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In TELE-audiovision 11-12/2014 we presented the
DVR-Studo HD 3 Software
TELE-audiovision-1411/eng/dvr-studio.pdf
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38 TELE-audiovision International — The World‘s Leading Digital TV Industry Publication — 01-02/2015 —
TEST REPORT PVR Software
Recording
TV Programs
via UPnP
Thomas Haring
Recently, in the 11-12/2014 issue of
TELE-audiovision, we introduced the
DVR Studio HD 3 software package.
This innovative program makes it pos-
sible for a user to create a DVD or Blu-
Ray disk from a previously recorded
program on a digital receiver with just
a few mouse clicks. So the question
is what‘s the easiest way to get these
recorded programs from the receiver
onto your PC?
There are three ways to do this. The
first way would be to connect the re-
ceiver‘s storage device directly to the
PC. But this only works with external
storage devices and as long as the ex-
ternal device is connected to a PC, the
receiver can‘t record any other pro-
grams.
Another way with most PVR receiv-
ers is to transfer the recording to the
PC through an Ethernet connection or
via WiFi. For some manufacturers DVR
Studio HD 3 offers this ability directly
through the software.
The third method, namely the trans-
fer of recordings via UPnP is not only
a new feature in DVR Studio HD 3, it
is also very easy and comfortable to
use and, above all, works with all UPnP
compatible receivers. It is also the fast-
est method.
We‘ve already reported quite often on
UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) in the
course of a number of different TELE-
audiovision receiver tests. This stand-
ard is used for backup control of de-
vices within an IP based network and
has proven itself very advantageous in
the audio/video world. The days of pro-
prietary transmission methods are long
gone; through UPnP every compatible
receiver can communicate effortlessly
with every available PC, media center
and even other receivers within a net-
work. We were thrilled to see that Haen-
lein Software recognized that more and
more manufacturers were integrating
UPnP in their receivers and immediately
reacted by adding this standard to their
latest version of DVR Studio HD 3.
In order to test the UPnP transfer ca-
pabilities we used the DVR Studio HD 3
software in combination with a Techni-
sat Digit ISIO S satellite receiver and
a Western Digital network hard drive.
Both of these devices were hard-wired
into our local network through a router
onto which our test PC with Windows
8.1 was also connected.
First we tested the new function in
conjunction with the satellite receiver
and setup a new project with DVR Stu-
dio HD 3. In the dialogue field where
the desired recordings are added you‘ll
see a list of the local files as well as
the selection UPnP. All you have to do
is click on the UPnP selection and the
software begins to scan the entire local
network in just a few seconds for any
usable UPnP sources.
In our case both the satellite receiv-
er and the hard drive were recognized
without any problems and the availa-
ble multimedia data and recordings on
both of these devices were now acces-
sible. The user simply has to highlight
one or more of the recordings or files
and then click on the „Transfer Record-
ings to PC“ button to begin transferring
the selected items to the PC. We liked
that DVR Studio HD 3 showed the size
of the selected files so that the user can
get an idea of how much time would be
needed for the transfer. Since we men-
tioned „time“, we were pleased to see
that the transfer from satellite receiver
to UPnP was much faster compared to
the original software from the receiv-
er manufacturer. We had to perform
a comparison test; we simply couldn‘t
resist. The exact same recording with
a size of around 4 GB took about nine
minutes via UPnP to load onto the PC
whereas the original software needed
19 minutes for the same task; 10 min-
utes longer than via UPnP. To make
sure that this speed advantage really
existed we repeatedly performed this
measurement with a number of differ-