Miglia Technology today announced TVMax, a digital video recorder designed to match Apple’s Mac mini.
Eric Ferraz, Director of Product Management, Miglia Technology, stated in the press release: “TVMax is the ultimate analogue TV and video recording solution for any Mac user. It’s lets you watch TV in window mode or full screen, convert your VHS tapes to DVD in a few easy steps and best of all, TVMax records in MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and DivX formats. Bundled with EyeTV 2.0, TVMax is also ideal for iPod Video owners thanks to the exclusive One Click iPod export function.”
TVMax is bundled with EyeTV 2, which lets you watch, pause, rewind and skip forward live TV, schedule recordings, access online TV guides, edit recorded TV shows to cut out commercials, and much more. TVMax comes with an infrared remote control.
TVMax will let you store hours of TV programs on a single DVD using its built in hardware compressor, no need to strain your CPU any further, let TVMax take the strain!
Key Features
• Watch, Pause, Rewind, Skip forward Live TV
• Record and edit your favourite shows
• One Click iPod export
• Hardware compression to MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and DivX
• Convert VHS and Hi8 Tapes to DVD
Technical Specifications
• Host Interface – USB 2.0
• Host Connector Type – USB B Type
• TV Tuner – Analog Tuner, CableTV ready
• Up to 125 Channels
• Resolution – Standard definition (PAL/NTSC or Pal/SECAM)
• Antenna Connection – Antenna or cable
• Recording Formats – MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX. Hardware compression
• Power – External Power Supply
Dimensions:
• Length: 165 mm
• Width: 165 mm
• Height: 30 mm
• Weight 400gr
Compatibility:
Mac only
• Mac with USB 2.0 connectivity
• PowerPC G4/500 processor and higher
• 256 MB of RAM
• Mac OS X 10.4.x and higher
TVMax is available now from Miglia’s distribution partners or online store, for a recommended retail price of $249, €249, £169 (all prices are inc VAT).
More information here.
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If Apple doesn’t put its own attractive logo on the front of the Mac mini, what makes companies like Miglia think that someone would want to look at some random ugly logo on the front of a device sitting on top of the mini?
i knew one of these would come around soon
any suggestions for recording and playingf HD on a mini or MacBook? Is the EyeTV500 the best solution?
Nice, but way too expensive.
I wish we could get some of the less expensive PVR options that are available to PC Users.
I’ve been in the market for something exactly like this since I gave away my PyroAV link to a friend. I’ll pick one of these up.
Americans are crazy, they think this is Japan.
If it can’t do digital cable then it’s no good for me.
I did manage to connect my powerbook to the firewire port of my cablebox/DVR and use Apple’s software based DVHS recorder to capture HD video. That was pretty cool. I guess that iRecord probably uses the same system, but that had some quirks when I tried to use it.
So hopefully in the near future someone will put together a package that will allow for easy recording and archiving of DV from cable boxes. It’s getting close. With H262 the video can be reduced in size. The raw HD video from the cable box takes about 10 gigs worth of disk space for every hour.
What? No High Definition?
Bozos.
Heroin:
I think it’s funny that on Miglia’s own site, the logo vanishes from the front of the unit in the picture of the unit with the Mac Mini!
It’s like they also know that people don’t want to stare at their assy logo…
The EyeTV 500 is a great thing, but is limited to non-encrypted cable and over the air HDTV. Most cable systems encrypt most, if not all, of their content. If that”s OK with you, go ahead.
Hopefully, ElGato will make a version that supports a Cable Card that will allow encrypted content to be used. Given the MPAA’s current mood, I’m not sure how soon that would be.
I own an EyeTV 500 and only the encryption issue is a problem. The other issue if file size. 1080i can easily run 8GB/hour.
So you stack this with the mini and the other company that makes the Hard Drive, and maybe even the other devise with the ports (I know my description is random) and what do you have? A weirder looking white cube thing – again.
But the older cube is better looking, obviously without all the toys.
Sony will create their own OS which will incorporate media centre technology and telepathically beam content to your brain. Watch out Apple!
what makes companies like Miglia think that someone would want to look at some random ugly logo on the front of a device sitting on top of the mini?
Because the box goes nicely with the mini. Have you seen those third party external HDs in cases that look like this? Apple sells them in their stores!
Design wise, this is the way to go – a stack of white components all with thefootprint of the mini. It looks like it belongs in your TV room. It doesn’t look like a Windows Media Center FeeCee.
As for the lack of HD, digital, etc. – give them time. From their web site, it looks like this is their first product. We will have to wait to see if it succeeds or fails. Hopefully for them they succeed and more products come along.
The EyeTV 500 works great on my Core Duo iMac, but I’m not sure how well it would do with that fake GPU and shared memory on a mini or MacBook. HDTV runs at 2x the frame rate and at a much higher res than SDTV.
This is also obviously a Brit product – maybe the don’t have HDTV and digital like us Yanks.
Did anyone notice that this uses Elgato Eye TV technology?
I used to have their Alchemy DVR card for my G5 PowerMac. The hardware was OK, but the software sucked. Recently they have been using ElGato’s EyeTV software, the best I’ve seen to date.
Article that may be of interest:
Apple updates QuickTime Broadcaster (and how to turn your Mac into a PVR)
Steve…what good does it do to record in HiDef unless you can record to blu ray. Com’on is there something ya wanna say?
“Skip forward Live TV”
That must be worth the price alone!
Why USB 2? What happened to Firewire?????????
Hey Stocks are OverHyped Overpriced,
What up with the Anti-Americanisms???? Are you a terrorist?
Why 2 mentions of WHITE components in the comments? I’m confused. The stock mini and these stackable accessories are brushed metal. Only the tops are white. Confused.
No MPEG 1?
EyeTV still does not allow you to customize DivX bitrate but pc software has allowed this for a long time (correct me if I’m wrong about version 2). DivX customization is built into other hardware that uses EyeTV, like the ConvertX for instance, but as of yet, no Mac software interface for it.
Maybe Steve is “telling” us that BluRay is on its way in for Apple, in the short future. Ever imagined if the new PowerMacs will have BluRay compatibility? Macs rule the movie (and others) industries, and with Hollywood studios announcing some titles to be released in BluRay format… figure it out.
And yesterday, MDN announced that BluRay blank discs are already on the shelves.
Go Steve go!!! Be the first, and crush ’em all!
Hey you don’t know the history of stacked components. Tom Cruise does.
so this thing doesn’t have a hard drive either? This is expensive!
Also why is the height not the same as the mini. This would allow both stacking and sitting side by side without looking odd.
Mind you, stacking does have the advantage of covering one of the logos!
Funny, my Mini sits on top of my EyeTV 500 HD PVR. I wonder if I crack it open, whether I can jam the board into one of those NewerTech Mini-form factor HD cases? Then I’d have my HD PVR in a Mini case.
From the ports on it, this looks like an evolution TV that is repackaged into a mini box.
I have an evoTV and while in theory its cool, so far i’m having trouble getting a clean recording where the mini doesnt interfere with the tv reception. weird.
qka “This is also obviously a Brit product – maybe the don’t have HDTV and digital like us Yanks.”
It’s hard to see how this product could succeed in the UK as it only has an analogue tuner. Digital TV ( and HDTV ) is available across most of the UK and the old analogue transmissions are scheduled to be switched off starting in two or three years.
“Did anyone notice that this uses Elgato Eye TV technology?”
Didn’t you notice when Miglia started using Eye TV technology on previous Miglia products ?
“This is also obviously a Brit product – maybe the don’t have HDTV and digital like us Yanks.”
Why this constant supposition that the US is on the bleeding edge of new tech? UK actually has a wider distribution of digital broadcasting, including digital radio and TV. They will stop broadcasting analog altogether starting in 2008.
You don’t know the history of HDTV in the UK. Tom Cruise does.
So will Australian networks.
<a >Want digital?</a>
Funny… I just went to Formac’s page in order to get the link for their DVR. I was going to suggest that this new Miglia device would be a suitable replacement.
I too was wishing for digital.
Imagine my surprise when I say that Formac had already come up with a solution.
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Dammit! <a >I messed up the link.</a>
Doh!
*still waiting for editable posts*