Presence

My sister- and brother-in-law were kind enough to get me a six-month subscription to Comcast DVR for my recent birthday. Almost immediately, I began scouring the web looking for tips and tricks for cool things to do with your DVR.

The first thing I found that is extremely useful is how to set one of your remote buttons to do a 30-second skip. With a few quick pushes of a button, you skip through a few minutes of commercials. I like this so much, I often don't watch a show I'm recording when it airs live; instead I record it and watch it later. An episode of Lost takes only 43 minutes instead of 60. If you really want to get shticky, you can time it so that you start watching 17 minutes into the show; if you skip the commericals, you'll finish watching at the same time as the rest of the world, but you'll have spent much less time. I call it the DVR Theory of Relativity.

What I was really interested in figuring out was how to transfer recordings from the DVR to my computer. From there, I could burn a DVD or upload a clip onto YouTube. I found instructions for connecting a Motorola 6412 DVR to a computer using a Firewire cable (I have the Motorola 3216, but it works just the same). I didn't have a Firewire cable, so I ordered one from Amazon for $1.53; it arrived today, I followed the instructions, and with a few tweaks, I was able to get everything working. (Note: I followed the instructions exactly, but still had a problem converting the video to MPG format. I had to download an additional codec called Elecard. Once I installed the Elecard codec, everything worked fine). I also had to cycle the power once on my DVR, as the FF and REW were a bit messed up after a capture. Other than that, smooth sailing.

Behold, the fruits of my labors. I've set my DVR to record any and every Seinfeld episode that happens to air. The following clip is from a very funny episode where Kramer gets an assistant. Funny factoid: the assistant is played by an actor named Jarrad Paul, who happens to be the brother of a close friend of my brother. Anyway, say what you will about Michael Richards, this is a funny episode/clip.