[iBook] media centre

[Mike Wallinga]

What Brian said is all true with regards to Linda's question, but I 
think we're talking about apples and oranges here, at least compared to 
Angus's original question.  The iMac has all of those ports for 
connecting to TVs, but they are meant to send *output* to the TV, in 
other words what is on the iMac's screen will show up on the TV screen.

What Angus asked about is going in the other direction - he wants to 
take what is normally *input* into the TV (such as a cable channel or 
something) and make it *input* into the iMac instead, so he can either 
watch live TV on his iMac or save a TV show to his iMac's hard drive for 
later viewing (the "time shifting" he mentioned).  To do this, the iMac 
does need additional hardware.

I'm not familiar with the Avant card that was mentioned in another 
previous reply, but if it is a PCI card or something like that, it won't 
work in an iMac because the iMac has no slot.  The only solution I'm 
aware of for an iMac would be an external device like elgato's eyeTV:

http://www.elgato.com/index.php?file=products_eyetvmain

As a disclaimer, I've never tried it, so I can't recommend it one way or 
the other.  It's a product that has intrigued me for quite a while, so I 
keep an eye on it; it seems to get consistently good reviews.  But, 
since I already have a TiVo at home I can't convince myself to fork over 
the cash for it, so I can't give you any firsthand testimony.

Hope this helps!
- Mike W.

Brian Olesky wrote:

>Yes, S-Video and Composite are both methods for connecting to a TV. S-Video
>will give you the better picture if your TV has that kind of input. But
>you'll still need a sound connection. Composite are those red, white and
>yellow connectors. The yellow will supply the picture, the red and white
>will deliver the sound. If you have an S-Video connection on your TV, since
>it delivers a better picture, you can use the S-Video for picture, then
>connect the red and white composite connections to deliver the sound. Of
>course it all depends on which computer and what kind of TV you're working
>with, but these are good general guidelines.
>
>Brian
>
>On 10/14/05 9:10 AM, "Linda van Thiel" <lvt at mac.com> wrote:
>  
>
>>The new iMac has vga, s-video and composite video output ports
>>according to Apple's tech specs.  Meaning connection to a tv, right?
>>
>>Linda
>>SE Michigan
>>
>>Hello the list :-)
>>
>>The release of the new iMac G5 (with remote control!) has got me
>>thinking about
>>using it as a Media centre. The only thing missing is a digitalTV
>>tuner. Does
>>anyone use an external TV tuner with their Mac? What do you think of
>>it? Can
>>you
>>
>>a) watch TV?
>>b) timeshift TV?
>>c) use the computer at the same time as (b)?
>>
>>how much did it cost, etc?
>>
>>Any/all info appreciated!
>>
>>Cheers,
>>-Angus
>>