Gadget Lounge
Digital Technology for Digital Living.

January 13, 2005

Making the Mac mini Into A Real Home Hub.

EyeTV

With the focus now off MacWorld, it gives everyone a chance to really assess the announcements made by Jobs. One thing that immediately struck us about the Mac mini was it’s instant appeal for a home hub or media centre. The only thing lacking is an internal HDTV card, but that’d only bump the price up for what is meant to be a simple cheap Mac. So, if your interested there is an option, EyeTV from Elgato.

EyeTV’s advanced portable digital terrestrial TV tuner lets you watch live TV directly on your Mac in perfect digital quality.
Using the on-screen “Remote Control” or included IR Remote you can:
- pause the program when the phone rings
- repeat a favorite section
- fast forward

Record TV on your Mac …

EyeTV records digital television directly to your Mac’s hard drive to watch immediately or later. Collect and organize your favorite shows to watch again whenever you want.
Program EyeTV to record your favorite shows once, every day or every week….

Given the firewire interface on this and the new Mac, the setup would be very easy and elegant in any home cinema setup. It’s $AU580 at MacMall, added to the Mac mini means the whole package comes in at under $AU1400. A little pricey when compared to current digital TV receivers with built in hard drive (see DBA), but you’re getting the flexibility of a Mac including all the software, ability to connect to the net, and CD-R/DVD-ROM (upgradable of course to the SuperDrive) for archiving or playing DVDs.

Add a RadioShark from Griffin for another $AU120 (also at MacMall), and you can schedule recordings from the radio, and you’ll never miss any type of broadcast again.

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Gadgets boy | Comments (1) | Digital TV, Peripherals, Videogadgets,gadget,gadgets shop, latest gadgets, new gadgets

One Response to “Making the Mac mini Into A Real Home Hub.”

  1. Scott says:
    January 14, 2005 at 3:18 am

    I bought an EyeTV quite a while ago because I had no TV at home. Combined with my cinema display the quality of the TV is superb. The only thing I do have against it is you cannot (apparantly) run pay TV through it.

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