I was hoping to write this article on how to record video from your TV to your computer easily but since it is new to me and although I did have it working I am having problems getting it to work now and have learned some lessons about Vista along the way which is making me start to hate this operating system. I actually was able to record a few videos but when I went back a few days later to record some more the videos would not play in windows media player. I now receive a message that says.
Windows Media Player cannot play the file. The Player might not support the file type or might not support the codec that was used to compress the file.
Ok forget about all my whining about Vista and it’s problems, I found my answer for the reason it is not working is because most of the channels are encrypted, The videos I were able to make were off the CBS station and they do work with that channel. I will have to find out what other channels that will work, this is disappointing but maybe there is another way around this and I am going to look into it.
Well here is what I did the first time to and the equipment I used.
First Thing you need to to do is download the drivers for the DVR box. I have Verizon Fios and a Motorola box here is where you can download the drivers
Next you need to plug the Firewire cable to the DVR box and laptop or computer.
Next step would be to download and run the CAP-DVHS Software Under capture device it should show Motorola or whatever device you have. Click on it, then under settings set the following boxes convert 188 bytes, check pts, delete to SyncByte. Set the file extensions to .ts, if the channel is encrypted the information page will be blank and the video will not work I found this out the hard way thinking it was something else. If all works the video will be transferred to the folder you specified in CapDVHS. Good luck you may need it.
Equipment I used
Firewire Cable
HP Laptop with Windows Vista
CAP-DVHS Software for capturing
Drivers for Motorola DVR