tivo - your tax money at work

[timmy]

thought this might amuse some of u (maybe piss some people off? those that think tivo's are in short supply..)

a stack of 10 tivo's. hmmm... now why do i have ten tivo's?

I work for a local council, I suggested we buy them so they could be used as security DVR's for the local shops on the main street (high incidence of vandalism and crime). Very cheap alternative than commercial DVR's..

ahh recycled hardware, see thats using ur nogin :p

anyone broken their remote or IR blasters let me know cause i have a few spare, tehehe :)

[brucer]

*thud!* (sound of jaw hitting floor).. I think I like that picture more than is healthy :D

[zollymonsta]

Mmm I'm in heaven!!

Wouldn't mind another remote :) How much? :D

[Grant]

Goooo Timmy! great idea...

just please don't try and tell us this is 'work' !!!!

yeah sure....


Hey if you need some video switching & serial control switching let me know - I have some mates in chch that manufacture the control systems for AV apps eg Lecture theatres, crestrons etc


Nice to hear our tax dollars are being used for something useful ie furthering the tivo knowledge base :D

[number6]

thought this might amuse some of u (maybe piss some people off? those that think tivo's are in short supply..)

a stack of 10 tivo's. hmmm... now why do i have ten tivo's?

I work for a local council, I suggested we buy them so they could be used as security DVR's for the local shops on the main street (high incidence of vandalism and crime). Very cheap alternative than commercial DVR's..

ahh recycled hardware, see thats using ur nogin :p

anyone broken their remote or IR blasters let me know cause i have a few spare, tehehe :)

Forward thinking council (employee)!

How do you intended to use these in practice?
Have 24 hour long season passes that records everything for 24 hours, keeping the last 'n' recordings on disk, while at the same time, having a slave (time lapse) VCR record the input(s) to the Tivos as well for permanent storage purposes?
What "quality level" do you record at?

I guess you don't need Guide data for these Tivos.
Just don't try putting all 10 Tivos in one room as the Tivo remote only supports 9 distinct "Tivo remote codes", so the 10th one would need to be in another room.
[unless that is you run all Tivos as remote code 0 then all Tivos will respond to the same remote control].

I have thought of using something similar for surveillance purposes to have a record of who has been around at your house.

Of course, in that case, the Tivo would have to be well hidden from any intruder or they may well take the Tivo as well thus losing the evidence you have gathered. (as well as being well ventilated).

Still for under $500+camera cost you could have a good quality working surveillance system.

[timmy]

They are to be setup one per shop. Basically the camera will be installed and the tivo will be setup (by someone in the council) and the shop owner will NOT be given the remote. It will just be black box style recording (quite literally). If an incident occurs the council staff member will either take the tivo or use a portable tv/vcr combo to record off the video in question.

The recording is set up as 12x2hr time blocks and it is continuous 7 days a week. The camera's have IR so they work at night (and are inside the shop, pointing outside). To avoid tivo theft they may be bolted down but that is undecided as of yet. It is more of a deterant than anything. It gives shop owners some piece of mind (although its mostly in their head hehe) and lets the vandalising little ****s know that there are alot of cameras in their town now.. recording their every movement ;)

Also a profesional security system is being deployed on the main street, using wireless network enabled cameras and patched into the police station.

The tivo idea is a cheap alternative, it lacks features of security DVR's such as time lapse recording but its a neat simple solution that for our purposes is adequate enough. Like I said its not so much about functionality as it is about perception, that said recording onto hard disk was one of the main benefits to using tivo as oposed to existing slow play VCR solutions.

[thomson]

Just don't try putting all 10 Tivos in one room as the Tivo remote only supports 9 distinct "Tivo remote codes", so the 10th one would need to be in another room.
Actually, while the standard TiVo remote will only handle 9 distinct codes the TiVo itself will support far more. For example, if you are using a programmable or universal remote then you can use the NEC1 protocol with a main device of 133 and a sub device of 48 to program the TiVo to a remote code of 10 :)

Stumbled across this by accident and have no idea what the actual limit is. However, before you get carried away by dreaming of 10+ TiVo's in your living room you may want to have a look at this Sony product (1TB, 7 Tuners): http://www.techjapan.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=277

[number6]

However, before you get carried away by dreaming of 10+ TiVo's in your living room you may want to have a look at this Sony product (1TB, 7 Tuners): http://www.techjapan.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=277
Actually I'd prefer the Tivo at least its something I can buy and use now.
I've seen hundreds of vapourware products coming out in the "future", unfortunately, that future, like the products themselves never seem to arrive.