Anyone using TTG+ with iPod Touch?

[cowboyshootist]

I am looking for anyone with experience using TTG+ with an iPod Touch. How does it work and are the results good, bad or otherwise?

I have a way to get Tivo videos onto my iPod Touch but it's a manual process and involves several time consuming steps. If TTG+ can handle the job then I'm all over it.

If you have any experience with this, I appreciate hearing from you. I understand that the resolution that TTG uses is not necessarily optimum for the iPod Touch.

Cheers
TC

[wiedmann]

I have an iPhone and have used both TTG+ and Videora iPhone Converter. TTG+ does a good job (especially once you've modified the settings to generate the full resolution). However, I like the fact that I can zoom in on letterbox programs using a custom profile with Videora iPhone Converter.

TTG+ is relatively simple, since you don't have to convert from .tivo to .mpg first. Just right-click and select convert.

[cowboyshootist]

So why bother zooming in when you can get a full resolution conversion? I guess this is the part I don't understand. If I make the settings such that it uses the full realestate of the iPod Touch screen why worry about zooming in? Perhaps there are programs that won't fill the entire screen without zooming in?

Thanks for your response.

Cheers
TC

[wiedmann]

Exactly. When you play back 4:3 programs on the iPhone, it won't use the whole real estate - instead it adds black bars left and right. This is what you want for full-screen programs since otherwise you'd cut off the top and bottom of the picture or distort it.

For 4:3 letterboxed programs (e.g. Battlestar Galactica on SciFi), zooming in avoids having black bars around the whole picture. If you just convert a 4:3 letterboxed program using THD+, you get the black bars on left and right added by the iPhone player as well as the black bars on top and bottom that were recorded by the Tivo.

Does this make sense?

[cowboyshootist]

I think I understand, although really I don't. :) I think it has to do with 4:3 versus HD versus letterbox etc..

I know this particular program is an HD program although my current Tivo is a Series 2 and not HD. The iPod Touch doesn't have "HD" resolution so I don't know how that's going to work when I get HD content and then convert for the iPod.

For now, the Zoom feature of the Touch works fine.

[wizzy]

I set my wife up with TTG+ for her Touch, and she likes it. Her only complaint is that it's hard (impossible?) to fast forward through the commercials. Any tips there?

[cowboyshootist]

I set my wife up with TTG+ for her Touch, and she likes it. Her only complaint is that it's hard (impossible?) to fast forward through the commercials. Any tips there?

I have the same issue when playing content on the iPod Touch. I have heard that there are programs out there that can strip out the commercials but I don't know how that would work with TTG+. I think you would have to run this before converting to the iPOD.

[Puppy76]

I think I understand, although really I don't. :) I think it has to do with 4:3 versus HD versus letterbox etc..

It doesn't have anything to do with HD really, it's just the aspect ratio. If the source is recorded with black bars on the top and bottem of the image, then on a widescreen device like the iPod touch it will end up having bars on all four sides unless you have the converter chop them off during the conversion process...that's unless the iPod Touch's zoom mode can zoom in the correct amount to get rid of most of the bars, without cutting off any content. Even still that would be lower quality than having the converter program do it.

I set my wife up with TTG+ for her Touch, and she likes it. Her only complaint is that it's hard (impossible?) to fast forward through the commercials. Any tips there?

Are you sure? I've got a 5.5G iPod, and it can fast forward through commercials just fine. If anything, I'd think a flash based iPod Touch would do a better job, since mine sometimes has a little lag when I start fast forwarding since it has to spin up the drive all of a sudden.

[crobey]

I've got TTG+ and an iPod Touch. I've got TTG+ working and generating the .mp4 files. I haven't been able to actually put them on the Touch. I've added the directory and they show up on iTunes under TV Shows, but how do I sync them over. I must be missing something very simple.

[cowboyshootist]

It doesn't have anything to do with HD really, it's just the aspect ratio. If the source is recorded with black bars on the top and bottem of the image, then on a widescreen device like the iPod touch it will end up having bars on all four sides unless you have the converter chop them off during the conversion process...that's unless the iPod Touch's zoom mode can zoom in the correct amount to get rid of most of the bars, without cutting off any content. Even still that would be lower quality than having the converter program do it.

So is there a way to have the converter maintain the aspect ratio of the original content such that you don't get the bars on the sides?

Are you sure? I've got a 5.5G iPod, and it can fast forward through commercials just fine. If anything, I'd think a flash based iPod Touch would do a better job, since mine sometimes has a little lag when I start fast forwarding since it has to spin up the drive all of a sudden.

The issue I have had is that I start FF the commercial and when it starts to go real fast things get balled up and I usually wind up at a point in the program prior to the commercials. I don't know that this is an iPod Touch specific problem but it does seem to be related to where your finger touches when using the on-screen FF (since the Touch doesn't have any buttons). Maybe I just have fat fingers...LOL

[cowboyshootist]

I've got TTG+ and an iPod Touch. I've got TTG+ working and generating the .mp4 files. I haven't been able to actually put them on the Touch. I've added the directory and they show up on iTunes under TV Shows, but how do I sync them over. I must be missing something very simple.

IN order to synch them with the iPod you must do one of two things. Either you manually drag them from the iTunes Library to the iPod listed in iTunes or you check the box to automatically synch the iPod whenever it connects to iTunes. I prefer the manual method because it allows me to control the content on the device.

[Puppy76]

I prefer manual too, especially since I think video was tied to something else that I DIDN'T want synced automatically.