Disk space/HD folder/8.1.1

[Amnesia]

Before I got 8.1.1, I had been using my HD folder as a guide to which shows I should watch first in order to reduce disk space...

But today I finally verified that a one-hour show recorded on an HD channel will take the same amount of disk space whether or not the show is HD.

For example, a one-hour episode of SD Survivor Fiji recorded on CBS-HD will take the same amount of space as a one-hour episode of HD Close to Home...

I had thought that someone told us the opposite---that a SD recording on a HD channel will take up less disk space than a HD recording...

[TivoInNY]

I'm pretty sure that an hour recorded off of an HD channel will be stored the same way, regardless of whether the original source was SD or HD. I'm no expert, but from what I understand, the format (e.g., 720p, 480i) is determined by CHANNEL, not television show. Therefore, an SD program playing on an HD channel is being up-converted before being sent out so it's saved as an HD stream.

I could be totally wrong, but that's been my assumption. Better than the SA 8300HD which, as best I could tell, saved EVERYTHING in HD just because I had the output set to 720p fixed...

[mpastreich]

Yeah.

Basically:

For Analog sources TiVo compresses the video based on the quality level you have selected, but for Digital sources (both Digital SDTV channels and HDTV channels), the source is recorded "as is", so any size is directly determined by the broadcast, not by anything else (the actual format of the show etc.).

If CBS decides to upconvert a show to 720p and broadcast it, then TiVo just looks at the inbound stream and says "Ah, Digital stream, record as is".

Considering the price drops in SATA storage (take a look at some of the fun after market drive upgrades people have done to their TiVos :) ), I figure as soon as eSATA is approved, storage space will fast become a moot point (at least as long as TiVo2Go is enabled on the Series 3's within a reasonable timeframe after that).

[CraigHB]

According to the new usage indicater, shows recorded from a non-HD digital channel are using about 1 GB per hour. Analog channels on basic quality use around .6 GB per hour and shows on medium quality use around 1.6 GB per hour. Shows recorded from an HD channel (regardless of format) use around 7 GB per hour. Shows recorded from an HD channel don't always appear in the HD recordings folder. I believe the TiVo uses guide data for that. So, a show that isn't advertised as HD in the guide data will not appear in the folder even though it's using 7 GB per hour. Best thing to do is use the actual channel number in determining which shows to watch first. For me, it's easy because I get my HD channels OTA and they always have a dash in them.

[Carsten]

Where can I see the size of a video? How do I get there?

[Amnesia]

Press "Info" when looking at the show in NPL.

[Runch Machine]

What new usage indicator are you referring to? Where is it? I am not aware of such a thing.

I concur with the others, the channel format determines how much space is used and it doesn't matter if the show is low def or high def. Low def shows are upconverted to 720p or 1080i depending on the format that the stations uses. I record the local low def news from an analog channel to save space.

[Amnesia]

For S3's in new in 8.1.1. It indicates how much disk space a particular recording takes. As mentioned above, go to the NPL, select a show and press Info.