Manual Recording

[Martin J]

Manual recording is something I'm struggling to get to grips with.

If I'm watching live TV (via a HD-PVR) and see something I want to record, I can right-click and select "Record this show" from the menu. Because there is no EPG info, that action seems to add a scheduled recording of two hours in length.

For example, it's 19:47 now, I press "Record this show" and I have a scheduled recording entry that is listed as being from 19:00 to 21:00 (even though I've only just turned the PC on).

If I let the recording reach its stated end time, then I can see the programme in the "All SageTV Recordings" menu, but what if I want to cancel the recording five minutes later, but keep that five minutes? If I select "Cancel Recording", it deletes the file and removes it from the recordings menu.

So how does one to stop/start a recording "on-the-fly" and keep that recording?

Any pointers would be appreciated (and apologies is this seems to be a pretty basic question).

[MeInMaui]

I do not believe that SageTV is designed to capture clips like that by default. I think there is a setting where you can disable the cleanup of live TV files. That would prevent the clip from being deleted. There may also be an import designed for this.

One other possibility is this functionality is built into the SageMC alternative interface. When the option is enabled, you can press record during live TV and it will ask you if you want to start recording from the current time or from when the show/watching began. If you press record again at some later point, it will stop recording and save the clip.

Aloha,
Mike

[Conejo]

Martin,

What are you watching that doesn't have EPG data?

When viewing LiveTV, Sage creates and saves a file for each and every program you watch. If you change channels then that recording gets broken and a another file gets created for the new channel. Return the the previous channel and the previous broken recording starts up again at the current time.

When you select to 'record this program' sage then turns that file into a scheduled recording, giving it tuner priority. Try to change channels and Sage will use another available tuner for LiveTV, or if another tuner isn't available for the selected channel then it throws up a conflict window.

All of your watchable tuners should have EPG data attached to each channel, unless: it's VOD broadcast; some local station that isn't carried on a major Cable or Sat network; or you've plugged your capture into a DVD or Bluray player.

Your other option is to create a TIMED RECORDING (Original STV3: Scheduled Recordings > Create Timed Recording) that lets you select a START and STOP date/time.

[Martin J]

Mike, thanks for the reply.

Originally Posted by MeInMaui

I do not believe that SageTV is designed to capture clips like that by default. I think there is a setting where you can disable the cleanup of live TV files. That would prevent the clip from being deleted.

I can see how that would work, but it would also save the entire file up to the point of stopping watching, which could be many GB in size. If one was trying to save one pop video but had been watching MTV for hours, the saved file would be considerably larger than it need be.

I'm finding this area of SageTV the hardest to deal with, all the hardware PVRs I have will record from point A to point B depending when I press the record button, regardless of their live TV capabilities.

Originally Posted by MeInMaui

One other possibility is this functionality is built into the SageMC alternative interface. When the option is enabled, you can press record during live TV and it will ask you if you want to start recording from the current time or from when the show/watching began. If you press record again at some later point, it will stop recording and save the clip.

That sounds like the sort of thing. Having just installed SageMC 16x9 however, the interface seems far more confusing than the regular Sage GUI. Is there a user guide for SageMC, there doesn't appear to be one via the download page?

[Martin J]

Originally Posted by Conejo

What are you watching that doesn't have EPG data?

A Hauppauge HD-PVR connected to a Sky digibox via component and S/P-DIF. I'm in the UK, so haven't yet figured out how to get EPG data and import it to SageTV, although I know DigiGuide should work.

I haven't installed my IR blaster yet either, so I'm currently changing channels via the original remote.

Originally Posted by Conejo

Your other option is to create a TIMED RECORDING (Original STV3: Scheduled Recordings > Create Timed Recording) that lets you select a START and STOP date/time.

That's a good idea, although you'd have to be aware of what was upcoming first, rather than being able to record spontaneously.

[Opus4]

There is a List of available customizations in the customizations forum. I believe nielm's Multi-function Stop import has an option to save a partial file.

- Andy

[Martin J]

Originally Posted by Opus4

I believe nielm's Multi-function Stop import has an option to save a partial file.

Andy, thanks for the pointer, that's going to help a great deal.