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Twitch Tutorial: Keeping your audio in sync
We do a lot of streaming here on Joystiq these days (Joystiq.com/Twitch, people!), and we're always trying to provide the highest quality we can. To that end, we're trying to get everyone on staff up to speed on the best way to stream console games using the El Gato Game Capture HD, one of the most popular game capture devices, and OBS, a very popular (and very free) piece of software. As much as we love the Game Capture HD, it does feature a small delay that can put your miraculous voice out of sync with the on-screen action. That just won't do, of course, so we've whipped up a handy tutorial video on how to correct it. Rather than keep this Joystiq training tool to ourselves, we figured we might as well share it with you, all of our beloved readers, watchers and Twitchers. Keep in mind that this is specific to OBS and the Game Capture HD. If you're looking for basic Twitch setup info, you can point your browser right here.
Review: Elgato's EyeTV Mobile for Dyle
Elgato has been making video hardware for a number of years, and typically I've found the offerings to be as good as any given consumer would need. As hardware has gotten better, Elgato's offerings have been able to pump out HD signals to your Mac or iOS device. Here I'll review an odd duck, a digital TV tuner called EyeTV Mobile, but it's only for a TV service called Dyle. Unfortunately the Dyle service, which is tied to the hardware I'm reviewing, has no history of success. It appears to be an experiment by a consortium of broadcasters, and there's no telling if it will last. If you want broadcast TV on your iDevice, Dyle is only going to take you so far. Hardware Elgato's hardware is great. The 30-pin accessory (at the time I was sent the review unit the Lightning connector was brand-new) allows you to tune in Dyle.tv programming. You're able to attach a small antenna (seen in the picture above) or add a more substantial one (included) with a magnetic base. You can also plug in to USB, and apparently the accessory contains a small battery (although I was able to watch TV without it showing much of a charge). Unfortunately this USB port is not able to charge your iOS device at the same time, so forget about pass-through charging. This is just to charge the EyeTV Mobile, for reasons slightly unclear to me. But as I said, the hardware is great. Elgato makes good stuff. It's the service that will leave you scratching your head. Service According to its site, Dyle is "the creation of Mobile Content Venture (MCV) -- formed by major broadcasting groups." Unfortunately those major groups wound up only agreeing to broadcast Fox and NBC programming. Not all of it, mind you. If you tried to tune in to the football game last night you couldn't -- it was blocked. Also, coverage is limited. Also, unlike actual terrestrial digital television broadcasts, Dyle isn't showing you the full channel lineup of any given channel. Where I live, the local Fox and NBC stations have two channels on digital TV (not cable, this is free TV over the air), so I'd have 10.1 and 10.2 for my local NBC affiliate, and one would carry "primary" stuff like the national feed, and the .2 channel is typically local -- a loop of the weather or a local talk show, stuff like that. Dyle doesn't have this. It only has the national feed. The channel guide is virtually useless. I wound up using i.TV to see what was on or coming up later. There is a tiny amount of buffering, in that you can rewind a tiny bit and pause playback, but it is not that useful. So yes, Dyle is "free" TV over the air, but not free TV digital broadcasts as we know them. It's an alternative to these built by a consortium. And in the consortium's wisdom they have removed most channels (because those networks apparently refused to participate), removed all secondary channels, agreed not to show things like sports with blackout restrictions, and launched a product with less coverage than existing broadcast coverage. And one more thing; the quality of the image sucks. AllThingsD tried the service in San Francisco and New York and found a couple more channels were available, but as with my testing, they also had issues with image quality and audio sync. Basically, it's like watching HD video compressed using Cinepak. This really sounds like a brilliant plan, doesn't it? It's exactly the sort of design-by-committee platypus tech that a consortium of old world thinkers would produce. It's as if the King of Spain told Columbus to sail back to America, but in a concrete boat powered by a tiny sparrow and he can only bring back what will fit in his skinny jeans. Dyle may not even be free forever, apparently. There's no telling what the future holds (because the consortium of geniuses who came up with this boondoggle refuse to say what plans they have, yet to refuse to agree to going forward). Maybe this will get better or perhaps it'll wind up on the scrap heap of failed ideas. While Dyle says it is working on big things, I just don't understand how this layer fits in the ecosystem. Do we need this intermediary? I feel like it's ill-conceived and superfluous, devoid of any real purpose now and merely a beta test to see if they can provide a real service (for a fee) later on. Conclusion If you gotta have free TV and live in a big city, the Elgato EyeTV Mobile for Dyle is great. It's too bad Dyle itself is so utterly terrible. If you want to just watch regular digital television broadcasts, get the EyeTV Mobile which supports actual digital television broadcasts, not this limp noodle of a service called Dyle. Unfortunately you'll only be able to use that in Europe, not America.
Show floor video: El Gato HD hardware and EyeTV 3
While we wait for Apple to cram a TV tuner or cable card into the Apple TV (don't hold your breath-- seriously), El Gato continues to pump out some nice hardware/software tools for watching the tube on your Mac. One thing that caught my eye: you can start distributing recorded live video around your house 30 seconds or so after the EyeTV starts recording a show. I remember when we had to rig some VLC nonsense together to get livestreaming on a remote machine with the old EyeTV. Oh, and they've apparently added something very similar to the Season Pass feature on Tivo, which is quite cool.Check out a nice demo after the jump.
Show floor video: Equinux shows the TubeStick
Equinux, makers of iSale, CoverScout and an interesting collection of other apps, was at Macworld demoing TubeStick, their TV receiver. Like El Gato's EyeTV, the TubeStick is a hardware doohickey with the TV parts inside (logically) and some software that lets you watch TV on your Mac. Unlike El Gato, however, there is a social aspect to TubeStick. Example: you can chat with friends who are watching the same thing. The CEO took us on a quick tour, which you can view after the break.(Note: Equinux also gave us some show swag which we'll be giving away next week)
EyeTV 2.5 offers free slingbox-style video streaming
%Gallery-8131% As we posted last week, Elgato's new EyeTV 2.5 upgrade (free to existing customers) offers WiFi video streaming. Today I finally had the opportunity to sit down and put the update to the test: to see how it worked and to see where the new technology could take me. I found that this update turned my Mac Mini into a free, low-rent slingbox. I can now bring my home TiFaux with me on the road, just by tuning in using my iPhone, iPod touch or laptop.
Elgato's Turbo.264 gets date and price
A few days ago we told you about a new product for encoding H.264 with hardware instead of software, which should obviously speed things a long, as well as free up CPU cycles for something else. At the time we didn't know much about the product, but now our friends from Elgato have filled us in. The Turbo.264 will be available in the US by the end of April with a MSRP of $99. We also learned that the device can encode any video that QuickTime can handle, including 3rd party QuickTime components and that any software that supports QuickTime Export, including EyeTV's very own one click export, is supported. The bad news is that while the device can help you encode your HD clips to H.264, the maximum output resolution is limited to 800x600.
El Gato's mini-ATSC tuner -- Mac's only
It was only a few weeks ago we spied the first ATSC tuner in thumbdrive form but it wasn't Mac compatible. El Gato, maker of the Eye500, has our back though and just announced the EyeTV Hybrid digital/analog tuner just for Macs. The tuner is in the form of a small thumb-drive that utilizes USB 2.0 to deliver analog or digital TV to your Mac. Just plug it and go. Well, you might have to use the antenna if you aren't in an area with generous NTSC/ATSC coverage. Or you the included break-out cables will allow you to plug in an old VCR, DVD player or game system as long as you covert the signal to coax. El Gato's EyeTV 2 software is wrote natively for OS X and will allow you to record in MPEG-2 -- that is if your Mac has enough power. The tuner is currently available for $150 on their site.[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
El Gato's EyeTV Hybrid digital/analog tuner for Macs
You know you need it: that squishy soft gaze that comes with the kind of numb only a TV can deliver at the end of a hard day. El Gato knows this too, and delivers yet another fix to Mac owners in the form of the EyeTV Hybrid. As the name implies, this USB 2.0 stick delivers both hi-definition capable digital ATSC and traditional analog NTSC tuners to record (in MPEG-2 if your Mac has the muscle), edit, and pause live TV when combined with El Gato's bundled EyeTV 2 software. What's more, the kit works with the Apple Remote and includes a break-out cable for connecting composite and S-Video sources like your gaming rig -- for "zero latency" play on your Mac's display -- or that dusty VCR to convert the ol' VHS collection into digital media. Inputs that owners of Apple's stellar, but otherwise inflexible, 30-inch displays will certainly appreciate. Available now for $150 or €150 for our DVB-T signal lovin' brethren. [Thanks, Doug]
Turn that Mac mini into a media center - finally
When the mini was announced, about the only person NOT thinking "media center Mac" was Bill Gates. I immediately bought one, and I bought the then-new El Gato EyeTV with that ATI logo on it (the full name escapes me). That El Gato box is ugly, gets hot, and didn't really do what I wanted... So now El Gato has a new version of their baseline TV input device out, and this time it has a remote! So, between a big hard drive, the El Gato EyeTV EZ, and a Mac mini Core Duo, you finally have a nearly-perfect Mac-based media center. And to help you set it all up, there's Chris Hamady's excellent page on his Media Center Macintosh Project. Great. So what the heck am I going to do with my old rig?Chris sets up his EZ with the mini, and it works great, in no small part because of that nifty remote (curse you El Gato!). He adds a big honkin' hard drive for all that sweet, sweet pep. Then he rips his DVD's using Handbrake, so his collection is accessible using Front Row. To top it all off, he puts XP on there (complete with some security measures). I guess he can use his Windows boot for watching those nifty CNN videos...
