavericks os.
Hmmm did I forget anything?

TiVO used to have a program for Macs to facilitate transfer between the Mac and TV. It was never as all supported as the PC version and seems to have been discontinued at this point. The HDMI port is probably a no go. The port is designed to output to TV so if any type of capture is attempted that way the capture device often won't permit it.

It is possible to capture through a firewire port but I did not see one listed on the Premiere. Not sure it would work from HDMI through an adapter to firewire.

The two options I have used most frequently with TiVO are TiVO Transfer which is part off Toast ii and a free program called cTiVo. Both options require the TiVo to be on the home network. Here's a link to info about cTiVO including download link

I have not used either option in some time but both are still available. You probably won't have problems with what you are transferring but TiVo tries to lock down copy protected programs pretty tightly. The one problem I have had with both programs is that transfer over a network can be slow.

Wow! Thanks for the info. Tivo used to have an app to watch progs on your computer, but that went away when the romio and the streamers came out. Do you know if cTivo will work remotely through a port forwarded connection? It would be nice to be able to get shows while away from home.

The reason I asked about the composite connections is that my tivo has those also on the rear as well as componet and hdmi. I have two old sony 8mm and hi-8 mm camcorders that I want to take the video from. My firewire 800 to mini dv cable came yesterday so I can test all that stuff out. The wife is leaving for a business trip so I will get a chance ;-)

I have not tried port forwarding with cTiVO so I can't help much there. If the Sony cameras have firewire ports that should go to the firewire port on the Mac. iMovie may recognize it directly. Some cameras were recognized that way.

The Sony firewire ports may be designated as iLink and use a tiny firewire connector that is similar to the micro or mini usb connector.

The network connection is probably the easiest way to remove things from the TiVO but if it has a connection marked 1394 that is a firewire 400 connection. If you have that connection and really want to try that avenue send me a PM. It may take me a while to dig up the a link to the software and sorting out other issues could quickly run this thread into the weeds.

ok, that program rocks! It works great and I got that show that I wanted to cut/paste from it to a new one. thanks! Still need to play with it to optimize for my needs.

I take it you tried cTiVO? What version of OS X are you running? I haven't tried it much since we are currently using the cable company DVR. Our current box is not TiVO driven but the next one probably will be. They are moving in that direction. Twice in the last 3 hers or so we have had boxes go bad. The only reason they did not give us a TiVo box then is that they were out of them.

I may send you a PM with a question about the current TiVO software if I can figure out how to word it that makes sense. I still have a Series 2 box with a menu system that drives my wife nuts.

Glad to help.

ankhseeker said:

The reason I asked about the composite connections is that my tivo has those also on the rear as well as componet and hdmi. I have two old sony 8mm and hi-8 mm camcorders that I want to take the video from.

Click to expand...

Does the TiVo have composite Input? or just output?

The output of Sony 8mm/Hi-8 cameras is analog composite plus audio. You need to digitize it for use on computer/DVD, etc.
~6 yr ago, I bought the cheapest frame grabber/digitizer device I could find on amazon. EasyCap DC60 - still available. It doesn't come with Mac software, but comes with acceptable Windows software, called Ulead VideoStudio SE. There is an open source Mac project called EasyCap Viewer. I wasn't satisfied with it, so I use the Windows software.

ok, Here is the story now. The Tivo box has composite, componet, and hdmi outputs. Put the composite output into a sony, DVMC-DA2 box and get nic digital output out to the MBP. IMovie captures it nicely! Problem and question solved. Thanks to everybody. As for the camcorder, it has s-video and that goes into that box as well.

Thanks for that info. Always looking for one more way to get things done.

The last captures I did fed some old video tape from the VCR to the composite inputs on the TiVO. From there I can transfer files over the network to my Mac. A little slow but I can use gear I had.