[DennyCrane]

I've got a Motorola 6416 III 160GB PVR, and I'm interested to know a how accurate the "25 hours of HD recording" is? The reason I ask is because I'm going away for a week, and with all the new shows starting, I have 24 hours and 1 minute of shows that are set to be recorded while I'm gone. I will ensure it's at 0% capacity before I leave, but I want to know if there are other considerations that could affect the amount of shows that can be recorded. I may re-configure my series recordings so some are in SD if you think it's necessary. I really don't want to have to do that, but I'd rather do that than miss out on shows.

My other question is with regards to what shows get priority over hard drive space? I have my series recordings set up in priority order, but what happens when the box fills up? My assumption is that the recording priority has no affect on what's already recorded, but I thought I would ask anyway. That just determines what gets priority if more than two channels are being recorded at once, correct? So how does the device start removing shows to make room for new shows? Does it just start deleting from the oldest show forward (first in, first out)? Is there an effective method of assigning priority levels to shows already stored on the hard drive? I set up some of the more important series to save until 'I delete'. The only other option is until 'Space is needed'. I'm assuming 'Space is needed' would go with the first in, first out rule?

Let me know if you need further clarification. Any tips you have to offer would be greatly appreciated.

 

[accord1999]

I've got a Motorola 6416 III 160GB PVR, and I'm interested to know a how accurate the "25 hours of HD recording" is?

It would depend a lot on the channels you're recording, as they're not all at the same bit rate. Most of the US broadcast channels are compressed at around 14-16 Mbit/s, which costs about 6.5 Gigabytes per hour. A few channels, like HDNet and Showcase are heavily compressed to less than 10 Mbit/s and only use about 5 Gigabytes per hour. On the other extreme, local Canadian channels (and AMC) are generally uncompressed and will consume about 8-8.5 Gigabytes per hour.

 

[spitoon]

If you can afford it, I'd just recommend getting an expander...solves all the problems

Otherwise, further to accord's post above the shows usually take up a little less space than you think, so I'm pretty sure you'd be fine at 24hrs.

I think that if you have the shows set to delete as "space is needed" that it will do the first in-first out thing...if you have everything set to "I delete" then I think it will just stop recording all together.

I suppose you could prioritize and just leave one, least important, show as "space is needed"...in that situation the worst case scenario is that you might miss one or two episodes of that show?

 

[magnet]

May I suggest you record a few of your lesser favourite shows in Standard definition instead of HD.

 

[loracweb]

I wouldn't count on it being that reliable. When they first came out yes, but less so now. Consider that Shaw markets the DCX3400 as being able to record up to 60 hours of HD, and that is basically 3x the recording space of your 160...

 

[DSgamby]

Or you sign up for NHL CI and you can swap your HDPVR for a new HDPVR with either 500 GBs or get a HD plus a PVR Expander with a TB.

 

[Shaw Guru]

I had the same issue when I went on vacation last year for a week. About 40 hours of content to record for all family members. Best thing to do is set up about half on the SD channels. This resulted in my 160GB hard drive being 70% full upon returning.

 

[loracweb]

Ugh. Avoid SD. It isn't worth the pain Buy an expander, or upgrade your internal HDD. You don't have to buy the expander from Shaw...

Your family will thank you when you get back for making sure everything was in HD...

 

[DennyCrane]

Most of the US broadcast channels are compressed at around 14-16 Mbit/s, which costs about 6.5 Gigabytes per hour. A few channels, like HDNet and Showcase are heavily compressed to less than 10 Mbit/s and only use about 5 Gigabytes per hour.

Oh good - 2 hours a day x 6 days is HDNET (Prison Break is playing back-to-back right now). So those 12 hours should use approximately 60GB. So that should leave me with 100GB for the other 12 hours of random recordings. Even at 6.5GB/hour, that's only 78 gigs which puts me at around 138 gigs. Does the firmware or anything use up a portion of the 160GB space? It sounds like I might be okay.

If you can afford it, I'd just recommend getting an expander...solves all the problems

I didn't want the Pace box with the expander for a number of reasons, but these forums seem to indicate that you can add expanders to the Moto boxes as well. I may have to look into that. I have a 1TB external USB drive for my PC, so maybe I could use that. I definitely won't be figuring that out before I fly out tomorrow morning though.

I suppose you could prioritize and just leave one, least important, show as "space is needed"...in that situation the worst case scenario is that you might miss one or two episodes of that show?

Good tip!

Or you sign up for NHL CI and you can swap your HDPVR for a new HDPVR with either 500 GBs

Really? I'm not much of a hockey fan, but how long do you have to sign up for?

Best thing to do is set up about half on the SD channels.

I didn't want to have to do this because I've turned into an HD snob, and because I'd have to re-adjust all my series recordings. I already had to do that last week when Shaw replaced by box because of frequent choppy signals...and it didn't fix the issue by the way. But I also understand this is probably the best quick fix to my problem.

Your family will thank you when you get back for making sure everything was in HD...

LOL, no family...24 hours is all me!

 

[antonk]

Expanders work on Motorolas just fine, but you can't use a USB external drive - it must be eSATA. Lots of info in other threads, like the conspicuously named "External Hard Drive Thread For Motorola DCT" one.

 

[DennyCrane]

Expanders work on Motorolas just fine, but you can't use a USB external drive - it must be eSATA. Lots of info in other threads, like the conspicuously named "External Hard Drive Thread For Motorola DCT" one.

I'm well aware of those threads, thank you. I haven't spent the time to read through them yet though.

 

[accord1999]

Oh good - 2 hours a day x 6 days is HDNET (Prison Break is playing back-to-back right now). So those 12 hours should use approximately 60GB.

I did a recording of two hours of Prison Break on HDNet and it used 10.3 GB (GB = 1,000,000,000 bytes) for two hours in Calgary.

So that should leave me with 100GB for the other 12 hours of random recordings. Even at 6.5GB/hour, that's only 78 gigs which puts me at around 138 gigs. Does the firmware or anything use up a portion of the 160GB space? It sounds like I might be okay.

Yeah, just avoid recording on the local Canadian channels whenever possible and you should be fine. The DCT should use some space to store metadata about the recordings but it shouldn't be significant, on Pace boxes it only reserves 1% of the total space for it.

 

[DennyCrane]

Yeah, just avoid recording on the local Canadian channels whenever possible and you should be fine.

Why, because the bit rate is so much higher? I love watching stations like CTV HD because the quality is SO good...I guess this could explain why.

 

[accord1999]

Why, because the bit rate is so much higher? I love watching stations like CTV HD because the quality is SO good...I guess this could explain why.

Yeah, CTV, Global and CBC all have among the highest bit rates on Shaw and each hour will take about 8 GB.