Being one of the few people left in America without a DVR, I’ve had my eye on an EyeTV for quite a while now but have not had a hands-on experience with one. Last week, one of our buyers came to me with an open-box EyeTV Hybrid to try out; I jumped at the chance! Now, I’ll be honest, I’m not the biggest television fan. Along with not having a DVR, I also don’t own an HDTV. Luckily, the EyeTV Hybrid works just fine in Standard Definition so keep in mind while reading this article that no testing was done of the HD functions of the product.
As soon as I got home I plugged the EyeTV Hybrid into the back of my Mac Mini Server, which I use as a media center. I realized there were several ways to hook up EyeTV to my television and cable. The EyeTV Hybrid comes with a coax jack built right in for use with cable or an antenna. It also comes with an optional “video cable” to attach to an alternate video source. My Mac Mini is already connected to my television with S-Video and an optical audio cable, so all I needed to hook up was the cable line. However, I was already running into some confusion and the vague directions were of no help. I have digital cable that routes through a cable box and to my television. It seemed that the most logical thing to do would be to unplug the cable to my television and plug it into the EyeTV; thinking that I needed my programmed Digital Cable box to get access to all of the channels.
I fired up the software and after install was immediately told that my software was out of date and I needed to upgrade; this is not unusual. Often times when one tries to install software from the disk that came with the product that disk is actually out of date. So, I downloaded. Two more downloads and a driver update later and finally my software was ready to use…or so I thought. In going through the setup assistant I was told the EyeTV had to scan for channels. This reminded me of setting up an old TV for the first time. It took over thirty minutes for the EyeTV to scan and once it was through I was told I only had three channels. Sure enough, since I had routed through the cable box, the only real channel that displayed was the one for the box itself. That meant that I could still control the channel by using my cable remote, but I couldn’t see the program list on EyeTV or tell it what to record. It was basically defeating the whole point of the EyeTV.
Then I wised up, plugged the cable line from the wall directly into the EyeTV, waited the thirty minutes for the channels to refresh and, voila, I finally had a program list and was able to control the EyeTV via my computer. The next step was getting the EyeTV remote working. To my chagrin, I found that the remote works with an IR receiver directly on the EyeTV. I have to say, that is a poor design considering the EyeTV is made in the form of a USB stick and is intended to plug in to the back of a computer. IR requires line-of-site so the remote was completely unresponsive until I used the included USB extension cable and propped the EyeTV Hybrid above my Mac Mini (creating an eye-sore in the process). Now I could at least get the remote working, about two thirds of the time. Let’s talk about this “remote” for a moment. This is potentially the cheapest looking and feeling remote I’ve ever seen. Aside from the giant letters reminding me it was “Made in China”, there wasn’t much of a description to it. Several of the buttons are not labeled in any real recognizable fashion. There’s no included manual (either physically with the EyeTV or within the program itself) to explain what the functions of the non-labeled buttons are and for the most part many of the buttons just plain don’t seem to do anything. The remote is also so intermittently responsive, that I ended up jamming buttons in frustration and occasionally yelling at my computer like a nut-job.
Aside from the cons, the EyeTV does the minimum that I asked for. It recorded the programs that I told it to and it allowed me to watch television through my computer. The program guide is fairly cohesive with a decent interface. I was disappointed that it was unable to record two programs at once. I also noticed that if I was watching a program that I was also recording it would occasionally hiccup; like watching a streaming video online without enough of a buffer. Overall, though, the quality was about the same that I get through my cable box.
I think this would be a great product for someone who does not have a television and is looking for an affordable DVR solution or just wants to watch TV on their Mac. The remote issues and setup time aside, the product performed consistently and it’s low-profile is convenient. I’d be curious to hear from those using the HD functions of the EyeTV Hybrid. Have you had a positive, negative or neutral experience with the EyeTV? Shoot me a line, I’d be curious to hear about it!
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